COMPANY BACKGROUND

Facilities

Frontier is headquartered on 56 acres of land a mile and a half outside the small town of Norway, Iowa. We moved to this area in 1982 and built a 22,152-square-foot building to hold all of our operations, warehousing, and offices. Today, our facility has grown to 145,000 square feet and houses our corporate offices and our spice, seasoning, bulk, and distribution businesses. The plant is a food-production facility and is American Institute of Baking (AIB) certified.

Aura Cacia, our aromatherapy and natural personal care business, is located in a 24,000-square-foot production facility 25 miles from headquarters near the town of Urbana, Iowa. The building is a remodeled coffee facility and sits on 4.9 acres of naturally managed land.

In 2011, we purchased a 102,200-square-foot facility in North Liberty, Iowa, for expanded raw material storage and manufacturing capabilities.

Our Urbana and Norway facilities are certified organic handlers in accordance with USDA’s National Organic Program. North Liberty will be certified as an organic handler when we start processing operations there.

In addition, we rent office space in Boulder, Colorado, for our Creative Department and have home-based personnel situated around the country.

Products

We offer nearly 10,000 products across 290 brands (including our own brands of Aura Cacia, Simply Organic and Frontier) through our distribution business. Products sold under our own brands are: Frontier bulk herbs, spices, teas, food ingredients, and seasonings; Frontier bottled spices, seasonings, and flavors; Simply Organic spices, seasoning mixes, flavors, and foods; and Aura Cacia essential oils, skin care oils, and personal care products. We also manufacture private-label spices and essential oils.

Ownership

Frontier was founded in 1976. It is organized as an Iowa cooperative, owned by more than 30,000 wholesale customers. Each member has one share and one vote. The members elect a Board of Directors that hires Frontier's CEO and oversees the business in the interest of the members. Member/owner investment provides the capital for the business to operate, and the Co-op's annual net income is divided among the members according to patronage.