September 29, Salinas, CA – Fresh Express, the No. 1 salad maker in the world and the pioneer of the fresh-cut salad category, today announced that it will immediately begin to resume fresh spinach production following a statement issued by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and the confirmation that no cases in the recent and tragic fresh spinach outbreak were epidemiologically linked to Fresh Express or its operations.
“We are grateful to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the State of California Department of Health Services for their tireless leadership in protecting the public health during this outbreak,” said Fresh Express President Tanios Viviani. “Food safety has been and will always remain the number one priority throughout our company and in every single phase of our operation. It is gratifying that we can once again provide our loyal consumers and customers with fresh and safe ready-to-eat fresh Spinach products.”
The company confirmed that it will begin spinach production immediately and is expecting its fresh packaged Spinach to reach both retail and foodservice customers, and ultimately consumers, very soon.
“From the moment news of the outbreak first reached us, we formed a specialized team to help support the government’s investigation in any way we could,” said Jim Lugg, Senior Vice President for Quality and Food Safety. ‘In our industry, even a single consumer illness is one too many. We are making our proprietary and comprehensive field and manufacturing food safety protocols available to authorities as they continue to evaluate the standards that need to be adopted industrywide.”