Think of it as designer lettuce. A round leaf that fits a hamburger bun with no waste, with bright green frilly edges nearly full circle extending beyond the edges of the bread, a thin mid-rib, a little crunch throughout the leaf, and a sweet flavor, without the bitterness found in some lettuces. These are, according to Rick Russo, director of foodservice and customer solutions at Mann Packing Co. Inc. in Salinas, CA, characteristics of a new lettuce variety exclusive to the company and introduced to the foodservice trade late last fall under the trademark name “Better Burger Leaf.”

Mann Packing’s ‘Better Burger Leaf’ fills the bill and fits the bun.They are, in fact, characteristics that customers have been asking for, and since the product’s introduction last year, demand has outstripped production, Russo said. “It has been very, very well accepted by the industry. The growth rate has been phenomenal to the point that right now we have been trying to keep up with our acreage plantings. We are actually in a little snafu right now, where we have had to halt [sales] growth to wait for our acreage increases to catch up,” which, he said, should be accomplished when fields now planted come into production in August.

Basic Burger Leaf is “a hybrid variety that has characteristics of both green leaf and also iceberg lettuce,” Russo said. “We produce that in our whole leaf value-added format, where we de-leaf the product, wash it, and pack the product ready to use in whole leaves.”

The company has been doing green leaf, Romaine and red leaf whole-leaf products “for a while now,” he said. “It is fair to say we are the industry leader in those whole-leaf-type products, and over the last several years we have had a lot of inquiries from customers” who would come to the company’s field trials or visit on field tours, expressing “a desire to have a leaf that was more round-shed,” versus the typically elongated leaves of Romaine or green leaf lettuce — something that would fit better on a sandwich.

Mann Packing does a lot of trial work with seed companies, and in the process has opportunity to see many of the new varieties developed by the seed companies in their breeding programs, he said. In the course of those activities, “we came across this variety … that resonated with us,” as it seemed to have characteristics customers had inquired about.

Leaf shape had not been a specific criterion the seed companies had been looking for in their breeding program, but “it just happened to fit,” Russo continued. “It came out of a line of other products, similar varieties, where the common trait among these varieties was the lettuce was typically non-heading,” which facilities production of the whole leaf product. “We are actually using some similar varieties in our Arcadian Harvest line, which is a totally different product line, more of a salad product line. But this one we felt met this particular request that we had received from different customers” for a sandwich application.

Mann Packing trialed the round-leaf variety for about 18 months “to see how it performed” through all growing areas, Russo said. In the process, the varieties other desirable traits, in addition to shape, became evident. One of those was the consistent green color “from the outer leaves all the way to the inner leaves,” so the lettuce on every sandwich “is always going to have that nice bright green color.”

Mann Packing “worked out an agreement with the seed company, where we have exclusivity on the variety, with some options for the next several years, and it is working out really well, except that [demand] has grown faster than we anticipated,” he said. “We made a dedicated carton for it, and we made it’s own logo” so there is “a lot of marketing” behind it.

The company has planted additional acreage aggressively and will soon be “back on track” and able to accommodate “what we see as pretty rapid growth,” Russo said.

Some of the business for Better Burger Leaves has “displaced some of the other products we have,” he said. But “in some cases, it is brand-new business for us. We’ve got some major chains that are testing it and taking a look at it also.”