Date Lady Inc. responds to rapid growth by acquiring new facility near airport

Colleen Sundlie: New facility will allow space and equipment for Date Lady Inc. to proceed with planned new product launches.

Date Lady Inc., which has experienced rapid growth in recent years, is expanding with a new facility near Springfield-Branson National Airport, said owner and founder Colleen Sundlie. She said in a recent interview that Date Lady grew revenues roughly 70% year to date.

The company, started in 2012, manufactures a line of date-based products such as syrup, sugar, chocolate spread and barbecue sauce. Seven years later, according to past Springfield Business Journal reporting, Date Lady products were being sold in Walmart locations, and by mid-2020, Sundlie inked a deal with Target. 

These days, Sundlie said Date Lady also sells directly to consumers online, and additionally to manufacturers. For example, the company sells 2,000-pound totes containing date syrup to makers of food bars.

According to past reporting, Sundlie got Date Lady started with $120,000 in seed money sourced from her own savings, along with an uncle and a Small Business Administration loan. 

More recently, The Bank of Missouri in early September lent Date Lady just shy of $2.1 million, according to Greene County recorder data collected for SBJ On the Record listings. Sundlie said the money went toward a 13,000-square-foot warehouse and production facility located at 4331 W. Calhoun St., along with equipment.

“We finally were able to score the perfect building – still not big enough,” Sundlie said in a recent interview with SBJ from her home out of state, where she works remotely to operate her Springfield-based business.

Matt Mahan, the company’s chief financial officer, said the seller of the building was Executive Print and Promo, a fictitious name registered to Fulfillment Services LLC, according to Missouri secretary of state records. Equipment for the new facility includes a bottling system and a kettle for making products like chocolate syrup and barbecue sauce, Sundlie said.

As it transitions into the new space on Calhoun Street, Date Lady retains the facilities on Commercial Street where the company got its start, Sundlie said: an original production facility at 900 W. Commercial St; a fruitcake bakehouse at 918 W. Commercial St.; and a shipping warehouse at 932 W. Commercial St.

“We have one office left that we haven't turned into production in that original building,” Sundlie said. “And so it's really been quite hilarious to do what we've done in such a small building.”

Sundlie said production has been moving to the new building as Date Lady plans new product launches, and she expects the move of some operations to Calhoun Street to be complete in January. The plan is to carry on the multifaceted operations at both the new facility and the existing ones, Sundlie said: “We’re just going to be separating what we make.”

“We have really been in a waiting period for new products, because we just haven't had the space,” Sundlie said. Unlike many similar consumer packaged-good brands, Sundlie said Date Lady prefers to do “everything in-house” rather than rely on contracting with a co-packer or co-manufacturer.

She added, “We’re actually making the value-added products, and we’re bottling and labeling everything in-house and shipping it all.”

That preference, in part, has led to the “holding pattern” for new product launches, even as Date Lady has been conducting research and product development for years, Sundlie said.

The new facility will allow more product to be available for sale to meet demand from customers currently reaching out to the company. Sundlie also said she plans to hire a full-time Date Lady salesperson for the first time.

Date Lady employs about 25 staff, and Sundlie estimated eight to 10 of them would be working in the new facility in its early stages. Mahan said three years ago, Date Lady employed 11-13 individuals but since that time, the employee count has roughly doubled.

Sundlie noted that growth isn’t new for the company, but rapid growth has been: “We've grown every single year, but the growth was much slower when we started, which has been almost 13 years ago. So, the past few years has really compounded.”

The company declined to disc lose specific revenue figures but Mahan said the company had roughly tripled revenue since 2022. Why all the growth? Sundlie credits increased awareness among U.S. consumers that a date isn’t just a fun night out with your crush, but also a brown, oblong edible fruit that can serve as an alternative to sugar. Prized for its sweetness since the ancient Middle East, it grows on a type of palm tree.

“You see dates on all of the restaurant menus these days,” Sundlie said, “whether it be wrapped in bacon or as a sweetener instead of sugar at a juice bar or at a cafe. Dates are all over the place now.”