Fustest with the Freshest

When California fruit & vegetable farmers decided to try shipping by air to the East Coast, they needed a man who understood both marketing and aviation. They got such a man in 42-year-old Ralph Myers, produce farmer and private flyer of Salinas, Calif., who delights in flamboyant frontier clothes and his nickname "Cocky."

Last week, after an eight-month test (30 planeloads), Cocky Myers reported back to the United Fresh Fruit & Vegetable Association what he had found out.

His most important discovery: U.S. housewives will cheerfully pay more to get fresher, tastier food. When prices were up to only 10-c- a lb. more than train-shipped produce (OPA granted special ceilings), consumers gladly paid the difference. When the differential was greater, sales resistance developed. But the airborne foods often sold anyway. Examples: airborne grapes sold for 44-c- a lb. v. 27-c- for groundshipped. One surprising drawback: "experienced" shoppers, used to the appearance of days-old, rail-shipped products, often refused to buy fresh airborne lettuce because it looked "too green."

Is there a great new source of profits for airlines and farms in air shipments? No, said Cocky Myers, not at present air rates. At the lowest air freight rate to date for scheduled air routes, 26-c- per ton mile, Myers found only a "meager volume" of perishables could be shipped. But, he added hopefully, rates could be reduced sufficiently by specially designed freight planes, including insulation, to boost volume. Would this be done? Cocky Myers bluntly warned West Coasters that they had better see that it is done. Said he: "We must revolutionize our methods [or] it will be an invitation to the quick freezers and dehydrators to take over all or part of our perishable business."

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