In collaboration with Dutch product designer Vacuvin, special packaging has been developed for the corer. The cost of the packaging is € 0.30 each (or € 0.69 including the corer). We are pleased to send samples for your own use. If you are interested, please contact Hanneke Driebergen at このメールアドレスはスパムボットから保護されています。観覧するにはJavaScriptを有効にして下さい

For commercial orders you can contact Ronald van der Ven direct at the Vacuvin office: +31 152626 926 or at このメールアドレスはスパムボットから保護されています。観覧するにはJavaScriptを有効にして下さい

Read more: http://www.vacuvin.com/Salad_Cutter_474.html

Fresh-salads company Florette introduces a new salad category: Belles à Croquer. These mono-products are made possible by using multi-leaf Salanova® types. The little loose leaves present attractively and due to minimal bruising they have a longer shelf life.

With its five factories, a production of 950,000 bags per day and sales in ten European countries, French company Florette is one of the largest vegetable processors in Europe. The fresh-salads company reaffirms this leading position with the introduction of a new salad category: 'Belles à CroquerTM'. Their Laitue Cerise® is 100% Salanova® red butterhead lettuce, and Feuille de chêne noisette® is 100% Salanova® red oakleaf. The bags weigh 100g and the contents consist entirely of whole, small leaves.

3-days-longer shelf life
The 'Belles à Croquer' category is made possible by using Salanova® multi-leaf types. The 3-dimensional loose, small leaves present very attractively and thanks to minimal bruising can be stored for longer; shelf life is prolonged by at least 3 days! The fact that mono-products are popular in France is confirmed by the following data (source: Nielsen): 80% of all ready-to-use salads sold are mono-products. The leafy-salads segment has grown by 18% and the mono-products account for 90% of the growth in the pre-packed salads category.

With its new Sweet ButterTM blended lettuce salad mix, Fresh Express captured the top spot in US supermarket of New product sales during the third quarter in 2006 (source: IRI Retail MarketWatch Report of 2.11.2006). Despite the E.coli spinach crisis, US sales were almost $4.5 million in just eleven weeks. One of the significant ingredients in the Sweet ButterTM blended lettuce salad mix is Salanova®, a totally new generation of multi-leaf lettuce from Dutch breeder Rijk Zwaan.

Remarkable achievement
According to IRI, the launch of Sweet ButterTM was a huge success. The achievement is all the more remarkable in that this Fresh Express Salanova®-based product outperformed major, branded consumer products from companies like PepsiCo Inc., Frito Lay, Campbell Soup Co, Kraft Foods Inc. and Procter & Gamble.

Unique tenderness and texture
The success of this new product is the result of the joint efforts of Fresh Express and Rijk Zwaan to innovate in the fresh-cut category. Fresh Express, since 2006 part of Chiquita Brands LLC and the largest processor in the United States, has been collaborating with Rijk Zwaan for nearly four years now. Fresh Express firstly used Salanova® as important ingredient of the Sweet Baby Greens mix. This new ‘Baby Blend’ was introduced in September 2005.
Jennifer Whittle, Vice President of Innovation by Fresh Express, describes Salanova® as: “A great combination of flavour, texture and quality. This lettuce is unique for its tenderness and refreshing, sweet taste. There is nothing else like it!”

First processable butterhead
Rijk Zwaan’s area manager USA, Wim Grootscholten, agrees. “This Salanova® multi-leaf butterhead lettuce is the first good processable butterhead with a sweet and tender taste which exactly meets the needs of the American consumers. The crisp texture of the leaves gives it a real ‘bite’ and the fantastic colour contrast in the leaves of red Salanova® variety Renoir RZ presents the mix very attractively.”

‘One cut, … ready’ lettuce
Salanova® is one of the newest products of Dutch vegetable breeder Rijk Zwaan. Its goal was to create a totally new salad concept for the convenience market the ‘One cut … ready’ lettuce. After years of research and breeding, Salanova® was born. The Salanova® range consists of various lettuce types which are all easy to prepare. Their uniqueness lies in the many small, ready-to-use leaves once the core has been taken out in one go.
With millions of heads of Salanova® produced per year it is one of the popular lettuce varieties with processors, such as Fresh Express, and increasingly also with consumers all over the world. Salanova® won the award for Best Innovation of 2006 during the last Fruit Logistica trade fair in Berlin.

Traditional lollo and oakleaf lettuce are taken off the shelves, Salanova® with root system still attached are put on. "A very logical development, really," says Edwin Vels, fruit and vegetable category manager at Schuitema. "Continental lettuce types have a low turnover in our C1000 shops so they stay on the shelves for longer, with a certain loss of freshness of the product.

Salanova® with the root system still attached increases shelf life by at least another 3 days. On the Delicious nursery, the red and green multileaf butterhead and multileaf oakleaf lettuce for C1000 are grown hydroponically in gutters. Because no soil is used, the product is perfectly clean. In week 45 (2006) it made its first appearance in a number of shops on a trial basis and in week 46 we organised a promotion: two heads of lettuce plus a free corer. It was a huge success. This is our way of introducing the consumer to the product and so, hopefully, generate repeat purchases. Because it is such an innovative lettuce, the added value of the Salanova® concept does have to be explained.

The price of Salanova® is the same as for ordinary oakleaf lettuce or lollo rossa and promotions might just nudge the consumer into buying Salanova®. By putting Salanova®-with-roots in their shopping basket, everyone can fancy themselves as another Jamie Oliver. The presentation is fantastic; you cannot buy fresher and it looks like a rose. Who wouldn’t want to have something so beautiful in the kitchen?"