Case Study
Long-Term Sustainability Strategy
Overview
Duda Farm Fresh Foods and Measure to Improve turned sustainability into a long-term business strategy, resulting in a strong foundation that not only supports the business today but helps prepare it for the future.
Building a Foundation for the Future
Across the fresh produce industry, sustainability expectations continue to evolve. Many companies are still determining how sustainability fits into long-term business operations, planning, and decision-making. But as Duda Farm Fresh Foods celebrates 100 years, the company’s approach reflects something deeper: a commitment to building a strong foundation that not only supports the business today but helps prepare it for the future.
Rather than approaching sustainability as a stand-alone initiative or a “check-the-box” exercise, Duda intentionally integrated sustainability into its long-term business strategy. Recognizing that the future of agriculture would require stronger collaboration, greater visibility across operations, smarter resource management, and improved organizational preparedness, the company chose to invest early.
Over the last several years, Duda worked alongside Measure to Improve to build the internal culture, structure, and alignment needed to support sustainability as part of how the business operates, not as a separate program, but as an integrated component of long-term business success.
“Sustainability and stewardship have always been part of our ethos. As we honor our family’s 100-year legacy in farming, we want to continue building a company that can thrive for future generations.”
Recognizing Industry Changes
Long before many of today’s sustainability pressures accelerated, Duda recognized that the agricultural business environment was changing.
At the time, the company did not know exactly how sustainability reporting, retailer expectations, packaging regulations, or transparency demands would evolve. What leadership did recognize, however, was that waiting to react later would likely create greater challenges for the business.
Rather than waiting for requirements to fully materialize, Duda chose to begin building organizational alignment early. Working with Measure to Improve, the company focused on creating a practical framework that would help prepare teams across the organization for future expectations while supporting continuous improvement.
Duda invested in:
Communication
Collaboration
Organizational alignment
Continuous improvement
Cross-functional engagement
Those investments helped establish the internal structure and working relationships that continue to support the company today.
“When we first started talking about building a culture of sustainability, we knew it would take time. Today, we’re seeing that investment come to life across the organization.”
Building Sustainability Into the Business
Early on, Duda recognized that sustainability could not succeed if it lived in isolation.
Instead of assigning sustainability to a single department or treating it as a compliance exercise, the company intentionally incorporated sustainability into broader business conversations involving:
Operations
Planning
Packaging
Marketing
Research and Development
Sales
Leadership
Growing Operations
This approach helped create stronger cross-functional visibility and alignment across the organization while reinforcing that sustainability is connected to:
Operational efficiency
Long-term resilience
Innovation
Customer expectations
Resource management
Future business readiness
Most importantly, it shifted sustainability from being viewed as additional work to being understood as part of running a modern, forward-looking agricultural business.
Through its Growing Greener Generations (GGG) Team initiative and ongoing collaboration with Measure to Improve, Duda created opportunities for employees across departments to better understand how sustainability connects to everyday operations and long-term business success.
This helped foster:
Stronger internal engagement
Shared ownership
Better communication
Increased operational visibility
A culture focused on continuous improvement
“What started as conversations around sustainability evolved into something much bigger, stronger collaboration, better visibility across teams, and a shared understanding that sustainability touches every part of the business.”
Sustainability as Part of Long-Term Business Planning
As sustainability became more integrated across the organization, it also became more connected to broader business planning conversations.
By encouraging greater collaboration and visibility between departments, Duda supported conversations around planning, coordination, resource efficiency, and long-term organizational preparedness. Measure to Improve helped facilitate these discussions, ensuring sustainability remained connected to business priorities and operational realities instead of having them be a stand-alone initiatives.
Rather than viewing sustainability purely through an environmental lens, Duda approached it as part of building a stronger, more prepared organization overall.
That perspective helped sustainability become a business conversation, not simply a reporting conversation.
“Sustainability really sits at the intersection of people, planet, and profit.”
Rooted in Stewardship and Long-Term Thinking
As Duda celebrates its 100-year legacy, this milestone reflects more than longevity. It represents a century of family farming, stewardship, resilience, and a willingness to evolve alongside the changing needs of agriculture, customers, and consumers.
Sustainability reflects many of the values that have long shaped the company’s approach to agriculture and continues to guide how Duda is building for the future:
Stewardship
Innovation
Adaptability
Long-term thinking
Commitment to future generations
The company’s willingness to invest time into building culture, alignment, and preparedness reflects an understanding that sustainability is not achieved through a single initiative or short-term project. It is part of a broader commitment to strengthening the business in ways that honor Duda’s past while helping position the company for the next century.
It is built over time through consistent leadership, organizational commitment, and intentional business decisions that support long-term resilience, continued innovation, and the ability to thrive for future generations.
“It’s encouraging to see sustainability become embedded in how we operate every day, not simply as a point of discussion, but as a force shaping how we think, how we plan, and how we position the business for long-term success.”
The Partnership Between Measure to Improve and Duda Farm Fresh Foods
Building a sustainability foundation does not happen overnight. It requires time, commitment, leadership, and a willingness to bring people together around a shared vision for the future.
As Duda worked to integrate sustainability into its long-term business strategy, Measure to Improve served as a trusted partner, helping facilitate conversations, align teams, and create a framework that connected sustainability to broader business objectives.
Together, the focus was never on creating a separate sustainability program or simply responding to emerging requirements. Instead, the partnership centered on building the organizational foundation needed to support long-term success.
Over the years, Measure to Improve worked alongside Duda’s leadership and Growing Greener Generations (GGG) Team to help:
Build cross-functional alignment across departments
Facilitate sustainability planning and strategy discussions
Increase organizational awareness and engagement
Connect sustainability initiatives to business priorities
Prepare for evolving customer, retailer, and industry expectations
Foster a culture of continuous improvement
Rather than taking a one-size-fits-all approach, Measure to Improve helped Duda develop a sustainability strategy that reflected the company’s unique culture, operations, values, and long-term vision.
The result was not simply a sustainability program. It was a stronger organizational foundation that helped position Duda to navigate emerging challenges, identify new opportunities, and approach the future with greater confidence and alignment.
“What Duda built was never about checking a box. They made the intentional decision to integrate sustainability into the business itself, the operations, the planning, the conversations, and the long-term strategy. That foundation is what prepared them for where the industry is today.”
A Model for the Future of Agriculture
Duda’s experience demonstrates that building a meaningful sustainability foundation takes time, commitment, and intentional leadership.
It also demonstrates that the companies best prepared for the future are often the ones that begin building long before they are forced to.
By treating sustainability as a strategic business decision rather than a separate compliance exercise, Duda has focused on building an organizational foundation designed to support long-term resilience, adaptability, and continued growth as industry expectations continue to evolve.
As the company enters its next century, the work completed over the past several years serves as a reminder that meaningful progress is not built through a single initiative, report, or project. It is built through leadership, collaboration, organizational commitment, and a willingness to invest in the future before the future arrives.
For others across the fresh produce industry, Duda’s journey offers an important lesson: the strongest sustainability programs are built on a solid foundation. Companies that invest the time to create alignment, engage their teams, and integrate sustainability into business strategy will be better positioned to navigate change, respond to evolving expectations, and capitalize on future opportunities.
“The companies building the foundation today will be the companies best prepared for tomorrow.”
About Measure to Improve
Founded in 2014, Measure to Improve’s mission is to help produce companies measure, improve, and credibly promote their sustainability efforts. Our clients include produce growers, packers, shippers, and industry associations across the United States. Our staff has a proven track record of helping companies identify and implement strategies to increase efficiency. By supporting clients in setting ambitious, but attainable, sustainability goals, MTI encourages progress that can be validated and marketed. MTI’s projects address a variety of sustainability challenges, including water, energy, greenhouse gas emissions, waste, and social accountability.
About Duda Farms
At Duda Farm Fresh Foods, we're serious about sustainability and take responsibility for our environmental impacts. We intend to reduce the amount of packaging we use and increase the recyclability, reusability, and compostability of our materials. We are also keenly aware of how important packaging selection is in maintaining optimal product freshness and preventing contamination.