14 CapitalPress.com
April 17, 2015
Apple family does it all and keeps growing
The folks at E.W. Brandt
and Sons like sharing the com-
pany’s history and explaining
the challenges of this year’s
market.
Allen Brandt, part owner
with brother Dana Brandt, is
the son of the founder, Everette
W. Brandt, who along with his
wife, Ada, started their oper-
ation in 1947 with 16 acres of
peaches and cherries.
Their family had been farm-
ing in the area since 1908, and
through ups and downs E.W.
and Ada maintained a business
that has been passed down to a
new generation.
It was not until fairly recent-
ly that the greatest growth has
occurred.
Allen Brandt remembers
there were less than 20 acres
when he completed college and
returned to the family business
in 1974.
“The rest is history,” he said.
E.W. Brandt and Sons expanded
to around 1,200 acres in the fol-
lowing years.
He credits the growth to in-
genuity and the desire of the
company to do everything.
The company, he said, devel-
oped a reputation for high-qual-
ity fruit, which was made possi-
ble because it took control over
not only cultivation and harvest-
ing but also packing.
It has been a successful mod-
el so far, Allen said.
“We’re still here, anyway,”
he said. “We’re growing and
hope to continue growing.”
This optimism is shared by
Allen’s son, Joe.
“We’re on this path of
growth, and we plan on continu-
ing,” Joe said.
But this is a difficult time for
the region’s fruit growers, Ryan
Moore, a Brandt sales executive,
explained.
Washington produced a re-
E.W. Brandt and
Sons
Started: 1976 (as E.W. Brandt
and Sons)
Owners: Allen Brandt and
Dana Brandt
Location: Wapato, Wash.
Crops: Cherries, peaches,
nectarines, plums, apples,
prunes, pears
Acres: 1,200 owned
Erik Peterson/For the Capital Press
Ryan Moore, E.W. Brandt and Sons sales executive, stands next to
a sign at the Wapato, Wash., company.
cord apple crop this year, he
said, and other growing areas
produced large crops, creating a
flood of apples worldwide.
Most often, when apples are
plentiful in Washington, they are
scarce in other regions of the
U.S. Then, when they are boun-
tiful in other places, Washington
orchards are less productive.
On top of that, a port slow-
down hampered the export mar-
ket.
“The orders are coming and
the buyers are there, but if you
can’t get them on a boat and to
the countries you want to get
them to, it isn’t going to do any-
one any good,” Moore said.
The option was to send the
apples to domestic markets,
places that already had a surplus,
which has driven down prices.
In addition, trucking is a
problem, as many small truckers
have either gone out of business
or joined with larger groups.
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