With a recent outbreak of cyclospora linked to lettuce, some consumers are steering clear of the leafy green. But for Mississippi lettuce producer Salad Days, the concerns have actually driven more customers to seek out its locally grown products.
Located in Flora, Salad Days operates out of a 68,000-square-foot indoor hydroponic greenhouse. Unlike traditional farming, hydroponic farms use nutrient-rich water rather than soil. Salad Days co-founder Leigh Bailey said the company’s indoor growing methods help eliminate exposure to outside contaminants, and its lettuce has not been linked to the cyclospora outbreak affecting other products across the U.S.
“[Salad Days] has come in the spotlight the last several weeks with this terrible food safety scare with cyclospora,” Bailey said on MidDays with Gerard Gibert. “The indoor growing methods just seem to make a lot of sense when you look at what’s happening from outside contaminants that you control.”
Bailey added that Salad Days uses a controlled municipal water source that goes through an additional round of filtration to help prevent pathogens from entering the water used to grow its lettuce.
“Why not put it indoors, where you know what’s being put on it? You know the water you’re using is not subject to runoff, wildlife, other things that can be damaging, or any sort of outside contaminants,” she said.
When Mississippi’s first case of cyclosporiasis – the intestinal illness caused by the microscopic parasite, cyclospora – was reported July 17, Salad Days immediately took to social media to assure Mississippians and other regional customers that its products were safe.
Since then, the company says its retail customers have doubled their orders as more people turn to Salad Days rather than larger brands grown elsewhere.
“We’ve seen a big increase in our retail sales. We do food service packed products as well as retail, and we’ve seen a bigger spike in the retail than in the food service, but there’s been a lot of activity in both,” Bailey said. “People are coming out of the woodwork saying, ‘Can we trust this product? We’re tired of skipping our salad.’ So, it’s made a lot of people willing to go back to eating salad.”
In another social media post, Salad Days said the surge in demand has taken the company from filling small box rucks to loading full 18-wheelers with its lettuce.
The hydroponic “living lettuce” is available at many local grocery stores and farmers markets. Some larger retailers, including Kroger, also carry Salad Days at select locations.
By the end of July, Mississippi had 12 confirmed cases of cyclosporiasis, according to The Clarion-Ledger. The Mississippi State Department of Health did not respond to a request for clarification from SuperTalk Mississippi News on the number of confirmed cases as of Aug. 11.
