assignments, including when he graduated from the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs and while he was stationed in Florida. They also are very much looking forward to the 2019 Western Growers Annual Meeting in Hawaii. THE FUTURE OF AG: Like most in the California agricultural business, Dominic is an optimist. He acknowledges that producing food in the Golden State is a challenge with seemingly new hurdles to jump every year. “It is getting more challenging with labor and water issues and new regulations,” he said. “We’ve been doing this for 50+ years and we plan to continue.” WESTERN GROWERS CONNECTION: The company has been a member of Western Growers for many years but it was only in 2018 that Dominic got actively involved in the organization as a member of the Board of Directors. “It is very interesting and helpful to interact with the other board members who have different commodities and are growing in different regions. It is very good to be exposed to other ideas and hear how others are dealing with their concerns and the issues we all face.”
growers an extra option for their excess production. Continuing its steady growth, earlier this year, Muzzi Family Farms, in partnership with Coastline Family Farms, launched C&M Family Cooling LLC, a cold storage and shipping facility in Castroville, CA. STILL A FAMILY AFFAIR: While 77-year-old Dominic Sr. is phasing out of day-to-day management, he still serves as the president of Watsonville Produce and is still an important member of the family team. Dominic Jr. spends most of his time managing the numerous entities, which include the multiple fresh cooling and shipping plants, the frozen vegetable operation as well as the sales team. Each facility has its own senior manager in place. He calls Lisa the “hub” of the organization as she handles administration, the IT (information technology) department and accounting. Dominic considers the Muzzi Family Farms’ operations a small player in specialty agriculture especially when compared to the very large companies in the industry. But with the company’s many different entities, he does allow that maybe they are a medium size operation. “Among all of our entities, we sell about 10-12 million packages a year,” he said. FAMILY LIFE: Dominic Jr. and his wife, Casey, live on the Muzzi Family Farm in the same house in which Dominic grew up. The two met at the annual rodeo in
Brawley, where Casey also grew up in a farming family. “We have no kids, but lots of animals,” Dominic said. For fun, the couple love to travel and have spent many vacations following the career of a nephew who is a pilot in the Air Force. They have visited him at many of his
Wishing you many years of happy retirement. Congratulations Tom!
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