Background
SANFRUT was started in 1993 by Peter Bianchi and Stefan Sauter as a trade link between producers worldwide and customers in Switzerland and Europe. Thanks to extensive experience of the company founders, their relations to outstanding producers and ongoing dedicated work. SANFRUT today is considered a reliable partner to both wholesale and the processing industry.
Credo
Our goal is to develop and maintain long-term relationships with our partners. Our success is based on the added value which we offer to both our customers as well as our suppliers. Through our services we intend to meet precisely this target, and so to link the requirements and expectations of customers and producers. To insure unprejudiced information we do not take own positions. Absolute discretion, reliability, precision, and flexibility are cornerstones of our operations.
People
SANFRUT is made of a small, skillful team, which combines experience, know-how and market knowledge to your advantage. Their partners are:
Stefan Sauter
After becoming a licensed retail trade employee, I continued my studies to earn the diploma of Retail Merchant. In this position I soon was promoted to chain store manager of a large food distributor. After a short excursion as managing director of a fashion house, I found my way back to the food sector, first as manager of a food distribution center and then by participating in the founding of SANFRUT. Today, I’m in charge of traffic management, administration, human resource and bookkeeping.
I'm married and a father of a daughter. In winter I'm an enthusiastic skier. During the summer time I like to look after our garden. There, I’m the general manager of the Barbecue. As a "Seebueb" ("boy of the lake"), my family and I are frequently lured to the lake. Generally speaking, I'm interested in all sports. Throughout the whole year I play table tennis with friends or I enjoy Ice Hockey and Football with them.
Jürg Wermuth
After finalizing my apprenticeship as a gardener I gained experience in production and purchasing in an international environment. During that time I continued my professional education to successfully achieve a diploma as Commercial Agent. With additional business studies at the university of St. Gallen I prepared myself to successfully manage a company. Since joining SANFRUT in 1998, I managed various of our products. At the moment I take care of commodity items such as almonds, hazelnuts, walnuts and cashews. Besides trading, I maintain our QA and IT systems.
I am married and a father of three children. I deeply enjoy spending time with family and friends. When I need a change, I like to do sports such as (motor)-biking, squashing and hiking. Furthermore, I like spending a nice evening with good friends, preferably at a place, where the smoke of a hand-rolled cigar is accepted.
Samuel Peyer
As a graduated food technologist I originally started out in food production where I worked in different positions for producers of chocolate, bakery and pasta products. Searching for a new challenge I switched to marketing at a renowned Swiss gastronomy company. During this time I earned a degree in marketing and sales. Later, I held jobs as Brand Export Manager with the world’s largest chocolate manufacturer and worked as Key Account Manager for a co-packer for food and cosmetics. Since joining SANFRUT in 2005, I take care of items such as «specialties», apples, berries, groundnut kernels, coconut products, nut preparations, to mention only a few.
I describe myself as a man who enjoys the finer things in life on the one hand and, on the other, as a sport enthusiast, or “sports nut”. I spend a lot of my free time with my wife and friends playing golf, tennis, going mountain biking, going out to eat at finer restaurants, travelling and collecting wines.
Daniel Schlegel
After my commercial apprenticeship with a fruit and vegetable import firm in the St. Galler Rhine Valley I went to a trading company for fresh, dried and frozen fruit and vegetable products in Liechtenstein for 10 years. They supplied the processing food industry. In 1998 I graduated from the SIU Zurich as a fruit and vegetable specialist and took up a position with a well-known fruit and vegetable importer in Canton Glarus. In a period of 15 years there I was one of the managers responsible for purchasing, marketing and quality control. Since May 2014 I am a member of the SANFRUT team and take care for dates, figs, apricots, raisins, walnuts and groundnuts.
In my free time I spend most of the time with my wife and our two children. They share my passion for wild mushroom which we search for in the area. In 1999 I became an official mushroom expert and I have been in the board of the Swiss Association for Mycology responsible for the marketing of scientific books and publications. My other hobbies are rambling, photography, reading and travelling.
Niko Rouskov
Born in Bulgaria, raised in Berlin, settled in beautiful Switzerland in 2009. After a quarter of a century in various positions in the hotel industry, both on land and at sea, now looking for new directions in the food industry, where a customer-oriented approach is more in demand than ever.
Hobby DJ, avid table tennis player, explorer of national hiking trails and passionate traveler.