In this time of pineapple gluts, the transportation method plays a crucial role in the satisfaction of retailers and consumer, for it directly affects the quality of the produce.
Luca Bernardini works for the 2M Exotic Fruits company which markets the Anana’ brand, “The advent of the so-called fast-ships surely represented an innovation. However, one must take into account not only the travelling time but also the distance to the harbours and the different Custom Clearance practices. To recap, pineapples get to retailers within 16-20 days from the harvesting.
2M Exotic Fruits is specialised in exotic fruits (avocado, mango, pitaya, papaya, etc). The pineapple is produced in the Dominican Republic. This country is very well connected from a logistics standpoint - also thanks to tourism and the numerous daily charter flights. “There is only one way to deliver a perfectly ripe pineapple: air transportation”. In this manner, the specialist can deliver the fruit within only 48-72 hours from the harvesting.
Costa Rica, Panama and the Dominican Republic farm the same pineapple variety. Once the goods are loaded on the plane, the principal airports are in Spain and Italy. In any case, the fruit can be shipped globally.
By managing the shipments in this way, the organoleptic characteristics remains extremely good because of the longer ripening time on the plants. It is impossible to achieve this through any means of transportation different than planes.
Even though the air transportation affects the price of the produce (usually twice as much higher than the ship transportation), the customers are extremely happy – also because the produce targets those high-spending customers.
“Usually, our pineapples are harvested between Friday and Saturday. They arrive in Italy on that same Saturday and the next Monday they are delivered to retail outlets. Times are really short as if the customer ate the produce directly on the field!”.
The company holds the GlobalGAP certification. The business is looking for an international partnership with clients and distributors for supplying national and international markets.
