New package nationwide for Queen Bee Honeycrisp™ apples

CMI has announced the national rollout of its new pouch bag line for Queen Bee Honeycrisp™ apples. The new program launched early this fall started as a test but was almost immediately expanded nationally due to strong demand from retailers.

“The CMI Queen Bee Honeycrisp™ project was developed this summer,” said Steve Lutz, Vice President of marketing for CMI. “With a large crop we knew there would be a big opportunity to drive additional Honeycrisp sales. At the same time, our national analysis of scan data results revealed that there was a big retail opportunity to increase dollars by creating options for supermarkets to devote more shelf space to Honeycrisp,” According to Lutz, with only one PLU number, it is difficult for retailers to add Honeycrisp SKU’s except through poly bags. Lutz says poly bags have historically been used to attract a value oriented shopper. “Our research revealed that particularly with Honeycrisp, rather than focus on value there was an opportunity to entice consumers to actually increase transaction size by providing high quality pouch bag packages that better align with the Honeycrisp image.”

With the objective of designing a high quality package, CMI’s marketing team focused on solutions that would ultimately boost supermarket performance by offering new options to accommodate a variety of retail price tiers. The team ultimately developed three new high graphic color packages; a two pound and a three pound pouch for snack-sized fruit, and an industry-first with the two-count package for jumbo fruit.

Queen Bee Honeycrisp Apples™ Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rv-3joSM8ME

For more information:
Katharine Grove
Tel: 509-888-3427
katharineg@cmiapples.com
www.cmiapples.com