The market is amazing. New items continually appear unnoticed, without Apple mania, so to speak. Consider spinach, Popeye’s power pill.
Forty years ago – for those living in the northern states, anyway – spinach was either canned or frozen, and always absent from the produce section. At home, frozen was the choice. I remember seeing the cube of greens dropped in a boiling pot of water and salt – for me, the more salt, the better.
I had no idea what the fresh leaves of a spinach looked like; its leaves were always wilted in a frozen or boiled mash.
While eating dinner this evening, I placed a few leaves of fresh spinach on my hamburger, and then I paused: when did we start eating fresh spinach, in midwinter, nonetheless?
I went to the refrigerator and removed the remnants of the bag of spinach. I pulled out a few leaves and stems, taking my first cognizant look at spinach.[1] The leaves and stems were long and crisp, with not a wilt to be found. Amazing.
So, when did this revolution occur? When did I go from wilted frozen to crispy fresh?
Sure, new technology hits the market with glamorous fanfare. But the market also revolutionizes in ways that are never news, with improvements appearing both unnoticed and appreciated.
Note: [1] My knowledge of spinach moved from information-knowledge to action-knowledge, in a Kirznerian manner, so to speak.
{ 2 comments }
A polymer bag, gases, and an intergrated supply-chain.. Presto delicious spinach! For years, I had trauma from consuming the green mass of vegetable material that came from a USDA supplied can in the school lunch. Never again! It is well worth the additional transportation inputs, and remote chance of a communicable disease. Local foodies and USDA/FDA bureaucrats be damned!
Does anyone who has ever eaten fresh spinach actually ever eat that canned or frozen crap again? I mean it might be ok as part of a cooked dish, but it is inedible on it’s own. Great article on the under appreciated outcomes of freedom.
Comments on this entry are closed.