OUR DISTRIBUTOR OF THE MONTH
A brief history of the operations of
a Bohemian Distributing Company of
Los AngelesCalifornia
LONG before Heineken's came to
tbe United States, the Bohemian
Distributing Company was flourish
ing in Southern California, Almost
thirty years ago at a small shop in
downtown Los Angeles, the newly-
born Bohemian Distributing Com
pany was beginning to demonstrate
its precocity.
In these days, especially in South
ern California, so old and yet so new,
a quarter century is a fairly respect
able age for any business venture. To
myriads of Southern Californians the
successful history of Bohemian will
not come as a surprise. They have felt
that the company has always been
here and that it will continue to grow
as the population of California
grows.
Its President, Mr. J. S. Foto,
originally came to Los Angeles from
New Orleans in 1913 and opened
a small store dispensing alcoholic bev
erages for home consumption, known
as The Arcade Wine Company. Dur
ing Prohibition, he changed his
operation to grape juice, syrups, ex
tracts, etc. Then in 1921, through a
mutual friend, he became acquainted
with a young businessman from San
Francisco, Frank Vitale, a merchant
by instinct and training.
Soon Foto and Vitale formed a
partnership and before long, the bus
iness grew and the organization was
expanded. In 1923 A. Trapani and
Vincent J. Trapani, the latter its
present energetic General Sales Man
ager, joined the partnership of Foto
and Vitale and it became a corpora
tion. As a good San Franciscan,
Vitale had selected as its new name
"Bohemian" which was taken from
a famous club in San Francisco.
As the years went by and Cali
fornia grew in population and indus
try, the young business enterprise
kept step with the times. Despite the
depression of 1929, Bohemian sur
vived the financial hazards of the
period.
Though the rapid development of
the Bohemian organization, including
the Acme Breweries, made business
history, it clung to an old-fashioned
and substantial code of ethics. It was
a general distributor of beverages.
Merely to sell goods to a customer
was not enough; the company was
equally concerned in merchandising
their products and placing them in
the hands of the ultimate consumer.
It helped in that by wisely counselling
its dealers and by obtaining adequate
advertising for the products it repre
sented. This same policy persists to
day as a high priority policy of the v
corporation and represents an exten
sion of the personalities of its partner-
founders.
J. S. Foto, who besides being
President of Bohemian is also Vice
President of the Acme Brewing Com
pany and President of the White Rock
Bottlers' Company of Los Angeles,
still finds time to occupy himself with
matters of civic interest. During
World War II, he served as Board
Director of the American Red Cross.
Bohemian's modern office building in the Vernon industrial district of Los Angeles
was completed in 1940 and is the nucleus for the company s marketing and dis
tribution facilities throughout the Far Southwest. The present Acme Brewery, now
Kgreatly enlargedappears in the distance
S. FOTO
Bohemian's co-founder and President
FRANK VITALE
Bohemian's co-founder and General Mgr.
