As I predicted last week, it is proving to be a month where the produce departments in most multiples have created their own approach to the traditional January sales, with plenty of two-for-one offers.

What caught my eye, however, were the “new lower price” stickers on Tesco’s organic mushroom range, at 69p for 200g of cups. Consumers so far have been aware that organic produce has always carried a price premium, but the current strategy is the latest indication that the difference compared with conventionally grown crops is closing.

Ready-ripened is another area where retailers have created added value, the attraction being in the offer of fruit that can be eaten immediately. The ready-ripened label has already been applied successfully to avocados and stonefruit, but I was interested this week to see it on Hayani dates from Israel, at £2.99 for six.

My first foray into the fruit trade came in the 1950s when I was a student, and I found myself typing invoices for one of the leading date importers, JLP Denny. Then there were only glove boxes from Tunisia, packed in Marseilles and sold seasonally as stored old crop from about October, until the new crop was ready prior to the Christmas holiday. Maturity never came into it!

And while on the tropical side of the business, one line drawn from all corners of the earth that continues to expand is mango. Coming in a wide range of shapes and colours, most consumers are understandably still somewhat hazy about varieties.

At least many of the names, such as Tommy Atkins and Alphonso, are easy to remember. But for a real tongue-twister, Sainsbury’s now stocks a pale yellow variety called Nam Dok Mai from Thailand, at £1.99 each. If it catches on, the grower’s name - River Kwai - could prove much more memorable.

Another tropical line now well established is pineapple. This week, a neighbour brought me one of the smallest mini pines I have ever seen. It might have been left over from the festive season last month, but unfortunately no-one could remember where it was bought. It looked like a variety called Victoria to me and just proves the point that even in well-established lines, the boundaries are sill being stretched.

And speaking of names, there is no doubt the time has long passed when breeders immortalised their success by using their own identity, of which the most famous, in the UK at least, is probably Mr Cox.

In the search for something descriptive, it is surprising that no-one has come up with the very appropriate name Peardrop, now identifying a brown-skinned, rotund fruit being grown in the Netherlands, and sold loose on Sainsbury’s shelves at £1.99/kg, in its Taste the Difference range.

Finally, I would love to know what level of retail wastage is acceptable in the growing range of fresh herbs that is now very much part and parcel of the modern home cookery era.

I make the point, as I saw a large proportion of a display being replaced as the sell-by-date slid by. Elsewhere, Sainsbury’s has added a new dimension with its Winter Warmer mixed pack of herbs, at £1.29.

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