In 2021, for the first year, Benson Hill Ingredients, LLC participated in Food Export-Midwest’s Market Access Program (MAP) funded Branded Program to grow their exports to Mexico. The Iowa company used their allocated funds to complete international bakery trade seminars, to ship product samples, to create promotional giveaway items and literature, and to update their website to Spanish.

These activities helped Benson Hill Ingredients, LLC gain $576,000 in sales to Mexico while also gaining them 7 new foreign buyer contacts and 1 new distributorship relationship. They also project to complete $800,000 more in sales to the market over the next twelve months.

Last year was the first year Benson Hill Ingredients, LLC participated in Food Export’s Branded Program, but they have also attended Buyers Missions, webinars, Focused Trade Missions, and is part of the Online Product Catalog.

Based in Creston, Iowa, Benson Hill Ingredients, LLC is an ingredient supplier of value-added soybean ingredients such as defatted soy flour, defatted soy flakes, and defatted soy grits. These ingredients can be used in further food processing systems in the areas of bakery, meat, extrusion, and pharmaceuticals.

Food Export uses funding from the Market Access Program (MAP) to help America’s small businesses increase their exports of food and agricultural products. As these exports increase, these small businesses are creating jobs and improving the strength and stability of our agricultural economy. Food Export-Midwest and Food Export-Northeast are non-profit organizations that work in collaboration with their member state departments of agriculture and the USDA’s Foreign Agricultural Service. They offer a wide range of programs and services that help boost America’s agricultural exports.