Taylor Farms Produce Is Sold Everywhere, Making Outbreak Difficult to Escape

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But the rise of Taylor Farms embodies the consolidation of the produce industry — particularly in its processing. Founded in 1995 by Bruce Taylor, a third-generation produce grower now its chief executive officer, Taylor Farms makes 40% of bagged or packaged salads in the US, according to the company.

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Since its 2019 purchase of Earthbound Farm from Danone SA, the company has bought or invested in a range of businesses from all over the world. In 2021 it acquired FreshPoint Toronto in Canada, Sysco Corp.’s specialty produce distributor in that region, and in 2024 invested in Hessing, a fresh fruit and vegetable processor and distributor based in the Netherlands.

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Last year it acquired Natures Way Foods, a UK prepared food manufacturer, and earlier this year, Equinox Growers, a Virginia-based greenhouse growing leafy greens.

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Taylor Farms says it is the largest grower of organic greens in North America. Its harvests about about 25% of the vegetables it sells. The company partners with just under 300 smaller farms to source the rest, Taylor Farms said in a 2025 report. It generated $7.3 billion in revenue in 2025, according to Pitchbook.

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Taylor has acknowledged the strains the rapid expansion has put on his company. In a 2018 interview with SmartBrief, the CEO said he was kept up at night by trying to recruit the employees to keep up with his rapid growth — particularly with a “very complicated business.”

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“When you’re growing at 10%, 12% a year off a large base, you need a lot of new leaders, and that’s the challenge we’re finding right now,” he said.

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The company now collectively employs more than 24,000 people.

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Other challenges are endemic to their business. Leafy greens are particularly challenging from a food safety perspective because they are often eaten raw, compared to foods that are cooked at temperatures that will kill parasites and other germs. 

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Parasites like cyclospora are extremely difficult to detect, and lettuce has a short shelf life — both factors in why the US government still hasn’t produced a lab test linking Taylor Farms to the outbreak. And even washing greens with special steps designed to reduce cross-contamination won’t prevent cyclospora because the parasite is resistant to the sanitizers commonly used in produce-washing systems, according to Mary Anne Roshni Amalaradjou, a food microbiology expert at the University of Connecticut. 

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The large scale of Taylor’s operation isn’t the source of the contamination, which is currently suspected to have originated at a single farm in Mexico. But, Amalaradjou said, “it can increase the potential reach of an event once contamination has occurred.”

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“If you source from different farms, it’s much more easier to have the sort of outbreak in one farm diffuse,” said James Sayre, assistant professor of cooperative extension at the University of California, Davis.

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Still, there may not be any other viable model. Growing leafy greens requires large capital investments and operates on low margins, Ortega said, dynamics that favor larger companies. 

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The number of US farms has dwindled over the years as bigger operations have expanded, with the USDA estimating a 10% drop in farms in the decade from 2015 to 2025. High costs for inputs like fertilizer and seeds weigh particularly heavily on smaller operations, and not all children want to take over their parents’ farms. 

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Agriculture experts say consolidated processing does enable the swift distribution of lettuce. That’s particularly true for bagged salads and packages of pre-chopped vegetables that are increasingly popular with consumers.