California-based Apeel Sciences and Holland-based Nature’s Pride have officially teamed up to offer Apeel avocados — with double the shelf life on average — to European customers. Apeel’s plant-derived coating technology provides produce “a little extra peel” that naturally slows the rate of water loss and oxidation — the primary causes of spoilage — and leads to improved quality, extended shelf life, and transportability without reliance on refrigeration, controlled atmosphere or preservatives.
James Rogers, chief executive officer and founder of Apeel Sciences, and Adriëlle Dankier, chief commercial officer at Nature’s Pride.
Subject to European Union regulatory approval, Nature’s Pride plans to integrate Apeel’s food waste prevention technology across its wide avocado value chain. Nature’s Pride supplies Europe with over 230 unique fruits and vegetables from 59 countries, including ready-to-eat and off-season products.
“We put the health of people and the environment at the heart of all we do,” said Adriëlle Dankier, chief commercial officer at Nature’s Pride. “We are constantly looking for improvements in our value chain to provide our customers with the highest quality and most tasty products. With Apeel, we share the same values — we are both pioneering and passionate about reducing food waste, and we want to work collaboratively with others to solve this problem. This makes Apeel the ideal strategic partner for us. We look forward to reducing food waste, unlocking new value for everybody in the supply chain, and growing the fruit and vegetable business with all of our partners together.”
According to the European Commission’s/Fusions E.U. Project 2016, food waste in Europe has reached 97 million tons annually, with associated costs estimated at 164 billion dollars. Apeel’s formulations applied to produce have demonstrated a greater than 50 percent food waste reduction at the retail level in the U.S.
“Food waste is a massive global problem and with a strategic leader like Nature’s Pride, we can look to a future where there’s much less waste in the system, and we can advance sustainability together with benefits to everyone in the supply chain,” said James Rogers, chief executive officer and founder of Apeel Sciences. “Nature’s Pride and Apeel have the same vision for a future where our food systems operate more harmoniously with nature, and we couldn’t be more thrilled to work with them to take the food waste fight to Europe very soon.”
The first Apeel avocados are expected to roll out mid-year in select European retail stores, subject to E.U. regulatory approval. As part of the partnership, Nature’s Pride and Apeel Sciences will introduce a co-branded label, signaling consumers to the quality, sustainability, longer-lasting freshness, and less food waste made possible by Apeel’s technology.
In order to meet increasing demand both domestically and around the world, Apeel Sciences is expanding its U.S. team to support the company’s relationships with fresh food suppliers and buyers.
Mike Tucker joins Apeel as team leader of buyer relations, overseeing the group who will work with retailers and wholesalers to grow existing Apeel programs and introduce new Apeel products to the market. Tucker’s experience includes his most recent role as category manager at Sakata Seed and over a decade of buy-side experience with Target.
Chayla Balko joins Apeel as a senior account executive on the buyer relations team. She brings over 15 years of experience in the food and beverage industry, working with retailers to build winning sales strategies. Her most recent roles were as business development manager at Golden Sun Marketing and business development representative/key account manager at the Oppenheimer Group.
Michele Visser returns to the produce industry as the director of supplier relations at Apeel, where she will work closely with the grower-supplier community to implement joint go-to-market strategies that unlock value. She most recently served as the vice president of sales at Aplos Software and as a senior account manager at Famous Software.
