To everyone that tweeted about my tweet re the smaller sized onions: I share your frustration. 30 years ago our size standard was 1 5/8 inch. Then it was pushed to 1 3/4. Then 2 inch and now mostly 2 1/4. It is in part extremely frustrating to me because ... https://twitter.com/ChrisPawelski/status/1215367560948060166

... to grow a larger size onion you have to plant less onions per foot. The larger the onion the fatter the neck and the greater chances that pathogens can penetrate the heart of the onion via mainly rain and cause some form of decay. It’s easier to grow those ...

... larger onions when you grow in the desert, with minimal rain, low humidity and you use drip tape irrigation. But here in the northeast on the eastern seaboard, on muck soil, those conditions don’t prevail. I plant less per foot I’m more likely to have some ...

... onions with a form of decay. I’m better suited to plant more per foot, to produce a slightly smaller onion with a thinner neck. I’d have a greater yield with better quality. Is a bigger onion better? For food service and restaurant uses, sure, probably so....

... But for home use? No. So who is pushing the larger size and why? Our outlets, the chain stores. They tell the people we sell to it’s what the consumer wants. Yet the overwhelming reaction I mostly hear from consumers, FOR YEARS, is that they prefer smaller ...

... sized onions. So why are they really pushing the larger sizes? Well ... let’s say a recipe calls for a half cup of onion, the consumer cuts an onion in half for the recipe, what’s done with the unused half? The grocery store is counting on it being thrown out....

... That’s right, it’s planned waste. So the consumer will more quickly go back to the grocery store and buy more onions. I, the farmer, have absolutely ZERO power to change this. I am a slave of the whims and demands of the people I sell to. The power to change ...

... this lies with you, the consumer. If you were to complain, complain not just to the produce manager at your local store but more importantly, to the produce buyer for the chain, at their HQ, that would have an impact. They are afraid of you. If you were to ...

... start a call campaign and just a few dozen people would threaten to take their business away and to the store that supplied them with smaller size onions, that would make a difference. And while you are at it ask them why they pay so little to the farmer while ...

... they make so much ... well that would make them squirm. No one challenges them. They do what they please. And right now that includes demanding large onions while paying the American farmer so little, if they even choose to buy our onions at all (or other produce) ...

... versus cheaper foreign product. Sad, isn’t it? @threader_app “compile”

I just had one of my outlets offer me $.14lb for TWO AND ONE HALF INCH DIAMETER yellow onions. That's right, they want 2 1/2inch. I guess the chains read my thread and this is how they respond ... a big F-U to growers and the consumer.