The Willis and Goe families share a vision of producing the best quality fruit money can buy. Long time friends, the families have been working the fertile soil in the Hood River Valley for generations. On these family farms, nestled below majestic Mount Hood, they grow fresh pears, cherries, apples and blueberries. From meager beginnings they have worked diligently for over 60 years and have grown their operations to over 500 acres of fruit and berries.
To maintain the freshness and high quality of their fruit, they built high-tech controlled-atmosphere cold-storage facilities to extend the time frame in which they can bring their fruit to market.
With these advances in production and storage, it soon became obvious the families needed a different way to market and sell their fruit as well.
Mike Willis remembered the old days, when people would stop off at fruit stands along the road. They would pick up fresh fruit, take it home, and let it ripen for a few days until it was ripe and ready-to-eat. Now, he observed, people do not want to wait, they expect their fruit to be fresh and ready-to-eat, and in a form that is easy to store and share with others. This observation led the families to a new business opportunity; Gorge Delights. The goal of this company was to develop new ideas for value-added fruit products.
Our first goal has been to add value to fresh fruit and make it more convenient to eat and store. To that end, Gorge Delights began producing fresh sliced apples and pears. Hand-sliced fruit is bathed in a calcium and vitamin C solution to prevent browning and packaged in re-sealable containers. With an extended shelf life of up to two weeks, this fresh sliced fruit is meeting the demand of consumers desperate for fresh, convenient fruit.
Our next product was developed with the help of the USDA. Keeping with our desire to support American agriculture, Gorge Delights introduced JustFruit bars, the only true 100-percent fruit bar on the market today. Using only Northwest grown fruit, Gorge Delights produces several products and many delicious flavors of fruit snacks that have no additives or preservatives but still provide a two year shelf life. Gorge Delights also uses this patent-protected technology to manufacture high quality products for private label producers throughout the world.
From our current processing facility in North Bonneville, Washington, Gorge Delights works diligently to ensure that every product that leaves our plant does so containing only the freshest and purest ingredients, thus assuring a quality product for the consumer. Our high quality standard are a tradition that has lasted for generations and will provide healthy fruit snacks for generations to come.
