Produce buyers: They're the holy grail for anyone trying to get their fresh fruit or vegetable sold on a commercial scale. With the right strategy, retail, foodservice, wholesale and even nonprofit organization buyers can make your business soar.
But you have to understand what they want and need, and then give it to them.
So, knowing what makes a produce buyer tick is critical — not like the eye-twitch they get when they're highly stressed, a possibly common state of mind when their delivered loads are late, short or otherwise horribly wrong.
To answer some of these questions, we did interviews at trade shows, on Zoom, by phone and email. Our PMG staff conducted buyer research, plus we created a Produce Buying Fundamentals module in Produce EDU, our new professional education and training platform.
The supplier relationship
Yes, we know it's all about relationships. That takes time. But how to start forming one?
When making contact in whatever way, don't do this: cold call, said Tim Graas, executive director of produce at Kansas City, Kan.-based Associated Wholesale Grocers and a longtime produce buyer.
Do your research first. Make sure your product fits the customer.
“I want suppliers to know our business better, what our members and consumers want,” Graas said. “They need to be more personal.”
Take the professional training course, Produce Buying Fundamentals, Level 1, on ProduceEdu.com.
Good numbers are necessary, but they have to like working with you.
“It's not all about data. It's about trust. And if you make a mistake, own up to it because memory is long,” said Scott Horner, owner of EMP Everything Matters Produce Inc., Hartford, Conn., where he consults, brokers and merchandises for produce businesses. He also was a Sysco-FreshPoint produce specialist and broker and Best Market perishable supervisor.
Invigorating category by category requires in-depth conversation to understand: the produce available, quantity, time of year, how to time the best value and new varieties being grown, said Steve Patt of Tourtellot and Co., Warwick, R.I. He has worked for or with independent grocers for nearly 50 years.
Negotiating
Produce buyers often feel like stockbrokers. They can be pressured to price items higher to meet gross profit targets, but that can slow down sales and the whole supply chain, resulting in a product not as fresh as it could be, said produce retail expert Armand Lobato.
“You want to be as aggressive as you can and have as low a gross profit percentage as you can stand because you'll be turning that inventory quickly and ultimately you take more money to the bank,” Lobato said.
For buyers without a say in how their purchases are priced, being aware of the strategy can help when there's a chance to chime in with ideas to move more product.
Newer buyers have a lot to learn about varieties, USDA grading and specifications — all of which can hold negotiating power.
Accomplished buyers are already well-versed in the product lines and know what the going rates are, Patt said.
Much of their negotiation leverage has more to do with how much volume they move, how regular a customer they are to the shipper, how attractive their terms are, how quickly their company pays its bills and how flexible they are when things get a little sticky.
Worries
Like many buyers, Lori Hoadley, senior operations coordinator for Brighter Bites, worries about being shorted. She buys produce for 18 schools in Austin, Texas, which amounts to about 1,500 families each week, and about 2.5 pounds of eight to 12 types of produce per family. She has to change up her products each week to introduce her customers to new fruits and vegetables, so they'll later become loyal produce consumers.
“Especially with logistics issues, the wiser I can be with my budget and purchasing, the more families we can feed," Hoadley said.
Hoadley still knows she has to pay for quality, so freshness — and correct timing to achieve it — are also key.
“We want families to open up their boxes or bags and say, ‘Wow, look at this eggplant. It's beautiful,'” she said. “We want them to be delighted and buy it again, even after their Brighter Bites program has ended.”
Phillippe Rousseau, produce buyer and manager at Dearborn Fresh Supermarket, Dearborn, Mich., said buyers want to know the seasonality of produce based on each region to help with the timing of their orders.
Mike Downey, director of Military Produce Group's produce procurement and business development, said it helps him to know growing area locations and timing for each seasonal transition, especially for vegetables, tomatoes and berries.
Suppliers can help by sharing general market conditions: weather impacts, yield issues, field or crop diseases, the most current supply and demand outlooks, as well as longer-term supply outlooks.
Because produce is so perishable and unpredictable, buyers can't plan ads six weeks out. They have to work a week to 10 days in advance, Patt said.
Competing
Buyers have to be aware about what happens after their produce is in-store to compete with other retailers.
They may look for ways their stores can share the grower's story to meet consumer wants. They're thinking of how to highlight local farms and local seasonality. Eddie Avila, produce director of Super King Markets, La Canada Flintridge, Calif., said it helps that most of their produce buyers were previously produce managers, bringing that knowledge to the role.
Still, buyers need to work with current produce managers to understand merchandising's effect on sales. They need to understand the perishability times and storage conditions for different kinds of produce, and how fast promotions move product.
Sure, price is top of mind for buyers, but they're also looking at price in the context of value. If you can provide a superior product for 10 cents more a pound, you're providing value to that buyer.
Buyers want to do better than they've done in the past, so they need to sit down with grower-shippers and wholesalers and find out what to put in the ad that's breaking in 10 days by asking: "What's new? What's exciting? What can be of value?”
Oh, those late trucks
Buyers have to plan for the inevitable: late trucks. They can create plan Bs, and they can also get savvy at avoiding the scenario sometimes, said Lobato, with 40-plus years of logistics experience.
First — and this is a biggie — buyers are looking for reliable transportation. Ha! Sounds like an oxymoron these days, and it's often not their fault. But buyers need communication, and lots of it, so they can adjust plans accordingly.
Some buyers hand the order off to a broker, give it to someone who handles logistics internally or they set up and dispatch the truck themselves, Lobato said.
Buyers want trucking companies that are regular produce haulers with paperwork in order, well-maintained trucks and experienced produce drivers who communicate well.
To avoid or manage issues, buyers may need to know if the product is early, peak or end-of-season. They need to know if the quality and other packing specifications are intact, and if supplies are plentiful or tight, Lobato said.
For on-time deliveries, they also have to consider precooling, cross-docking or fumigation. When the truck is late, a buyer has to know where to turn to cover with short buys locally or how best to prorate on-hand inventory to the stores.
When a quality control inspector rejects a load, that's another huge headache for a buyer.
Make it easier on buyers
In this labor market, there could be more unseasoned buyers navigating a steep learning curve. Provide answers to questions they don't know to ask yet.
And make buying from you easy. Create sales sheets that are easy to read and understand, said Danielle Magnus, co-founder of food brand Plant-ish, delivered and sold at retail in Westchester County, NY.
“A supplier sent us their catalog, and it was this huge PDF with all these coded columns. I'd have to have a different degree to read it correctly. It was the least user-friendly sales sheet,” she said.
And it all comes back to a supplier relationship with good communication and trust.
“Recently, I received the wrong version of what I ordered, and I could text my sales rep to tell him, and he told me he'll take it off my bill, don't worry about it,” Magnus said.
“I love great customer service.”