Employees at the Hunts Point Produce Market in the Bronx have been hard at work since the early morning hours of the weekend, filling orders and loading trucks ahead of the Thanksgiving holiday.
All to ensure grocery shelves and restaurants are stocked so that the Thanksgiving spread includes both staple and unique items.
What You Need To Know
Hunts Point Produce Market employees are working around the clock to fill orders and stock grocery stores and restaurants ahead of Thanksgiving
Top Banana, a Bronx distributor since 1996, will move 1 million pounds of bananas this week alone
A Thanksgiving meal for 10 will cost slightly over $55 nationally, down 5% from last year, but New Yorkers face an average of $66
“We are cramming six days’ worth of business into three days. It’s a very reduced week. So the overall volume of produce goes up and then you have less time to do it. So we’re working around the clock starting Sunday night at, let’s say, four in the afternoon, all the way through the Thanksgiving holiday,” said Dan Barabino, vice president at Top Banana.
Top Banana has been a produce distributor at the market since 1996.
This week alone, they will move 1 million pounds of bananas out of their facility and into grocery stores and restaurants, only after they say the fruit has reached the perfect level of ripeness for the next leg of its journey.
“It’s going to be more steps between where we are now and your counter at home. So this is going to go to, let’s say, a retailer’s distribution center and then it’s going to get loaded to the retailer and it might go into the back of the store before it’s eventually put on the shelf,” Barabino said.
While prices at the grocery store may feel higher, according to the American Farm Bureau Federation, a Thanksgiving feast will cost less than last year. The national average cost for 10 people is slightly over $55 — a 5% decrease from 2024.
However, in New York, the average is more than $66, or about $6.61 per person — nearly 20% higher than the national average. Barabino said tariffs have influenced produce prices this year.
“We source a number of domestic products, especially the Thanksgiving items, like onions, sweet potatoes and potatoes for the holiday,” he said. “But a lot of our other items come from Central and South America. So those items were impacted by tariffs for the first quarter.”
“Hopefully we get some relief. It looks like we’re going to get some relief, but at the end of the day, we’re in a true market. So it’s a complex equation between supply and demand for where the ultimate price of the commodity lands,” Barabino added.