That first day, Joe Spence, the delivery salesman, set out in the wagon with 132 pounds of Challenge butter. He returned that evening with 120. The total sales for the day were 12 pounds.

After going through two salesmen during the first couple of months of business, Clyde Mitchel, the General Manager at the time, went out with two pounds of Challenge butter (one from Tulare and the other from Riverdale) in a black satchel with ice packed in both ends. He would tempt grocers with butter on a cracker and if that failed, he would leave a pound with them to try on their own table. When Mitchell returned in a couple of days, an order was usually requested for five to ten pounds. The grocer would then pass the first small order out among his most particular customers, some of whom would return to demand more. In this way, the business was built up, slowly at first, then faster and faster, because the general supply of butter in Los Angeles, at that time, was largely inferior to Challenge.

Through the sterling efforts of men who tramped incessantly from store to store, demonstrating the higher qualities of the farmers' own butter, the brand caught the public's interest, and sales increased until the Challenge brand became the leading selling butter throughout the west.

Today, Challenge butter is the largest selling brand in the West, and the Danish Creamery brand that Challenge markets is a strong brand in Southern California and the San Joaquin Valley. Very early, the management of Challenge recognized the elements of successful butter marketing: consistent quality, consistently promoted. By refusing to sell any butter that didn't meet the highest standards, Challenge built a statewide reputation for quality.

That reputation grew as Challenge pioneered in the dairy industry with product and manufacturing innovations such as the aluminum butter churn, the first successful metal butter churn in the world. Shipping butter in corrugated cases instead of wood containers was a Challenge idea, too.

In addition, Challenge developed a standard for service that distinguished itself from other organizations.

Challenge has also been a leader in advertising and promotion. In 1911, its first year of operation, for example, a Challenge advertisement appeared on the first lighted billboard in Los Angeles, at 7th and Figueroa. The company's slogan in those days was: "Better buy better butter." Challenge is still California's most widely advertised and promoted butter, with an award-winning campaign in television, outdoor advertising, radio and magazines.

And today's theme line aptly sums up both the company and its products: "Making a stand for quality." In a world of substitutes and synthetics, the pure, natural quality of Challenge butter is indeed making a stand.

Joe Spence and the company wagon have given way to a fleet of immaculate refrigerated trucks. And the company now markets to the retail, foodservice and food processing business in the Western states.

Challenge butter has become part of the West. And it will continue to be a growing part.

Challenge Firsts

	Used first lighted commercial outdoor billboard for advertising.
	Developed first lab sampling of all butter to ensure quality.
	Developed first consumer size Swiss cheese package.
	Developed first metal churn and replaced wooden churn.
	Developed first corrugated paper package for shipping cubes, replacing wooden containers.
	Developed lining cheese boxes with Pliofilm and curd was pressed into the boxes. Kraft copied their method. Los Angeles Mutual Dairymen, a Member of Challenge, was one of the first producer organizations in the country to equip the dairies with farm tanks, and to use tanker trucks for milk pickup (1948).

First Butter Churn

Challenge also experimented with the churning process. Their mechanical department developed different metals as a replacement to wood churns. They experimented with the cast aluminum alloys for a full year to determine resistance to attack the acid in the cream and also of the salt.

Shipping Butter in Paper

For many years all bulk butter was shipped in wooden containers; tubs in the east and central west, 68-pound spruce cubes in the west. This added to the freight costs. Experiments by Challenge enabled conversion from wood to corrugated holes. The movement spread throughout the United States, and within a few years wooden containers for bulk butter had become obsolete.