Grown & Made in the USA
"Grown Here, Made Here"
On this Fourth of July weekend, we are proud to say Chukar Cherries' products are grown and made right here in the Pacific Northwest of the United States. Our motto is not lipservice: since our beginning in the 80s, founder Pam Montgomery dedicated herself to using locally grown fruit and USA-sourced quality ingredients. In addition to being local, our products are free of preservatives (including imported chemical perservatives!) and anything artificial. Using local products and clean ingredients is a simple philosophy that we’ve lived by for over 30 years.
Our motto "Grown Here, Made Here" means that all cherries and apples used in Chukar products come from Washington State and occasionally Oregon, Montana, or Idaho. We never use imported South American cherries, even in lean years when the NW has a less-than-ideal harvest.
In our cherry nut mixes and granolas, the almonds, pistachios, honey, oats, flaxseed, and more are also grown domestically, with most tree nuts coming from California. The one exception is cashews, which are only grown in the tropical climate of Brazil.
The name and location of our chocolate provider is a bit of a trade secret, but we can disclose that they are a historical and longstanding iconic US company based in California where they craft many varieties of fine chocolate using premium ingredients.
Once we've gathered all of our fresh Northwest cherries and US-sourced ingredients, we process them in our Prosser, WA headquarters into the tree-to-table goodies that you see sold on our website and in our various retail stores such as Chukar Cherries at Pike Place Market.
In addition to sourcing our ingredients just miles from our headquarters, our finished products are packaged in materials that are sourced in the US. We work with forward-thinking American vendors to ensure that our packaging is as eco-friendly as possible, such as the Biotre bags for our Cherry Pecan Caramel Corn.
Lastly, here in our Eastern Washington office and factory, we are lucky to have some of the best and brightest minds of the area working in our facility. Some employees have been with us for over 20 years.
We always answer the phone during business hours and are happy to assist you with your needs. You can expect to hear a friendly Pacific Northwest voice at the other end of the line when you call customer service.
In regards to local production, when farmers deliver ripe cherries to the Chukar factory in early July, the fruit is cooled, washed, sorted, washed again, pitted, and dried slowly without preservatives in warm air tunnels. Our dehydrated cherries are then packaged for eating and cooking, paired with roasted nuts for healthy no sugar added energy snacks, and layered in premium chocolate for legendary cherry sweets.
If you are reading this and are new to Chukar Cherries, here are some bullet points about our company:
- We started Chukar Cherries in the 1980s in south-central Washington—an arid, agricultural region where orchards and vineyards roll for miles. Unique soil composition and a short growing season make the area ideal for growing sweet cherries such as Bings and Rainier cherries.
- To this day our manufacturing factory and headquarters are in Prosser—the heart of this fertile region. Within our factory, we dehydrate cherries and apples, handcraft our chocolate covered cherries, bake our granola, biscotti, create our cherry & nut mix, cook our cherry preserves, package our goodies and gifts, and fulfill orders every day.
- It’s fun and rewarding to be able to promote the region's bounty while helping hardworking farmers sell their crops outside of the typical grocery store process.
