MUKILTEO – Making Ivar’s famous clam chowder takes huge 75-gallon kettles, a secret recipe and, not surprisingly, tons of clam meat.
At the company’s shiny new soup production plant just off Mukilteo Speedway last week, Bob Donegan, Ivar’s president, stopped for a moment. He watched workers carefully inspect clam meat for odd bits of shell or sand before it was cooked.
Dan Bates / The Herald
Finally, he leaned over and muttered two words to the employees.
“Keep clam,” he said, echoing Ivar’s signature slogan.
Ivar’s is proud of its white clam chowder’s reputation and, with the new 17,000-square-foot production facility, it can make more of the mollusk-themed soup than ever.
Donegan said it was designed with expansion in mind, as sales of chowder and the company’s other soups have grown by about 20 percent annually in recent years.
Dan Bates / The Herald
“What we told the architect is we wanted to continue to be in here with one shift a day 10 years from now without having to add any space,” he said.
After producing soup in a 57-year-old, low-ceiling warehouse in the Seattle’s South Lake Union area, Ivar’s clearly had specific ideas in mind when building the new structure. The ceilings in the Mukilteo building range up to 40 feet high, allowing workers to stack boxes of ingredients high in the facility’s storage rooms. A computerized forklift knows exactly how high each storage shelf sits.
The floors are made of an epoxy material that doesn’t get slippery when wet, reducing the chance for accidents in the sprawling kitchen area. At the plant’s truck loading and receiving docks, spotlights mounted on movable metal arms can be moved to brighten the inside of dark freight trailers.
The approximately 20 employees at the plant all work four 10-hour shifts each week instead of a five-day week. That allows more flexibility for managers to boost production when business picks up.
“If we get a big order, we can add a second or third shift, or add weekends,” Donegan said.
The attention to detail in the new plant reflects the thought that goes into Ivar’s food, said Donegan and Chris Lewark, the company’s national sales manager. For example, before putting clam meat into their chowder, most companies don’t do the extra inspection Ivar’s employees do in order to remove pieces of shell. But that reduces complaints from customers.
“It’s an added cost, but in the end, it’s worth it,” Lewark said.
Also, Donegan said, Ivar’s new facility packages the restaurant chain’s dipping cups of tartar sauce, ketchup and cocktail sauce. In the course of a year, the location will produce 7 million tartar sauce cups alone.
Donegan said the chain makes sure its pieces of fish are narrow enough to be easily dipped by diners into the cups.
The new soup plant also will make gallons of Ivar’s salmon chowder, as well as portabella mushroom and potato soup, chicken tortilla soup and chili. Those last three products are marketed under the Spirit Bay Soups name.
Ivar’s sells its chowder and the Spirit Bay Soups in supermarkets and to other restaurants and eateries. It’s possible to find the company’s soups at Safeco Field, on Washington state ferries and in cafeterias at Microsoft, the Boeing Co. and many high schools statewide. Worldwide, nearly 10,000 other restaurants and stores sell Ivar’s chowders and soups, including outlets in China, Mexico and Japan.
The company plans to eventually offer more soup flavors for both wholesale and retail markets.
“I think what we have developed has all been well-received,” said Einar Larson, who was an Ivar’s chef for nearly 40 years and is now in charge of new product development.
But clam chowder is still Ivar’s staple soup. Lewark said he eats copious amounts of chowder, often sampling the competition as he travels around the country. There are other good chowders out there, he admitted, but there’s also no question in his mind which brand is best.
“There’s so many things that ours click on that the others don’t,” he said.
Reporter Eric Fetters: 425-339-3453 or fetters@heraldnet.com.
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