La India Packing Company

Duane's take

Here's my telling of what the official marker has to say, right there in Laredo, Webb County, Texas. Now, some stories start with a grand building, a famous name, a ribbon-cutting ceremony with dignitaries in tall hats. This one starts with a family home. 1924.

Two Mexico natives, husband and wife Antonio and Antonia Rodriguez, opened La India Packing Company right out of their own house in Laredo. That's where it began. A kitchen, a family, and a mission.

The Mexican Revolution had been pushing people north, and Laredo's Hispanic community was growing. Antonio set about serving that community the way it deserved to be served. Mexican chocolate.

Medicinal herbs. Spices. Kitchen staples.

The flavors that connect a people to their home when home is a long way off. Business grew the way good things do, quietly at first, then all at once. The family purchased a small frame home on Marcella Avenue to use as a storefront.

And when that wasn't enough, they added a brick building to the operation, giving them the room they needed to expand their line of spice blends, the kind that could put a traditional Mexican dish on your table in a fraction of the time. Now here's where the story turns. In the 1990s, La India Packing Company was sold to daughter-in-law Maria Guadalupe Caudillo de Rodriguez, born in 1932 and gone from this world in 2008.

Under her continuing family management, the company updated their logo, developed additional spice blends, and published a bilingual book on traditional herbs. They expanded the product line to reach flavors from diverse cultures. The company wasn't just preserving one table's worth of memory anymore.

It was setting a bigger table. In 2000, La India Packing Company expanded again, this time to include a cafe. Five years later, in 2005, the company was recognized as a Southwest Certified National Minority Supplier.

Their products spread to stores throughout south Texas, with international shipping available to carry those flavors wherever in the world someone might be waiting for them. A family home on the Texas-Mexico border, 1924. A brick building, a storefront, a cafe, a bilingual book, and shelves across south Texas and beyond.

La India Packing Company started with Antonio and Antonia Rodriguez tryin' to preserve something worth keeping. Turns out, the rest of the world was hungry for exactly that.

What the marker says

La India Packing Company is a family owned and operated supplier of herbs, spices, and Mexican chocolate. The company has served as an integral part of Laredo’s Hispanic community while offering buyers the unique flavors of Mexican and south Texas cuisine. In 1924, Mexico natives and husband and wife Antonio and Antonia Rodriguez opened La India Packing Company in Laredo out of their family home. Aimed at preserving Mexican cuisine and supplying the city’s growing Hispanic population brought on by the Mexican Revolution, Antonio began selling Mexican chocolate, medicinal herbs, spices, and kitchen staples. As business grew, the family purchased a small frame home on Marcella Avenue to serve as a storefront. A brick building was later added to provide additional space to accommodate their growing product line of spice blends that produced traditional Mexican dishes in a fraction of the time. In the 1990s, La India Packing Company was sold to daughter-in-law Maria Guadalupe (Caudillo) de Rodriguez (1932-2008). Under continuing family management, the company updated their logo, developed additional spice blends, published a bilingual book on traditional herbs, and expanded their product line to include flavors from diverse cultures. In 2000, the company expanded once again to include a cafe. In 2005, La India Packing Company was recognized as a Southwest Certified National Minority Supplier. The company’s products are available in stores throughout south Texas with international shipping available. La India Packing Company has preserved Hispanic culture and introduced traditional Mexican and south Texas cuisine to audiences worldwide. (2023)