Had a fantastic meeting with Bradley for the Southeastern Grocery chains.  They represent Winn Dixie, BiLo, J H Harveys, and Fresco.  Fresco is a mostly Hispanic group in the Miami and very most southern parts of Florida.  Winn Dixie now has around 380 stores, BiLo has 150 stores, J H Harvey's has around 50 stores, and the Fresco stores number around 26 stores.  Last year about this time Southeastern was in the process of coming out of a bankruptcy situation, which to my understanding, they have emerged from.  We discussed in length the promotions we could offer his different store groups.  He elected to go with ad circulars for his store groups.  He said that he might want to do demos in a few stores that would be undergoing remodels or new stores.  I told him to let me know and that we might be able to help him.  I think it would be a great gesture to do so if at all possible.  Last year we got more ad support than we ever have gotten from his group of stores.  Bradley said that he planned on doing just as many if not more if at all possible.  He knew that one of his weak areas was not advertising Rainier Cherries and that he missed the boat on this.  He said if all possible, he planned on advertising them this year.  He fully understands that the crop might be a few weeks late this year, but is looking at it positively and said that he felt he had lined up some good suppliers.  He also did an outstanding job last year in promoting our Stone Fruit and said he planned to do so again this year.

We met for almost 1 1/2 hours.  When he asked where I was from toward the end of our meeting, he said that a gentleman from Salisbury was also working for him.  When he told me his name, I told him what a small world as he used to be a buyer for me when I was with Food Lion.  He called him down to meet with us and we caught up on old times.  His name is Alan Hurley.   In summary  just a great meeting that I think is going to be very good for our growers.