HAMMONTON, NJ — Despite very cold weather during the winter and early spring, the 2015 New Jersey spring produce deal seems to be off to a good start, according to Bob Donio, vice president of Frank Donio Inc., here.

“I think things are starting out well,” Donio told The Produce News Thursday morning, May 14. “The produce is looking good, the pricing on this early product — the lettuces, the greens — has been good. And quality has been excellent.”

Because the winter was very cold in many parts of the Northeast, including New Jersey, “We thought we’d be considerably behind,” said Donio. “But the last few weeks have been unseasonably warm, so we’re pretty much on the normal production schedule.”

One exception was asparagus, one of the state’s signature early vegetables. “Asparagus did start out a little late,” Donio said at the company’s office here in the southern part of the state. “But most leafy items caught up and started pretty much close to normal.”

As of mid-May, the company was handling its standard lineup, such as “all the cooking greens, lettuces, herbs and cilantro,” he said. After that, “we’ll segue into the summer vegetables,” [such as] green and yellow squash, beans, cucumbers, peppers and eggplant, right after Memorial Day.”

Blueberries are one of the Garden’s State’s very popular items, and the berries are important to many south Jersey companies, including Frank Donio Inc. While it was still a bit too early for any definitive statements about blueberries, Bob Donio did say, “It looks like a big crop, and it looks like a good crop. This warm weather [recently] was perfect pollination weather. If the weather stays the way it’s been, it should be a good crop — and the quality should be excellent.”

On the personnel front, Wayne Kuehner joined the company on May 11 in the Information Technology Department. He graduated from LaSalle University in 2008 with a bachelor of science degree in management information systems. “That gives us three full-time people for that department,” noted Donio.

Also, Michelle Monaco, who has been with the company since last August, is the company’s first director of human resources. This is her first time in produce; she previously spent five years with EHS Technologies, a defense contractor in Morristown, NJ.

Frank Donio Inc. continues to make improvements and upgrades to its facility. “We’ve made a seven-figure investment in post-harvest cooling equipment for our New Jersey crops to insure the quality of locally grown items,” said company President David Arena. “More specifically, that means a brand new hydrocooler, and a brand new vacuum cooler, which more than doubled our capacity for vacuum cooling. We also increased our forced air cooling to increase capacity and efficiency.”

He concluded, “It’s an important investment to guarantee the quality of our Jersey products. It keeps the ‘fresh’ in Jersey Fresh.