It wasn't a simple choice, but it's one Ryan McKenna is happy to have made. The 23-year-old gave up his study of medicine at Trinity College in Dublin, Ireland, to come home this summer to Prince Edward Island, Canada, and join the business founded by his grandfather and great-uncle. McKenna Bros. Ltd. in Cardigan, Prince Edward Island, is a distributor-shipper of potatoes and seed potatoes. Mr. McKenna became an official, full-time member of the company's sales department in July. "I had been teetering back and forth, trying to make a decision," said Mr. McKenna, who graduated from the

What do the Atlanta Zoo, an all-female triathlon in Boston, the NASA campus in Houston and Seattle's Microsoft cafeteria have in common? These diverse locales, and about 400 grocery stores in between, all enjoyed energizing visits from the Zespri kiwifruit Power UP team in July and August. "Power UP," Zespri's 10-city promotional campaign, brought branded vehicles, local marketing experts, New Zealand kiwifruit growers, retailers and thousands of consumers together in a mobile celebration of Zespri kiwifruit's excellent taste and nutrition merits. "When kiwifruit was named as a superfood in Dr

It's official. Mushroom prices are down and so are mushroom supplies. The National Statistics Service of the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Agricultural Statistics Board released its annual study Aug. 16 on U.S. mushroom production and prices. NASS figures show that 2005-06 mushroom sales were 843 million pounds, down 1 percent from both the 2004-05 and 2003- 04 seasons. The 843-million-pound total marks the nation's "lowest level since 1998, confirming how seriously increased production costs have affected the mushroom industry," a NASS press release stated. The average price for fresh

SPRECKELS, CA -- Some eight years or so after the idea first gathered steam to build a facility that would house cooling, shipping, business and administrative operations all under one roof, D'Arrigo Bros. Co. of California has realized its dream. On Tuesday, Aug. 22, the company held a ribbon-cutting ceremony to mark the opening of its soon-to-be headquarters. The first shipments from the facility actually took place the day before when a shipment was sent to New York City to family facility D'Arrigo Bros. Co. of New York and another to Boston to D'Arrigo Bros. Co. of Massachusetts. Family

FRESNO, CA -- Ed Beckman, president of the California Tomato Commission, and a delegation of several growers and shippers of California tomatoes recently went on a trade mission to Japan, the second one this year. The mission proved to be productive in expanding opportunities for California tomatoes in the Japanese marketplace, according to Mr. Beckman. In an interview with The Produce News Aug. 15 after returning from the previous week's trip, Mr. Beckman was very upbeat about the prospects for increased trade with Japan, including strong possibilities of getting California tomatoes into

California tomato packer-shipper Gonzales Packing Co. in Gonzales, CA, has filed a lawsuit against the California Tomato Commission and its president claiming that the commission is unconstitutional and that Chief Executive Officer Ed Beckman has misappropriated funds. A.G. Kawamura, secretary of the California Department of Food & Agriculture, is also named in the lawsuit for failing to carry out his oversight duties. The tomato firm has been withholding its assessments for the past year in what a spokesperson said was its effort to gather information on the commission's expenditures. Melanie