The U.S. Small Business Administration is recognizing El Popular Inc., an East Chicago manufacturer, as the SBA Great Lakes Exporter of the Year.
El Popular is the manufacturer and wholesale distributor primarily of a Mexican-style sausage called chorizo. They sell to national and regional retailers.
“I’m third generation,” said owner Edward Garza in a December Northwest Indiana Business Magazine story. “I took the business over in 2002, built a USDA meat plant in Valparaiso and grew it to one that services almost the entire United States and Canada.”
Garza will be honored during a May 9 luncheon in downtown Indianapolis, along with other winners.
“The business was started by my grandfather, Vicente F. Garza, who migrated from Mexico to the United States in 1925,” he said. “He had a storefront in (East Chicago’s) Indiana Harbor where he would make the sausage himself and then he would fill up his Model T with it and drive to corners in Chicago to sell it.”
Four of his sons followed in the business.
“After my grandfather passed, my uncles slowly sold their shares to my father, Richard Garza, who became sole owner in 1981,” he said.
The company’s line of products included molé sauce, queso, spices and seasoning mixes, Mexican hot chocolate mix, and chorizo in various blends of picante chili and red pepper and other seasonings.
El Popular also was honored during the 33rd annual Entrepreneurial Excellence Awards as the best family-owned business. The awards were open to small businesses in Lake, Porter, La Porte, Starke, Jasper, Pulaski and Newton counties.
Indiana Gov. Mike Braun also proclaimed May 5 through 9 Small Business Week in Indiana. More than 569,500 small businesses that support more than 1.2 million Hoosier jobs call the state home.
The SBA has celebrated National Small Business Week for 60 years. SBA Administrator Kelly Loeffler will host a two-day small business roadshow. She is the 28th administrator of the SBA.
