Presenting quality of the past in modern tomatoes varieties

You can say many things about the fresh produce market, but it's never boring. Recently a remarkable trend has appeared: people are willing to pay more for a quality product. According to Ziya Yildiz of Yuksel Tohum, this demand for quality is an important concept for breeders nowadays. That's why they united their heirloom varieties under the new brand Yuxcellence.

The colour variations are broad but the shape is remarkable: the tomatoes of the Yuxcellence brand all have a characteristic heirloom appearance. It's not the only thing that distinguishes them from other varieties in the market. "Conventional varieties were intentionally bred to maintain their shelf life rather than fulfilling the demand of consumers - almost as if the shelf life was prioritised over other criteria of quality factors", Ziya says.

According to the Yuksel team, this isn't the way to continue. "It creates a circle lowering down market prices and eventually losing customers who aren't willing to pay for these shelf-life-oriented products. It might offer a price advantage at first, but in the end it won't build the market. On the contrary: we went through an era wherein numerous supply chains disappeared."

Nowadays quality has become more important. "Retailers are trying to get ahead of the competition with quality fruit and vegetables. Consumers are absorbed in the fact that they want to consume the healthiest, highest quality and best product - and ignore a 10% price advantage."

The Yuksel Seeds have been anticipating this. "We've set quite an ambitious goal for ourselves, to meet the demand for high quality tomatoes. Our breeders spend hours and hours in the greenhouse, working on hundreds of cultivars to find the unique and cohesive flavor that really touches the heart of the end users."

From their genetic pool, several heirloom varieties have been created by the Yuksel Tohum breeders. "While keeping the fundamentals of modern vegetable breeds, we focused on the high quality aspects such as flavour, colour, aroma and taste - and the distinguished heirloom characteristics." Now these are united under the Yuxcellence brand, being recognizable for growers and partners further up in the chain.

"We believe consumers have the right to purchase good quality, healthy and fresh products and we are also sure that by growing Yuxcellence varieties, growers can stabilize their income even in the competitive market of nowadays and the future. Producing high quality product in a sustainable way is the key to success for growers worldwide. That's why our answer to the market is Yuxcellence."

Yüksel Tohum
Ziya Yildiz
T: +90 242 461 23 93
C: +90 532 414 00 17
F: +90 242 461 23 46
[email protected]
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www.yukseltohum.com