Need source of store-level sales quantities of specific produce items

I used to work at one of the firms (no longer! My opinions are my own! etc.) that Talk to Me Goose mentioned and I highly doubt you will be able to get this kind of data without some sort of serious subterfuge. 1. This data is definitely not publicly available as it's what these companies build their business models around. Very broadly speaking, retailers sell their point-of-sale data to Nielsen/IRI/Spins, which then clean, analyze and aggregate the data and then sell it to manufacturers. No one in this chain is incentivized to give this type of data away for free. 2. Even if this data existed produce is going to be particularly difficult to measure. All of these companies use the existence of UPCs/bar codes on packaged products in order to most accurately capture the volume of specific consumer products sold. Produce, unless it's prepackaged, obviously doesn't have this. The solution that these companies have devised to work around this is to have household panels, which rely on a demographically balanced panel of consumers reporting their purchases, which are then statistically aggregated to a national scale. Obviously, this involves a lot of calculations/approximations for store-level data. 3. Finally, at least when I was at my company, places like Whole Foods or Trader Joe's hold their data even more closely than the big Kroger, Supervalu and Safeway grocery conglomerates. If you "cooperate" -- AKA if you're a retailer or grocery store that decides to sell your data -- then you're also able to get back broad industry data. So if I am Andrewesque's Grocery Store located in New York City, and I sell my data to Nielsen/IRI, I am able to get back data about the general grocery store industry in New York. Importantly, I can't get specific data about Competitor Grocery Store, only broad industry-data -- Nielsen/IRI are extremely careful to avoid this as obviously it would dis-incentivize individual stores from selling data, for competitive reasons. If a retailer/grocer decide not to sell their data to Nielsen/IRI, Nielsen/IRI will not furnish them with the industry information -- it's sort of a quid pro quo. Places like Whole Foods have decided that it's not worth it to have their data available to competitors, even if it is only part of a whole and this means they can't get industry channel data from Nielsen/IRI. I think if Whole Foods isn't willing to have this data available in a masked, aggregate form in a formal transaction, the odds of you being able to get it informally are pretty low.

The produce crosses each store's loading dock. Find a store where you can see the loading dock from public property, then photograph the pallet loads. If the boxes are labeled, and you know the weight of product X for a box size, and the photo quality is good, you've got some data. Wouldn't hurt to verify this is legal where you live.

If you are willing to pay, some of this data is available from http://www.nielsen.com/us/en/solutions/measurement/retail-measurement.html http://www.iriworldwide.com/ and http://www.spins.com/. These solutions are aimed at manufacturers and marketers in the industry, so expect to pay $$$$$$ for the data you want. Another avenue to take would be to contact a produce manufacturers trade group. They might be willing to give you some ballpark numbers if it is in the name of education or your paper could benefit them somehow.

The produce crosses each store's loading dock. Find a store where you can see the loading dock from public property, then photograph the pallet loads. If the boxes are labeled, and you know the weight of product X for a box size, and the photo quality is good, you've got some data. I'm all for watching businesses to calculate stuff like this. I've done it in different industries. It can be done easily in other circumstances. Without some serious Mission Impossible shit going on, the logistics of doing this in the produce/grocery world would be remarkably difficult for a couple reasons; First off, most grocery stores of size unload from the truck directly onto a loading dock. That's like, three or four feet of visibility between truck and the dock. The stuff gets moved into refrigeration really, really fast. The loads typically are on the loading dock for a couple of minutes, tops…if they stop moving between the truck the walk in, you're doing something wrong. It doesn't hang out long enough anywhere to really get a good look at it; which is one of the reasons being a 'produce reciever' is a terrible position to have in the produce department. In the departments I worked in, it was usually reserved for punishment. Second, produce pallets are usually mixed loads even at very busy grocery stores. You've only got one, two sides facing out to be readable if you're lucky, and you could have a stack of 6 boxes of arugula facing the other way. Maybe the busiest grocery stores in the US (by sheer volume) bring in a full pallet of that product, but I highly doubt it. I worked at the 2nd busiest grocery store (per square foot…and it only held that title for two years) and they wouldn't get that much in on a given day. Third, typically with leafy greens like this, a grower or packer only makes 1 box, with half a dozen checkboxes on the outside to determine what the contents are. So you've got 6 identical boxes with 'baby arugula' or 'baby lettuce' or any number of other products stamped on each box…and I speak from the experience of breaking those pallets down five days a week (I wasn't the best worker back in those days, lots of receiving shifts), that they're often mis-labeled, and barely decipherable close up. There's going to be an entire pallet of 'Cal-Farms' product, and maybe two or three of those a day is baby lettuce…but the boxes are otherwise identically except for a check or puncture mark on the box…if the distributer even bothered to do that. Other packers are moving towards reusable, collapsable crates that are even harder to decipher the contents of at a distance (or sweet jesus close up). The labels on the outside just get stuck over other labels, and they always fall or get torn off because of the levels of condensation the are ever-present in the produce cooling world. Really, if you want to accurately and ethically do this, you ask the store manager politely and get ready to accept a 'no way are we giving you that information.' If you want to be slightly unethical about it, you get a job at a grocery store, or a distributer and keep your tally going. You don't start 'making friends' with a produce clerk or manager, because the request you're asking of them can get the fired. This is a bad idea, and really, could lead to someone's termination if the wrong person finds out. Not something I'd like hanging over my head.