Wegmans to 'Celebrate Organics!' (with video)

Wegmans Food Markets will host a Celebrate Organics! event this Saturday from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. with organic sampling stations featuring pan-seared organic kale, organic vegetable barley soup, Beemster organic gouda, Canadian-certified organic mussles and other samples throughout the store.

In addition to hearing about relationships with supplier-partners like Bell & Evans Farms, which according to a blog post by Wegmans category merchant Tony Caterino has "the best-tasting organic chicken we've ever had," shoppers will learn the story of Wegmans’ Organic Farm.

Wegmans will carry new produce from the Canandaigua, N.Y., farm this year — live Italian Parsley, Curled Parsley and Cilantro plants.  

"You’ll be able to snip a few leaves to add flavor to whatever you’ve got cooking!" said Amy Cimino, Wegmans Organic Farm Store ambassador, in a Fresh Stories blog post.

The Rochester, N.Y.-based retailer will also promote its new Return to Sender plastic bag program this Saturday by giving a coupon for a free reusable bag to the first 300 customers who bring in clean plastic bags.

Earlier this year, Wegmans began printing "Return to Sender. Don't trash it — bags recycled at Wegmans are transformed into new Wegmans bags with 40% recycled content" on plastic shopping bags. The retailer uses 4,000 fewer plastic bags per store per day than it once had. 

The event comes at a time when Walmart has launched an organic initiative involving the Wild Oats brand and Target is curating organic brands under its Made to Matter program.