At an Indianapolis institutional food service trade show that year, John Marten met Fred Luker.

However, other family members did not believe that the traditional Sexton customer would be interested in frozen foods since the capital required for restaurants to install freezers and refrigerators was large.

This policy shift created a huge demand from the national school lunch program for portion control meat items.

Central Soya exchanged 150,000 shares of stock for all Fred's Frozen Foods assets, brands, operating equipment, personnel and $7 million outstanding debt.

In 1971, Central Soya added a west coast Fred's Frozen Foods distribution warehouse and manufacturing plant in Riverside, California.

[4] In 1982, Fred's Frozen Foods introduced their first mass-produced breaded mozzarella cheese stick for the foodservice industry.

[6] On January 24, 1986, International Multifoods Corporation of Minneapolis, Minnesota announce that it had entered into an agreement to purchase Fred's Frozen Foods and Centre Brands from Central Soya for $73 million.

In March 1994, The Doskocil Company, a maker of pizza toppings and other meat products, agreed to purchase from International Mulifoods Corp the Frozen Specialty Foods Division for $135 million.

The brands acquired with the purchase of the division included Fred's Frozen Foods, Rotanelli's, Posada, and Little Juan's.

In 1999, Foodbrands America, Inc. dba Specialty Brands, LP of Ontario, California registered Fred's for Starters trademark to reflect the new focus of Fred's Frozen Foods to be the leading foodservice provider of prepared appetizers, namely, breaded and battered vegetables, breaded and battered cheese sticks, onion rings, steak nuggets, meat and seafood based prepared appetizers, namely, crab Rangoon, pot stickers and chicken shu mai.

In April 2002, Tyson announced it had entered into an agreement to sell Foodbrands America, Inc (including Fred's for Starters) to Windsor Quality Food Company, LTD.