Columbia Marketing International and grower McDougall & Sons are excited about the completion of the new packing and storage facility at Baker Flats just outside of Wenatchee, WA. “The vision behind this new CMI facility was simple: to make packing more efficient which, in return, would offer immeasurable benefits for all of CMI’s customers,” said Katharine Grove, a member of CMI’s marketing team. “This new McDougall facility will offer the flexibility to fill multiple packaging types and to do so quickly and with quality care every step of the way. The mere size of this facility will allow for consolidation of multiple shipments for customers so that trucks can make fewer stops and get the fruit on the shelves as quickly as possible.”

Upon completion, the $8 million facility will occupy a footprint just shy of half a million square feet upon completion. Grove said it was a challenge to find a parcel of land large enough for the build.

The Baker Flats facility will be ready to store and ship fruit this fall. Grove said packinglines will come online in May 2014. “At the closing of phase one, there will be three buildings with 24 rooms and a capacity for 45,000 bins of controlled atmosphere fruit — which equates to 900,000 packed boxes of fruit,” she stated. Eleven loading docks will be available, with four more planed during phase two. “There is space for 30, if needed,” Grove added.

Transportation efficiencies have been incorporated into the design of the facility, and all controlled-atmosphere, quality-controlled storage will be under one roof. “We’ll maintain cold chain from a weather standpoint, not having to haul fruit out into the elements,” she stated.

According to Grove, harvest timing for this year’s crop of apples is a week to 10 days ahead of last season. This translates to good marketplace dovetailing. “That’s a positive with old-crop supplies dwindling at this time,” she observed. “We should get good volumes of apples and pears to market after Labor Day as retailer attention shifts more to these categories.”

CMI markets both conventional and organic apples. “CMI is approximately 15 percent organic versus roughly 7 percent for the Washington apple industry as a whole,” Grove said. Organic product is marketed under the “Daisy Girl” label.

Gala production ramped up around Aug. 15. Other varieties marketed by CMI include Honeycrisp, Golden Delicious, Red Delicious, Fuji, Jonagold, Braeburns and Cameos. “Pink Ladies will be coming along about the third week of October,” Grove said.

CMI also offers the exclusive varieties Ambrosia, Kiku and Kanzi.

She was asked about sizing and quality this season. “Apples will be larger, [with] some varieties a full size larger,” she replied. “The trees were a little more lightly cropped this year as a natural response to being heavily cropped for last year’s record crop. Quality prospects are very good for this year’s crop due to good growing conditions plus a little smaller crop allowing the opportunity for fruit to be harvested in a timely manner.”

Roughly one-third of the company’s overall apple volume is sold to export markets.

This season, CMI plans to introduce a new two-pound high-graphics pouch bags for smaller apples marketed under its “Hero” brand, designed for consumption by children. Varieties available in the brand are Reds, Fujis, Grannies and Galas. “A two-box shipper unit along with p-o-s materials will be available to support this program, plus an interactive online program for the kids to check out,” Grove commented.

Two- and five-box shipper units and pouch bags have also been redesigned for the Ambrosia and Kiku varieties.

“Our complete line of shippers, display units, tote bags and other p-o-s materials is updated and ready to go,” Grove said.