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Pete Vegas was raised in the small town of Ferriday, La. His family has always been involved in farming, and he farmed soybeans (on his own) to earn his way through college. He worked for Chiquita Banana on a 12,000 acre banana farm in Panama for two years after graduating from Louisiana State University with a degree in Agribusiness. Pete returned to school and earned a Master’s Degree (MBA) from Harvard Business School. Pete became manager of a startup rice milling company that was a joint venture between Comet Rice and the government of Puerto Rico. The government planned to convert thousands of acres of idle sugar cane land into rice production, and then mill the rice on the island. Pete supervised construction of the Comet milling facility and trained a 200 man work force. It was a great opportunity to learn the business because Pete was involved in farming, drying, storing, milling, and marketing the rice. The local farming project faltered and the company was forced to import rice. As a result, Pete learned a great deal about shipping, stevedoring, and handling bulk rice. The company was a tremendous success during Pete’s tenure as manager. In 1986, Pete returned
to the U.S. to become Vice President of Marketing for Comet Rice mills. At
the time, Comet owned large mills in Maxwell, California and Greenville,
Mississippi. Pete Vegas traveled the world to develop customers for
Comet Rice. He studied Thai Jasmine rice in Thailand, Basmati rice in
northern India, and Japonica rice in Japan. On behalf of the company, Pete
did joint ventures in Europe and Asia. At the time, the largest customer
for U.S. rice was the government of Iraq. All the rice was being
shipped to Iraq in 50 KG bags. Utilizing his knowledge of rice
logistics, Pete designed and supervised construction of a bulk handling
facility in Aqaba, Jordan. The facility incorporated new technology
that, for the first time, allowed large volumes of high quality white rice
to be shipped in bulk and bagged at destination. The cost savings were
tremendous. Comet came to totally dominate the Iraqi market and its
sales to Iraq exceeded 300,000 MT per year. Pete resigned his
position with Comet Rice to start Comet Rice Ingredients (as a subsidiary
of Comet Rice) just months before the Iraqi war brought the U.S. rice
business to a standstill. Pete has always had an interest in food science. In his travels, he learned how other countries used rice in applications other than table rice. In the United States other grains like corn are used to make snacks, starches, maltodextrins, high fructose corn syrup, cooking oil, etc. Pete’s concept was to develop similar new applications and products from rice, and so Comet Rice Ingredients was born. Over the years, the company developed an extensive line of rice flour, modified flours, instant rice, and most recently IQF (frozen) rice. In 1998 American Rice had financial problems and for a period of time operated under the protection of bankruptcy. During this time, in partnership with an investor group in Los Angeles, Pete acquired the assets and liabilities of the company. The company was renamed Sage V Foods, and today owns and operates three food production facilities in Freeport, Texas where it manufactures and sells rice based products to most of the major food manufacturing companies in the U.S. |
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