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Milestones: Calabro Cheese Corp.
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Business New Haven
11/24/2003
By: Priscilla Searles
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Calabro Cheese Corp.
580 Coe Avenue East Haven,
CT 06512
Tel: 203-469-1311 Fax: 203-469-6929
Web: www.calabrocheese.com
Ownership:
Joseph Calabro and family
Milestone: 50 years
Timeline:
Calabro Cheese was founded in September 1953 by Joseph Calabro in Bridgeport.
Born in Sicily, Calabro attended the University of Messina. He was pursuing a doctoral degree in physics and mathematics when World War II broke out and he was forced to leave school. He served in the Italian army as an officer, and following the war emigrated with his sister and mother to the United States in October 1948.
Five years later, Joseph and his father, Salvatore, began purchasing various food products, such as fresh ricotta, mozzarella and sausage, selling to area mom-and-pop grocers. In addition they sold door-to-door in Fairfield and New Haven counties.
Calabro started producing cheese when he went into partnership with Gambardella Cheese Corp. of New Haven in May 1958, forming the Gambardella/Calabro Cheese Corp.
The company remains family-owned to this day, with Joseph still very much involved in day-to-day operations. A half-dozen family members now work in the business that employs 110 people.
Achievements and Accomplishments:
Growing sales and an expanded distribution area forced the company to acquire new facilities. In 1959 the company leased the River Creamery Corp. of Wells River, Vt. as a manufacturing facility. In 1961 they purchased the company, leaving the distribution in New Haven.
In 1981, with sales at an all time high, Calabro Cheese built a new 24,000-square-foot production and distribution center in East Haven, subsequently closing the Vermont and New Haven facilities. In 1996, a 30,000-square-foot expansion project was completed, enabling Calabro Cheese to better serve its customers in the New England, New York/New Jersey metro areas as well as customers across the country.
Calabro specializes in producing Italian cheeses: ricotta, ricotta impastata, mozzarella fior di latte, grated parmesan and romano cheeses; and a line of select specialty cheeses which includes scamorze, caciocavallo, burrini, smoked mozzarella, fresh basket cheese, and queso blanco.
Calabro was also the first Italian cheese company to develop fat-free ricotta cheese with no salt and no preservatives added. Two years ago Calabro added a fat-free mozzarella cube and fat free shredded mozzarella.
The company has won numerous awards for its cheeses. In 2003 Calabro took home a gold metal for its fior di latte from the Wisconsin Cheese Makers Association, and another gold for the same cheese from the American Cheese Society.
Looking Back on a Changing Industry:
When Joseph Calabro began the business he sold his products door-to-door, a tradition he brought with him from Sicily. And the company's early customers weren't weight-conscious - no one much counted calories. Today the business is about giving customers choices.
Selling door-to-door has been replaced by a continuous quest for the most efficient ways to deliver products to customers. Today Calabro distributes its manufactured products via a fleet of refrigerated trucks to Connecticut, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New York, New Jersey and southeastern Pennsylvania. It also distributes products in Florida, Texas, Ohio, Wisconsin and Colorado via Italian cheese distributors.
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