U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Official websites use .gov
A .gov website belongs to an official government organization in the United States.

Secure .gov websites use HTTPS
A lock ( ) or https:// means you’ve safely connected to the .gov website. Share sensitive information only on official, secure websites.

Manufacturing Extension Partnership (MEP)

Healthy Comfort Food Manufacturer Makes Magic in Portland

With the help of: Oregon Manufacturing Extension Partnership

About

In 2011, Christy Goldsby set out to create a healthy comfort food that’s raw and easy to digest, after her friend developed an auto immune disorder. She wanted something decadent that didn’t break a strict diet, and Honey Mama’s was founded. Honey Mama’s creates high-quality fresh chocolate bars that are fun, nutritious and delicious. The bars are made with virgin coconut oil instead of cocoa butter in traditional chocolate bars and are full of bold, deep flavors, decadent textures, and are free from gluten, soy, dairy, and grain.

The Challenge

The business has experienced significant year-over-year growth. Honey Mama’s began with two staff members and $50K in revenue their first year. In 2018, they reached $3.5 million in revenue and have grown to 32 employees. Goldsby has built relationships with co-ops, independents and multiple national food retailers to sell her products.

With a strong increase in consumer demand and growing relationships with large national retail distributers, Honey Mama’s was looking to scale manufacturing and increase overall capacity to meet the needs of their customers.
Linda Wechsler our rep was an amazingly thoughtful and empathetic person to work with. She took the necessary time to really truly understand our process and product and help develop systems/processes within individual departments. We could not have asked for a better partner to work with from OMEP.
— Tyler Falls, Operations Manager

MEP's Role

The largest challenge Honey Mama’s faced was scaling manufacturing to meet new growth demands. Because the product is unique (it must be refrigerated) they had to create innovative packaging solutions. OMEP helped the company remove bottlenecks and free up capacity, including installing new packaging equipment. Additionally, Honey Mama’s needed more space to scale their business. OMEP partnered with them to lay-out equipment and increase capacity as they moved from 3,000 sf of space to a 12,000 sf manufacturing facility. Honey Mama’s staff were also cross-trained on the new equipment and can now perform work more effectively. 

 

Created June 2, 2020, Updated July 12, 2021