Packing format
A pallet that mixes sizes or varieties
Nothing in the marketing standard stops it. Uniformity is a rule about the contents of a package, so a pallet carrying several correctly filled and correctly marked boxes is compliant however many specifications sit on it. What a mixed pallet costs is traceability and speed at the door, because one handling unit now carries several markings and several lots.
The figures
| Where uniformity applies | The contents of each package, not the pallet (Reg. (EU) 2023/2429, Annex I, Part B, Part 2) |
|---|---|
| What uniformity means there | Same origin, variety or commercial type, quality and size, and appreciably the same degree of ripeness and development |
| The one mixture the standard allows | Distinctly different citrus species in a sales package, uniform in quality and, per species, in variety and origin. Size uniformity is not required |
| What each package must carry | Identification of packer and dispatcher, nature of produce, origin, and commercial specifications including class and size |
| What the standard says about pallets | Nothing. The unit it regulates is the package |
| The traceability duty | Operators must identify the supplier and the immediate recipient of any food (Reg. (EC) 178/2002, article 18) |
| What a mixed pallet becomes | One handling unit carrying several markings and more than one lot code |
| Worth asking for | The mix set out pallet by pallet on the packing list |
| Whether we build them | Not confirmed. Our packing arrangement is still open |
What it changes on an order
You order several sizes in small volumes
A mixed pallet is the only way to buy a spread of sizes without taking a full pallet of each. That is a real commercial reason to ask for one, and it is worth asking for it explicitly rather than hoping.
You identify stock by pallet
Warehouse systems that label the handling unit assume the unit is homogeneous. Put four specifications under one identifier and the system will be confidently wrong about three of them until somebody opens the pallet.
You have to trace fruit backwards
A clean boundary is what makes a withdrawal small. Where varieties or origins share a pallet and the paperwork does not separate them, the smallest unit anyone can clear is the whole pallet.
What this note does not settle
- This describes what the marketing standard regulates and what it leaves alone. It is not advice on whether any particular package or pallet conforms.
- Pallet level identification is a commercial convention rather than a requirement of the marketing standard. What your systems need is a question for your own supply chain, not something the regulation answers.
- Whether we can build mixed pallets, and at what minimum per specification, depends on a packing arrangement that is not settled with the grower.
Source: Commission Delegated Regulation (EU) 2023/2429, Annex I, Part B, Part 2, Regulation (EC) No 178/2002, article 18
Uniformity is a rule about packages
The European marketing standard for citrus fixes what may travel together inside one package. It says nothing about what may travel together on one pallet. A pallet holding four sizes in four correctly filled and correctly marked boxes breaks no rule at all, which surprises buyers who have read the uniformity clause and assumed it reached further up the load.
What a mixed pallet does break is the convenience of treating a pallet as a unit. Every package carries its own marking, so a mixed pallet carries several, and the identifier a warehouse puts on the whole thing now covers contents that are not alike. That is a records problem rather than a legal one, and records problems surface late.
The day it costs you
Mixed pallets are read at the moment somebody needs to isolate something. A quality query on one variety, a lot to be withdrawn, a complaint that has to be traced back to a picking date: each of those wants a clean boundary, and a unit that mixes origins or varieties does not offer one. The whole pallet becomes suspect because no smaller piece of it can be cleared.
A second cost shows up at the door. Mixed units slow a goods in check, because the checker has to open and verify more than one specification on the same pallet, and slow checks get shallow. If you need them, say so at the order stage and ask for the mix to be described pallet by pallet on the packing list, so the boundary lives on paper even when it does not live on the floor.
Talk to the grower
Tell us the variety, the sizes and the delivery week you need. You get a delivered price and what we can commit to in writing, from the person who picks the fruit.
The grower handles enquiries. Response times are still to be confirmed.