A new brand of California-grown easy peeler is set to challenge the dominance of Sun Pacific’s Cuties label is US produce aisles. Produced by Paramount Citrus, Wonderful Halos clementines and mandarins were launched last November and are being backed by a five-year, US$100m marketing campaign.
Paramount’s owners Roll Global – the company behind the POM Wonderful pomegranate juice brand – said the first phase of the campaign, featured marketing and TV ads playing across the country to coincide with the main production season. Availability will run through to April, with output expected to double in the next five years.
The launch of Wonderful Halos comes on the heels of the disintegration of Paramount’s partnership with Sun Pacific. Paramount sold the Cuties trademark to its former partner for an undisclosed sum in May 2013.
Fruit is packed at a US$220m facility in the San Joaquin valley that has the capacity to handle 800,000 bags of fruit, or 19m mandarins, each day. This season, it will process the country’s largest mandarin harvest.
The easy peeler category has grown rapidly in the US since their introduction in the 1990s. So far this season, the category has grown by an estimated 33 per cent, with sales of Wonderful Halo reportedly on a par with Cuties.
Paramount has partnered with Fresno, California-based Fowler Packing to market the brand. Between them, the two companies handle 65 per cent of the state’s mandarin crop. Paramount is now looking for third-party growers to supplement its 5,700ha of mandarin production.
