LoCo Food Distribution

What LoCo Food Distribution does

LoCo Food Distribution is a Fort Collins, Colorado-based wholesale food distributor founded in 2011 by Elizabeth and Ben Mozer. The company purchases locally-grown, processed, and packaged foods from more than 100 Colorado producer brands and resells them to retail establishments along the Colorado Front Range, with delivery spanning from Fort Collins to Colorado Springs via a company-owned fleet under a 48-hour order cutoff and $200 minimum order policy. LoCo's customer base spans three primary segments: grocery stores (both large chain and independent), institutional foodservice accounts (hotels, hospitals, universities, school districts, corporate cafeterias, and Denver International Airport), and restaurants, coffee shops, cafes, gift shops, and specialty shops. The company describes itself as a two-sided local-sourcing platform: retailers gain a single point of contact for ordering, pricing, promotions, and delivery across many local brands, while producers gain outsourced distribution reach without handling their own warehousing and last-mile fulfillment.

The technology stack is intentionally light. The core customer-facing surface is the LoCo Foods Catalog (locofoodscatalog.com), an online catalog system where wholesale buyers log in to place orders and view delivery schedules. This is supported by a Customer Portal for account and distribution-area management and by two supplier-facing portals (a Vendor Portal for existing suppliers and a New Supplier Portal for onboarding). The company has no disclosed proprietary software, no API surface, no app, and no AI/ML systems; it is described in the source material as a traditional wholesale food distribution company. Sales are run through a dedicated team including Local Food Specialists, Chain Team Specialists, and an Institutions Sales role, making the go-to-market sales-led rather than product-led or self-serve.

LoCo makes money through wholesale distribution margins: it buys from local Colorado brands, marks up product, and sells into retail with a transaction-based commercial model. Pricing is not transparently published, but the $200 minimum order requirement, 48-hour ordering cutoff, and pay-as-you-go billing cadence indicate a transactional wholesale motion rather than subscription or contracted-revenue economics. The company is privately held and founder-owned, with Elizabeth Mozer serving as CEO; no external venture or private equity investment has been disclosed. At the time of the most recent company description (~2021), LoCo operated with nearly 20 employees from its Fort Collins headquarters.

Name

LoCo Food Distribution

Legal name

LoCo Food Distribution

Website

https://locofooddistribution.com

Company type

Private

Founded year

2011

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

11–50 employees

Short description

LoCo Food Distribution is a Fort Collins, Colorado-based wholesale distributor that sources products from 100+ Colorado food brands and delivers them, via owned fleet and online catalog ordering, to 1,000+ retail, institutional, and restaurant accounts along the Colorado Front Range.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Product category

Wholesale Food Distribution

NAICS

Grocery and Related Product Merchant Wholesalers (4244)

SIC

Wholesale-Groceries, General Line (5141)

akta.pro primary industry

Grocery & Supermarket (Ambient/Dry) Wholesale Distribution (CRAOAAAB)

Keywords

• Wholesale food distribution
• Local food sourcing
• Specialty grocery supply
• Institutional food distribution
• Regional produce delivery

Headquarters

HQ city

Fort Collins

HQ country

United States

HQ region

North America

Offices1 record

Markets served

GTM type

B2B

Offering type

Services

Cost components

Supply Chain, Operations, Personnel, Marketing or Sales, Infrastructure

Revenue model

1. Wholesale Food Distribution: Revenue generated through distribution fees and product margins as a wholesale distributor of locally-grown, processed, and packaged foods. The company purchases products from local Colorado brands and growers and resells to retail establishments with a markup. Orders must meet a $200 minimum for delivery.

Pricing tiers

Go-to-market motion1 record

Distribution channels2 records

Marketing channels7 records

Core offering

LoCo Food Distribution is a wholesale distributor that purchases locally-grown, processed, and packaged foods from over 100 Colorado brands and resells them to retail establishments across the Colorado Front Range. The company operates a company-owned delivery fleet to deliver consolidated orders to grocery stores, institutions, and foodservice operators, with a $200 minimum order requirement and 48-hour order lead time. Customers and suppliers interact through an online catalog, a customer portal, and vendor portals that handle ordering, account management, inventory, and supplier onboarding.

Product overview

LoCo Food Distribution operates a wholesale food distribution business that connects Colorado local food producers with retail buyers along the Front Range. The core offering consists of a catalog-based ordering platform (LoCo Foods Catalog) through which customers can browse and order from over 100 local brands. The company supports its distribution operations with dedicated customer and vendor-facing portals for account management, ordering, and supplier onboarding. The integrated system enables streamlined local sourcing for grocery stores, restaurants, institutions, and other wholesale buyers.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Products and services

• LoCo Foods Catalog Online catalog platform that enables wholesale buyers to browse and order local food products from over 100 Colorado-based brands, place orders, access delivery schedules, and manage their accounts. Targeted at wholesale customers along the Colorado Front Range.
• Customer Portal Self-service portal for existing wholesale customers to access account information, view distribution areas, check delivery schedules, and manage orders. Targeted at existing retail and institutional customers of LoCo Food Distribution.
• Vendor Portal Portal for existing suppliers to manage their product listings, inventory, and wholesale orders. Targeted at the 100+ local Colorado brands already supplying LoCo Food Distribution.
• New Supplier Portal Portal for prospective new suppliers to submit applications and begin the onboarding process to become a LoCo Foods vendor. Targeted at Colorado growers, ranchers, and manufacturers seeking wholesale distribution.

Named customers3 records

Segments3 records

Ideal customer profiles3 records

Technology focussed No

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

Scale indicators4 records

Recent moves5 records

Expansion highlights4 records

Broad incumbents

• Sysco: Sysco is the largest broadline foodservice distributor in the world, serving restaurants, healthcare, education, hospitality, and government accounts. It overlaps directly with LoCo's foodservice and institutional customer segments and the 48-hour ordering cadence typical of broadline distributors.
• US Foods: US Foods is one of the largest broadline foodservice distributors in the U.S., serving independent restaurants, healthcare, hospitality, and government customers. Its scale, broad assortment, and regional distribution center model are analogous to the broadline counterpart of LoCo's institutional and foodservice accounts.
• United Natural Foods (UNFI): UNFI is the largest publicly traded wholesale distributor of natural, organic, and specialty foods in North America. It supplies retailers, institutions, and foodservice customers with a product mix closely aligned with LoCo's local-emphasis assortment, making it a comparable for category, customer overlap, and go-to-market motion.
• KeHE Distributors: KeHE is one of North America's largest specialty and natural food distributors, serving grocery, foodservice, and convenience channels. While national in scale, KeHE directly competes with LoCo where local/specialty brands reach grocery shelves on the Front Range, making it the most strategically comparable broader incumbent.

Direct peers

• Shamrock Foods Company: Shamrock is a private, family-owned food distributor serving the Western and Southwestern U.S. with its own delivery fleet and broad assortment of grocery and foodservice products. Its family ownership, regional concentration, owned-fleet model, and broad-line grocery distribution make it a strong operational peer to LoCo.
• Cooperative Partners Warehouse: Cooperative Partners Warehouse is a regional distributor of natural, organic, and local foods serving co-ops, independent grocers, and foodservice accounts in the Upper Midwest. Like LoCo, it consolidates fragmented local sourcing for retailers and is mission-aligned with natural/local producer networks.
• Cherry Capital Foods: Cherry Capital Foods is a Michigan-based wholesale distributor focused exclusively on locally-grown and produced foods, connecting regional farmers and producers with restaurants, grocers, and institutions. Its mission and model (local-only sourcing, distributor to retail/foodservice/institutions) are an extremely close analog to LoCo, making it the most directly comparable peer.

Market position

Strengths5 records

Weaknesses5 records

Competitive moat4 records

Key risks6 records

Key highlights6 records

Customer concentration

• Xx.com/LoCoFoods
• FacebookWWW.FACEBOOK.COM/LOCOFOODDISTRIBUTION
• InstagramWWW.INSTAGRAM.COM/LOCOFOODS
• PinterestWWW.PINTEREST.COM/LOCOFOODDISTRIBUTION

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles9 records

Funding overview

Funding rounds

Investors

Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

M&A

Investments

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about LoCo Food Distribution