Draft:Fruna
Chilean food and confectionery company
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Fruna is a Chilean food company that produces confectionery, candy and other mass-market food products. Founded in 1961, it is based in Maipú, in the Santiago Metropolitan Region, and is known in Chile for its wholesale distribution network and for products such as Tabletón.[1][2][3]
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| Company type | Private |
|---|---|
| Industry | Food industry |
| Founded | 1961 |
| Founder | José Antonio Santiesteban |
| Headquarters | Maipú, Santiago Metropolitan Region, Chile |
Number of locations | 60 (2019) |
Area served | Chile, Bolivia, Nicaragua, Panama |
| Products | Confectionery, candy, biscuits, ice cream, soft drinks |
Number of employees | 3,500 (2019) |
| Website | www |
History
According to profiles in La Tercera and Diario Financiero, Fruna was founded in 1961 by José Antonio Santiesteban, who had previously worked in another confectionery factory and used his savings to establish his own business. The company later developed as a family-run enterprise, incorporating Santiesteban's children and other relatives into different parts of its operations.[1][2]
By 2019, the group employed more than 3,500 people, operated around 60 sales outlets, and exported products to Bolivia, Nicaragua and Panama.[1]
Products and market position
A 2008 consumer report estimated Fruna's share of the Chilean biscuit market at around 16%, mainly under the Fruna and Serrano brands.[4] The company's business model has been associated with wholesale sales to small retailers and with lower-middle and lower-income consumer segments.[5] A 2020 report by the Foreign Agricultural Service of the United States Department of Agriculture listed Distribuidora Fruna among Chile's wholesale discount-store operators serving independent stores and neighborhood businesses.[6]
Among Fruna's best-known products is Tabletón, a chocolate-coated vanilla biscuit that the company says originated from a production error and later became one of its most popular items.[3] In 2017, during the 2017 Chile wildfires, the company released an ice cream named in tribute to the 747 Supertanker.[7]
Labor and safety issues
Fruna has faced repeated criticism over alleged labor conditions at its facilities. In 2017, after the deaths of two workers at the company's Maipú factory, the company came under renewed scrutiny over workplace harassment and working conditions. One of the workers, Rolando Venegas, died by suicide at the plant; later reporting by Cooperativa said he had left a letter blaming supervisors for his decision.[8] Fruna rejected the accusations, while one of the company's unions described the reporting as a smear campaign against the firm.[9][10]
The company's products have also been involved in safety complaints. In 2016, a family in Osorno reported finding part of a human finger in a Fruna ice cream product.[11] Regional health authorities later confirmed that the fragment was human tissue, and in 2017 a court ordered the company to pay 5 million Chilean pesos in damages to the affected family.[12]
During the COVID-19 pandemic in Chile, health authorities temporarily shut Fruna's plant in July 2020 after inspectors found a lack of COVID-19 protocols and other sanitary failings.[13] Prosecutors later said that the factory's collective permits as a food-production operation were in order, while an investigation continued into a nursery associated with workers' children that had been operating irregularly.[14] The Labor Directorate separately fined the company 153 monthly tax units for violations of maternity-protection rules related to nursery benefits for workers.[15]