Tuesday was on my calendar for a meeting on Monday. It had been there since Thursday penciled it in on Friday. I was confusing myself as to who was what-day and what-day was who so I tried to clear …
A Banana Walks Into a Bar…
As part of our celebration of 25 years in business, we are dusting off some of my classic newsletters. Here’s one from 2006 that reveals the inspiration behind The FruitGuys Bananas. It must …
The Balance Needed in Spring
Balance feels like something we need these days. Between wild weather (in California at least) and banking instability, finding balance for farmers, and the ag industry in general has been a bit of a …
A Pixie Celebrates The FruitGuys 25th Anniversary
One day, Pixie Tangerine, better known as Minnie of Who, or Who for short, was enjoying a Thursday, thinking about today being today and not tomorrow or yesterday. As Who was tapping their rind …
Celebrate Black Farmers & Agricultural Inventors
There were nearly a million farms operated by Black farmers around 1920 which the census at the time noted made up about 14% of the total U.S. farms. Today the National Agricultural Statistics Service …
Pliny The Elder’s Last Podcast
Scene: Pliny the Elder’s open atrium podcast studio in Misenum, Bay of Naples, August 24th, 79 CE Pliny E: Welcome listeners & toga wearers. This is again, Gaius Plinius Secundus coming to you …
Those Back-to-Work Butterflies 🏢 🦋
September always makes me feel butterflies of excitement. The change from summer to fall still paints faint memories of me looking for the perfect Trapper Keeper with a velcro flap or of dropping my …
B-eautiful Gifts from The FruitGuys
Editor's Note: The gifts listed below were available for the 2021 holiday season. To see our current gift lineup, click here. This year is flying by and that means that gift season is just around …
Sweet as Ataulfo Honey
When I first heard someone say, “Ataulfo,” I nearly said, “Gesundheit!” The Ataulfo mango is sometimes referred to as the “champagne mango.” And it makes me think of that line from the Van Morrison …
Ode to the Apricot
I have been given a copy of Robert Palter’s The Duchess of Malfi’s Apricots, and Other Literary Fruits. It’s a great reference book if you like those moments of clarity when writers unravel the human …
Coming of Age
I owe the birth of The FruitGuys to the creative power of, well, desperation. It was 1997. My wife, Pia, and I had been married for a year and were living in a small one-bedroom apartment in San …
The Care and Feeding of Kiwis
(Throat clearing) “Excuse me—we have a strict ‘no pets’ policy here.” “I don’t have any pets.” “What do you call that cute, fuzzy brown thing you’re petting?” “A kiwifruit.” (Pause) …
Great Grape
I have to admit that as a kid growing up on the East Coast in the 1970s and ’80s, I didn’t really know what real grapes were. I mean, I knew what they were, but somehow I thought that the two …
Caramelized Bananas
INGREDIENTS One banana Butter PREPARATION Peel the banana and cut in half along the horizontal axis. Heat a skillet large enough for the banana slices, and add a pat of butter. …
POW! Right in the Kisser
Grapefruit will not be ignored. If you dig into one, you are just as likely to get a clownish squirt in the eye as to have your other senses treated to a trumpeter’s storm of fragrance and color. The …
How to Resolve a Customer Crisis
(Reprinted from Chris Mittelstaedt’s column, "Eureka," on Inc.com.) Every business makes mistakes. What you do next is the difference between losing customers forever and gaining lifelong …
The Bank Scam That Hit My Business
Reprinted from Chris Mittelstaedt’s column Eureka on Inc.com FruitGuys founder Chris Mittelstaedt explains how hackers got into his company's bank account--and how not to let it happen to …
Survival Skills Every Entrepreneur Needs
Reprinted from Chris Mittelstaedt’s column Eureka on Inc.com Technology can make your job easier. But when something goes wrong, you need basic business instincts to back you up. Remember the Air …
7 Deadly Management Sins
Reprinted from Chris Mittelstaedt’s column Eureka on Inc.com How to identify--and root out--your worst human instincts before they infect your team. If there's one thing that's consistent across …
GMO Labeling Initiative
The FruitGuys supports California’s Prop 37, the “Right to Know” GMO (genetically modified organism) labeling initiative. This issue is important to Americans everywhere, not just in California. YES …
