The natives of southern Brazil and Paraguay spread the pineapple  throughout South America, and it eventually reached the Caribbean.  Columbus discovered it in the Indies and brought it back with him to Europe. The Spanish introduced it into the Philippines, Hawaii, Zimbabwe and Guam. The fruit was cultivated successfully in European hothouses, and pineapple pits,  beginning in 1720. Commonly grown cultivars include 'Red Spanish',  'Hilo', 'Smooth Cayenne', 'St. Michael', 'Kona Sugarloaf', 'Natal  Queen', and 'Pernambuco'.

The pineapple was introduced to Hawaii in 1813; exports of canned pineapples began in 1892. Large scale pineapple cultivation by U.S. companies began in the early 1900s on Hawaii. Among the most famous and influential pineapple industrialists was James Dole, who started a pineapple plantation in Hawaii in the year 1900. The companies Dole and Del Monte began growing pineapple on the island of Oahu in 1901 and 1917, respectively. Maui Pineapple Company began pineapple cultivation on the island of Maui in 1909. In 2006, Del Monte announced its withdrawal from pineapple  cultivation in Hawaii, leaving only Dole and Maui Pineapple Company in  Hawaii as the USA’s largest growers of pineapples. Maui Pineapple  Company markets its Maui Gold brand of pineapple and Dole markets its  Hawaii Gold brand of pineapple.

In the USA in 1986, the Pineapple Research Institute was dissolved and its assets were divided between Del Monte and Maui Land and Pineapple.  Del Monte took 73-114, which it dubbed MD-2, to its plantations in  Costa Rica, found it to be well-suited to growing there, and launched  it publicly in 1996. (Del Monte also began marketing 73-50, dubbed  CO-2, as Del Monte Gold). In 1997, Del Monte began marketing its Gold  Extra Sweet pineapple, known internally as MD-2. MD-2 is a hybrid that  originated in the breeding program of the now-defunct Pineapple  Research Institute in Hawaii, which conducted research on behalf of Del  Monte, Maui Land & Pineapple Company, and Dole.