SunSelect tomatoes

British Columbia-based SunSelect Produce has partnered with Danish group Schur Star Systems to bring together snacking vegetables and mason jar-shaped bags.

'SunSelect has secured the exclusive rights to Schur's mason jar bag across several categories in the US, Mexico and Canada,' explained Reinhold Krahn, director at SunSelect. 'Our discussions with retailers have illustrated the great promise of this pack. We believe it could have an enormous influence on how healthy snacks are profitably merchandised at retail and easily enjoyed at home.'

SunSelect's exclusive range includes peppers, cucumbers, tomatoes, cherries, red and green grapes, craberries, apples, kiwifruit and blueberries, with potential extensions of the jar bag concept for other products.

According to the group, in the coming months SunSelect and Oppy will offer the concept to producers of many of these items.

The Schur Jar Bag was first seen by members of the Krahn family at Fruit Logistica 2015.

'We felt the design would be a great fit for snacking items and a differentiator on the shelf,' said Krahn. 'It's more stable than other packaging options within clamshells and cello bags, and plays on the popularity of home canning and use of mason jars in decorative and useful ways around the house.'

Hans Christian Schur, Schur’s CEO, shared Krahn’s enthusiasm about the partnership and the promise of the bag concept for many types of fresh fruits and vegetables.

“It’s a new venture for us to have a partner in produce,” he said. “The enterprise is based on SunSelect’s desire to differentiate in the fresh category, and Schur’s commitment to deliver a solution to help them achieve that. We are excited to expand the concept with SunSelect, bringing in associated companies like Oppy who work with growers of other items.”