Value-added vegetables.

Consumers are showing strong interest in increasing their overall produce consumption and continue to be wowed by the time and work savings offered by pre-cut fruits, vegetables, and salad greens. Most importantly for the future outlook of the produce industry, many more consumers expect to increase rather than decrease their use of pre-cut fruits and vegetables next year. In consumer feedback on expected use of different types of produce, we found twice as many consumers expecting to use more pre-cuts of all kinds as we found expecting to use less. Part of that 2:1 ratio is attributable to the perceived importance of eating more vegetables and fruits of all kinds to stay healthy. But the importance of pre-cuts' time and work savings is best illustrated by the expectations of frozen vegetable use, where the ratio was 1:1 instead of 2:1. In other words, the number of consumers expecting to use more frozen vegetables next year was exactly the same as the percentage expecting to use less.

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Although that sounds wonderful for pre-cuts, there are some problems lurking in the feedback from those consumers who expect to use less. Most of them blamed their plans to use less pre-cuts on quick spoilage experiences. The challenge for the industry is to further upgrade quality, freshness dating, and packaging AND/OR to manage consumer and retailer expectations.

One of the other findings that emerged from our shoppers' comments is the overlap between heavy users of pre-cuts and heavy users of frozen and even canned vegetables. Just as fusion cuisine is mixing ethnic foods and flavors in the same dishes and meals, consumers are fusing their pre-cuts and frozens in the same dishes and meals. Many of our shoppers reported using both pre-cut and frozen vegetables in more than five of their last ten dinners at home!