Buying a food distribution business in Southwest Florida

• Exclusive or long-standing supplier agreements, in writing, with brands customers ask for by name.
• Many customers, careful credit checks and little bad debt.
• Tight, well-planned delivery routes, so each truck makes many stops a day.
• A well-run cold chain (keeping food cold door to door): temperature monitoring and logs, reliable refrigeration, and backup power for hurricanes.
• A clean inspection history with the state and the FDA, and no recalls.
• Low spoilage and shrink (product lost to damage, theft or errors), tracked by product, with slow sellers dropped.
• Buyers and salespeople who know the customers and suppliers.
• Some customers on standing orders that go out weekly without a sales call.

• Supplier agreements: exclusivity, territory, termination and consent to a sale. Many can be ended on short notice, so talk to the main suppliers before you commit.
• How much rides on the biggest customers, and how many are restaurants that could close or switch suppliers.
• Overdue customer bills and past bad debts. Small restaurants and stores can be slow to pay.
• Inspection reports, recalls, customer complaints, and temperature logs for the coolers and trucks.
• Age and condition of coolers, freezers, trucks and their refrigeration units, and what breaks most often.
• An inventory count, with expired or nearly expired stock written off before the price is set.
• Fuel, insurance and driver costs, and driver turnover.
• For importers, customs records, tariffs and how long goods take to arrive.
• For produce, whether growers and shippers have been paid. Under PACA, unpaid sellers hold trust rights over a dealer's produce, inventory and receivables (money customers owe).

• Which brands are exclusive to you, and can those agreements be transferred?
• How much of your business comes from your top ten customers?
• What happens if a cooler fails, or the power goes out after a hurricane?
• What did your last state and FDA inspections find?
• How much product do you throw away each month?
• How do you decide which customers get credit?
• Do any of your suppliers sell directly to your customers?

This region covers Lee, Collier, Charlotte, Sarasota and Manatee counties on the Gulf coast and Hendry, Glades and DeSoto inland: Fort Myers, Cape Coral, Naples, Bonita Springs, Punta Gorda, Port Charlotte, Sarasota, Venice, Bradenton, LaBelle, Clewiston, Moore Haven and Arcadia. The coastal economy runs on people who choose to live or spend the winter here: retirees, seasonal residents, and the construction, real estate, health care, financial and home services that follow them. Tourism, golf and boating add to it.

Inland, the economy is agricultural: sugarcane around Clewiston, citrus, cattle and vegetables, with Immokalee in Collier County a center for farm work. The building trades, pool, landscaping and pest control companies, property managers, medical and dental practices, and marine businesses tend to do well along the coast.

This is one of Florida's most seasonal markets. From roughly January through April, restaurants, shops and service companies run at full speed. Summers are slower, so look at monthly revenue, not only the yearly total. The coast has taken two major hurricanes in recent years: Ian came ashore at Cayo Costa in Lee County in September 2022, and Milton at Siesta Key in Sarasota County in October 2024. Rebuilding brought a wave of work for contractors that won't last forever, so ask how much recent revenue came from storm repairs. Insurance costs and flood zones weigh on every property.

Housing costs near the coast make hiring hard, especially around Naples. New communities east of Interstate 75 in Lee, Collier, Charlotte and Manatee keep service companies busy.