The Produce Marketing Association Foundation for Industry Talent took advantage of Leap Day by announcing that it will be leaping into its milestone 10th anniversary this year by launching a new name, website, logo and an even stronger commitment to the industry’s greatest asset — its people.

“As we looked at this milestone of our 10th anniversary, we realized the need to sit down, reflect and rebrand,” Leonardi Batti, PMA Foundation chair-elect and president of Taylor Farms Florida, told The Produce News, adding that the Leap Day timing of the announcement was deliberate.

In an effort to revitalize its purpose and mission to encourage more young people to get involved in the fresh produce industry, the PMA Foundation’s Board of Directors have developed a “deep-dive” strategic plan, which led to the rebranding of PMA Foundation as the Center for Growing Talent by PMA.

“We are evolving into the Center for Growing Talent by PMA to better communicate to our industry what we can do for them,” said Dick Spezzano, board chairman for the Center for Growing Talent by PMA and president of Spezzano Consulting Service Inc. “The new name also emphasizes that the strong relationship with PMA continues.”

As part of its overall rebranding efforts, the Center for Growing Talent by PMA is scaling up its “Attract” strategy by increasing its reach to more universities and students; calibrating its “Develop” strategy so that its leadership programs meet the mission and are suitable; and defining its “Retain” strategy by positioning itself to help companies better understand what it takes to keep and advance the right employees.

“Simply put, that means we are pushing the organization to a new level to meet our industry’s ever-growing demands for talent, and to respond to competitive forces that are threatening our industry’s ability to retain our essential people,” said Jim Leimkuhler, the organization’s immediate past chair and Progressive Produce president. “We listened carefully, and are leaning into our industry’s most important priorities — for today and tomorrow.”

The Center for Growing Talent by PMA can now be found online at www.GrowingTalentbyPMA.org. It is also launching a social media campaign, called the “10 for Talent” challenge, to draw more attention to its revamped brand, and collect donations to help support its mission.

“On the occasion of this group’s 10th anniversary, we are inviting industry members to demonstrate their energy and commitment to talent, both for our industry and for their companies,” said PMA President Cathy Burns. “Our ’10 for Talent’ challenge is a fun and social media-oriented fundraising effort that calls on 10,000 industry members to give $10 each to the Center for Growing Talent by PMA, to fun and accelerate our important work.”

Participants can simply contribute $10 online at www.GrowingTalentbypma.org/give10 or text 10forTalent to 41444. The organization is encouraging people to have fun with the challenge by sporting some orange (the Center for Growing Talent by PMA’s official color) and posting photos to your social media channels, showing that you participated. Photos can be shared on Facebook and LinkedIn; and submitted at www.GrowingTalentbypma.org/10-for-talent for a chance to win a free registration to one of its programs, including PMA Fresh Summit and the Emerging Leaders Program. You can also tweet using the hashtag #10forTalent.

“We are incredibly proud of how far we’ve come in only 10 years, but we aren’t the kind of people to celebrate our anniversary by just sitting back and eating cake,” said Margi Prueitt, executive director for the Center for Growing Talent by PMA. “We’re refreshing our brand, clarifying our messaging, and are ready to meet our industry’s growing talent needs for the next 10 years and beyond.”