About BerriHealth

At BerriHealth, we are focused on one thing: Supplying our customers with high-quality black raspberry products to help improve their quality of life.

We are located in Corvallis, Oregon, in the Willamette Valley, one of the richest and most fertile agricultural resources in the world. This allows us to work directly with local farms to ensure the best quality of black raspberries, and a streamlined process from picking them at the farm to a package showing up at your doorstep. Our supply chain is completely encapsulated within the state of Oregon, and is essential in providing high quality materials for medical research or as a functional food that improves wellness and may help prevent some cancers of the mouth and gastrointestinal tract.

The use of freeze-drying technology allows our customers to consume black raspberries year round as a convenient snack, or as a topping on your favorite cereal, salad, yogurt, or even ice cream. Blending the berries into smoothies, milkshakes, or fruit drinks is yet another way to enjoy our freeze-dried black raspberries. Our goal is to help you increase your consumption of high quality berries in a convenient way to help you improve your well-being.

Eco-Friendly Practices

When we set out to found this company, we wanted to make sure we would minimize our impact on the environment. After all, it is our natural environment that allows us to stay so healthy and battle many of the issues we have! This is truly a commitment for us. We don't want to just try and sell ourselves as a Green company.

Our black raspberries all come from within the state of Oregon where we are located. This means that we are supporting local farmers, and also reducing transportation and storage costs as well.

The black raspberries are then sent straight to a GMP/FDA certified freeze-drying facility that is just a 20 minute drive away from our main office. Oregon Freeze Dry is the leader in freeze drying technology in the world, and we are very fortunate to have them in such near proximity.

After the freeze-dried black raspberries are packaged and ready to be sent out to the consumer, it's stored here in Oregon as well. That means from the time your black raspberries are picked to when they are sent out to your home, they never leave the state.

About Our Team

Dr. Gary Stoner

Dr. Stoner received his Ph.D in microbiology from the University of Michigan in 1970. Currently, he is a Professor Emeritus in the Department of Internal Medicine at The Ohio State University. He also has joint appointments in the Departments of Pathology, Oral Biology, and Human Nutrition.

Dr. Stoner has conducted studies in chemical carcinogenesis and cancer chemoprevention for more than 30 years focusing on cancers of the lung, esophagus and colon. Currently, his laboratories are conducting studies of the ability of various chemopreventive agents, including berries, to prevent cancer in the esophagus and colon. The results of his research are documented in more than 350 peer-reviewed publications and book chapters. Dr. Stoner has received several awards including the NIH MERIT Award. He has served on multiple NIH study sections, most recently as Chair of the NIH/NCI Chemo/Dietary Prevention (CDP) Study Section. He also served as Chair of the Carcinogenesis, Environment and Nutrition Advisory Panel for the American Cancer Society. He is past President of the Carcinogenesis and Molecular Biology Specialty Sections of the Society of Toxicology, and of the Ohio Valley Society of Toxicology. He serves on the Editorial Boards of multiple journals including his role as Senior Editor for the Prevention section of Cancer Research.

Don Sturm

Don Sturm is a 3rd generation berry farmer whose family has owned and run Sturm's Berry Farm for over 50 years. Along with the rest of his family, he has managed 150 acres of various berries in Corbett, Oregon and is developing another 150 acres specifically for black raspberries near the Oregon coast. He is well-known throughout Northwest Oregon for delivering fresh, high quality berries.

Surin Vasdev, MD

Dr. Vasdev completed his undergraduate education at Dulwich College in London, England before entering medical school at the University of London. Upon graduation, he moved to the U.S. where he finished a residency in internal medicine and a fellowship in gastroenterology and hepatology at the prestigious Mayo Clinic before going on staff there. He is board certified in gastroenterology.

Dr. Vasdev has been practicing in Corvallis since 1992 providing patient care in diagnostic and therapeutic endoscopy, as well as general gastroenterology. He founded Corvallis Gastroenterology in 1997 and assumed the role of Medical Director of the Samaritan Endoscopy Center when it opened in 2006. He oversees services provided in this state-of-the art facility where the goal is to "provide safe and comfortable endoscopic procedures with cutting edge technology in a facility dedicated to endoscopy".

Named Assistant Professor of Medicine in 2007 for Western University of Health Sciences, Dr. Vasdev is actively involved in graduate medical education and teaches students about the gastroenterology specialty.

His other interests include mountain-biking, painting, and watching movies with his wife and children.

Steve Dunfield

Steve began his career working in high technology in the Silicon Valley. After relocating to Oregon in 1991, he worked at Hewlett Packard in product engineering where he developed quality systems experience. Mr. Dunfield went on to business development roles at HP founding many life science business opportunities which led to him starting up biotech companies. His passion for improving wellness through natural products and whole functional foods led him to Dr. Gary Stoner's work on black raspberries and freeze drying as a preservative free way to improve the distribution of high quality berry products. Providing convenient, year-round access to high quality black raspberries grown in Oregon by Sturm's Berry Farms enables our customers to increase consumption of this super berry.

Sturm's Berry Farm

Sturm's Berry Farm (Located in Corbett, Oregon) first came into existence in 1941 and it has always been a family owned farm. The farm has over 100 acres of various berries. Don is the third generation of his family to keep up the tradition of growing high-quality berries. He was born in 1955 and worked doing a wide variety of jobs on the farm all through school. The farm first started growing black raspberries in 1962, and when Don took over the farm in the 1980s he continued to grow these rare berries. He is even working on developing more land near the Oregon coast specifically for black raspberries. He is well-known throughout Oregon for delivering fresh, high quality berries. His son Travis has worked on the farm for most of his life and the Sturms plan on continuing the family tradition of farming into the future.

As Don began to distribute his berries to other states in the Northwest, many people would recognize him and his trucks, but they could never remember his name. Instead, everyone started calling him simply “The Berry Man”. This caught on so quickly that Don decided that would be a great name to put on all his flats of berries, and the name is still being used today.

The micro-climate in this specific part of Oregon is perfect for growing the very fickle black raspberry due to the moderate temperatures and high amounts of rain for most of the year. The winters stay warm enough that the roots don’t freeze, and the summers stay relatively cool during the time approaching harvest so that the berries don't roast on the vines. The valley soil is full of nutrients for the berries to grow, and the sandy loam allows the soil to drain quickly during the heavy rain season.

The farm has also installed expensive drip irrigation on all of their fields. This allows them to supply water directly to the roots of the berry plants rather than wasting copious amounts of water using overhead spray irrigation commonly found at many farms. Drip irrigation also substantially reduces the amount of mold found on the plants and berries, as it does not spray the entire vine with water and also limits water to unwanted weeds.

Speaking of berries, the farm grows a wide variety, including six varieties of red raspberries, 3 varieties of black raspberries, 6 varieties of blackberries, marion berries, boysenberries, blueberries, and strawberries. He sells most of his berries directly to markets locally in Portland and along the coast. You can walk into many stories in the local Portland area and find berries and jams straight from Sturm’s farm. The farm also distributes to the nearby states of Idaho, Utah, and Washington.

For black raspberries, the picking season is limited to three weeks in July, which is shorter than most other berries. During this time, black raspberries are harvested, sorted, cleaned, and put onto a refrigerated truck within an hour of being picked. Within 6-12 hours the berries are taken to a nearby facility where they are individually flash frozen and packaged. It takes less than 24 hours for the berries to go from on the vine to frozen and packaged in consumer-ready bags.

Harvesting the berries is a lot of work, but so is pollinating them! Sturm’s is home to the Oregon Berry Bee Project, whose goal is to help bolster the dwindling population of native Oregon Berry Bees by setting up safe and symbiotic homes for them on berry farms. Sturm’s farm was chosen for this in part because they do not use any pesticides or other chemicals on the berries. Bees can be harmed by even trace amounts of chemicals. Don has personally helped with various parts of this project, from building bird-safe shelters for the bees, to helping install webcams for scientists around the country to monitor bee activity. The Oregon Berry Bee Project also benefits the farm. Here is a quote from their project website:

“Using native solitary bees for pollination fits well into the sustainable agriculture practices on the Sturm farm. The Sturms do not use any insecticides on their berries. Beneficial insect populations have been sufficient in the absence of insecticides to control insect pests. The lack of insecticides makes the farm a favorable place for pollinators as well. Because they offer pesticide-free berries, they have developed a large customer base who we hope will appreciate native solitary bees for pollination.”

The Sturms have partnered with OBBP since 2007 and the project is continuing with good success in 2011. Sturm’s Berry Farm provides a safe haven for the bees to thrive and pollinate cane berry bushes, and according to the researchers involved, “it is clear that these bees are doing well” in their new home.

Don’s farm is also home to many honey bees that are owned by local beekeepers and are not park of the OBBP. Honey gets flavor from the flowers the bees collect pollen from, so berry farms are a natural location for businesses looking to harvest and sell honey locally. Most beekeepers have to move the bees off of farms when pesticides are being sprayed because the bees are very sensitive to any chemicals. On Sturm’s Berry Farm the bees can stay on location year-long due to the lack of any harsh insecticides being sprayed.

Integrated Pest Management (IPM) is another system utilized at Sturm's Berry Farm to improve the quality of their berries while reducing pesticide and other chemical use. IPM focuses on understanding the natural ecosystem that exists at a farm and utilizing natural methods for keeping harmful pest populations at acceptable levels. It focuses more on supporting natural predators and using mechanical prevention methods (such as screens and traps) instead of eradicating everything with pesticides. The Sturms family has farmed this land for generations and prefer to use sustainable long-term methods so that future generations will have the same quality land that previous ones had.

Why Us?

You already have a lot of information on our background, who we are, and where our berries come from, so we will try and keep this simple.

1. Black raspberries are well-researched and are a concentrated source of healthy nutrients, polyphenols, and fiber, while being relatively low in sugar.
2. We take whole USDA Grade A berries straight from a quality Oregon farm, and keep them all-natural by not adding (or removing anything but water) anything between the time they are picked and when they show up at your door.
3. At BerriHealth, we keep things local, working with responsible farms and nearby Oregon companies. This not only helps local businesses, but also lessens our impact on the environment.
4. Our goal isn't to spend of bunch of money on marketing. We are focused on investing our time and money on bringing you better quality products at competitive prices while supporting research efforts involving black raspberries.

If you want a high quality product that has decades of research and may help significantly with cancer prevention as well as with your everyday health, you won't regret purchasing our products.