Fruit and Juice Business

I saw this in a mall near our home in the Philippines. The mall has a detached outside area that has food souvenirs shops, restaurants, and a food court. One part of the food court faces into a row of fruit and vegetable shops.

Primarily a Fruit Vendor and Secondarily a Juice and Smoothie Vendor

A couple of the fruit and vegetable shops were also selling fruit juices and smoothies like coconut juice and avocado smoothie. Their juice and smoothie business may be doing well if not getting along as I noticed a constant stream of patrons all the while I was observing them. Take note that this is not the first time I have observed this.

We ourselves never fail to buy from them every time we eat there. Just like us they serve the health conscious people who can only buy soda drinks primarily being sold by the meal shops to wash down their meal. We also at times also buy the fresh fruits which they primarily sell which comes as an afterthought for us once we have already bought their fruit juice.

I think they could also do additional business by doing specialist blends as I see fruits I like to taste as either a juice or a smoothie but they are never offered. The price is much more expensive than soda drinks and a third of the cost of our meal for the standard size but we still buy nevertheless.

That is how much the demand is for these products for people who are so saturated by soda drinks everywhere that there is an innate desire for them to drink something that is healthy if it becomes available. If ever other enterprising people had the same situation I bet they can make money doing the same.

Only Just a Juice and Smoothie Vendor

Incidentally I found a similar situation when I was eating at food courts in Australia. There are also a lot of people who buy from specialist fruit juice vendors. The similarity is that both sell fruit juices and smoothies and both sell fresh products straight out of the fruit. The Australian version is however much fresher as they are not premixed with water and other ingredients before being sold.

This is more expensive to do as each serving has to be made from fresh ingredients all the time. They are also more concentrated in terms of fruit volume and mixing the ingredients together in a blender all the time just adds more cost and time. This is why it is more expensive to operate such shops.

Add to this that these Australian fruit juice vendors do not sell fruit together with their juices. However it is interesting to note that for example one Australian business doing this is operating profitably and has branches in several countries. Boost Juice is the name of the company and you can check online their background especially their profitability.

Mixing Them Together

Just imagine if these companies would sell fresh fruits and juices at the same time. These two products complement each other this is especially true since both products are categorised in the “fresh food” variety. However there are also implications when you mix both products together.

In the Philippine model the buyers are more concerned with the price. The juices are made not to cost a lot otherwise there would not be much of a market for it especially if the cost equates to a meal already. That is why they are sold with more water content than usual and added with sweeteners to give an appealing taste.

The fresh fruit is more expensive on volume sales than the juice. That is why the fruit sellers are primarily selling fresh fruits rather than fruit juices. Compare this with the Australian model where the quality in terms of fruit content is higher and the freshness quality is also higher. They can sell their products at a higher markup which can be a meal already because the customers can pay for quality.

Other Products and Services

Another selling model I have seen is when vendors peel and cut up the fruits and sell them per piece. I have seen for example peeled pineapples being sold and even cut into pieces. Selling pineapples this way is very good as pineapples are notorious for being not only very hard to peel but the pineapple eyes are also notoriously hard to remove.

Going back to my Philippine food court example. The meal vendors there do not sell desserts. They concentrate mainly on meat, seafood and vegetable meals. If their customer would want a dessert after their meal then they are out of luck. These same customers could for example resort to eating peeled and cut pineapples and any other fruit for desserts.

Imagine if you have a fruit stand where you sell fresh pineapple juice, fresh pineapple fruit, peeled pineapple fruit with the pineapple eyes removed. This means that you have 3 products to sell to customers from just one fruit. Add to this that you can make several blends with pineapple like unsweetened natural pineapple, sweetened pineapple and so on. You can even sell a hot pineapple beverage.

We are just speaking about pineapples. But how about fruits that taste well with cream or milk? Take for example bananas. Although there is no income to be had from peeling and cutting services for bananas they can be served besides in juice or smoothie form. You can cut up bananas and use sweet liquids like cream or milk for them to be dipped on.

Cut up bananas, apples and any fruit you can think of and put them in a cup. Pour sweet liquids on them like the previously mentioned items cream and milk. Though the sensation of drinking very cold fruit juices and smoothies is very soothing especially in a hot weather the sensation of biting and chewing something brings itself its own sensation like satiety.

By doing this fresh fruit and fruit juice vendors are now entering the territory of meal vendors. Let us use bananas again as an example. Bananas are fine to eat on their own but imagine instead of dipping them in sweet liquids you for example dab a small quantity of peanut butter on it or a fruit jam.

Expanding it further let us put a banana and peanut butter in a sandwich. You can literally sell this product but you can also sell a much simpler product as a fruit vendor. This is fruit jams as I have previously mentioned. You can also sell pickled fruit especially if you have a lot of leftover fruits and know how to make jams and pickles.

The good thing again with selling these products is that these products are also categorised in the somewhat “fresh” variety. Although these products are already processed they still are not as much processed as the products we see being sold in shops which are almost composed of synthetic processed products. This gives these products a good reputation with consumers.

Conclusion

Fruit vendors can create several products and services from only just using the fruits that they sell. They can sell besides the fruit such products as juices, smoothies, fruit desserts, jams, pickles and so on as well as services such as peeling and cutting fruits into pieces. The important thing to do is to introduce these products and services in limited quantities to find out which ones the customer will buy.