POM Harvest Tour: Sorting, Juicing, and Bottling

Rectangle 58

Hi, I'm Tina!

I’m the owner of Carrots ‘N’ Cake as well as a Certified Nutrition Coach and Functional Diagnostic Nutrition Practitioner (FDN-P). I use macros and functional nutrition to help women find balance within their diets while achieving their body composition goals.

Fit + Fueled

An in-depth, 4-week reverse dieting course for women who feel like their metabolism has slowed down, think they might have hormonal imbalance and can’t lose weight no matter what they do.
Get all the tools to take your physique into your hands. Over six-months, you’ll transform your life, mindset, and body in this program that’s part-course, part-coaching, and part-community.
Categories
weight loss

On the final day of the POM Harvest Tour, the group toured the POM Wonderful offices, the fruit sorting and packaging plants, and the juicing and bottling plant.

I’m honestly surprised by how fascinating I found the experience. The POM Wonderful process is incredibly interesting!

DSC_0045.JPG

The tour started in the main office where we outfitted ourselves for the tour.

DSC_0043.JPG

Hardhats and hairnets are sexy! 😉

DSC_0050.JPG

DSC_0051.JPG

The first area we toured was where the pomegranates are stored from the day’s harvest.

DSC_0052.JPG

The pomegranates are stored in large containers until they are transported to the sorting area. The fresh fruit rarely waits more than a day or so in this location.

DSC_0057.JPG

DSC_0060.JPG

The next stop on the tour was seeing where the fruit entered the sorting facility.

DSC_0065.JPG

The pomegranates are loaded on a large conveyer belt that travels inside the plant.

DSC_0069.JPG

A gorgeous sea of red! 😀

DSC_0071.JPG

DSC_0073.JPG

Inside the plant is where all of the magic happens!

DSC_0078.JPG

After entering the plant via conveyer belt, the fruit passes under a camera, which rapidly takes 25 photos of EACH piece of fruit. In seconds, a computer analyzes each pomegranate for factors such as size, color, and imperfections (i.e. scarring, sunburn), and sorts each fruit accordingly.

Once the fruit is sorted, they are destined to be sold as whole fruit, turned into juice or another POM Wonderful product.

IMG_3837.jpg

After the sorting process, the fruit is inspected by hand. Workers check for imperfections– particularly scarring– that the cameras may have missed.

The pomegranates that will be sold as whole fruit are then washed, dried, coated with a fungicide wash to prevent the spread of disease or bugs, coated with a light wax, dried again, stickered, and finally packaged for retail sale.

During the harvest season (just 15 weeks out of the year), millions of pomegranates are processed in this high-tech facility each day. But, it only takes about 15 minutes for a single piece of fruit to pass through the entire process. Holy technology!

DSC_0079.JPG

POM also has a traditional sorting facility where about 200 workers sort each fruit by hand. This plant processes about 25% of what the computerized plant processes and employs four times as many workers.

DSC_0082.JPG

If a pomegranates is destined to become POM Wonderful juice, they are transported to the juicing room.

Our group also toured the juicing and bottling areas, but we were not allowed to snap photos there for privacy reasons. Let’s just say that the POM bottling process is really COOL! 😉

DSC_0085.JPG

To read more about the POM Blogger Harvest Tour, check out my previous posts:

Day 1:

Day 2:

Day 3:

You Might Also Like

DON'T MISS A THING

Join the community!

Get recipes, workouts. and discounts straight to your inbox for FREE!

Join The community

Get recipes, workouts. and discounts straight to your inbox for FREE!

@carrotsncake

© 2022 Carrots ‘N’ Cake. All Rights Reserved | An Elite CafeMedia Food Publisher | Funnel Build & Design by: Maria Filipina Co.