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Company history: In 1970, Carl Dillman and his wife, Sue, began selling oven-baked apple butter to the former Colonial Room Restaurant in Brown County. Carl delivered the apple butter jars to the eatery while driving his milk route for Bloomington-based Johnson’s Creamery, where he worked for 37 years. As demand grew for the apple butter, the Dillmans began expanding their product line. Within the decade, the home business started selling to orchards, other restaurants and gift shops. In the 1980s, the Dillmans incorporated and their son, Cary, joined as a partner. Carl died in 2015 at age 84, leaving Cary as sole owner.
Products: Dillman Farm now offers more than 100 products, including numerous fruit spreads and preserves, relishes, salsas, pickles, glazes, marinades, barbecue sauces, salad dressings, mustards and pasta sauces. The products have been made and jarred at the family farm on State Road 45 in Bloomington since 1978.
Availability: Dillman Farm products are sold online and at dozens of specialty retailers, orchard shops and grocery stores, including Kroger, Fresh Thyme, Rural King and Target.
Other business: A majority of Dillman Farm’s revenue comes from producing products for other businesses, often sold under specialty labels for farm orchards that have their own shops.
Overcoming adversity: Dillman Farm has survived two disasters at its facilities: a fire in 1991 that was started by an apple cooker and caused $400,000 in damage and a tornado in 2012 that demolished and damaged buildings and destroyed the farm’s boiler.
Compiled by Jeff Newman
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