Technology that measures sweetness will reward Driscoll’s growers
Watsonville, Calif.-based Driscoll’s has announced a partnership with the Israel-based technology solutions company Consumer Physics to leverage its SCiO technology to innovate Driscoll’s quality measurement process.
The Near Infrared (NIR) technology and breakthrough design offered through the Consumer Physics SCiO Cup will allow Driscoll’s to measure the brix, or sweetness of its berries, more effectively, according to the release. The technology enables Driscoll’s Quality Rewards System, which measures berry quality and rewards the firm’s high-performing independent growers.
“We are constantly looking for ways to improve the flavor of our berries,” Brie Reiter Smith, Driscoll’s director of quality systems design and technology, supply chain, said in the release. “Investing in technology that ensures more flavor consistency within our proprietary berry varieties is important to our continued efforts to elevate our berry consumers’ experience. Partnering with Consumer Physics was an easy decision. Their impressive and novel brix measurement device allows us to reward the independent growers across our network who provide the ripest and best tasting berries.”
The release said the Consumer Physics SCiO Cup supports cloud-based software to deliver lab-grade analyses to mobile devices in second. An entire clamshell of strawberries is able to fit in each SCiO Cup and be scanned at one time, according to the release. That eliminates the need for inspectors to select which berries to measure for Brix. For raspberries, blackberries and blueberries, the release said more than two six-ounce clamshells can be measured in a single reading.
Driscoll’s will begin integrating SCiO Cup devices within its quality measurement process this month in the U.S., Mexico and Canada, according to the release. By the end of 2021, Driscoll’s will rely exclusively on the SCiO Cup device for Brix measurements in the approximately two million quality inspections conducted annually in North America.
“We are excited to see our technology adopted by Driscoll’s,” Damian Goldring, co-founder and chief technology officer at Consumer Physics, said in the release. “It fits perfectly with Driscoll’s innovative use case. The SCiO Cup delivers within seconds, accurate, consistent and non-destructive Brix analysis in berries. We have been developing this solution closely with Driscoll’s over the past couple of years and already see additional opportunities to implement this solution across the Driscoll’s supply chain in the future.”
The release said the firm’s Quality Rewards System was developed to further reward independent growers that harvest the ripest, most attractive fruit while meeting key quality elements of freshness.
Driscoll’s independent growers are rewarded based on their ripeness performance relative to growers with the same crop in the same geography, according to the release.
The Consumer Physics technology directly supports the program by enabling the non-destructive measure of degrees brix, according to the release.
