OrchardWorld’s name is among the minds shaping the future of food and drink and is a trusted leader in the produce industry within top fruit, stone fruit, cherries, and citrus.

We’ve grower partnerships in the UK and worldwide, delivering a seamless journey from orchard to table. This history of meaningful connections across the world spans almost 40 years, and as a brand, it’s not just about delivering great fruit to retail customers – it’s about engaging with families and inspiring their choices.

The range in stores and online connects our loyal consumers with the joy and value of fresh produce. Our passion for ethical sourcing and responsible production resonates with the growing demand for sustainability.

OrchardWorld is all about turning premium produce into an experience that brings families together.

Our OrchardWorld brand initially started off with a small selection of top fruit (apples and pears). It has progressively grown over time, and now we have over 20 lines in our range, including a premium tier, ‘Our Best’. Our fruit is carefully selected by our procurement experts, bringing you some of the best varieties around, all with their own unique flavours and characteristics. The team have worked tirelessly over the years to select the winning varieties that we think you will love, bringing them to your attention so that you can decide which flavours best satisfy your taste buds.

Mark Culley, Managing Director

Mark grew up on his parents’ family-run fruit farm in Colchester, Essex. Spending much of his spare time helping around the farm, it became apparent at an early age that he was destined to work within the fresh produce sector.

However, seeing his parents struggle through the 80s within this challenging environment, he wanted to bring something slightly different to the table that would make a difference to them and other local farmers in the same position.

The UK industry had to change as it was struggling to compete with cheap imports. At the time, there was a very limited selection of varieties available in the UK, with Granny Smith and Golden Delicious being imported, and the red dessert and Cox being grown in the UK.

Whilst the Cox was a popular variety supplying up to 70% of the UK apple industry, the ongoing struggles included very light yields and generally poor quality.

Combining his extensive experience, academic and agricultural studies (at Hadlow College, Kent) with developing growing techniques, he started to combat some of the challenges. This is where he was able to make a difference to his father’s livelihood. In 1989, Mark was invited to join Poupart Ltd., a marketing company that ran a group of English growers acting as a ‘go-between’ to the growers and major supermarkets.

Mark knew of the Royal Gala, which was a variety predominantly grown in France and New Zealand and was aware that certain UK farms had tried growing very early strains. He and his father decided to spend their time and effort investing in growing this variety on their farm. A more colourful strain called Mondial Gala had now become available from the nurseries, and as their experience grew, the harvests kept on improving. This would be the winning variety, which would help his father’s farm grow. It had huge potential: cropped a lot heavier, used fewer pesticides, was frost resistant and up to 90% of good quality on each harvest. This was a big improvement on Cox, which is now less than 10k tonnes as opposed to 120k tonnes 30 years ago. The process took a long time to establish. With the correct orchard husbandry, the first real yield would not be until 3 years in, and it would not be until 5 years that full production would be accomplished. However, accomplished it was.

Mark met Ian Hall, a buyer at the time for Sainsbury’s in the late 80s. Jointly, they realised the potential in the product. He teamed up with Mark to push this from the retailer side, whilst Mark was able to encourage more growers, including his father, to grow the OrchardWorld Royal Gala by reducing marketing costs and giving them incentives to grow it. New colour strains made for a more interesting variety.

The introduction of the PLU (price look-up code) label was invaluable to the growth of this project, meaning that more varieties could be added to the very small list. By the late 90s, this product had a foothold and was sold in Sainsbury’s supermarket. It wasn’t until 2005 that this really took off.

Today, about 30 years after its commercial introduction in the UK, Royal Gala is consistently one of the top three best-selling apple varieties in UK supermarkets, with annual sales of around 60,000–75,000 tonnes.