INDUSTRY NEWS

The Mixim Packaging System from Sambrailo Packaging, Watsonville, Calif., is a modular system with a common foot pattern that allows varying sizes of cartons and inter-packs to be mixed by layer on the same pallet. More than 10 sizes of cartons, clamshells and mesh baskets provide shipping flexibility. Another benefit of the system is the Mixim clamshell's tunnel-flo ventilation, which reportedly allows the fruit to cool down 20% faster and stay that way, with next to no condensation.

Dole Fresh Vegetables, Salinas, Calif., begins a three-month consumer continuity program featuring a Walt Disney Records mail-in offer for Classic Disney CDs on Dole Classic Iceberg and Greener Selection salad bags. The salad bags will be flagged with a silhouette of Mickey Mouse and sales support will include POS cards for the produce department encouraging consumers to collect all four volumes of CDs.

Tri-Valley Growers, San Ramon, Calif., introduces its S&W Fine Foods brand line called Growers Private Reserve for the produce department. Packed in traditional glass Mason jars and displayed on a grower's cart with a rack for recipes, the line consists of yellow cling peach slices, and apricot halves, packed in a light syrup, enriched with vitamin C and natural fruit flavor. Each has about 90 calories per serving.

Mann Packing Co., Salinas, Calif., has received the Golden Shopping Cart of the Year award for its sugar snap peas. The annual award, from the authors of "Supermarket Sampler," columnists Carolyn Wyman and Bonnie Tandy Leblang, honors the best new food products introduced into U.S. supermarkets.

Keeping fruits and vegetables fresh longer is what most consumers want, according to a recent survey, and they would buy more produce if they didn't have to worry that it would spoil in the fridge before they could eat it. To the rescue comes Green's Extra Life, Englewood, Colo., with a cartridge that reportedly lasts for three months in each refrigerator bin. It contains oxidizing agents that rid the fridge of built-up ethylene gas, which makes produce ripen too quickly.