Company Overview
Wisconsin based Denali Ingredients is an ingredients manufacturer serving the ice cream, novelty, fluid dairy, bakery, and food service markets. The company makes a wide range of high quality products created by a team of professional research and development food scientists. Denali serves its customers by delivering innovations in a unique manner we like to call The Denali Difference. The people of Denali make the company what it is.
In September of 2006, Denali Flavors purchased the former CoolBrands and Eskimo Pie ingredients manufacturing facility in New Berlin, WI and renamed it Denali Ingredients. Since then the organization has gone through many upgrades and additions and now features over 110,000 square feet of production, warehousing, and offices, encompassing two buildings. Best of all, Denali Ingredients is fortunate to employ some of the most experienced in the industry as well as some of the upcoming best and brightest.
Denali Ingredients is a sister company to Michigan-based Denali Flavors, Inc., one of the leading inventors and marketers of specialty ice cream flavors, including its signature line of Moose Tracks® ice cream flavors. For more information, visit www.moosetracks.com.
Denali Historic Timeline:
1962: Wally Blume graduates from Purdue University with a B.A. in Economics.
1962-1985: Wally works for Kroger in positions of increasing responsibility, including several in the dairy area of the business.
1986: Wally moves to Michigan to become Director of Sales and Marketing for Country Fresh, Michigan’s largest dairy at the time.
1987: Wally accepts a new position as Vice President of Sales for General Container, a company that sells packaging, ice cream ingredients, and ice cream flavor concepts.
1988: The Original Moose Tracks® flavor is developed, an indulgent combination of vanilla ice cream, peanut butter cups and now famous Moose Tracks Fudge® (a decadent dark chocolate thick and salty fudge). The Moose Tracks® name pays homage to a miniature golf course in the upper peninsula of Michigan called “Moose Tracks”. The golf course is located nearby to the first dairy to sell the Moose Tracks® ice cream flavor.
1989-1996: The Moose Tracks® flavor grows rapidly, and by the end of 1996 it is being manufactured and sold by 34 regional dairy processors/plants in the US. During this time, new Denali “Alaskan Classics” flavors were introduced: Caramel Caribou, Bear Claw, and more.
1996: Wally Blume and two other founders form Denali Flavors, LLC, an ice cream flavor licensing company with Original Moose Tracks® as the founding licensed flavor. The company name Denali refers to the national park in Alaska, a unique connection to the “Alaskan Classics” ice cream flavors named after animals native to the park.
1997-1999: Denali Flavors continues to grow at a rapid rate across the U.S. By the end of 1999, Moose Tracks® and other Denali Flavors are being manufactured and sold by 73 regional dairy processors/plants in the US.
2000: Wally Blume, at age 62, mortgages his home and other assets to buy out his two partners. In October, Denali Flavors®, Inc., is formed. This same year, new Moose Tracks® flavors are introduced: Chocolate Moose Tracks®, Extreme Moose Tracks® and others. Wally, along with his wife June, work tirelessly to manage and build the business.
2001: Wally and June add a sales force to assist in growing the Denali Flavors business, including Neal Glaeser, a seasoned ice cream/novelty and ingredients professional, to lead as president of the company. Moose Tracks® and other Denali Flavors are now available nationwide, being manufactured and sold by 84 regional dairy processors/plants in the US.
2002-2005: Sales continue to grow and additional Denali Flavors are added: Mint Moose Tracks®, Brownie Moose Tracks® and more.
2006: Denali Flavors purchases former Cool Brands/Eskimo Pie ingredients manufacturing facility in New Berlin, WI. The facility is renamed Denali Ingredients, which marks Denali’s venture into ingredient manufacturing. The plant produces just over 20 million pounds of ingredients at time of purchase. Moose Tracks® Fudge manufacturing is added to the facility, which was previously supplied by a contract manufacturer.
2007-2008: Denali invests over $6 million in updated and expanded production capabilities, warehousing, and offices in the ingredients facility.
2009: Denali Ingredients invests in a second manufacturing facility in New Berlin, WI, adding new product offerings of cookie dough and other extruded inclusions. The two facilities encompass over 110,000 square feet of space.
2009-2012: Both the licensed flavors and ingredients businesses continue to grow. In 2012, Denali Ingredients’ volume reaches 40 million pounds, doubling from the time of purchase just six years prior.
2012-2015: The R&D team grows in an effort to formulate new ingredients that address the rapid and ever-changing demands in food ingredients. During this time, many new products are developed and new customers added.
2016: Denali Ingredients unveils another $5.5 million facility expansion and upgrade to Plant #1, the corporate headquarters. Improvements include the addition of a state-of-the-art R&D development center, a pilot lab, increased production capacity and storage, a complete re-facing to the building, and new administrative space. Company facilities now encompass 123,000 square feet of space. One decade after purchase, Denali Ingredients now produces close to 50 million pounds of ingredients and has more than doubled the workforce, employing more than 100 people.
2017: Accommodating overall growth, changing demands in food and food safety, the company invests heavily in additional R&D, quality control, sales, and marketing resources. Denali Flavors continues to thrive across the U.S. and Canada, with more than 30 million cartons of Moose Tracks and other Denali Flavors sold annually.
2018: Denali purchases a third facility in New Berlin, WI, to accommodate accelerated growth in the extruded doughs and flakes business and prepare for the addition of a baked inclusions capability. Plant #3 is 96,000 square feet of space and slated to open in 2019.