The Fruit Company

We at The Fruit Company wanted to just take a minute and wish you all and your families a wonderful fall.  As the leaves start to dance off the trees and the colors change, enjoy the time shared with loved ones and friends as we enter into a festive time of year filled with the lighting of the fireplace, hot chocolate and the sprinkling of rain.

The Fruit Company has designated every Friday as “Fruit Friday” – a time when local customers and visitors can purchase world-renowned orchard fresh fruit at favorable discounted prices.

The fruit is of higher quality than can be typically found at the grocer’s, but is available because it does not meet The Fruit Company’s extremely stringent gift grade. Excess inventories of gourmet goodies are also on hand for purchase.

On Friday, June 1st, The Fruit Company is holding a one-time Warehouse Extravaganza – to be held from 8 am to 10 am and 12 pm to 3 pm – to clear out its spring inventory. Customers may choose from decorative boxes or wicker baskets and fill them with delectable fruit and gourmet treats – all on sale.

According to Scott Webster, CEO of The Fruit Company, “This is a wonderful opportunity for the local community to come visit our gifting facility, where some of the world’s finest fruit gifts are created, and choose their favorite varieties at a very special price.”

To sweeten the offer, the first 50 customers who arrive at the warehouse, located at 2900 Van Horn Drive in Hood River, will receive a decadent box of 36 individually-wrapped Bellows Chocolate Ganache Brownies, absolutely free. Since the Ganache Brownies will be offered on a first come, first served basis, it is essential to arrive early; doors open promptly at 8 am.

Fruit Friday items are for purchase in person at the Hood River location only. Orders are not accepted and items cannot be shipped. Fruit Friday selections change from week to week. So be sure to sign up for The Fruit Company’s emails to keep in-the-know about the following Friday’s choices. To find out more about The Fruit Company visit the website at http://www.thefruitcompany.com.

About The Fruit Company:
The Fruit Company, located in the Hood River Valley of Oregon, has dedicated itself to delivering the finest orchard fresh fruit and gourmet gifts. The company heritage, spanning three generations, is focused on delivering the best-tasting, healthy items from their vast product offerings. As one of Oregon’s Top 15 growing companies and part of Internet Retailer’s Top 50 “Best of Web”, The Fruit Company continues to impress and amaze with a wide selection of gift items – for all occasions – shipped throughout the United States. Today they are one of the top gift basket companies and employ more than 200 people during their peak season. For more information on The Fruit Company’s gift selections and sustainable practices, please visit their website at http://www.thefruitcompany.com.

Spring in the Hood River Valley means two things: orchards full of delicate blossoms and the inevitable frosts that threaten them. Weather monitoring allows fruit growers to keep a closer eye on the temperature during this time of year, and if at night it dips below freezing alarms will sound and people rush into the orchards to protect the sensitive blooms. For decades the main line of defense was diesel-fueled smudge pots that are placed amongst the trees and used to chase away the cold. In more recent years gigantic fans can also be used to push the rising warm air back to the earth and displace the cold drafts.

Here at The Fruit Company we are proud to that our orchard operation has gone entirely propane with our smudge pots. Instead of adding to the diesel pollutants in the air we are now burning propane gas, which is drastically better for our environment.

Pollination is also incredibly important during the blooming season. Honeybee hives are placed in the orchards in order to pollinate the blossoms and ensure a bountiful crop in the autumn. Many blocks of pear trees have crabapple trees interspersed throughout as they are more attractive to the bees and it prevents them from straying and seeking other flowers in the vicinity. Once the honeybees are done pollinating an orchard their hives are moved to another orchard to continue to process, oftentimes with many different fruit growers sharing the same bees in a season.

Besides propane smudge pots and natural pollination, we are also utilizing a new innovative planting style in our orchard operations that will not only increase fruit production but also improve the safety for all employees working in the orchards and conserve land use in our beautiful Hood River Valley.

Bing cherries hang from branches, their dark merlot skin glimmering outwards towards the dirt road.  They are ready to be picked.  It’s a week later than expected but harvest will come; the Bings are ready, the Bings are ready.  For Orchard Manager Eric Shrum, the sight of a thriving Bing crop should be cause for celebration, but it isn’t.  He’s not ready to relax.  There will be time for that when all the cherries have been picked, but until then, there’s work to do.

Eric Shrum works for Orchard View Farms in The Dalles, Oregon, where he manages some 2100 acres of cherries.  With the help of over 400 employees during harvest, it’s Mr. Shrum’s job to make sure that Orchard View Farms and their 12 varieties of cherries turn out to be the best of the season.

The job would seem impossible.   And if not impossible, impossible to do well.  But listening to Mr. Shrum talk about his cherries, you would think he was a home gardener checking daily on a lone cherry tree in his back yard, urging it to grow night and day. Read more

With the 30^th anniversary of the eruption of Mt. St. Helens, we take a look back at the event and remember it like we do every year: in awe.  If you’ve seen photos or been to the mountain, you know that the eruption of 1980 was astonishing.  In fact, it’s hard not to consider pieces of the eruption (photos taken mid-blast, the plume of smoke, the collapsing north face) beautiful.

Unfortunately, the area was devastated from the eruption, landslides and lahars that spread some 230 square miles.

Thirty years later, things aren’t so bleak.  Mt. St. Helens is recovering and the surrounding wild life is in the early stages of returning to its once striking form.  Take a look at NASA’s collection of satellite images from the past 30 years, and note the spread of vegetation.  It’s incredible. Read more

When we talk about volcanoes, we talk about giants.  Sleeping Giants.

We knew that as kids.  Others called them volcanoes but really, they were always giants.  We learned their parts: the magma, the rock, the pressure and release.  We learned, to our disappointment, that most were dormant, or worse, inactive.  And then we learned about the 1980 Mt. St. Helens eruption.  It was the kind of thing we’d been waiting for, something even we couldn’t have made up.

It started with an earthquake on March 18^th—a tiny glimmer of life after 123 years of hibernation.  More would follow.   Avalanches crashed down the mountain side as earthquakes grew in size and frequency.  Inside the volcano, magma was swelling. Read more

I’ll admit it, I have both loved and hated Hood River. I’ve been here so long, since birth actually, that I feel like a part of its history.  I remember when partial lengths of the main road leading up town had no sidewalks.  I remember when our first McDonalds moved in down on the port and when there was nothing but fields in what is now the west end of town.  As I grew up in The Hood River Valley I just dimly remember the slow change from a child, happy and unconcerned, to a smothered teenager, antsy to get away and see the world.  I itched to get away from the all too familiar faces and sleepy streets.  There was more…something better out there, right?

In the years since high school I’ve left and come back, left and come back, and now back again, I’ve yet again found new love for this now not so sleepy town.  Since the golden age (everyone gets to refer to their childhood as the golden age) the sidewalks have all been paved, the windsurfers have moved in and the world of tourism has discovered us.  And yet, today I discovered that even with two McDonalds, a Taco Bell, Diary Queen, Wal-Mart and two, yes two, grocery stores we have not stumbled too far from our small town roots. Read more

The Fruit Company CEO, Scott Webster, will be speaking Monday, May 10, at 6:30 pm for the Farmlife speaking event focusing on Thinking outside the Barn.  Be sure to join the community as we hear multiple speakers discuss new ideas and strategies that are outside the scope of the farm.

Thinking Outside the “Barn”
Adding Value to Farms & Farm Products

An apple is an apple is an apple—right? Not anymore. Grocery stores operate with buzzwords and price differences. And farmers find new ways to compete by specializing in organic or artisan goods or by exploring ways to process raw goods into “new” options or simply by using marketing and the global economy to expand sales. What are the economic and ethical risks and rewards faced by farmers? What should consumers know about “value-added agriculture”? Representatives from local agribusinesses and the Gorge Grown Food Network will share their experiences and their plans for the future.

Speakers: Gary Willis & Don Stevens, Gorge Delights; Scott Webster, The Fruit Company; Representative, Gorge Grown Food Network

Exciting news for the local Columbia Gorge area! The National Endowment for the Humanities will be presenting an exhibit honoring farming and the farm families for their contribution to the past, present, and future of the industry.  This wonderful experience will be presented at the Hood River County History Museum starting March 25 running through June 20. Read more