MEDIA RELEASE – 6 August 2009
Canberra’s popular Saturday morning market, the Capital Region Farmers Market, has successfully matched one of its growers with the internationally recognised, Australian headquartered juice brand, Boost Juice.
Boost Juice has purposely sourced regional products, and is using fruit from a market grower in its Canberra Boost Juice outlets.
“More and more Australians are becoming aware of where their foods come from and want to build connections with local growers. Boost Juice bars in Canberra have made the ‘choose local’ task easier by sourcing their fruit from growers based at the Capital Region Farmers Market in Canberra,” said Tony Howard, Rotary Club of Hall and Farmers Market spokesperson.
Boost Juice in the North Canberra area of Belconnen has been using regionally grown lemons and oranges from Glendinos Fruit and Vegetables based in Leeton NSW, in its juices and smoothies for the past few months. Belconnen Boost Juice franchisee, Arthur Cvetanoski, was introduced to Mick from Glendinos after expressing disappointment with the ‘distributor supplied’ fruit he had previously been using in his products.
“We had been using other fruit and were not happy with the quality and price. We love the quality of the fruit Mick brings us, it is fresh and tasty, and makes a big difference to our juices and smoothies,”
“When we want to catch up with Mick we just head out to the Farmers Market at Exhibition Park on a Saturday morning and see what’s fresh that week. Nothing replaces the opportunity to talk direct with the grower and in this case our supplier”, said Arthur Cvetanoski.
All three Boost Juice Canberra stores, Belconnen, Woden and Civic, will use more regionally grown fruit when they introduce a special ‘local hero’ drink later this month. From 24 August until 24 September, they will use regionally grown mandarins from Glendinos in its ‘Mandarin Madness’ smoothie.
Boost Juice will publicise the fact that the fruit is regionally grown from a market grower in radio and print media advertising up until the release of the Mandarin Madness smoothie. Posters
instore will also remind shoppers that they are buying juice made from regionally grown, fresh fruit.
The first Boost Juice store opened in Adelaide in the year 2000, and over the following six years more than 189 stores have opened throughout Australia and the rest of the world. This pilot promotion in Canberra signals the potential for stronger connections of regional and local growers across the Boost group.
“Boost Juice is a company proud to be supporting local and regional growers in our effort to provide customers with a range of delicious and tasty juices and smoothies. We hope other franchisees around Australia will consider connections with local and regional growers,” said Boost National Marketing Manager, Rachel Bitzilis.
“We love the fact that we are supporting a regional grower. We are so happy with the quality of the fruit that the market brings us, that we will also be using other products seasonally, including watermelons in summer,” said Mr Cvetanoski.
The Capital Region Farmers Market at EPIC is a genuine farmers market with over 100 stalls offering a diverse range of fresh food and agricultural produce straight from the producer to the customer. It is held every Saturday morning at Exhibition Park from 8 am to 11 am.
All funds generated from the Market are fed back into regional communities and other projects chosen by the Rotary Club of Hall which founded the Market in 2004.