Here it is – August already.   The summer months have been packed in these parts with warm, sometimes hot, temperatures, plenty of outdoor activities, festivals, family and friend outings and visitors.

Janet and I have been on the go, too, traveling around in the CherryFlex Express – better known to us as “the bus.”  We have participated in several parades, been on hand for canoe and bike races, queen events and agricultural gatherings.  And we are not done yet.

While passing out CherryFlex ProSports Shot pouches at a National Cherry Festival bike ride, we were pleasantly surprised to learn that the news about super fruit benefits is spreading.

During our missionary work on behalf of the fruit industry, many of the riders were already aware of the muscle and joint soreness relief that cherries can provide.  They were already making cherry products a regular part of their training regimen.

And though that was welcome news to our gang, in a way I’m not surprised.

The industry’s official website – choosecherries - is focused on promoting the healthful benefits of tart cherry consumption.  Cherry juice, juice concentrate and our tasty pouches filled with tart cherry paste (Cherry Flex ProSports Shots) are among the tart cherry-based products linked to providing antioxidant health benefits.  There’s even a Red Recovery Routine page provided by the Cherry Marketing Institute to help athletes improve their performance with a smart mix of foods.  Further, a Power Team comprised of a decathlon gold medalist, nationally recognized sports dietitian, and ultra-marathoner, has been formed to add credibility and updates to the use of tart cherries in training routines.

At last, tart cherries are gaining some richly deserved recognition.  The truth is that this Super Fruit has among the highest level of antioxidants, anthocyanins, and phytonutrients, providing the nutrition required by active people.

Don’t be left out.  Visit our website or call toll free 1 877.591.3101 for your cherry fix!

With the tart cherry harvest winding down, there is no better time to stock up on FruitFast’s quality line of Montmorency Tart Cherry products.

This is especially true with FruitFast Tart Cherry Juice Concentrate.

Juice concentrate prices will be going up next month but there is still time to take advantage of current pricing —  if you place your order in July!

The 2010 growing season has been an unusual one, producing far fewer tart cherries than last year’s bumper crop.  Above normal spring temperatures forced the fruit trees to blossom early, only to be hit by several frosts.  This has forced growers and processors to be very selective with allocating the cherry crop for frozen, dried, dessert and juice concentrate use.

FruitFast is working hard to secure the best tart cherry juice concentrate pricing for our customers as a result.  While a cost increase cannot be avoided for concentrate, we are holding our current prices through the end of July.

Be assured that FruitFast will hold any juice concentrate increases to the minimum required to cover only our costs.

Order today and save.  Toll free 1.877.591.3101 or order online.

There can be absolutely no doubt that the 84^th running of the National Cherry Festival is underway!

Record crowds have poured into the Grand Traverse region of northern lower Michigan for one of the country’s largest and longest running festivals.  Hundreds of thousands of people are expected to descend on the Cherry Capital of the World over the next week to celebrate this amazing healthy fruit and to just have fun. There is something for everyone – performances by the Blue Angels, pie-eating contests, bike tours, dog jumping competitions and amusement rides, plus nightly entertainment.

Unfamiliar with the Montmorency red tart cherry?  Well, visit cherryflex.com and learn about the many benefits from this ruby-colored fruit, including its antioxidant properties for maintaining healthy joints, cardiovascular health and  healthy immune systems.*

With summer activities at their peak, this is THE time to become familiar with the benefits of FruitFast products.  Whether you enjoy walking, running, tennis, golf or are young or old, FruitFast’s exclusive process condenses the tart cherry into a thick paste that includes the skin and pulp.  This is where the cherry’s antioxidants reside.  Scientific studies show that CherryFlex helps maintain health joints* and speeds relief of muscle fatigue* – perfect for those on the go.

You have a wide choice of FruitFast products and all are made from quality, whole fruit without preservatives or additives in a process that does not apply high heat or solvents.

Choose from our popular line of fruit softgels, cherry juice concentrate or our newest product: CherryFlex ProSport Shots.  Taken orally, this delicious tart cherry gel is convenient and all pure fruit.

Help us celebrate tart cherries at www.cherryflex.com!

Farmers are always at the mercy of Mother Nature and that has been borne out once again with early predictions for the 2010 fruit harvest here in northern Michigan.

After a bumper crop in 2009, red tart cherry growers say harvest numbers will drop considerably after a yo-yo temperature range this spring that affected the fruit.

A check with my farming buddies points to this conclusion:

Early snowmelt, followed by unseasonably warm temperatures this spring, hastened the fruit’s development.  May frosts killed the blossoms and this will result in a lighter crop yield overall.  Some grower’s trees were affected more than others, but expectations are that the harvest could be down 50 percent or more.  Official estimates from the USDA are expected soon.

But there is always a silver lining.  Due to perfect growing conditions here in the Cherry Capital of the World last season, there is plenty of fruit in storage to meet the needs of the consumer and processors.

The supply of cherries  should remain stable and – we are happy to say – that includes Montmorency tart cherries for our FruitFast products.

It’s official – the winner of the FruitFast “Name the Bus” contest and recipient of a brand new Apple iPad is Ronald Cosby of Ohio.

The winning bus name is The CherryFlex Express.

Chosen from over 300 entries over the past month, Ron was notified of his selection this morning by company owner, Steve deTar.

“I was so excited when he called with the news,” said Ron.  “I got off the phone and immediately called my wife and said, ‘You will never believe this…but we WON!’”

A CherryFlex softgel customer for four years, Ron and his wife, Maria, saw the contest announcement on the FruitFast website and quickly submitted their suggestion of The CherryFlex Express.

“We were delighted to have the winner turn out to be a long-time, satisfied customer of ours,” said Steve.  “Seventeen FruitFast staffers reviewed the submitted names – and there were some great ones – but The CherryFlex Express was the clear leader by a two-to-one margin when the votes were tallied.

A 55 year-old native of southern Ohio, Ron says he is hooked on CherryFlex.

“I won’t stop taking CherryFlex.  I climb, stoop and crawl as part of my job and at age 55, I am getting around just fine,” explained Ron, who originally heard from friends that cherries were helpful for maintaining healthy joints.

Ron said he was looking forward to meeting company owner Bob Underwood and seeing the bus he named in person – but Mother Nature changed those plans.  The CherryFlex Express was scheduled to pull into Ron’s hometown to make the surprise presentation this afternoon.  But tornadoes and damaging winds swept across Ohio overnight and the Underwoods won’t be able to stop on this trip.

“The CherryFlex Express weathered the storm just fine and thankfully, so did we,” said Bob from the road.  “We are hoping Ron and Maria will join us this summer at the National Cherry Festival as our guests.”

Excitement is mounting and it won’t be long now before the winner of the Brownwood Acres/ FruitFast “Name the Bus” contest is announced!

More than 300 entries were submitted and thousands of curious onlookers were part of the contest to find a suitable moniker for this “monster on wheels” (and No, that is NOT the winning name!)

But we expect to announce the lucky winner of the Apple iPad on Monday afternoon right here and on Facebook.

Want a hint?  Bob and Janet Underwood are cruising the roadways now in the Bus…on their way to finding the winning entrant!

All we will say is that they are heading south – and as usual – attracting a lot of attention wherever they go.

If you see them – be sure to honk, wave or stop.  And check back soon to learn who won.

With the weather warming in Northern Michigan and the prospect of a busy growing season ahead, I’m again reminded of the importance of using U.S.A. grown fruit in all our FruitFast product lines.

There’s an old saying:  “Junk in, junk out.”  And that holds true in a lot of life’s endeavors, but never more so than in the production of our family of nutraceuticals.

We use only the best and only American grown fruits.  And what we can’t access in this region, we purchase from our country’s finest and most reputable fruit growers.

Regular customers and readers of our website and blog know by now that using the whole fruit in our proprietary manufacturing process is key to capturing the fruit’s goodness.  This includes the pulp and skin that’s processed in a chemical-free exchange with no added sugars, preservatives or fillers.  High temperatures are the bane of conventional fruit manufacturing, destroying important phytonutrients.  FruitFast’s way leaves valuable compounds intact, while not turning the fruit into a less potent powder.

It is this process that gives the company a product line unmatched in the world market.  In short, our research has found that you don’t argue with Mother Nature.  Treating fruit naturally is the best way to leverage and benefit from its inherent properties.

Preserving these healthful benefits of whole fruit has led to the development of our growing family of fruit supplements we’re so proud of, including fruits like Michigan’s Montmorency red tart cherries, wild blueberries from Maine, red and black raspberries from Oregon and Wonderful pomegranates from the San Joaquin Valley in California.

Ongoing research, development and testing will assure this standard of product quality while assuring access year round to the goodness of whole fruit — grown in the U.S.A, of course.

It’s not too late — there’s still time to enter to win an iPad from FruitFast.

Brownwood Acres/ FruitFast is giving away one Apple iPad in June to some lucky person and it’s simple to enter.   May 31st is the deadline.

Here are the EASY steps to enter the FruitFast iPad Contest:

1. Become a FruitFast Fan on Facebook.  Go to www.facebook.com/fruitfast.
2. Click on the Promotions tab in the menu bar: http://www.facebook.com/fruitfast?v=app_48008362724 and follow directions.
3. Name the bus.  This is your chance to be creative and witty as we look for just the right name for FruitFast owner Bob Underwood’s 40-foot motor coach.  Suggest as many names as you like.
4. Pass this opportunity along to family and friends!
5. Voting ends on May 31st, with the winner being announced June 7th.

In the event that we chose a name that has been entered multiple times, the first entry will be the winner.

It’s that simple.  And the winner will receive an awesome 16 GB I-Pad from Apple, worth $500!  FruitFast will find a cool name for the CherryFlex Bus, while spreading the word about the health benefits of our premium super fruit products.

Don’t wait!   Join the fun and enter the FruitFast iPad Contest today!

FruitFast is all about USA-grown, healthy, nutritious products with a commitment to quality and high standards.

We also know a thing about beauty, as anyone who has ever witnessed a hillside of cherry trees in full spring bloom can attest.

That’s why we’re thrilled that the new Miss USA 2010 reflects these tenets and more – and best of all—she’s from Michigan!

AP Photo

Rima Fakih, 24-years-old, and from Dearborn near Detroit, won the crown in Las Vegas over the weekend from a field of 50 other women.   The dark eyed beauty participated in the swimsuit, evening grown and interview segments of the yearly pageant, and will represent the United States in the upcoming Miss Universe competition.

Rima is the contest’s first Arab-American winner.  She’s also a recent graduate of the University of Michigan with a degree in economics and business management.

Although we have yet to determine if she is a cherry juice drinker or familiar with our CherryFlex brand, Brownwood Acres/ FruitFast salutes Rima and her family and supporters.  We wish her the best during her upcoming reign, and good fortune in the Miss Universe pageant.

The time honored Greyhound travel slogan goes something like “take a bus, and leave the driving to us…..”

Well, that’s kind of what we’ve been doing, though we did the driving.

Having just returned from a motor home/coach journey of the Central U.S., we’re struck, as always, by the enormity and diversity of this great country of ours.

Mindful of song writer Woody Guthrie’s classic “This Land Is Your Land,” we covered 3,000 miles on a round trip cross-country junket that led from the Great Lakes to the terminus of the mighty Mississippi in New Orleans—-or as the natives say:  “Naw’lins….”

How awesome this big slice of the mid-section of our country is!  From farmlands, seaports and mountains to the birthplaces of Jazz and the Motown Sound.

Our coach tour began the end of April when we set off in our newly-skinned bus – yet to be named as you may know -  destination: Louisiana.  Stopping along the way on our drive south, Janet and I were quite the spectacle with plenty of waves, honks and stares wherever we went…talking about the health benefits of red tart cherries.

After attending the National Animal Supplement Council annual convention on behalf of our popular CherryFlex for Dogs product, we headed back the other direction landing in Branson, Missouri.  Nestled in the Ozarks, this musical mecca attracts thousands of country music fans from all over – and yes, we saw some terrific shows.  We met lots of interesting people, told them all about our quality FruitFast products, and introduced them to our innovative CherryFlex ProSport Shots.

Then it was on to Kokomo and Shipshewana, Indiana – better known as Amish territory – a beautiful farming area we particularly enjoy that’s not far from the Michigan border.  After visiting with family nearby, we rolled on to Detroit before returning home to our trailhead—Traverse City.

As always, it’s good to be home again.