"My uncle started the business years ago in a local market selling strawberries. At one point he started working directly with growers, forging relationships which continue to this day. Nowadays, it is almost impossible to have that kind of direct access to growers and we were lucky that we have a large network that only supply their berries to us, which means that, no matter what else is happening in the market, we always have supply. We have very loyal partners and I think that this is because they know that we always have them in mind when making deals, and we want them to be able to share our success with them," said Ramazan Fidan from SBK.
During the domestic strawberry season, the company trades Swedish strawberries exclusively, and in the off season, Ramazan said that they import their berries from Spain and Belgium.
SBK continues to see growth, starting out with 2 employees, they have now grown to 32 and have warehouses in Gothenburg and Malmo, with their main office located near Stockholm.
Along with strawberries, Ramazan said that their wild mushrooms are another huge domestic product for this time of year.
"We have great supplies of wild mushrooms at this time of year in Sweden, which are in high demand in countries such as Spain, Turkey, France and Belgium, to name a few. Chanterelles and wild black Trumpet mushrooms are the varieties most in demand when it comes to export," shared Ramazan.
Along with domestic fruits and vegetables, SBK has a history of importing exotic fruits and vegetables for customers living in Sweden, originally from Asia or the Middle East.
"In the years that we have been operating, we have noticed that Swedish consumers are starting to experiment with fruits and veg that they wouldn't have known what to do with in the past. We trade kaki fruit and the average Swedish person probably wouldn't know what they were looking at. However, this is changing, which is most apparent in supermarkets like ICA, where we are seeing increasingly more exotics on their shelves. Once a fruit or vegetable is on their shelves, then you know it has truly broken into the main- stream."
For more information:
Ramazan Fidan
SBK Sweden AB
Tel: +46728577741
Fax: +468917070
Email: sbk@live.se
www.sbksweden.se