VISITOR TO FRUIT MARKETS

Dominion, Volume 32, Issue 66, 10 December 1938, Page 12

VISITOR TO FRUIT MARKETS

Californian Wholesale Dealer

ASTONISHMENT AT NEW ZEALAND PRICES "You do bare to pay for your fruit 5 over here,” said Mr. Michael Moreno, of Moreno Bros., Inc., Los Angeles, California, a wholesale dealer' in fruit and vegetables, when interviewed yesterday. "It’s a little difficult Io understamh you know. You talk about bounteous New Zealand, but I find your markets full of Californian produce, brought all the way across the Pacific to tills land of plenty. And the prices you pay! “Take these cherries,” said Mr. Moreno, glancing at a display of Greytown cherries in a shop window. “They are what, in price? One shilling, four pence. That would be 32 cents with us. Well, we would sell cherries like that in the season for from six to eight cents a pound. You are strong on our grapes, too. 'Those red grapes for which you pay 24 cents a pound we sell in our shops, right in Los Angeles, for four cents a pound. The white grapes. ‘Thompson's seedlings’ they are called over there, I have sold wholesale for Scents (lid.) a pound; sold them by the car load. They would retail at double that price, 6 cents (3d.) a pound.” Mr. Moreno was an interested visitor to the public markets in Wellington yesterday. The system of selling everything by auction was new to him. There was no such thing in Los Angeles. When the shopkeepers wanted supplies thev went to the firm which they knew could supply them, knowing that the price would sense the state of the market in any particular line. In short, Mr. Moreno said that the price was made by the middleman, based on what he knew to be the state of the market, which price was just as sensitive to fluctuation as' though the produce was sold at auction. The basic difference in the method was that in the United- States the fruit and vegetable dealer or middleman made the price; in New Zealand the retail dealers fixed the price, except in certain lines, such as Californian oranges and lemons, and the Australian oranges, when the prices were fixed by the dealers. Mr. Moreno said That his firm sold cases of oranges (loOs to 170’s) for from a dollar to a dollar and a half (4/- to 6/-) a case. Loose oranges were much cheaper, as were also apples sold loose. Different Handling Methods.

The visitor pointed out that they handled the produce in a different way to that in use in Wellington. After watching the men handle single case lots in stacking, he said that in California tlie trucks were a good deal longer and were fitted at the lower end with clamps, which gripped either side of the lower ease in a stack and so enabled the whole stack of seven or eight cases to be lifted at the one time. All the fruit was packed in standard size boxes which were left open at tlie top; there were just two lugs or grips on the case for handling, but as the stacks were even the fruit did not suffer and could be seen by everyone at once. Besides, it saved a lot of timber. Then they no longer used sacks for the conveyance of such vegetables as cabbages, cauliflower, lettuce, peas, carrots, parsnips and others. These goods were all carried in crates, made of wooden slats, so that aeration was ensured, and tlie produce was not so likely to suffer through heating up or sweating. Tn Los Angeles the markets were segregated. There was one for fruit and vegetables and another for (lowers, but in no case were there any sales by auction. One feature of tlie life in'California was the number of wayside fruit and flower stores out on tlie country roads. People witli cars would go for a 20 or 30-mile drive out of town and, seeing something cheaper than it could be obtained in the city, would come back with supplies for the week. Preparation of Asparagus. Mr. Moreno thought it rather odd that better prices were brought for solid thick-stemmed asparagus than for tlie long, green-stemmed sorts on sale yesterday. He picked uj> one of tlie thick wbite-stennned bundles, and said that; in Los Angeles lie could not sell that sort at all. They all went for tlie long, tender, green stalks. It was tlie green part, of the stem that counted —green stems and perfect tips represented quality in asjiarugus. Then? was a new way of marketing asparagus now in tlie United Stales. That was to get bundles of green asparagus, with good tips, press them gently together ami freeze them in solid' squares. That was really Hie ideal way to buy them, for tlie package was frozen hard enough to keep solid till taken home, when it was either placed in the cooler or slijiped at once into tlie boiler, if required for Hie evening meal.