Produce Retail
Columnist Armand Lobato recalls how a temporary head lettuce shortage took on a more dire presentation in a news report.
The company promotes Sebastian Carmona and Kristina Lorusso to vice president roles, focusing on international development and retail partner services.
Cart Assistant instantly transforms photos of handwritten lists or screenshots of recipes into a fully populated digital grocery basket, specifically optimized for store availability and a shopper’s favorites.
Some argue that soft openings help stores address problems before the spotlight of the grand opening, but there’s only one real opportunity to showcase things at their best, especially in produce.
By leveraging benefit-led education and celebrity influencers, mushroom suppliers are rebranding both staples and specialty varieties as approachable, everyday ingredients that boost brain health and enhance traditional meat dishes.
Aldi’s disciplined value model shows how clear positioning, tight assortments and affordable staples can help shoppers reach 30 plants a week without overspending.
A Circana webinar details that even as economic strain modifies grocery behavior, produce remains a cross-income staple, with value-driven households fueling much of the category’s recent growth.
I Love Produce expands its specialty produce platform with the acquisitions of Garlic King and Canada Garlic, strengthening operations, leadership and long-term growth under its “Growing Together” philosophy.
Fresh Del Monte recently showed retailers how an AI-powered robot can help inspire produce gift-giving for the holiday as well as every day, based on trials at three Chicago-area Jewel stores.
U.S. Sen. Ben Ray Luján introduces the Stop Price Gouging in Grocery Stores Act. State lawmakers across the country are working to protect family grocery bills and ban electronic shelf labels.
The rollout includes nearly 200 stores in California and Nevada, while Upside says its national platform reaches more than 35 million consumers.
In Week 2 of “The 30 Different Plants Per Week Challenge, Retail Edition,” simple meal-prep habits and Hy-Vee’s usage-focused produce guidance show how plant variety becomes sustainable when it’s built into foods shoppers already know and love.
Most new store openings get fouled up with wasted, neglected product and labor when overzealous orders block coolers, hallways and prep areas. Here are tips for better orders and plan execution.
Greg Foran brings four decades of global operational expertise to sharpen Kroger’s digital edge and store-level execution.
Melissa’s Produce says it is providing retailers with customizable product mixes and marketing tools to engage both core Asian shoppers and curious mainstream consumers.
Backed by double-digit growth and a feature on MarthaStewart.com, Frieda’s Branded Produce says its winter citrus program helps retailers convert health-conscious shoppers into loyal category buyers.
Certified health coach Hunter Stoler explains how adding more fruits and vegetables can support heart health while remaining affordable and approachable for everyday shoppers.
Produce and retail companies like Avocados From Mexico and Instacart are utilizing celebrity endorsements for Super Bowl LX to prove that even grocery staples can be marketed with the same level of spectacle and technological innovation as the world’s biggest tech brands.
The grocer is transforming its produce departments into competitive arenas this month, blending artistic grocery displays with high-stakes teamwork.
In the “It’s Not Magic. It’s Mushrooms.” campaign, the Emmy-winning chef headlines the commodity board’s 2026 campaign to keep mushrooms on the mind as the ultimate no-fuss, flavor-packed staple.
For Equifruit, which is marking 20 years in the fair trade banana business this year, the April 5 baseline tariff of 10% the Trump administration imposed on nearly all countries slowed the momentum it had been building in the category for two decades.
Amid a Midwest snowstorm, the 30 Different Plants Per Week Challenge, Retail Edition, begins with a lesson in resilience, highlighting how diverse merchandising and flavor-focused signage can turn a routine grocery run into a hunt for plant variety.
Proper and organized signing should be as important as ordering, rotation and sanitation, otherwise it can cost you time, labor hours and sales.
A new clinical study suggests eating the equivalent of one cup of blueberries a day could help reduce symptoms of depression and anxiety, highlighting the growing link between diet and mental health.
The Packer’s retail editor Jill Dutton launches a new weekly column exploring the science and strategy of the 30-plants challenge, bridging the gap between personal nutrition and professional retail insights. This piece introduces the series and explains the “why” behind writing a column that turns a personal quest to eat more plants into actionable data for the produce industry.
The Traverse City, Mich.-based cooperative of 30 grower-owners around the world has rebranded in what it calls a “transformative move” to underscore the importance of its farmers.
Stater Bros. Markets is expanding its partnership with Afresh to link store-level demand directly to warehouse buying, a move Afresh CEO Matt Schwartz explains will replace manual guesswork with a unified AI “brain” built specifically for the volatility of fresh food.
Naturipe Farms has become one of the first avocado packing houses in Mexico to earn the Pro-Forest certification, using satellite mapping to verify deforestation-free production and meet the growing demand for transparent, sustainably sourced produce from major retailers.
Amazon is shuttering its Amazon Fresh and Amazon Go physical locations to focus resources on a major expansion of Whole Foods Market and its rapidly growing same-day grocery delivery service.
Driven by breakthrough varietal innovations from leaders like Wish Farms and Naturipe, and supported by record-breaking retail data from the California Strawberry Commission, the berry category is entering 2026 as a $500 million growth engine for the produce department.