Global reach and personal attention in the dehydrated ingredients sector [Interview]

Elchais, a global leader in dehydrated ingredients, has put in place a strategy that aims to ensure that it can meet all customer needs. At the commercial end, this means ensuring the best possible customer service, expanding the company’s global reach, and developing a product portfolio that meets client needs. On the manufacturing side of things, the focus continues to be on reducing costs and maintaining product quality and food safety.

“Safe food, best quality at value prices – these are the cornerstones of our value proposition,” says Elchais CEO Bimal Kalvani. “Our focus is on being a one-stop-shop for all dehydrated products requirements and being able to meet the untapped market opportunities in this sector.”

Elchais supplies products in the three key dehydrated ingredient market sectors, namely baby food, human food, and pet food. The business offers a broad range of primary products from its factories, including green peas, green beans, onions, potatoes, parsnips, carrots, swede, white beet, red beet, sweet corn, lentils, precooked legumes, herbs in various cut sizes, powder, and granules as needed as well as blends of any and all of these products.

The company is also able to adapt to meet changing client needs. “During the Covid-19 pandemic, we kept our customers supplied with products at volumes that far exceeded their contracts as well as with products not contracted with us,” says Kalvani. “We also alert our customers to potential geopolitical risks to supply chains and cost increases and decreases. Simply put, we look to establish partnerships with our customers.”

Decades of experience in dehydrated ingredients

Elchais has decades of experience in the dehydrated ingredients business. Established in the 1940s, the company has been at its current operating sites in the Netherlands since the 1950s and in France since the 1980s.

“Both of these production sites were founded by local farmer cooperatives,” explains Kalvani. “Through various mergers and acquisitions over the years, we became a single entity known as Sensient Natural Ingredients Europe.”

With the spinout of Sensient Natural Ingredients Europe from its American parent company Sensient Corp the business came under new ownership, operating under the Elchais banner. “Elchais is a name coined from our two sites Elburg in the Netherlands and Marchais in France,” says Kalvani.

Global pioneer in cutting edge technology

Elchais has gone on to be a global pioneer in this sector. “We are the only business in the world that has inhouse air drying, freeze drying, and our patented and unique Vacu Puff technology,” says Kalvani. “In addition to these primary processing technologies, we operate state-of-the-art product sorting, mixing/blending and size reduction milling techniques. The breadth and the depth of what we produce and how we produce is a key element of who we are and what we do.”

Elchais also has full control along the raw material supply chain, from the farm to the finished product. “As a B2B company, our customer base consists of several major multinational food companies, as well as regional leaders and local SMEs,” says Kavani. “We also undertake bespoke production for customers as per their needs, and can assist them in new product development projects, right through to commercialisation.”

Launch of the Elchais Partner Supplier Network

In terms of investment in innovation, the company is currently developing and launching a product portfolio of new products produced by its Vacu Puff process and intends to further expand its freeze-dried product portfolio. “We have made huge progress over the past seven years or so,” says Kalvani. “Our business is now fully aligned to be able to deliver exactly what our customers need.”

Another good example of this focus on the customer has been the launch this year of the Elchais Partner Supplier Network (EPSN). This programme aims to further broaden the company’s product portfolio of offerings to its customers.

“Not all products demanded by global markets can be grown in Europe or are available at required price points that our customers can afford,” explains Kalvani. “This is why we launched the EPSN. The network consists of carefully curated companies in the global dehydrated ingredients business. We evaluate and partner with these companies, to purchase and resell certain products to our customers. We guarantee GMO-free products, and all our facilities are meat free.”

In this way, the company continues to pioneer the delivery of cost-effective, healthy dehydrated ingredients at the global scale, in innovative ways that fit with evolving customer needs.