Sweet or sour? Consumers now choose fruit 'a la carte'

In recent years, have appeared on the market a diversity, growing of varieties of fruit. Before a varietal change so quickly, users are struggling to learn what taste has a category of fruit with a specific name. In addition, users are reluctant to buy a new variety that are unaware, to doubt whether satisy your initial expectations. An example are the varieties of apples and nectarines with almost identical appearance that may be more sweet or even acidic. This produces confusion among consumers, that at the time of eating these foods, its taste is not consistent with expected initially. In mid-July, Irta launched the project 'Palette of flavours', which took place in Lleida (Catalonia). It mainly consists of classifying the taste of fruit with different colors at the same point of sale. Thus, consumers can choose between sweet or sour varieties.

Ignore the flavour of the fruit influences when it comes to repeat or not purchase

In recent years, the Isafruit European project, with the participation of the Irta, has demonstrated, through tasting in different countries, that two-thirds of consumers prefer the sweet taste of Apple and peach and only a third the acid. These conclusions are almost independent of the country, age or sex. On the other hand, the study has also shown that one of the main reasons for refusal to repeat the purchase of fruit should be the taste of it would not be expected by the user. I.e., that this prove a rather sour when her prefers very sweet. For a time, specialists of Irta's fruit growing program alert of this fact, which could slow increased consumption of fruit.

From Irta, they warn that lack of knowledge about the taste of similar fruits slows your consumption.

So far, Irta has collaborated in the classification of more than 100 varieties of fruit, depending on the contents of sugars and acids of each variety. This information is obtained after the evaluations of varieties of fresh fruit in the experimental stations of Lleida i Mas Badia, over the past 15 years. Implementation of 'Palette of flavours' aim is that the fruit tracked shelf with a color to indicate if the taste of the variety is sweet and refreshing (more acidic), so that the buyer has it easy when deciding on your purchase. The first pilot test takes place in the Pujol supermarkets, where the fruit with color codes is already classified in three of its supermarkets leridanos Plusfresc. In the absence of the results of a first assessment of this campaign, the supermarket chain studies to expand this project to the majority of its stores and other species of fruit of the shelf where the same problems occur.