Bringing $2 Million in Pre-Season Financing to Bonita Fresh
“ProducePay comes in, supports you, protects you, and helps you grow your business. It’s a win-win for everyone.”
Erick Mendoza Ramirez
– Director, Bonita Fresh
Company
Bonita Fresh
Michoacán, Mexico
Profile
Berries Grower
Challenge
Cash Flow
Solution
$2 Million
Financing
“In the produce business, you have to be able to react in a timely manner. You need to respond to various challenges, such as competition or weather conditions.”
The Challenge: Difficulty with Securing Bank Loans
“When you go to a bank, the bank asks you for guarantees, forms, and endorsements – these processes are very slow, and limit the operation.”
Erick Mendoza Ramirez, Director of Bonita Fresh, has almost 20 years of experience in produce trading. He has dedicated himself to diversifying across new markets and driving more sales. However, he has dealt with a constant challenge: capital.
Bonita Fresh needed to secure a bank loan to support improvements in operations, such as entering new markets and improving its product offerings.
Ramirez had been looking for bank loan options for two years: “When you go to a bank, the bank asks you for guarantees, forms, and endorsements – these processes are very slow, and limit the operation.”
Moreover, the company had been dealing with the same problem that many other produce sellers face: delayed payments. Depending on the commercial chain, they typically received their payments 30 to 90 days after shipping out the items.
Compounding the lack of access to capital, payment delays had been badly affecting the company’s cash flow.
“Our exposure to international markets made us realize that there are alternative financing options such as ProducePay out there.”
The Solution: Pre-Season Financing with ProducePay
“ProducePay’s financial services are tailor-made for exporters. They allowed us to rapidly expand our business.”
Following a long period of attempting to secure bank loans, Bonita Fresh started to look for alternatives.
Bonita Fresh was already utilizing ProducePay resources at the time, and considered our Insights service an excellent source of information. They shared their issues with us, and we worked together to find a solution.
We were able to provide the agribusiness with a US $2 million Pre-Season financing loan. Happily, the loan had a rapid impact: “The impact of ProducePay’s Pre-Season financing loan totally solved my business needs – in a very timely manner,” said Ramirez. “It allowed us to expand our business.”
Bonita Fresh is now looking into furthering financial and commercial partnerships with ProducePay, to drive new projects, develop its infrastructure, and diversify in more markets.
“ProducePay’s Pre-Season financing totally met our business needs, in a very timely manner. The capital allowed us to expand and broaden our business horizon.”
– Director, Bonita Fresh
