Ontario-based GS Foods Group Inc. has acquired two California food companies, Fresno Produce Co. and Hayes Distributing.

The purchases deepen GS Foods’ long-running involvement in school meal services and expand the company’s geographic presence in the Fresno and San Francisco Bay areas. Terms of the transactions were not disclosed.

GS Foods distributes a range of specialty foods under its two independent subsidiaries, Gold Star Foods Inc. and Good Source Solutions Inc.

Gold Star, which was founded in Los Angeles in 1978, focuses exclusively on school food programs. Good Source sells foodstuffs to specialty buyers such as prisons, amusement parks and health care facilities.

Both Fresno Produce and Hayes Distributing focus on school food services and will be integrated into the Gold Star brand.

Fresno, which distributes produce, was a three-decade-old, family-owned business serving roughly 100 schools. Hayes, which focuses on “ancillary snacks” such as chips and cookies, serves both schools and vending machine companies in the greater San Francisco Bay Area.  

“School nutrition is an enormous market, but it’s extremely fragmented,” said GS Foods Chief Executive Sean Leer.

He added that this fragmentation can lead to inefficiencies in the school food service pipeline. GS Foods will add more infrastructure to its newly acquired businesses, according to Leer, to help address some of these issues.

He said the Fresno and Hayes acquisitions were part of a bigger push by GS Foods to strengthen its market position in school food services.

California is currently GS Foods’ largest market, according to Leer, although the company distributes food to schools in all 50 states.

It has distribution facilities in five states. Two of these — in Colorado and Oregon — were added just last year as greenfield expansion projects.

“We are looking to become the preeminent supply system for school nutrition in the U.S.,” Leer said.

This effort will mean more organic and inorganic growth, according to Leer, including additional acquisitions and further greenfield expansions.

He declined to provide specific geographic or product targets for expansion but noted that his company would focuse on places where it currently doesn’t have a distribution presence.