Since 1956, Seara has been making mealtime special for families across 150 countries. From its wide selection of ‘In-Natura’ meats and poultry (frozen & fresh) to its pre-cooked and industrialised food solutions, Seara stays true to its promise of bringing quality, range and taste to the table.
The brand takes pride in the fact that its products are 100% vegetarian-fed, carefully farm-raised, and free from antibiotics and hormones.
Juliano Julibeu, Seara Managing Director, tells Wholesale Manager what are the key products in the brand’s range that wholesalers should be stocking.
Can you tell us a little of the company’s history?
For more than 60 years Seara has been building its reputation as one of the most trusted and reliable providers of chicken in the business. Our network of family-run farms, processing plants and quality assurance teams has steadily grown. Our client base too has expanded incredibly over those 6 decades. Today we deliver chicken to many of the world’s most popular restaurants, as well as to a multitude of smaller food businesses and directly to consumers.
Today we have more than 60 production plants, over 89,000 employees and nine offices around the world. Seara exports chicken to more than 150 countries globally through our products and services, in several channels such as retail, food servicing, processing factories and distribution.
We have a UK office in London and another in Amstelveen, the Netherlands with a complete structure to support our customers: sales team, customer service, supply chain, marketing and quality control.
What are the key products in your range that wholesalers should be stocking?
We pride ourselves on delivering great chicken to our clients – prepared, cooked or coated in whatever way your kitchen needs it. Whether you need chicken fillets, breaded drumsticks, or burgers ready for the grill, we can help you cut preparation time, energy bills and labour costs.
Our premium coated range includes chicken fillets, breasts or chunks that can be breaded, battered, southern fried or hot and spicy. While our popular primary frozen range features boneless and skinless fillets, thighs and grillers.
We work with great wholesalers who know the demands of the food businesses they serve.
What are the benefits of frozen chicken?
At Seara, we work with thousands of small, family run chicken farms across Brazil. We then process their chicken meat before exporting it to 150 countries worldwide.
Our world-class health and safety experts have identified that freezing chicken, as early in that process as possible, is by far the best means to keep all our customers safe, while delivering the quality, taste and freshness that they expect from Seara.
Our frozen range is remarkably close to meat in its freshest form. This is because we only raise healthy, high-quality animals, carefully processed at source and then quickly frozen to the highest international standards. Not only is frozen food safer, and preserved for longer, but it also allows restaurants and food businesses to use only what’s needed, to meet customer demand. This reduces food waste, increases savings and still provides wholesome meals. The advantage of economic bulk purchases goes a long way. There is no need for artificial preservatives and nutritional value is locked in.
Seara’s frozen range deliver convenience, versatility and innovation to the kitchen table for the entire family without compromising on quality. We save our clients enormous time, labour costs and energy costs by delivering chicken prepared exactly the way their kitchen wants, whether that’s fresh, frozen, fried, breaded, battered or ready for the grill.
How do you guarantee the quality of the chicken?
Due to our size, Seara is able to employ teams of world-class vets, who visit every family farm which supplies produce to Seara. For the European market alone, Seara has approximately 3,000 integrated properties supplying our chickens, all of which follow the highest EU food safety standards for imports.
After that, when the meat arrives at our central processing facilities, we have rigorous health and safety inspections to guarantee that our food meets the highest standard. Anything that is being exported has to pass the rigorous quality checks required by everyone importing food to the UK, Europe and beyond.
We strictly follow all relevant animal welfare regulations and legal requirements established by the United Kingdom and the Brazilian Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and Supply. Seara employs first-class veterinarians to oversee traceability, animal health and food standards across our farms.
How do you ensure Halal slaughtering and processing?
Seara has specialist Halal teams at our facilities in Brazil, who ensure that all the correct customs are observed. As an additional layer of oversight, we bring in different teams of clerics to certify the entire operation depending on where the meat is ultimately destined for.
Quality is essential to Seara, and that’s evident through the highest international certifications for excellence in production. From farm to kitchen, Seara applies care and expertise to ensure excellence in every detail, as verified by – among others – British Retail Consortium, Supplier Workplace Accountability, Global Certificate for the Agricultural Chain, Halal Certifications and Certificate of Conformity.
Does Seara have sustainability targets, for example to become carbon neutral?
Seara is serious about sustainability: contributing to the Fund for the Amazon to protect the rainforest and committed to achieving Net Zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2040. We are aiming for a 30% reduction of scopes 1 and 2 emissions by 2030.
We are a signatory of the Greenpeace-led Public Livestock Commitment. Compliance with this agreement means we are independently audited on an annual basis. We work in partnership with Greenpeace to improve our socio-environmental processes.
Our adherence to the Sustainable Water Management Programme includes the following actions: developing projects that go beyond the company’s operations including efforts to recover and protect water resources, developing innovative water recycling solutions, and developing projects, defining investments and setting targets to reduce water consumption in production processes.
Currently, 41% of our integrated farms are equipped with photovoltaic panels to generate solar energy. There is also a focus on outputs being exploited for biogas production. Seara’s Rural Agricultural Program encourages the separation and classification of solid waste by integrated producers in rural properties. Over 80% of our post-industrial waste is used for composting, recycling or energy reuse.
We recently purchased a fleet of electric delivery vehicles to further reduce emissions. And because 60% of Brazil’s total electricity is generated from renewable power, our trucks, plants and facilities are all powered by green energy.
Do you have any NPD at the moment?
Seara is always thinking about practicality, sustainability and health and working to bring innovation and convenience to our clients.
This year we focused on the Seara Professional line, without palm oil and specialised for the Food Service channel. At the beginning of 2023 we will launch 2 new products for Seara Professional.
What marketing support do you have for your brands?
Seara has marketing teams across key markets managing the brand.
Every year, more people come to recognise Seara as a source of great, affordable food. All year we promote activations of our brand at trade fairs including IFE, SIAL and other local events. We also love to hear from interviewers like you.
During the year we had several publications in specialised media, and launched our new website: www.searaprofessional.com
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