After a long development process, the company worked together with a tomato grower to develope a tomato plant that doesn't grow to the size of their outdoor cousins which may start small, but quickly reach up to at least one metre tall.
The Kitchen Minis tomato plant, which received 2nd place for the Innovation award at Fruit Logistica Berlin 2016, is typically 35 cm high when purchased. The plant comes with around 20-25 sweet cocktail sized tomatoes of around 5 to 15 grams. For those home gardeners with a green thumb, the plant can yield up to 150 tomatoes in its lifetime and can last up to 6 months.
"We felt that the tomato plant fit nicely into the recent healthy convenience food trend. It is trendy to grow your own food. A few years ago, a big car and a big apartment were seen as status symbols, nowadays growing your own organic food and being about to cook a nice meal from it as well, is the new way to show status. It is not enough to serve something that you brought home from a restaurant," said Northern Greens Sales Director, Søren Terndrup Hansen.
"It is something that you buy for the novelty of it. It is also great to show your children where things come from and teach them a bit about the growing process."
Due to the nature of the product, the company has only been offering the plants to nearby markets at this time, which includes Norway, Sweden, Finland, Germany, Switzerland and the UK. It boils down to the fact that it is difficult for the plants to survive longer than 4-5 days in a truck without sunlight.
A pepper plant version that was developed a bit later is also available. Although Søren said that the company is putting its focus on the tomato plants for now. The peppers are seedless and are the same concept of its older sister. The company has been working on the development of a cucumber version, but it is still early days and will need more development.
For more information:
Søren Terndrup Hansen
Northern Greens A/S
Tel: +45 76 25 00 08+45 76 25 00 08
Email: sth@northerngreens.dk