Detwiler’s buys land in East Manatee for $2.2 million. Here’s what could be in store

The rapidly growing, family-owned Detwiler’s Farm LLC purchased C&D Fruit & Vegetable Company, 16505 State Road 64 E., for $2,225,000.

Detwiler’s, which opened its farm store in Palmetto at 1800 U.S. 301 N. in July, acquired the 48.5-acre C&D property and 39,288 square feet of building space, but not the tractors and other farm equipment. Those are being sold separately at auction.

The company also has stores in Sarasota at 6100 N. Lockwood Ridge Road and at 6000 Palmer Blvd., and in Venice at 1250 U.S. 41 Bypass. Detwiler’s Farm Market Distribution Center is located at 7425 16th St. E. in Sarasota.

The owners of C&D Fruit and Vegetable Co. Inc. and Trio Farms, LLC, filed for Chapter 11 protection on Feb. 9, 2017, and announced two months later that they had decided to sell the company.

The end came after 35 years of growing, packing and shipping fresh fruits and vegetables to wholesale customers throughout the United States and Canada.

“We have struggled to compete with Mexico as prices kept dropping and profits declined. While I believe our berry quality is better than the product from Mexico, paying our employees a fair wage has always been important to us,” Tom O’Brien, president and founder of C&D, said in a 2017 press release.

O’Brien Family Farms retail market had been a local favorite in the Bradenton area, offering strawberries in the winter and a mix of peppers, tomatoes, beans and squash in the fall and spring.

The Bradenton Herald was unable to reach Detwiler family patriarch Henry Detwiler Sr. for comment. But he is known to move cautiously and has been looking for several years to expand the business.

In 2015, when the Detwiler’s opened their store at Lockwood Ridge Road and University Parkway, Detwiler said: “I have been looking at this location for three or four years, but wasn’t ready before to make a move. It’s a nice store in a nice area. We are reaching out to Bradenton and Sarasota, and this will help pull some of the pressure off the Sarasota store.”

The Lockwood Ridge store was formerly a Sweet Bay supermarket. The Palmetto store is a former Winn-Dixie.

Detwiler’s is always looking for deals on produce, and having a third store open gives the company more buying power, Detwiler said in 2015.

Detwiler has not said what is planned for the C&D property, but one of the uses could be for a distribution center as well as for farming.

The sale of the C&D property was reported Tuesday by the Manatee County Clerk of Court’s Office.

This story was originally published October 16, 2018 at 4:09 PM.