Harry and David Fruit

[GlorifiedRice]

I really want some GOOD peaches. I am thinking of buying some Harry and David Oregold Peaches. My Dad used to give 12 month H&D subscriptions as xmas gifts. But I havent had any H&D fruit in years...

Is it still perfect?

I noticed that even the "donut peaches" in stores, suck now. I think they gas them too.

[baroness]

I've had no experience with H&D peaches. In terms of their other fruit:

The pears are great. The "Maverick" pears, which are irregularly shaped, are a relative bargain by H&D standards.

I specifically called to find out what variety of apples would be in a gift, and got the dreaded red delicious (haa! ) instead of what I was promised, but they DID refund the price....so IF the peaches were not satisfactory, they would most likely adjust your account on request.

[SheenaGreena]

omg, fruit does suck now.

I bought some nectarines the other day and they tasted like WATER...not sweet, not sour, nothing

I want to know that there is good fruit out there. I also had organic strawberries the other day that tasted gross

[GlorifiedRice]

Okay Ill buy 3 things from H&D, Peaches, Pears and Nectarines...

Ill buy the Pears at the H&D store. HHmm, Maybe Ill buy the pears at the store and JUST peaches from the catalog.

Is it hot enough for you Sheena?

[SheenaGreena]

is their fruit expensive? for some reason I find that when I buy fruit at asian grocery stores it usually tastes better.

hot enough? You mean the weather? Geez it's only 95 here..how's philly?

[ghostrider]

We ordered some H&D fruit - pears & then plums - in late winter only because my SO had gotten a gift card, which made it very cheap.

It didn't seem any better than what I was getting from my local fruit market at that point, though it was all coming from South America then.

I remember the actual H&D Oregon pears as being stellar, considerably better than the late winter stuff. Hopefully they still are.

I can't imagine their peaches being better than local stuff though. Don't you guys in Philly have better available?

Edited June 28, 2007 by ghostrider (log)

[srhcb]

As much as I love H&D's (my Grandfather used to give Gift Baskets and Fruit of the Month Clubs for Christmas fifty years ago ) the best peaches are from Frog Hollow.

Order early; they usually run out.

SB (mmmmmmmmm

[xxchef]

I'm bumping this thread up again. It's been 3 1/2 years since it was last discussed and I was wondering what's changed (if anything) with Harry and David Fruits?

Personally we've just ended our second year of fruits of the month from them and will not be signing up again. Maybe we'll buy a box or two of Riviera Pears when they're available but that's about it.

We signed up for the H&D fruit club because, being in a very rural area, our local selection of fruit is dismal at best. Sure it's at a premium but fresh top-notch fruit, delivered, in season, from the packer right to your door? Not a bad deal in theory. We've had just about everything from them: apples, grapes, strawberries (ridiculously, individually cradled in foam), pears, oranges (that came with cutesy bibs "they're SO juicy!"), pineapples, mangoes, papayas, peaches, nectarines, etc. Aside from the pears it was all about on par with what I can get locally. Sure, some of it was very pretty, or exceptionally large (the grapes were HUGE!) but flavor? Texture? Aroma? Not so special.

They are real experts at packing fruit for shipping to have it arrive in good shape, I'll give them that. Because of our remote location and their bizarre practice of shipping some things FedEx, some UPS and some USPS we had more than one shipment go bad in transit, but I think that for most of the civilized world this would not be an issue. They were also good about replacing the fruit or crediting our account when bad things happened en route.

They are also very good at marketing. I think of them now as the Hickory Farms of fresh fruit. That's not particularly a compliment.

What are your recent experiences?

[gfweb]

Looks like H&D have some issues.

http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2011/02/09/fate-of-harry-david-in-doubt/

[scubadoo97]

I have a business associate that sends me the fruit of the month package each year. Outside of the pears the fruit is not much better than what I find at my local supermarket except that is a little prettier because it was hand selected.

[Milt]

We receive a H&D assortment every Christmas and have enjoyed receiving the fruit. This year, however, we made a Thanksgiving trip to Brownsvile, Texas and brought oranges and grapefruits back to Georgia with us. The folks at Loop Farms commented on how sweet the grapefruit was - much sweeter than usual for that early in the season. Apparently, time on the tree helps sweeten the fruit. When we returned home, we all tried H&D oranges and Loop Farms' oranges and the difference was amazing. The H&D oranges were not nearly as sweet, juicy, tasty as those we brought back from Texas. The pears were excellent, as always. The apples were also quite good - nothing exceptional, but good apples just the same. I grew up in an apple growing community in northwestern New Mexico and am reasonably well aware of good and/or modest quality apples.

The above article didn't mention whether customer satisfaction with product was a factor in the decreased sales. The above comments make me thank that customer satisfaction likely is a factor - even if they are now aware of it.