A
STORIED
History
19th Century
The history of the Colace family’s involvement in agriculture dates back to the 19th century. Joseph Colace Sr. began as a grape and olive grower in Naples, Italy. Around the turn of the century, Joseph made the decision to move his family, which consisted of his wife Carmella and his three boys Vince, Tony and Joseph Jr. to Philadelphia to start a wholesale and retail business.
1952
After serving in WWII, Vince, Tony and Joseph Jr. decided to move west to El Centro, CA in pursuit of an opportunity to return to their farming roots.
1953-1964
Shortly after arriving in El Centro the boys opened the doors of Colace Brothers, a packing and shipping company that focused primarily on head lettuce and cantaloupes. While in El Centro, Joseph Jr. or “Pop Pop” as most people knew him, fell in love with and eventually married Alice Dessert, daughter of Raymond B. and Jennie Dessert of the Dessert Seed Company. Between the years of 1953 and 1964 Joseph Jr. and Alice had 5 children, ToniAnn, Joseph III, Marla, Bill and Kathy.
1983
Tony and Joseph Jr. made the difficult decision to close the doors of Colace Brothers. Shortly thereafter, Joseph III and his brother Bill started their own packing and shipping operation called Five Crowns Marketing. In 1987 the brothers added Crown Farming to the operation and began growing a wide variety of product throughout the southwest.
2007, 2010
Over the past 30 plus years the Colace brothers have grown iceberg lettuce, romaine, cauliflower, broccoli, asparagus, sweetcorn, cantaloupes, honeydews and varietal melons. In 2007 Joe and Bill added Crown Citrus to the family of companies and in 2010 formed a partnership with Prima Bella, presently known as GloriAnn Farms, which packs the GloriAnn packaged corn label.
2017
Van Meier Logistics was created to handle the business’ growing freight needs.
2020
TODAY
Five Crowns Marketing is a company that was built on a strong foundation of faith, integrity and stewardship. The Colace’s are proud to be a 4th generation farming family and plan to continue their deep-rooted history and tradition in agriculture for generations to come.
