This 12 months, the DelGrosso household has loved not one, however two milestones as each DelGrosso Meals Inc. and DelGrosso’s Park have a good time their 75th anniversary.
Ferdinand and Mafalda “Murf” DelGrosso started their enterprise enterprise in 1947. Nevertheless, because the oldest main family-owned producer of pasta sauce within the US, DelGrosso’s historical past goes again even additional. In 1911, Marianna Pulcino emigrated to america, bringing her household’s pasta sauce recipe together with her.
Years later, his daughter, Mafalda “Murf” Pulcino met and fell in love with Ferdinand DelGrosso. The couple married and, in 1943, purchased a small restaurant on 17th Road in Altoona, which they named DelGrosso’s Café. Utilizing Marianna’s recipe, the restaurant shortly gained notoriety for its spaghetti sauce.
Eager to broaden their rising enterprise, in 1946 the DelGrossos purchased Bland’s Amusement Park in Tipton and commenced making their sauce there.
“After they first purchased the park, it had a skating rink, a bowling alley, a picnic space and some rides,” mentioned Amy Mearkle, a spokeswoman for DelGrosso.
Within the 1950s, the corporate discovered its first industrial buyer in Ernie Wissinger of Wissinger’s IGA.
“Ernie was the primary motive Dad was in a position to get began,” mentioned Joe DelGrosso, the corporate’s present CEO. “He was instrumental in getting us began within the enterprise.”
Within the 1960s and early 1970s, the corporate started promoting its merchandise on the three largest chains within the Pittsburgh space: Large Eagle, Store N Save, and Foodland.
DelGrosso’s outgrew the unique manufacturing constructing on the amusement park within the late 1970s, and the choice was made to construct a brand new facility throughout the road. Within the 1980s, the corporate expanded additional and commenced packaging non-public label sauces for grocery store chains. DelGrosso Meals at present packages greater than 300 recipes for roughly half of the 20 largest grocery store chains within the US, together with its personal and a number of other worldwide manufacturers.
In the meantime, the park was additionally present process modifications and progress. In 1988, a crosswalk was constructed over Route 220, vastly bettering accessibility to the park. A miniature golf course was in-built 1992, adopted by a go-cart observe in 1994. After that, the Tipton Waterworks was in-built 1997, and the Tipton Rapids water slides have been added in 1999. The park had its greatest addition in 2016. : Laguna Splash water park.
“We had a progress plan for the long run,” mentioned Carl Crider Jr., parks president and common supervisor. “Each couple of years, it was one thing new and thrilling.”
Crider defined that a lot of the park’s success is because of the truth that its aim is to offer high-quality meals and leisure at a good value.
“DelGrosso’s Park and Laguna Splash’s mission has at all times been to offer high-quality meals and household leisure in a clear, secure and pleasant surroundings,” he mentioned. “We by no means wish to compromise our high quality. We at all times wish to be honest in costs. Folks admire that.”
Together with the remainder of the DelGrosso household, Joe DelGrosso expressed his pleasure at reaching the 75-year mark.
“I’m honored that our household has been in a position to have a good time 75 years in enterprise,” he mentioned. “We wish to proceed with the household legacy, each within the park and within the sauce enterprise, and stick with it to the fourth technology.”
