A group of 11 tomato growers from Germany, Austria & Switzerland gathered at the high-tech greenhouse from Gemüsebau Steiner GmbH in Kirchweidach Germany to join the Strabena Event. Jack Endhoven, Key Account Manager at De Ruiter, started with an introduction of how Strabena was commercialized in 2016. During this introduction, Strabena was directly well appreciated at retailer level because of its strawberry fruit shape, good taste levels & fruits tight to the truss. This was also recognized by growers and therefor three growers in Germany, Austria & Switzerland embraced Strabena to make it a success.
After the introduction the initial Strabena grower Paul Zantman, from the Netherlands, started with the second part of the meeting by sharing his best practices on how to grow Strabena. Next to that, Paul also shared the experiences of cooperation Van Nature, which is doing the sales his Strabena. Due to the positive responses from retail perspective, Paul is expanding with Strabena year after year.
Besides informing, the key activity during the Strabena Event was to share knowledge at grower level. This knowledge sharing was kicked off by Eugenio Roelofs, Technical Account Manager at De Ruiter. Discussions and knowledge exchange about how to grow Strabena from the different grower perspectives, was excited to everyone. Strategies on how to implement water & climate management were shared and discussed to the very detail.
To wrap up the Strabena Event, everyone was invited to the Chiemsee, to summarize and evaluate the day during a dinner with scenic views of the Austrian Alpes at the back stage.
For more information: 
De Ruiter Seeds
www.deruiterseeds.com
info@deruiterseeds.nl
Jack Endhoven
+31 6 51360588
jack.endhoven@bayer.com
Eugenio Roelofs
+31 6 25527721
eugenio.roelofs@bayer.com