Orange juice is revered for many reasons: Vitamin C, potassium, folic acid, and flavinoids for those who are keeping track. Orange juice is also a staple for many Americans, served at breakfast nation wide. For experienced orange juice shoppers, the words “not-from-concentrate” (NFC) and “pulp” carry important meaning about the product. Southern Gardens Citrus is the world’s largest supplier of 100 percent pure Florida NFC orange juice for the private label industry and major brands. Producing juice from 98 percent NFC and 2 percent concentrate, Southern Gardens led the way in the market’s transition from concentrate to NFC. “Originally, we were 100 percent concentrate, but the company had the foresight that NFC would be growing in popularity,” says President Ricke Kress. Southern Gardens’ Roots Founded in 1994 in Clewiston, the company started with 500,000 greenhouse-grown trees that had been planted each year since 1986 on what was previously cow pastures. Located in Hendry County near Lake Okeechobee, the area is known for its mild winters which are more conducive for the trees’ survival. With its 2.3 million trees across three orange groves in Hendry County, Southern Gardens is the third-largest grower in the state of Florida. As a subsidiary of U.S. Sugar Corporation, the company grows and processes fruit and supplies the juice in bulk for household names such as Tropicana and Simply Orange. Its processing facility is comprised of 160 acres but Southern Gardens has a total of 32,000 acres, of which 16,500 acres are planted groves. “There are three groves on three different properties all located within Hendry County – and all within 30 miles of the facility,” explains Kress. Advanced Practices Filling its role as an industry leader, Southern Gardens uses methods that are not only environmentally friendly but also are designed to facilitate optimum produce from its trees. The company uses custom-designed computerized irrigation and fertilization processes that identify the exact mount of nutrients and water each tree requires. Both are applied to the root zone of the tree to minimize water run off and maximize absorption. When battling the inevitable insect infestation, Southern Gardens turns first to specially bred predator insects before spraying chemical insecticides. When the latter is necessary, it is applied only to the infected trees. The company works year-round to maintain its quality control requirements. “We start the whole process in late November and it runs until the end of June. We operate 24/7. The only times we’re offline is for maintenance or clean up,” says Kress. During these “offline” months, Southern Gardens still employs 300 fulltime, 140 in processing and 160 in the groves. During harvest season, there are 220 and 540, respectively. With the majority of its oranges picked manually, Southern Gardens employs migrant workers through the federal government’s guest worker program. Southern Gardens provides elevates the importance of each employee, knowing its success relies on its team. To that end, the company provides these workers with English classes for its Spanish-speaking employees. The company also gives each staff member extensive training in safety and compliance, often using consultants to do so. With an incentive program, employees are promoted from within and are able to recommend bonuses each year for co-workers. Leaving Nothing to Waste If you think your new juicer is effective, try these numbers on for size: Southern Gardens squeezes 25,000 oranges each minute and produces 600,000 gallons of orange juice each day. The company uses a high-temp sterilization process after which the pasteurized juice is immediately cooled to 34 degrees and stored in aseptic tanks that allow the juice to stay fresh for shipment to customers. Shipping to the West Coast, the Northeast, and across Florida, the company has its shipment methods down to a science: “We flood the head space of our trucks with liquid nitrogen to keep the juice at a cool temperature…So by the time the juice arrives there’s no more than one-degree increase in juice temp,” explains Kress. “We have an on-time delivery performance rate in excess of 98 percent.” Making sure not to waste any of this precious fruit, Southern Gardens has a long list of byproducts that are produced after the juice is made. For every 100 pounds of oranges, 50 percent becomes juice and 50 percent products for more of America’s favorite items: cold-pressed oils, essences and aromas, press liquor, citrus molasses, and dried peels. A somewhat unexpected product includes d’limonene which is recovered after the conversion of the orange peel to press liquor and molasses and is used to make everything from adhesives to a solvent used in the electronics industry as an alternative for ozone-depleting chlorofluorocarbons. Fighting the Good Fight Though Florida is known for its year-round summer weather, it also has its share of challenges when it comes to Mother Nature. Hurricanes, freezes and droughts do occur; but Southern Gardens has of late come up against a new obstacle: greening. Greening may sound like a new environment-saving technique but in fact it is a bacterial disease that attacks the nutrient delivery system in trees. The Asian Citrus Psyllid feeds on an infected tree and carries the disease to others. “It’s a world-wide problem. We’re learning more about the disease everyday,” says Kress. “We were one of the first groves in Florida where the greening was found. We decided to be proactive and we’re on the forefront with every agency and entity to work with them on this,” he continues. The company has instituted a four-point program that requires inspecting each tree individually four times a year. If an infected tree is found, it is immediately uprooted and Southern Gardens has had to remove about 14 percent of its trees due to this disease. Determined to battle this more effectively, the company is working closely with Texas A&M University and an independent researcher to develop a citrus tree that is resistant to greening. In fact, in 2009, the company will test a caker-resistant tree that may have this potential. Perfectly able to tackle this challenge, Southern Gardens is optimistic about the future of the company: “We run our facility at 90-plus percent capacity each year and we have the ability to expand…We plan to continue to process oranges and to be quality suppliers that customers in the industry are looking for,” says Kress. Though the decision to grow will in part be dictated by the market, Southern Gardens promises one thing: more top-quality NFC orange juice for America.