02/23/07 Absolutely Pears

Absolutely Pears. I'm Greg Martin with today's Fruit Grower Report. A number of food and beverage companies are starting to take notice of the specialty fruit market and are beginning to utilize these fruit flavors in their products. Even some out of the ordinary companies have introduced new products featuring specialty fruits. The Absolut Spirit Company and Grey Goose Vodka have announced new pear flavored vodkas and Kevin Moffitt of USA Pears is excited about the announcement. MOFFITT: It's raising the awareness of pears, it's making pears hip in a way among a young audience and lastly they're actually promoting pears as a garnish. So even on the Absolut web site there's two pear drinks and they say garnish with pears&a slice of pear. So it is increasing consumption and purchase of pears in a very new and unique way. Moffitt says it's been difficult to reach that young adult aged market. MOFFITT: There's a lot of resurgence as you say in more of the younger population which is probably a big demographic that isn't consuming fresh fruit and pears, this is a way to introduce them to our product in a very obscure, strange (way) and we're not promoting alcohol consumption or anything like that but if pears can be used as a garnish in a non-alcoholic drink or slushy or whatever, it's a way to introduce the product to a new audience. USA Pears has a number of pear recipes on their website. That's today's Fruit Grower Report. I'm Greg Martin on the Northwest Ag Information Network.