07/23/2026
This is how we harvest and store our slicing tomatoes for market.
A lot of people think waiting for a tomato to fully fully ripen on the vine is how it has to be harvested. However, as a small- scale commercial producer, that is not realistic. If we waited for vine ripened tomatoes to be picked, we would loose half our crop to rot before we could get them to market. Our tomatoes are picked every other day, at color crack or blushing stage, during the week leading up to market day, kept in our tomato cooler at 63°F allowing them to slowly ripen to perfection for market.
Tomatoes are a huge investment on our farm. The money that goes into seed (root stock and heirloom seed), potting mix (for the initial seeding and then potting them on), heat and light to get them going early in the season, the biweekly soil amendments, trellising and pruning and harvesting time... yes tomatoes cost a ton to produce at scale. Because of this harvesting correctly for maximum yield and sales is critical to our farms financial success with them.
