NEW VARIETIES OFFER MORE CHOICES

Within the next decade, Mexican growers plan to introduce new varieties, which will offer shoppers and retail produce merchandisers more variety — and choices.

“Like with what happened to apples and stone fruit, there will be some point where we will have a category within a category of mangos,” says Ronnie Cohen, principal with Vision Import Group LLC, Hackensack, NJ. Cohen points to the peach category, which offers yellow, white, southern, California and doughnut peaches. “There will be different sizes and shapes of mangos,” he says. “Because of its logistics and where it’s positioned, Mexico stands the best chance. Once the growers figure out which varieties grow and thrive and then make some investment, if they hit it right, they will do very well.”

Some of the new varieties being planted include Malik and Nam doc mai. The growers expect production to increase in the next two-to-three years. “It’s the taste, the look, the smell,” says Daniel Ibarra Lugo, president of Splendid By Porvenir LLC, based in South San Francisco, CA.

The varieties will be marketed as specialties, to appeal to people from different ethnicities who grew up with mangos. “People who come from different countries are remembering the taste,” he says. “They find the mangos they buy don’t taste like the varieties they want them to taste like. Different ethnic groups consume mangos differently. They’re trying to get more customers in the different ethnic groups.”

Mangos help bring a late Winter and early Spring fruit into shoppers’ consciousness. “When you think of what other fruit comes into the market in the Spring, there’s not a lot of early fruit you can promote in March and April,” says Chris Ciruli, chief operating officer of Ciruli Brothers LLC, Nogales, AZ. “To get new fruit in the marketplace, mangos are one of the things that retailers can really feature early on.”