IDAHO FALLS, ID - Des Hague, CEO of Potandon Produce and RäFoods, announced a year-long partnership with Read Ahead as part of a broader Living Nutrition strategy focused on creating meaningful impact for families and communities. Read Ahead is a New York City nonprofit dedicated to helping elementary school students strengthen literacy skills and confidence through reading-based mentoring.

The partnership will be delivered through Sprout Cares, a community-impact initiative Potandon Produce developed through its exclusive marketing relationship with Green Giant Fresh potatoes and onions. RäFoods, a leader in living nutrition, will contribute financially and participate in the broader program.

Founded in 1991, Read Ahead pairs adult volunteers with New York City elementary school students for weekly reading and mentoring sessions. Its work focuses on helping students strengthen literacy skills, build reading confidence and develop meaningful mentoring relationships that support success in school and beyond.

The contributions from Potandon Produce and RäFoods will help Read Ahead provide programming that gives elementary school students the confidence and literacy skills they need to succeed in school and beyond.

"Read Ahead is thrilled to have the support of a legacy brand like Potandon Produce, along with the support of the Green Giant Fresh brand and the commitment of RäFoods," said Zoe Henriquez, Executive Director of Read Ahead, in the recent release. "Our work to build the reading and literacy confidence of elementary school students directly aligns with the Sprout Cares initiative, as together we look to grow our students' skills."

"Potandon Produce and RäFoods are each committing to the Read Ahead mission," said Hague. "Our hope is that we can help accelerate the good work they are already doing and make a meaningful difference in a child's life. Our companies spend every day thinking about growing and bringing fresh, nutritious food to families. This partnership gives us an opportunity to extend that idea of growth by helping children build their reading skills, confidence, and relationships with mentors. Just as importantly, we want to go beyond financial support by using our reach to introduce more people to Read Ahead and the work they are doing."

GROW SOMETHING GOOD

The year-long commitment will also serve as the foundation for a broader consumer-facing initiative under the message "Sprout Cares presents Grow Something Good."

Potandon Produce and RäFoods expect to begin planning the activation in October. The program will include in-store signage and QR-enabled materials that introduce shoppers to Read Ahead, explain its work in childhood literacy and mentoring, and give consumers an opportunity to support the organization.

"Grow Something Good is about taking the partnership beyond a donation and giving consumers a way to become part of it," said John Rota, Chief Marketing Officer of Potandon Produce and RäFoods. "Read Ahead already does the important work. Our opportunity is to use these brands' reach to introduce more people to that work and make it easy for them to participate. That is exactly what we want Sprout Cares to do."

Rather than connecting individual retail locations with individual schools, Grow Something Good is being developed as a unified campaign supporting Read Ahead and its broader mission. The consumer activation could launch during the holiday shopping period as program details and retail participation are finalized.

Specific retail partners and launch timing will be announced as plans are finalized.

NORTH AMERICA - Eighteen years watching this industry, and if you asked me what actually moves produce from a field to a family, I wouldn't say trucks, or apps, or price. I'd say the relationship between the person who grows it and the person who buys it. That handshake, repeated across a hundred desks and a thousand show floors, is the machine the whole business runs on. Time and again, it has proven more durable than whatever system happens to sit between the two parties in a given year.

Lately I'm not sure it's holding the way it used to. Call it a relationship recession: a slow contraction you won't find in any sales report, because the thing shrinking is trust. This is not to negate those that are doing it right, finding the balance between efficiency and trust, the handshake and the spreadsheet, the phone call and the contract. Many are, and we should look to those for guidance.

Everything in buying now pushes the other way. Portals, spot buys, reverse auctions, and the RFP that most retailers now run on: systems built to make the deal cleaner, faster, easier to measure. There is nothing wrong with any of them on their own. An RFP can take real friction out of the annual back-and-forth. But a system, especially in our business, is only ever as good as the relationship it sits on top of. Run it over trust that already exists, and it streamlines a good partnership. Run it in place of one, and it just wraps a tidy process around a race to the bottom, shrinking years of working history to a spec and a number.

That is the difference no software has closed: the call that saves a shipment before it turns into a claim, the benefit of the doubt on a rough week, the grower who plants on a handshake because he knows the order will be there. None of it scales. It is slow, and it is human, and that is exactly why it is worth more, not less, in a market trying to automate it away.

But every recession turns, when somebody decides the relationship is worth investing in again. The cost of entry never went up. Pick up the phone. It is still the best technology this industry has.

SAN FRANCISCO, CA - Instacart, a leading grocery technology company, and Dollar General Corporation, America's general store, announced a new partnership to offer same-day delivery of Dollar General's everyday essentials through the Instacart App and website. The partnership will launch with a pilot at approximately 7,000 Dollar General and pOpshelf stores in six states in the coming weeks with plans to expand to approximately 20,000 stores across 48 states this fall.

Through the partnership, customers will be able to shop Dollar General's broad assortment of affordable products on Instacart, including food and snacks, household essentials, and health and beauty products - with delivery in as fast as one hour.

"Dollar General's vast footprint and longstanding commitment to affordability make them an important addition to the Instacart Marketplace," said Ryan Hamburger, Chief Commercial Officer at Instacart. "As we expand this partnership to approximately 20,000 Dollar General and pOpshelf stores, we'll help provide customers in communities across the country with even greater access to affordable food and everyday essentials, with the convenience of same-day delivery."

"At Dollar General, our mission is Serving Others, and we continually look for new ways to provide customers with the value and convenience they count on," said Tony Rogers, senior vice president and chief marketing officer at Dollar General. "Our partnership with Instacart provides another convenient way for customers to access affordable food, household essentials and other products they need while saving them valuable time."

Dollar General will join more than 2,200 national and local retail banners on the Instacart Marketplace.