TAIPEI: President Chain Store Corp (PCS) said its annual sales of fresh fruit and vegetables are expected to grow by 20 percent from a year earlier to NT$1.2 billion (US$38.55 million) this year on expanded collaboration with a Formosa Environmental Technology Corp’s organic farm.
President Chain last month launched a special sales section for fruit and vegetable products at a dozen 7-Eleven stores in northern Taiwan.
President Chain said that since the launch, it has seen a 50 percent growth in sales of the products, which are supplied by the environmental technology company’s farm in Taoyuan’s Yangmei District.
President Chain plans to expand sales of the organic products to 70 stores by the end of next month and to 100 outlets in the first half of this year, a company statement said.
With plans to introduce more fruit and vegetable products from Formosa Environmental, President Chain said it hopes to turn the convenience-store chain into a small-scale supermarket.
The convenience store operator’s sales in the fresh fruit and vegetables sector reached NT$1 billion last year, President Chain fresh food division head Liang Wen-yuan said last month.
In the first three months of the year, sales of fresh fruit and vegetable products climbed 20 percent from the previous year, Liang said.
President Chain sells fresh fruit and vegetables at about 1,000 convenience stores.
