Dollar Tree is shuttering 1,000 stores in the coming years, though approximately 600 Family Dollar store closures will come in the first half of fiscal 2024. Of the remaining 400 stores, 30 closures will be Dollar Tree with the balance being more Family Dollar locations.

The stores closing after the first half of 2024 will shut down at the end of each store’s current lease term.

It started in a small conference room about 10 years ago and has grown into a can’t-miss event and Southern Exposure — such is the Power of Produce. This year the Power of Produce 2024 session played to a packed ballroom; once again presented and moderated brilliantly by Anne-Marie Roerink, principal and founder of 210 Analytics, and Rick Stein, vice president of fresh foods at FMI.

Mastronardi Produce's berry division has joined the coveted Sekoya blueberry platform in a strategic move to elevate its blueberry offering. A retailer favorite, Sekoya varieties are renowned for their exceptional firmness, sweet flavor, jumbo size and extended shelf life.

Mother Nature continues to impact supplies and quality out west as the last in a series of storm systems look to pass to the north of Central California and exit to the east today. As this system passes to the north, Southern California and the desert regions are bracing for another strong wind event. Sustained 20-35 mile-per-hour winds with gusts up to 45 miles per hour are expected across the southwestern desert region into Friday. High pressure returns early next week with rapidly warming temperatures in the desert regions.

Titan Farms announced a strategic collaboration with the Borquez family, bringing early access to the market with the first peaches harvested in the Northern Hemisphere. This innovative partnership will lengthen Titan Farms' peach season and offer consumers a wider range of high-quality peaches.

When a kid from Eastern Kansas settles in relatively nearby Northwest Arkansas, it would not appear to be a bridge too far. But when that path winds through California, Arizona, Belgium, Panama, Costa Rica, Honduras, Portugal and Florida, it speaks of a journey of much greater depth.

Laura Himes did grow up in the shadows of the University of Kansas in Lawrence, KS. “I am a Jayhawk,” she boasted, no doubt channeling the schools perennially top tier basketball program. But she added the affiliation is by proximity, not education.