The best time of year in agribusiness? Harvest time.
Our produce team gathered early at the produce warehouse — our director, the three buyers, me and another retail supervisor. We sat around this conference table in our biweekly meetings, systematically going over the usual: last week’s ad performance, this week’s ad outlook and the next couple week’s anticipated ad list.
This was along with a set list of what was going on in our 66-store chain, in regard to other business: competition checks, pricing updates and so much more. We got more done by 9 a.m. than most businesses accomplished all day.
Something that was brought up one morning was a letter sent from Oneonta, one of our Washington state apple shippers. Our apple buyer, John, said the shipper was offering to have someone from our staff travel to see the apple harvest up close as part of a tour. I asked John if he was going.
“Me?” His eyes narrowed as he took a long drag on his cigarette. “If you’ve seen one packing line, you’ve seen ’em all.”
Our director glanced down the table. “Anyone else interested?” he said. I couldn’t believe it. I’d been in the produce business since I was a teenager in high school, a blue-collar kid who never ventured very far. I held back any outward reaction, but inside I was doing handsprings and jumping up and down and thinking, “A trip? A buying trip? To see the Washington apple harvest? Woo-woo! Pick me!”
It must have been obvious that I was a raring to go, as our director calmly said, “Settled. We’ll send Armand.” He passed the hard copy invitation to me to read. The rest of the meeting was a blur as I peeked inside the envelope to see more details. It was set for early October.
A real harvest tour. Oh yeah.
“First time to Washington?” asked our Oneonta host, Scott Marboe. I smiled, thinking about a line from the 1986 film “Crocodile Dundee” in which Mick Dundee was asked a similar question and answered, “First time, anywhere!” It was indeed my first buying trip.
At 30, I was the youngest of our group, most of whom were much older and either produce directors or buyers. They regarded me with a wince. “You’re a specialist? A retail supervisor? Ugh, I had that job before. The produce ‘cop’ who has to keep the produce managers in line? No thanks.”
That was all right, I didn’t mind the good-natured banter and enjoyed listening to the experienced group share stories. One was from Sheboygan, Wis.; another from Pittsburgh; a couple guys from New York — “the city,” they reminded everyone.
We were scheduled to fly to Yakima after a brief stay in Seattle, but because of poor weather, we drove instead. The mountains were a lot like my Colorado home state — rugged and beautiful.
The harvest tour came next, and boy, what an experience.
We toured gorgeous rolling hills covered with all varieties of apples. The limbs were so heavy with fruit, the growers had to prop many up with wooden supports. The red delicious trees had an occasional branch of yellow “Winter Banana” variety spliced within so that the bees would have something to cross pollinate.
Even though some of my fellow visitors behaved as if everything were old news to them, I couldn’t get enough of the education.
We learned numerous details about what it took to plan, grow, thin, protect and harvest this bounty. While every state grows apples, the environment is perfect in eastern Washington for booming fruit volume.
Our hosts were so gracious, they showed us how the crop was harvested, all right. More importantly, we saw how the apples (and pears) are put into both short-term refrigerated storage and longer-term CA (or controlled atmosphere) storage and how the technology enables apples to last in the cold, oxygen-reduced storage sheds until many months later, so when these are pulled to pack, they are just as crisp as the day they are harvested.
We saw the cycle of growing, storage, sorting and packing lines, grading — the whole shebang. I still remember Scott (who sadly passed away earlier this year), his boss Paul Thomas (and his line of fine wines), the images of Yakima and of Wenatchee and visiting Lake Chelan. I still envision the theatre of fresh produce and seafood displayed and sold on Seattle’s public market, as well as so much more that I now only recall in treasured fragments. All great memories and the beginning of lifetime relationships. It was the first trip of many to follow in my career.
Harvest tours like this, or any kind, are simply the best education.
The following week, in the next meeting at home, the somewhat petulant apple buyer, John, asked, “So, Armand, how was the Washington apple harvest tour?
I feigned boredom but smiled at my director, Mike Aiton, who knew better. “Ah you know, when you’ve seen one packing line, you’ve seen ’em all.”
Armand Lobato’s more than 50 years of experience in the produce business span a range of foodservice and retail positions. He has written a weekly retail column for nearly two decades.
