Farmers are an innovative bunch of people. Doing what you can, when you can, and with what you’ve got is the best you can strive for some days. And what do you do when all you’ve got are misshapen carrots or broken rice? The answer for these farmers was to create new markets.Baby Carrots – Many of you may already know the history of so-called “baby carrots,” which aren’t baby at all. Before 1989, there was no such thing as the bags of baby carrots that are now pervasive in grocery store produce sections across the globe. These small, orange nubs differ wildly from what would be considered a real “baby” carrot, which are carrots harvested before they reach maturity.
The baby carrots you see bagged in stores were the brainchild of California farmer Mike Yurosek, who wanted to find a use for thousands of pounds of misshapen or broken carrots that were discarded every year. Taking inspiration from the frozen food industry, which routinely cut up his long, well-shaped carrots into smaller pieces, Yurosek began looking for a way that he could sell a fresh version of cut-up carrots.
The first batch was done with potato peelers and cut by hand. Yurosek then found a frozen-food company that was going out of business and bought an industrial green-bean cutter, which just happened to cut things into 2-inch pieces. And thus, this became the standard size for machine-cut baby carrots.
After a bit of practice and an investment in some bagging machinery, Yurosek called one of his best customers, a Vons supermarket in Los Angeles. “I said, ‘I’m sending you some carrots to see what you think.’ Next day they called and said, ‘We only want those.’”
The margins on bagged baby carrots were an economic dream for grocery stores. At the time, a bag of whole carrots was around 10 cents wholesale, which grocers could sell for about 17 cents. A one-pound bag of baby carrots, however, could be sold at double or more the grocer’s cost of around 50 cents.
The popularity of Yurosek’s baby carrots literally changed the industry, so much so that growers pressured breeders into creating new carrot varieties that were longer and bulkier. This allowed them to get four pieces rather than three out of each carrot. Today, the baby carrot market accounts for around $1.1 billion of the overall US carrot market, which had total sales of around $1.7 billion in 2024. Over $1 billion, just from cutting a carrot into smaller pieces!
The Wedding Rice – Greek rice farmers have been struggling for years under intense drought, as well as increasing competition. Greece is also a prime wedding location, with over 50,000 held across the country every year. Part of the longtime tradition of Greek weddings is tossing rice at the newlyweds, which consumes nearly 200 metric tons of edible, full-grain rice every year.
Broken rice – damaged during harvesting or processing – accounts for around 9% of Greece’s rice exports. The majority of it, however, is discarded or goes to animal feed. Under a new initiative, a cooperative in northern Greece’s Chalastra, a major rice-growing region, has broken rice being rebranded as “The Wedding Rice.” They’ve sold over three tons of the stuff since May. Not only has this given rice farmers a potential new revenue stream, but it also, by design, helps reduce waste. The Wedding Rice is now available for purchase at theweddingrice.com.
Moral of the story, learning to look at things differently can pay big dividends. It has been said many times as of late that having an open mind and becoming more “mentally flexible” pays the best return in a period of time where technology is greatly advancing. We have to be able to learn, unlearn, and relearn. (Sources: CBSNews, Priceonomics, Reuters, The Business Standard)
