Ace’s Organic Produce: Explained

August 6, 2020

Happy August! It’s been a minute since we published a post detailing the goings-on in our produce department, so we thought we’d give you an update. Read on to learn about Ace’s produce selection and procurement process, how we’ve adapted as a result of COVID-19, and why our offerings are so dang special. Enjoy!

Our Produce Philosophy

Here at Ace, we take a lot of pride in keeping all of the produce our customers need in stock each and every day. How is this different than other produce distributors? you may be wondering. Well…

First off, in the early days of Ace’s produce department, we began by supplying food to restaurants instead of retailers. While wholesale retailers are more forgiving, restaurants need to have the exact ingredients they order each and every day. (You can’t make Butternut Squash Ravioli without butternut squash, after all!)

In order to provide our customers with a wide array of fruits and veggies, we prioritize direct buying, in which the food travels from the farmer ? Ace ? the customer.

This short supply chain allows us to obtain just-harvested produce at the lowest price, engage with farms whose values align with ours, negotiate with them so we can get the best deal, and make sure we are providing our customers with the freshest produce on the market. It’s a win-win for everyone!

Fruits & Veggies in a COVID-19 World

Ace’s produce selection has changed quite a bit as a result of the pandemic. Although many of our customers initially shuttered when COVID-19 hit, the demand for produce is actually quite high right now. This is mostly due to a lot of non-traditional customers—think farmers’ markets, buying clubs, independent food retailers, and home delivery services—cropping up to fill the void when restaurants closed.

As a result, the produce we supply has changed to more consumer-friendly goods. For instance, the demand for kale has gone down but the desire for grapes, clamshell salads, and satsuma oranges is higher than it was before. We’ve enjoyed the challenge of finding innovative and creative ways to meet our customers’ needs.

Our Partners

All of Ace’s produce is still 100% organic, obtained from farms we’re proud to work with, and sourced as locally as possible. These days, the majority of our local produce comes from Row by Row Farm, Hepworth Farms, and Marolda Farms. At the request of our customers, we’ve also been sourcing microgreens from Wessels’ Farms.

Because we know that getting good, affordable produce year-round is important, we sometimes have to look outside of the tri-state area for fruits and veggies. In those instances, we primarily work with New Sprout Farms in North Carolina, Organic Valley in Wisconsin, and Oregon’s Bridges Organic Produce, which supplies us with apples, pears, onions, and potatoes.

When it comes to international fruits and veggies, we source from Peru’s La Grama, which is the largest distributor of organic Peruvian ginger. We also work with Green Explosion, a Colombia-based grower known for distributing extremely fresh and competitively priced herbs. We’re proud to partner with all of the farms listed above—businesses producing fresh, delicious, high-quality produce.

Well, we hope this post has demystified Ace’s produce procurement process a bit. There are a lot of plans for expansion in the works and we hope you’ll stick around for the ride. From all of us at Ace: Enjoy the rest of the summer and its bounty!