Apeel and Nature's Pride Team Up to Tackle Food Waste in Europe
THE NETHERLANDS AND CALIFORNIA, USA - Apeel Sciences has been making headlines ever since its avocados starting rolling out at Costco and Harps. No stranger to the spotlight, the company has once again made heads turn with its latest partnership. Apeel’s plant-derived food waste prevention tech will soon be integrated into Nature’s Pride avocado value chain, which will bring Apeel Avocados—avocados with double the edible shelf life—to European households for the first time.
“Food waste is a massive global problem and with a strategic leader like Nature’s Pride, we can look to a future where there’s much less waste in the system, and we can advance sustainability together with benefits to everyone in the supply chain,” said James Rogers, Chief Executive Officer and Founder of Apeel Sciences. “Nature’s Pride and Apeel have the same vision for a future where our food systems operate more harmoniously with nature, and we couldn’t be more thrilled to work with them to take the food waste fight to Europe very soon.”
According to a press release, the partnership comes at a time when food waste in Europe has reached 88 million tons annually and builds on Apeel’s successful introduction in the U.S., where the technology demonstrated more than 50% food waste reduction at the retail level. As part of the partnership, Nature’s Pride and Apeel Sciences will introduce a co-branded label, a signal to consumers of quality, sustainability, longer lasting freshness, and less food waste, made possible by Apeel’s technology.
“We put the health of people and the environment at the heart of all we do. We are constantly looking for improvements in our value chain to provide our customers with the highest quality and most tasty products. With Apeel, we share the same values: we are both pioneering and passionate about reducing food waste, and we want to work collaboratively with others to solve this problem. This makes Apeel the ideal strategic partner for us. We look forward to reducing food waste, unlocking new value for everybody in the supply chain, and growing the fruit and vegetable business with all of our partners together.” said Adriëlle Dankier, Chief Commercial Officer of Nature’s Pride.
Avocado pilots are expected to start mid-year in select retail stores in Europe, subject to EU regulatory approval, and both companies are excited to offer European customers and consumers Apeel Avocados.
In support of Apeel’s expansion to meet demand domestically and around the world, Apeel Sciences has expanded the team. The press release noted that this supports the company's efforts and relationships with its fresh food suppliers and buyers.
Mike Tucker will be joining Apeel as Team Leader of Buyer Relations. His role will be to oversee the group who will work with retailers and wholesalers to grow existing Apeel programs and introduce new Apeel products to the market. Tucker’s most recent role was as Retail Category Manager with Sakata Seed. He also has over a decade’s worth of buy-side experience with Target.
Chayla Balko joins Apeel as a Senior Account Executive on the Buyer Relations team. She brings over 15 years of experience in the food and beverage industry, working with retailers to build winning sales strategies. She gained her strong business development and industry knowledge from her most recent roles with Golden Sun Marketing as its Business Development Manager and The Oppenheimer Group as its Business Development Representative and Key Account Manager.
Michele Visser is returning to the produce industry as the Director of Supplier Relations for Apeel. She will work closely with the grower-supplier community to implement joint go-to market strategies that unlock the value of Apeel. She most recently served as the Vice President of Sales for Aplos Software, and she brings a keen understanding of how to support grower-packer-shippers in their successful adaptation of new systems and technologies from her time as a Senior Account Manager for Famous Software.
Congratulations to Apeel on this new partnership and to its new team members!
