# Mail Order Fruit-of-the-Month **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [November 2, 2005, 10:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mail-order-fruit-of-the-month/329184 "2005-11-02T22:31:21Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Harriet\_the\_Spry](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e56c9b/32.png) [@Harriet\_the\_Spry](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Harriet_the_Spry)\ **Post date:** [November 3, 2005, 9:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mail-order-fruit-of-the-month/329184/22 "2005-11-03T21:01:45Z")
I think this is an awesome choice of gift! That is exactly what I want my sweetie to do–think about what he knows about me and buy me something that’s a bit of a luxury that fits with what I want/need. Plus, it will be a reminder throughout the year! I have given and received from Harry & David before, with good results. I only have personal experience with oranges & grapefruit, but they were amazing. The grapefruit were peel & eat good! I think with the clubs they have enough experience to know what is a good fruit to use for each month, so can reliably provide what is at its peak at that time. ---
**Author:** ![Digital\_Stimulus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/aeb1de/32.png) [@Digital\_Stimulus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Digital_Stimulus)\ **Post date:** [November 3, 2005, 9:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mail-order-fruit-of-the-month/329184/23 "2005-11-03T21:27:34Z")
> [@middleman](#): > > There were also beef and seafood clubs (they were express shipped in dry ice, I believe). Ah, now a _beef_ club – that should be _her_ gift to _me_! Yay, cow! I wonder how I might surreptitiously suggest it. Dammit…now I want a T-bone… > [@WOOKINPANUB](#): > > We salute you, Mr. Fruit of the Month Giving Guy. > > (peeeears, apples and peaaaaaches) > > My apologies for any offence, Digital Stimulus. **snort** Exactly. No offense taken, anyone. > [@Harriet the Spry](#): > > I only have personal experience with oranges & grapefruit, but they were amazing. Thanks for the vote of confidence. I wonder: does citrus just ship better than other fruit? That would explain the kiwi complaint in **Athena** ’s cite. Makes me very wary about some of the other shipments; I’d think strawberries and papayas might not hold up well either. Which makes Hale’s a little more attractive, as that’s their specialty (whereas Harry and David’s seems to be pears). ---
**Author:** ![jayjay](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jayjay/32/6765_2.png) [@jayjay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jayjay)\ **Post date:** [November 3, 2005, 10:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mail-order-fruit-of-the-month/329184/24 "2005-11-03T22:01:33Z")
I wouldn’t worry about the Raymond references. The Fruit-of-the-Month thing happened in the very first episode, back when it was mildly amusing and before the series had a chance to really suck. ---
**Author:** ![LavenderBlue](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e95f7d/32.png) [@LavenderBlue](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LavenderBlue)\ **Post date:** [November 3, 2005, 10:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mail-order-fruit-of-the-month/329184/25 "2005-11-03T22:28:37Z")
My mother-in-law sent me some Harry & David fruit two years ago for Christmas. The fruit was okay. The pears were nice but the oranges were sub-par. It should be duly noted that my mother-in-law is an evil bitch who hates me and everyone else who is not her spoiled, stupid, nasty youngest daughter. ---
**Author:** ![Moirai](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/96bed5/32.png) [@Moirai](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Moirai)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2005, 1:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mail-order-fruit-of-the-month/329184/26 "2005-11-04T01:55:18Z")
God, I am so surprised by the negative review of Harry & David. We have been getting boxes every month for over five years and only once did we get a sub-par box, and that was because it was delivered while we were on vacation! They graciously sent another, and reminded us that if we knew we would be away, to call them and they would reschedule the delivery for when we would be home! Huh. Well, I love it. ---
**Author:** ![Cagey\_Drifter](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/b2d939/32.png) [@Cagey\_Drifter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cagey_Drifter)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2005, 7:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mail-order-fruit-of-the-month/329184/27 "2005-11-04T07:58:29Z")
Are there any CSAs in your neck of the woods? You could send your wife lovely fresh organic produce and also support local sustainable farmers at the same time, instead of some faceless mega-fruit corporation like Harry and David. 🙂 You’re basically “subscribing” to the harvest of a local organic farm, making a commitment to buy some of their produce at a fixed price. A longer description is here: > **[Community-supported agriculture](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Community-supported_agriculture)** > > Community-supported agriculture (CSA model) or cropsharing is a system that connects the producer and consumers within the food system more closely by allowing the consumer to subscribe to the harvest of a certain farm or group of farms. It is an alternative socioeconomic model of agriculture and food distribution that allows the producer and consumer to share the risks of farming. The model is a subcategory of civic agriculture that has an overarching goal of strengthening a sense of communit and a list of some CSAs is here: [http://www.greenpeople.org/csa.htm](http://www.greenpeople.org/csa.htm) ---
**Author:** ![Digital\_Stimulus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/aeb1de/32.png) [@Digital\_Stimulus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Digital_Stimulus)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2005, 2:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mail-order-fruit-of-the-month/329184/28 "2005-11-04T14:08:16Z")
I thought about local growers, but two things: I didn’t know where to look and I figured that someplace like Hale’s wasn’t really a “mega-fruit corporation” (I’m not sure if Harry and David qualifies either in my mind). I’m not too concerned with the latter, as it looks like most places are fairly small businesses or middle-men; as to the former, thanks for the link, I’ll look into it. ---
**Author:** ![Athena](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/35a633/32.png) [@Athena](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Athena)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2005, 3:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mail-order-fruit-of-the-month/329184/29 "2005-11-04T15:09:05Z")
> [@EJsGirl](#): > > God, I am so surprised by the negative review of Harry & David. The gist of the CI story was that they were comparing the fruit baskets from various companies to the fruit available at their local grocery stores, both quality-wise and price-wise. A lot of the negatives were about price (although not all - as I quoted above, they weren’t happy about the quality of every piece of fruit from Harry & David.) In general, they deemed the replacement values - ie, the cost to replace the fruit with similiar-quality fruit at their local groceries - at between $10 and $15, with the only exception on particularly large basket of not-very-exciting fruit. The cost of the baskets ranged between $57 and $75, with most falling around $65. ~$65 for ~$10 worth of fruit was the overall gist of things. ---
**Author:** ![DrMemory](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/977dab/32.png) [@DrMemory](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrMemory)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2005, 3:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/mail-order-fruit-of-the-month/329184/30 "2005-11-04T15:38:14Z")
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