Frank Crowley

The company owned by Frank Crowley, moved from Long Island, N.Y., to broaden their business' base.
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When other manufacturers were leaving the U.S. to go to India, Frank Crowley was doing just the opposite: He shut down his plant in India and moved operations of his spice business to New York.

"We started to have quality and shipping problems," with the Indian location, said Crowley, president of Spice Bouquet.

Direct oversight also meant that Crowley could nimbly respond to customer demands for large or unusual shipments.After a decade in business, Crowley decided to leave Long Island as well, looking south to expand his plant.

Crowley, a former executive with General Foods, chose Lenoir County for its plentiful land and through the assistance of state and county leaders.He also knew that competition would be limited.

"There are no major spice manufacturers in North Carolina or the adjoining states," Crowley said.

The Spice Bouquet's Kinston facility opened for production in July 2003.The company blends products to create a unique line of gourmet cooking items, including 84 kinds of spices and seven kinds of extracts, all sold through retailers.Spice Bouquet creates an even broader selection for its food service packs, which are sold to restaurants, catering halls and the military.Some of the spices include cinnamon sugar, Jamaican jerk seasoning, a steak spice, Cajun seasoning and a Carolina Bay seasoning that blends celery seeds, mustard, paprika, cardamom and ginger that goes especially well with crabs.Crowley also buys super-concentrated extracts from Brazil and Argentina, blending them with various ingredients to create extracts of vanilla, rum, orange and lemon, among others.

"We only buy top-grade merchandise," Crowley said, "and we don't maintain huge inventories.It's packed fresh and goes out."

The Kinston site proved to be a good decision.

"In New York, we had less than half the space we have here," said Crowley, who designed and built the 35,000-square-foot facility on four acres.The extra space enabled Spice Bouquet to have its own retail space on the premises, as well as to begin developing wood spice racks and gift boxes and baskets.

The plum-colored diamond on the label highlights the words "produced in Kinston, North Carolina," though Crowley says his biggest industrial customers are a supermarket chain on the west coast; military bases, Wal-Marts and K-Marts in Hawaii, and distributors in Guam and Saipan.

"Now we want to start selling here," Crowley said.