Sysco Product Information

Sysco Portland is committed to delivering Sysco branded products that provide consistency and exceptional value at all quality levels.  We also stock a wide variety of local, natural and sustainable products to meet all sorts of food service needs.  See below for the guidelines we apply throughout our product offerings. 

Sysco proudly stands behind each Sysco Brand product displaying the Quality Assured emblem and guarantees these products conform with our stringent standards for food safety, sanitation, and consistency.

Sysco Supreme: Absolute top quality products, similar in quality to Sysco Imperial, but unique in that they are rare in the industry, and virtually unique to Sysco. Sysco Supreme is reserved to the Elite of foodservice.

Sysco Imperial: The industry's best available quality products, produced in prime growing regions and packed to exceedingly-high specifications. Simply Excellent!

Sysco Classic: Sysco's lead quality level under which fine quality products are marketed. CLASSIC products meet or exceed top of the line, competitive "first" labels, and make up our largest array of products.

Sysco Reliance: Economy-positioned products that are specified at a level equal to competitive labels for similar grades or quality. Sysco Reliance products offer consistence and value.

Sysco Natural®: You can't expect what you don't inspect. So stands the time-proven philosophy behind Sysco Natural®, the foodservice industry's leading brand in the field of fresh produce.

Sysco Portland and our place in the market:

Consumers today want to know that their food comes from asafe, eco-friendly source. Sysco wants to help our customers reduce food milesby purchasing products from local suppliers; this helps promote freshness andsustainability. Sysco Portland is also committed to offering a vast selectionof sustainable, natural, rBST free, biodegradable, renewable, compostable andorganic products to provide our clients with the greatest variety of foodproducts and business services in the industry.

Local Foods

Local foods help to reduce delivery miles, also called foodmiles. Local foods are expected to promote local economies, to be fresher andmore flavorful while reducing handling issues, including lower transportationcosts and using fewer natural resources. Sysco receives its local products fromsuppliers in Oregon, Washington, Idaho and Northern California (as far south asMonterey).

Eco-Friendly

An alternative to goods usually purchased in most stores. Theseproducts are made with ecological and environmental impact in mind through outharvest and/or production.

Going Green

This is a comprehensive set of business plans and actions thatcan be taken to deliberately reduce and/or eliminate harmful effects on theenvironment, such as using bio-diesel or recycled truck wash water.

Certified Foods

A guarantee by the producer as having met certain requirementsto ensure their product is following the principle of sustainable agricultureand production. Sysco carries products with USDA organic certification as wellas certified by the Food Alliance, which is a third party organization thatupholds sustainable practices.

Organic Foods

A US Department of Agriculture certification of the NationalOrganic Program maintains that the products avoid the use of most artificialinputs, like synthetic pesticides and fertilizers, and bans the use of animalby-products, antibiotics and sewage sludge among other practices.

Natural Foods

Natural foods are minimally processed. Natural foods do notinclude ingredients such as refined sugars, refined flours, milled grains,hydrogenated oils, sweeteners, food colors, or flavorings. In proteinproduction, this also means no hormones, no antibiotics and 100% vegetarian feddiet.

Sustainable

A system of food producing that protects natural resources,safeguards the health and well being of workers and consumers, and enhancescommunities; this includes methods of harvesting or using a resource so thatthe resource is not depleted or permanently damaged and protects the future ofthe environment.

Socially Responsible

The principle that our company contributes to the welfare ofsociety and is not solely devoted to maximizing profits.

Safe

Our commitment to providing safe, quality assured products toour customers.  To ensure that ourcustomers are being provided with the highest quality products Sysco requiresour suppliers to sign a hold harmless agreement which states that they areresponsible for the integrity of their product.

Biodegradable

Product has the ability to break down safely and relativelyquickly by biological means under natural conditions into the raw materials ofnature and then disappear.

Compostable

Made from nature and can be returned to nature fairly easilythrough a composting process.

Renewable Resources

A resource is considered renewable if it can be naturallyreplenished. Sometimes this refers to sources of electricity such as solar,wind, geothermal, biomass and hydroelectric.  In food service, there are products made from corn, sugarcane, wheat, rice, potatoes, or bamboo that are replaced by new growthannually. 

Recyclable/Reusable

A product or material that can be converted back into materialto be used again in manufacturing new goods is considered recyclable.  Reusable products are ones that areused again after salvaging by special treatment or processing.

Bio-diesel

A diesel-equivalent, processed fuel derived from biologicalsources, such as vegetable oils, which can be used in unmodified diesel enginevehicles.

r/BST Free

Sysco distributes dairy products that are r/BST (r/BGH) free.This means that our supplier will not treat any cows with r/BST, a syntheticgrowth hormone, for milk used in the products specifically labeled as r/BSTFree.