Blue Diamond almond milk will glide down a Pasadena street Tuesday

Blue Diamond Growers has its first-ever float in the Tournament of Roses Parade, a flower-studded tribute to its almond milk.

The New Year’s Day tradition will take place in Pasadena for the 130th time, starting at 8 a.m. Tuesday before a national TV audience.

The milk under the Almond Breeze label is among the top-selling products from Blue Diamond. The cooperative makes the milk at its headquarters in Sacramento and also has plants in Salida and Turlock.

An artist rendering of the float shows a tall glass of the beverage, along with almond blossoms, pollinating bees and mature nuts. Per the parade rules, the float also will have lots of flowers — about 18,000 roses and 23,000 other types.

Riding the float will be five Blue Diamond growers and their families: Pat Romero of Turlock, Kevin Hall of Atwater, Steve Massaro of Chowchilla, Craig Fulwyler of Wasco and Gurchuran Dhillon of Bakersfield.

The parade will be live on ABC. NBC, the Hallmark Channel and Univision. It is a prelude to college football’s Rose Bowl, this year pitting Ohio State against Washington.

The almond milk float follows those entered in 2016 and 2017 by the California Milk Advisory Board, celebrating dairy products from cows. The Tracy-based board had its own family farmers riding along.

New Year’s might be a day of celebration, but the two kinds of milk have been a source of tension in recent months. The dairy industry, facing competition from plant-based alternatives, has asked the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to better enforce labeling rules that say milk must come from secreting animals.

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