On Dec. 16, the first breakbulk shipment of Chilean winter fruit arrived in the United States at the port of Wilmington, DE. The shipment marked the sixth consecutive season for the arrival at the port. Prior to this shipment, only blueberries and cherries from Chile were in the U.S. market.

Karen Brux, managing director for the Chilean Fresh Fruit Association, based in San Carlos, CA, said that with the first West Coast containers were scheduled to arrive by the end of December, which would add Chilean grapes and stone fruit to the U.S. market in January.Karen Brux

The CFFA is not only creative, but highly aggressive and effective in its promotional initiatives. It introduces new programs and projects every year, and this year is no exception.

“To launch the season, the CFFA will be using creative marketing elements that encourage retail promotions, motivate shopper purchases and expand our penetration at the retail level,” Brux explained. “This is, of course, in addition to our existing customized marketing support, which we offer to importers, wholesalers and retailers across the U.S. and Canada.”

The CFFA’s customized programs include point-of-sale materials to support retail chains in their broad-based “Taste of Chile” promotions.

“These materials merchandise the large spectrum of fruits available from Chile during the winter months,” Brux pointed out. “The best way for retailers to pull consumer attention to Chilean fruit is by creating large attractive displays and giving shoppers reasons to purchase it.”

Short, catchy recipe videos are a new tool for the CFFA. Brux said the organization has produced two videos for blueberries, but it intends to produce a broad range encompassing stone fruit and grapes.

“In a minute or less, consumers can learn how to make a tasty, convenient and nutritious recipe with Chilean fruit,” she said. “We plan to utilize these on our Facebook page and also provide them to retailers for their social media platforms.”

The organization is also developing numerous new creative, fun and easy usage ideas. Brux noted that many of them, like the image of sparkly grape Easter eggs, are connected to a specific season or holiday, so are perfect for social media.

Other exciting news is that CFFA is celebrating its first-ever season launch for Fruits from Chile in the Ontario Food Terminal, and it has hired its first Canadian-based merchandiser in 2015.

“Her name is Susanne Bertolas, and this is the first year she’ll be with us for the entire Chilean fruit season,” said Brux. “On Friday, Jan. 15, we’ll be kicking off the Chilean fruit season in Toronto with an early morning event at the Ontario Food Terminal.”

The terminal is the largest wholesale fruit and produce distribution center in Canada, distributing over 2 billion pounds of produce annually and servicing 5,000 registered buyers.

“The size and power of the independent retail market is enormous, and this is the market that services them,” Brux stressed.

“We’re also partnering with the Ontario Produce Marketing Association and sponsoring its website, http://producemadesimple.ca, for a total of three weeks: one for blueberries, one for grapes and one for stone fruit,” she noted. “Numerous usage ideas and visuals, as well as other relevant product information, will be featured.”

CFFA is now involved with a new foodservice program being launched by the Culinary Institute of America titled “Appetites + Innovation; a National Leadership Collaborative for Retail Foodservice.” The program will take place at the CIA’s Napa campus in Greystone, CA, Jan. 18-20.

“The CFFA is one of a few select sponsor organizations,” said Brux. “The program will be attended by 30 to 35 senior culinary and business leaders in all sectors of foodservice and retail, and includes representatives of many of the nation’s top supermarket chains. We will be presenting creative and on-trend usage ideas for Chilean fruit, and hopefully inspiring stronger sales of Chilean fruit beyond the produce department.”

And there is still more. For the third consecutive year, the CFFA will offer its highly successful The Great Grape Giveaway promotion to retailers across the nation.

“Produce managers simply display either our point-of-sale or custom point-of-sale materials that they develop, take a picture and email it to us,” explained Brux. “We then send them a code, they go online, enter the code and are instantly awarded anywhere between $25 and $100. We’ve had hundreds of stores participate each year because it’s easy and fun. For us, it’s been very effective in generating large, gorgeous displays of Chilean fruit.”

The CFFA will also run a blueberry promotion on Facebook during the month of January and a grape promotion in February.

“In addition to cross promoting with other products, utilizing retail social media channels has been an incredibly effective means of communication for the CFFA and its associated blueberry, cherry and citrus committees,” said Brux. “We have a wide and diverse range of beautiful photography, usage ideas and even videos from Chilean orchards that retailers can share with their customers to help bring the story of Chilean fruit to life. We also support numerous small retail social media promotions for Chilean fruit, giving away everything from store gift certificates to Nutribullets, or even lemonade stands during the summer.”