Category:United Fruit Companies

The United Fruit Companies of Nov Scotia was a co-operative network of apple growers which played a major role in shipping apples and related products from dozens of warehouses along the Dominion Atlantic Railway from 1911 until 1957. The United Fruit Companies were organized July 1912 as a co-op wholesale fruit marketing group founded initially by 51 farmers and fruit warehousing companies across the Annapolis Valley. It was formed in 1912 by growers to work together to store, pack, ship and market their apples together in co-op warehouses all along the DAR. The United Fruit Companies was comprised of “central”, headquarters staff in Kentville, an the “locals”, the farmer-owned co-op warehouses found from one end of the DAR to the other. The United Fruit Companies allowed many smaller and medium growers to earn a better living from apple farming by reducing shipping costs and paying better prices a well as providing spray and fertilizer at discount prices. The cooperatives faced stiff competition from corporate shipping organizations, particularly the British Canadian Fruit Association, W.H. Chase and Herbert Oyler who drew on deeper capital locally and from British firms. These large companies controlled many smaller growers by loaning them money and supplies in exchange for exclusive control of their apple crops. To cope with the collapse of the British apple export market, the United Fruit Company built a pair of large warehouses and a food processing plant at Coldbrook in 1946 to process apples more efficiently and develop new products. Shrinking markets for fresh apples and pressure from big private fruit companies caused serious problems for the United Fruit Companies in the 1950s. However the company was able to reorganize in 1957 and reform as a new co-op under the name Scotian Gold, which still operates today.