Florence Farms Update

Visited Florence Farm today, WOW the products are coming along and should be ready in a couple weeks. We have some squash blossoms now!!

Locally grown specialty produce from Peddler's Son and Florence Farms

Local, specialty and fresh. Those are some of the words we've been hearing a lot about lately from our customers. Peddler's Son Produce is happy to announce our partnership with Florence Farms. Peddler’s Son will be the exclusive distributor of specialty produce grown right here, in Arizona.

This partnership is branded under the label of Band of Bros. According to Ted Palmisano, 'We feel that this partnership is like an extension the Peddler's Son family. Band of Bros. was a way for us to include all of the folks involved.'

The initial crop will start small with a few items available in a couple of weeks. This will include:

Basil
Icicle Radishes
Baby Green and Yellow Patty Pan Squash
Baby Zucchini
Baby Scallopini
Baby French Carrots
French Breakfast Carrots
Baby Carrots of all colors.  

Future items will be ready for the fall harvest. For more information regarding our partnership, call your sales executive or 602 253 3577.

Melons

Cantaloupe: Product is extremely limited and will remain that way over the next two weeks. The Central American fruit is finishing up
quickly after rain from last week. This looks to be the last week for any availability. Mexican product is now crossing into Nogales, sizing is running small but quality is good. The desert melons will not start until May 17 at the earliest.
Honeydew: Very limited supplies of offshore product as shippers finish up in Honduras and Guatemala for the season. The west coast is all but done with Central American product. Nogales is receiving more supplies of Mexican fruit with good quality and sugars. The desert product is set to start with Cantaloupe the 3rd week of May.
Watermelon: Better supplies on seedless product with seeded watermelon in light supply. Prices are still at the bottom. The mini seedless are in better supply and quality is good, the market is flat.

Hot Dogs

Check out the video. Peddler's Son Produce is the proud supplier of Cloverdale products in Arizona. Ask for a sample of these fantastic products, including the Hot Dog.

Sustainability

There are 10 definitions in dictionary.com for sustainability and probably a different definition for each individual on what it means to them. We have been hearing a lot about sustainability practices from partners and others in the community and have been working on what it means to us.

Peddler's Son Produce has made a commitment to continuously improve the community we serve through sustainable practices. Our '3 P's - People, Partner/Products and Planet' outlines this commitment. We will promote a safe and healthy atmosphere where we value and recognize our employees, source vendors that provide our customer with products that are inherently more sustainable and reduce our own ecological footprint.

One of the programs we started this year was a cardboard recycling program. Produce comes in cardboard boxes and we sell a lot of produce! So, it made sense for us to purchase a cardboard baler. Already this year, it has saved us a significant amount of costs by reducing the number of times we need to have the dumpster emptied. We have recycled over 13 bales of cardboard year-to-date. That works out to approximately a bale per 7 10 days or over 13,000 pounds of cardboard that will be reused instead of taking up space in a landfill!

It's amazing what small changes can add up to and we're excited to learn more about ways we can do to help make our community around us a better place to live.

Do you have a sustainability program? What suggestions do you have?

Phoenix Children's Hospital & Peddler's Son Produce

Peddler's Son Produce was a proud In-Kind sponsor of the Phoenix Children's Hospital and Kohl's Healthy Kids and Families. The program encourages children 6-12 in over 50 schools valley-wide to walk or jog 25.2 miles during the school year. We donated over 1,000 apples to the participants.

Family and children have always been priorities in my life and I try to support programs that have the same goals. We have supported the Phoenix Children's Hospital for about 8 years and have enjoyed serving on their board.

Look for me on the golf course at the Phoenix Children's Hospital Brennan's 24th Annual Charity Golf Tournament on May 8th at the Gainey Ranch Golf Club at 6:45 and register here.

We're going green for more than just St Patrick's Day!

Green is not only the color of the day and for our lettuce, Peddler's Son is going green!

Our '3 P's - People, Partner/Products and Planet' is our commitment to continuously improve the community we serve through sustainable practices. We'll be focusing on these areas in the coming year and will highlight some of the programs here in the blog.

Our fearless leader, Ted, has been working with APS' Green Choice program 'Solutions for Business'. APS has approved Trade Allies that help businesses learn about the energy efficiency programs and incentives available to them. Last week Jim, from ATS Electric, Inc.- an APS Trade Ally, toured the warehouse and has come back with a plan for us to replace all of our fluorescent lighting with CFL. This will be the first phase of our energy reduction plan with programs for our coolers and motion detector lights in the near future.

We want to thank Jim for all of his help and friendly attitude and we're excited about moving forward with his suggestions to help reduce our energy use.

What plans or programs have you implemented? Do you have suggestions on partners or learnings along the way? We'd love to hear from you!