Washington Mint Blender Wins Limited Green Light in FTZ 216

FTZ News: The Foreign-Trade Zones Board has cleared Essex Laboratories to blend mint oils inside FTZ 216, but only under tight caps on foreign feedstock. The Port of Olympia filed the notification in February. On November 5 the Board said no further review was needed and authorized the activity on a limited basis.

Foreign-status peppermint oil is capped at one-fifth the volume of U.S.-origin *Mentha piperita* oil that Essex sources in a given year. Spearmint is limited to 45,000 kilograms annually and Mentha arvensis to 4,000 kilograms. Essex has one year to file a single sourcing report. If it fails to provide the report, the Board is to review the authorization for importing those components.

The Northwest still grows most of America’s mint oil. Idaho, Washington and Oregon account for the bulk of peppermint and spearmint output. U.S. peppermint production ran about 2.47 million pounds in 2025; spearmint about 1.61 million. Acreage has shrunk over the past decade as cheaper imported oil and synthetic alternatives took share, and Verticillium wilt keeps hitting yields. Most of the oil ends up in gum, toothpaste and candy.

Blending under zone procedures lets a firm defer or avoid duties on the imported fraction while it mixes and re-exports. Essex has long worked the Pacific Northwest crop and is tied into the larger flavor house dsm-firmenich. The quantitative limits tie foreign peppermint intake to domestic purchases and keep the other two oils small. The limits appear designed to protect domestic growers from competition with larger volumes of imported oil. Whether more oil actually moves through the Chehalis plant, or the main effect is simply cheaper blending for one company, will be clearer once Essex files the sourcing numbers the Board required./.