7-Eleven testing new wrapping for bananas

Bananas have a very short shelf life with an average of two days. 7-Eleven is test marketing a new wrapper that will keep a single banana firm and yellow for five days.

The largest convenience store in the nation, 7-Eleven, has started test marketing a new wrapper for bananas at 27 of their locations in the Dallas area. The new plastic wrap has been developed by Fresh Del Monte Produce, their supplier. In a report by freep.com, 7-Eleven CEO Joseph DePinto is quoted as saying, "Our customers want yellow bananas - not brown." If it is successful 7-Eleven could market their bananas in the plastic wrap in most of their 5,787 stores by early next year. The Fresh Del Monte wrap keeps most of the oxygen and moisture out so the bananas that are wrapped green will ripen more slowly. As cigarette sales continue to fall 7-Eleven is becoming more dependent on the sale of fresh food. More than 27 million bananas will be sold by the chain this year. If a customer walks into a store and wants to purchase some fresh fruit they do not want to see brown bananas. Selling yellow bananas " is one small example of what we need to do to reinvent ourselves," DePinto says as reported by usatoday.com. Not everyone is happy about the idea. The Natural Resources Defense Council is against the packaging. environmentalleader.com reports a NRDC spokeswoman, Jenny Powers, told USA Today “More plastic packaging is not a sustainable solution." Because of these concerns 7-Eleven says it has asked Fresh Del Monte to come up with a wrapper that's biodegradable. 7-Eleven says that by using the special wrap that fewer bananas will need to be delivered to their stores by trucks that use a lot of fuel.