My wife and I stumbled upon a local group selling heirloom tomato plants a couple of years ago. We grew a few and soon realized why they became heirlooms. The nicest thing that can be said is that they must be an acquired taste.
But IMO commodity tomatoes are some of the "easiest" things to improve upon. Regular supermarket tomatoes are often flavorless, the farmer's market tomatoes are often better (e.g. in California)
So heirlooms have higher highs and lower lows
IMO commodity tomatoes are consistent, but consistently "meh" ...
Like most things, it’s a different set of priorities and incentives that drive different results.
One clue is, the gene that ripens tomatoes is also the one that causes the skin to split. So the seeds get spread. But not useful for commercial use, as split tomatoes are worthless to sell. So they use varieties that don't express that gene. So they don't ripen much. So they are tasteless, no matter how long on the vine.
Definitely grow your own, if you care about tomatoes at all and have the room@!
A mutation of the SlGLK2 gene results in significantly less sugar in the fruit while slowing down ripening for transport.
Would you like to know how "Not From Concentrate" orange juice is manufactured? It may not be concentrated, but it involves many industrial processes and can be up to a year old when you buy it.
Fake food.
But I can't disagree strongly enough with calling store-bought and/or industrialized food "fake".
It's different. It has different tradeoffs. It's worse in some ways (and better in others), but what it most definitely is not is "fake".
I think I learned about Salmon being artifically pink from Hacker News several years ago
https://qz.com/358811/heres-why-your-farmed-salmon-has-color...
On the bright side, essentially everyone I know seems to like local produce, BEFORE I tell them it's local. Their taste buds are still attuned, and can tell the difference