Food Industry:
Taking it all back home

The family-owned Marquez Brothers corporation made a hit on the U.S. market with the El Mexicano brand, touted as making traditional foods—particularly cheeses—that old fashioned way with the freshest of ingredients. Now they feel it is time for the next step—expanding back into Mexico, where the founders came from.

Francisco Lara, partner and manager of Marquez Brothers in the key Los Angeles office, has no doubt that El Mexicano’s made-in-U.S.A. products and cheeses can compete favorably in their country of origin. “Most commercial cheeses there are partly made with substitutes instead of 100 percent from milk, as are those of the El Mexicano brand,” he told La Opinión newspaper.

Some of this expansionist fervor comes from the company’s experience in Los Angeles, where the brand really took off in 1991. Marquez Brothers started out as ethnic grocers in San Jose, California, where, according to Lara, they sold their wares door to door. But, “Los Angeles is the gateway to the whole country. ... In Los Angeles, sales multiplied with the orders from distributors all over the country,” he told the newspaper.

Although the El Mexicano brand has diversified into cookies, jalapeños, gelatin, salsa, beans, chorizo, sausages and other products, cheese still holds sway and the company uses the milk from 24,000 cows every day.
With 1,600 employees and 14 distribution centers, Marquez Brothers is still run as a close-knit family firm. Ten of the 11 siblings have worked in the company, and Lara himself is married to a Marquez, Ana Elizabeth, who is active in the company. Their dairy expertise dates back three generations to the family’s farm in Lagos de Moreno, in an area of Mexico known for the highest-quality dairy products.

The latest move to expand back across the border may not be all about money. As Francisco Lara says, “From Mexico we came, and to Mexico we hope to return.”