Princess Tours Sources Locally For 2008 Visitor Season
http://www.globalfoodcollaborative.com/articles/108/1/Princess-Tours-Sources-Locally--For-2008-Visitor-Season-/Page1.html
Collaborative INSIGHTS
By Collaborative INSIGHTS
Published on 15 April 2008
Regional sourcing of food and beverage product is one of the fastest growing changes talked about in the food media. Large and small companies alike are adopting the policies of local sourcing for a variety of reasons including reducing carbon foot print, assuring fresher foods, supporting their local economies and offering better food security (less people handling the product along the supply chain.)
Princess Tours stepped up its local sourcing efforts for the 2008 season and went way beyond adopting a policy. In early 2007, Princess Tours began identifying ways to provide their guests the complete Alaska experience of nature and culture to include a true taste of Alaska - it's food and beverage. Likely you may have seen Princess officials over the past year, as they pro-actively have met with producers and their respective supply chain of manufacturers and distributors. Well, the season is upon us and we think they deserve major kudo's for all of their work for the 2008 visitor season.
Regional sourcing of food and beverage product is one of the fastest growing changes talked about in the food media. Large and small companies alike are adopting the policies of local sourcing for a variety of reasons including reducing carbon foot print, assuring fresher foods, supporting their local economies and offering better food security (less people handling the product along the supply chain.) Princess Tours stepped up its local sourcing efforts for the 2008 season and went way beyond adopting a policy. In early 2007, Princess Tours began identifying ways to provide their guests the complete Alaska experience of nature and culture to include a true taste of Alaska - it's food and beverage. Likely you may have seen Princess officials over the past year, as they pro-actively have met with producers and their respective supply chain of manufacturers and distributors. Well, the season is upon us and we think they deserve major kudo's for all of their work for the 2008 visitor season.
Major Kudo's - Well Deserved
"Princess is committed to broaden its economic footprint here in Alaska," says Princess Tours, VP Community and Public Affairs, Bruce Bustamante. "Food and beverage was a logical way for our company to support regional businesses, at the same time enhancing the overall guest experience by incorporating more of the local fare." In 2008, Princess recruited a Food and Beverage Operations Manager, Philippe Janicka to execute the plan of sourcing locally. Philippe is a former chef and restaurant owner/manager with a long interest in introducing local fare into the traditional food service supply chain.
If you attended Global Food Alaska 2007, you may have remembered that Princess Tours
was there meeting up with producers. In fact, they contacted us early
on to bring 3 professionals to source product and participate in the
show and conference. Already they were on the move to match local
producer capacity with their food service needs.
Coincidentally, Phlippe Janicka, also attended - although not yet in his current role at Princess. Philippe attended simply because of his life long interest in sourcing locally. It was a great beginning to our better connecting producer with market.
During the 2008 season, guests of the 5 lodge properties and 22 associated restaurants will sip North Pole and Silver Hook coffees our of Alaska scened and crafted hot cups. They will snack on Alaska Potato Chips and Alaskan Wild Salmon wraps, dine on Alaska fine seafood to include scallops, salmon and Alaska King Crab supplied by a host of local processors. Guests will have their choice of local brews from the regional micro-breweries in the interior and on the Kenai Peninsula and Alaskan Brewing, of course. Dessert - ice cream, of course - provided by Hot Licks and made to order for Princess from Alaska specialty flavors and wild berries. You'd think that was enough - right? It wasn't for Princess. They wanted to make sure that each lodge, well represented the local fare for that region to reflect the uniqueness of each respective property. In doing, so, they are providing smaller producers an opportunity to do business with Princess in a microcosm of a much larger corporate business environment. Each lodge has a menu that reflects the best of the area and while the 2008 procurement season is wrapped up, the 2009 season offers more opportunities with products and capacities that might possibly add value to Princess Tours food and beverage service.
Princess Tours is the largest cruse and tour operator in Alaska. They own and operate five wilderness lodge properties, a fleet of deluxe motorcoaches and 10 luxury rail cars in Alaska. You likely have visited one of their lodge locations - Fairbanks, Copper Center, Kenai, Denali and McKinley. In fact, the Denali Princess is the largest hotel in the State of Alaska and the housing that supports that property alone is ranked as the 12th largest hotel/lodging operation. Not only does Princess feed its lodge and rail guests, but it employees 2000 people during the visitor season with 1,000 of those living and eating on-site each day.
Obviously, food is big business to Princess and Princess is making itself big business for Alaska producers. What makes this all that much more positive for local businesses is that this is a long term strategy of collaboration with local producers. We often used to lament that we had a faceless market, but Princess has contributed the professional faces to a very large and promising market with a full intent to expand their product offerings in 2009 and beyond. We can't wait to hear what the guests think about their newly enhanced '08 experience.
Thank you Bruce, Philippe and Princess Tours
Bruce Bustamante
VP, Community and Public Affairs
Princess Tours - Alaska
Philippe Janicka
Food and Beverage Operations Manager
Princess Tours - Alaska
If you attended Global Food Alaska 2007, you may have remembered that Princess Tours
was there meeting up with producers. In fact, they contacted us early
on to bring 3 professionals to source product and participate in the
show and conference. Already they were on the move to match local
producer capacity with their food service needs. Coincidentally, Phlippe Janicka, also attended - although not yet in his current role at Princess. Philippe attended simply because of his life long interest in sourcing locally. It was a great beginning to our better connecting producer with market.
During the 2008 season, guests of the 5 lodge properties and 22 associated restaurants will sip North Pole and Silver Hook coffees our of Alaska scened and crafted hot cups. They will snack on Alaska Potato Chips and Alaskan Wild Salmon wraps, dine on Alaska fine seafood to include scallops, salmon and Alaska King Crab supplied by a host of local processors. Guests will have their choice of local brews from the regional micro-breweries in the interior and on the Kenai Peninsula and Alaskan Brewing, of course. Dessert - ice cream, of course - provided by Hot Licks and made to order for Princess from Alaska specialty flavors and wild berries. You'd think that was enough - right? It wasn't for Princess. They wanted to make sure that each lodge, well represented the local fare for that region to reflect the uniqueness of each respective property. In doing, so, they are providing smaller producers an opportunity to do business with Princess in a microcosm of a much larger corporate business environment. Each lodge has a menu that reflects the best of the area and while the 2008 procurement season is wrapped up, the 2009 season offers more opportunities with products and capacities that might possibly add value to Princess Tours food and beverage service.
Princess Tours is the largest cruse and tour operator in Alaska. They own and operate five wilderness lodge properties, a fleet of deluxe motorcoaches and 10 luxury rail cars in Alaska. You likely have visited one of their lodge locations - Fairbanks, Copper Center, Kenai, Denali and McKinley. In fact, the Denali Princess is the largest hotel in the State of Alaska and the housing that supports that property alone is ranked as the 12th largest hotel/lodging operation. Not only does Princess feed its lodge and rail guests, but it employees 2000 people during the visitor season with 1,000 of those living and eating on-site each day.
Obviously, food is big business to Princess and Princess is making itself big business for Alaska producers. What makes this all that much more positive for local businesses is that this is a long term strategy of collaboration with local producers. We often used to lament that we had a faceless market, but Princess has contributed the professional faces to a very large and promising market with a full intent to expand their product offerings in 2009 and beyond. We can't wait to hear what the guests think about their newly enhanced '08 experience.
Thank you Bruce, Philippe and Princess Tours
Bruce Bustamante
VP, Community and Public Affairs
Princess Tours - Alaska
Philippe Janicka
Food and Beverage Operations Manager
Princess Tours - Alaska