The Pear Bureau Northwest plans to launch a new consumer advertising and public relations campaign designed to engage and educate consumers, supplying them with vital need-to-know information on pear ripening and recipe usage. "Fun, eye-catching ads will appear in print and digital versions of Cooking Light, Food Network Magazine, Every Day with Rachael Ray Magazine, Bon Appetit and more," Director of Communications Cristie Mather told The Produce News. "In addition, online ads for USA Pears will appear on a vast network of food and lifestyle websites."

Idaho Falls, ID-based Kingston Cross Dock & Cold Storage announced Brian Osborne as its new warehouse and operations manager on July 1.

Osborne brings over 30 years of experience in cold storage, operations, and logistics to his new position, where he will focus on daily operations and adding to the level of customer service offered to KCD’s growing customer list.

Organic produce continues to be an excellent growth segment for The Nunes Co., based in Salinas, CA, and its Foxy brand of vegetables.

Sales Manager Doug Classen told The Produce News that the newest additions to the line are red and green cabbage.

“We now offer all of our core items in both conventional and organic packs,” he said.   “Our goal is to give our customers a choice in all the items that we offer.”

A newly completed cooling facility at Columbine Vineyards in Delano, CA, “measures in at 204,200 square feet, roughly 3.5 times the size of an American football field, and can store 750,000 boxes of produce when full,” according to a company press release.

Peru made its first avocado shipments to the United States late in the season of 2011 with small volume, and volume has climbed each year since. This year is the first that Peru is exporting what could be considered a large volume of avocados to the United States, according to Xavier Equihua, chief executive officer of the Peruvian Avocado Commission.

With the season in full swing, Equihua said July 22 that he expects Peru to ship around 115 million pounds of avocados to the United States during the period from late May to early September.

With a shorter crop this year than in 2013, the California avocado industry anticipated an earlier finish to the shipping season, with heavy volumes well into August but declining the latter part of the month and only moderate availability thereafter.

Due to the lighter supplies and the earlier finish, the California Avocado Commission will not carry its promotional activities as late into the season this year as it did in 2013, but those efforts will continue through Labor Day.