By: Pasquale R. Stabile
(Jan 3, 2011)
The Page oranges were very sweet and tasty. I'm glad they arrived just in time for Christmas --- they made an excellent orange & fennel salad for my guests. Thank you!
Comment on this Review
There seemed to have been a mix-up regarding shipping, however. Hence the four rather than five stars. Local Harvest informed me that the oranges shipped a full week before the actual ship date, and tracking was a challenge.
Living in Chicago, with the freezing weather and all, I was planning to keep an eye on tracking the oranges so that I could be home when they were delivered and avoid having them freeze on my doorstep. I was thwarted in my efforts to track however --- I did not have any idea when the oranges would arrive.
I was lucky though, because the package arrived on a relatively mild day (~28 degrees F). The oranges survived the journey and our climate relatively unscathed.
Comment
Pasquale, Thanks for your kind review of the Page Oranges. Fortunately, we have a few more so have opened them up for a more orders this January. In regards to tracking the shipments -- we're concerned about freezing temperatures, too. So, we use a unique shipping method. We are members of a Cooperative, Florida Gift Fruit Shippers Association. On a given day, every member of the Coop packs boxes and baskets that are going to a certain group of zip codes. We take the fruit to our terminal in Orlando, where it is sorted and combined with fruit from the other shippers. Our trucks, which have insulated trailers (Fedex and UPS trailers are not insulated), then haul the fruit directly to a Fedex hub near your home. Fedex then combines our fruit with other kinds of packages, and delivers them all to your local post office. The Postman then makes the final delivery to your door, and they are all informed that they shouldn't leave the fruit out where it can freeze. In a handful of cases they'll ignore that advice, but the vast majority of the packages are delivered successfully. The point of the story is that since the fruit is moving through three different channels, there isn't a "tracking number" that we can provide. We can track them through the Coop, though, so if you ever want to know where your package may be or the estimated delivery time, you can just call us at 800-672-6439 during the day. We'll be happy to look it up and let you know. While it isn't as tightly integrated as when Fedex handles the package all the way through, our shipment method is much faster, which is important, and the fruit is protected from freezing. We feel that the inconvenience of not having a tracking number that you can look up is warranted, since the primary goal is to get the fruit delivered quickly and in good condition. So, please do not ever hesitate to give us a call. Many thanks. Pete Spyke Owner