Limoneira starting to grow pink lemons with striped skin, pale pink flesh
The agribusiness is capitalizing on the growing interest in speciality citrus and has begun introducing its pink lemons at the major food conventions, getting positive responses from food-service and retail businesses. "There's a trend now. Speciality citrus and niche markets are popular," said John Chamberlain, director of marketing for Limoneira.
Speciality citrus makes up about 10 percent of Limoneira's sales. Pink lemons are the newest citrus variety the company has introduced in years, Chamberlain said.
Although pink lemons were discovered as far back as 1931, according to UC Riverside, the fruit hasn't caught on the way pink grapefruit has. Both contain lycopene, the antioxidant compound that gives produce such as tomatoes their red or orange colour and some citrus a pale pink tint. While the pink lemons look unusual, the fruit tastes only slightly different from yellow lemons, Chamberlain said. A gene mutation provides green stripes on the skin.
Chamberlain said Limoneira began growing them about seven years ago and has planted trees on 45 acres around its Santa Paula property, where it experiments with about 300 citrus varieties. The trees are more sensitive than yellow lemons in how they react to fertilizers, water and other elements and need to be watched more closely, he said.
Nationwide, speciality citrus increased in value in the most recent season, while standard citrus dropped in value. Oranges, grapefruit and lemons each fell in value by double digits during the 2012 to 2013 season, according to the Agriculture Department. The value of tangerines and Mandarins, both speciality varieties, grew 22 percent.
"It's a growing portion — not a big portion, but it is growing," Paul Story said of the speciality citrus market. Story is director of grower services for California Citrus Mutual, a grower-based California industry trade group.
Limoneira will start selling pink lemons commercially in late spring or early summer, Chamberlain said. Consumers may buy the fruit now on the company's website at $3.79 for a pouch of three or four lemons, he said.
To stir up interest in the pink fruit before and for the holidays, Limoneira is promoting it through an international marketing campaign, "Unleash the Natural Power of Lemons." The campaign has a site with recipes but also promotes other lemon uses, such as health, beauty, decorating and cleaning. Pink lemons have their own cocktail and food recipes on social media sites like Pinterest.
"The more you talk about something, the more you get people interested," Chamberlain said.
Source: therepublic.com
