Introduction:
Ordering fresh fruits online can be daunting, especially when you don’t know the process for delivery. That’s why Ikigai Fruits has spent countless hours perfecting our delivery process. Nobody wants bruised or rotting fruit delivered to their homes, especially luxury fruit!
Ikigai Fruits is one of the only ways you can get authentic, fresh Japanese fruit delivered straight to your door. Each delicate piece of produce must be protected for thousands of miles across various modes of transportation, and we’re serious about retaining freshness across distance.
So, how do we ensure each fruit will arrive as fresh as when it came off the vine, tree, or bush?
In this article, we’ll go over a few basic questions about the Ikigai Fruits shipping process.
What is the Timeline from Order to Delivery?
If you’ve ever wondered what the steps are between the moment you checkout on our website to the moment you find your delivery on your doorstep, we’ve got you covered. Here’s a broken down timeline of the journey every delicious fruit from Ikigai Fruits undertakes.
Step 1: The Order
You initiate the process when you checkout with your favorite Ikigai Fruits. We only request the exact amount of fruit ordered on our website from our growers. If 100 people want a Crown Melon, we request exactly 100 Crown Melons.
Step 2: The Harvest
Once we receive the orders and pass on the request to the farmers, they go into the gardens and harvest exactly what we’ve asked for. The farmers take their time to pick the most beautiful fruit at the correct stage of ripeness that will be perfect by the end of the long journey. Our farms are scattered throughout Japan where our farmers utilize their climate conditions to grow the pinnacle of Japanese fruits.
Step 3: The Airport (Japan🇯🇵)
All the fruits are harvested and are on their way to you! The first stop is the airport in Japan.
Step 4: The Airport (U.S.🇺🇸)
After a long flight, the fruit lands safely on American soil. Every shipment has a much easier time navigating than the average traveler as the helpful staff ensure everything is transported safely.
Step 5: Final Check & Packing
The fruit gets a final quality check from our passionate partners, and is packaged properly so each piece of produce goes to the right home.
Step 6: It’s Yours!
Your fruit has finally arrived! Enjoy the juicy first bite of every piece and don’t forget to share it with your favorite people.
How Are the Fruits Protected?
Ikigai Fruits travel straight from Japan. They travel thousands of miles from the fields or greenhouses where they’re born to your dining room table. How do we ensure this precious cargo is as fresh as the day we picked it on the day it arrives at your home?
The process for protecting each fruit can differ depending on what each variety necessitates. Some farmers have created special packaging to ensure the fruits sustain little to no damage during transport.
For example, some of our farmers use a specific kind of packaging that holds their delicate luxury strawberries. This packaging is called “yuricago” (pronounced you-ree-kah-go), the Japanese word for “cradle.” It is a handmade cushioned container in which the strawberries are protected from bruising during their travels.
Once the fruits arrive in the United States, we take extra care to package them with urethane and other cooling materials to keep them fresh and protected even longer.
How Do Ikigai Fruits Stay Fresh?
Our biggest concern is making sure the fruit we deliver to you is as fresh as the moment we picked it. So, how does Ikigai Fruits maintain the same freshness throughout the delivery process?
We use a variety of techniques and special considerations to ensure the best quality Japanese fruit is delivered every time. Here are just a few:
1. We only order the exact amount of fruit customers order from us in a given set period of time. This is why we have specific order periods for each variety.
2. Each fruit is harvested at a time that considers the length of its journey and current ripeness.
3. Temperature consideration during transportation is key. Special packing materials and methods are chosen once the fruit lands in the United States to keep the produce cool.
Why Does It Take a Few Weeks To Ship?
If you follow us on social media (@ikigaifruits on Instagram), you may sometimes notice our order announcement posts have an estimated arrival window. You’ll definitely find that information on a given fruit’s product page. Depending on the fruit you’re ordering and the season, these windows shift.
Why is that?
The slight delay comes from the way we order from our farmers. We only order exactly as many fruits as we need from each farmer to ensure we don’t waste any of their precious stock. This also ensures we don’t create food waste by overordering any specific variety.
We gather as many orders as we can during a certain pre order period, then we make a bulk request from our farmers to fulfill those orders.
We appreciate the patience of our loyal customers when it comes to waiting for your fresh Ikigai Fruits to arrive, and thank you for letting us succeed with a process that is good for the environment, good for our farmers’ businesses, and good for the quality of your fruit.
Conclusion
It’s incredibly rare to find Japanese fruits imported directly from Japan in the United States. Some Japanese fruit growers have found ways to grow their crops in the U.S. to reduce shipping costs, but at Ikigai Fruits, we want the passion of the original farmers and their original techniques to shine through in every delectable bite.
Ikigai Fruits is one of the only ways to taste authentic Japanese fruit grown in Japan with Japanese climate, nutrients, and traditional wisdom without having to take a trip to Japan yourself.
If you have any questions regarding our shipping process, our farmers, or our mouth-watering fruits, please feel free to fill out our Contact Us form or send us a message through social media @ikigaifruits.