Market Report - July 8th 2015

STRAWBERRY FIELDS FOREVER

The last two weeks of insane heat are making it difficult to write a static report on a quickly moving target.  Apple market is changing as importers start to balance inventory and incoming arrivals from the South with what are stab-in-the-dark projections about the Washington harvests which could be very early.  Expect this market to become more volatile over the next few weeks through the juggling act.  Exceptional pricing on avocados – prices are set to drop over the next month as growers are now allowed to harvest new crop from what is projected to be an outstanding harvest.  The Mexican government equivalent of our CFIA (Sagarpa) decides when new crop has enough dry matter and oil for export.We are currently into the last load of the older crop, which is always the best fruit with the highest amount of oil.  We have dropped prices substantially on these.  Some of these were also stored a few degrees too high, so will probably ripen a bit faster on the shelf.   Buy lots, put them on special and we will hold your hand on anything you don’t sell.  Thanks in advance!Blueberries are still in high volume – ripening has been triggered with the heat across several varieties, and cooler temperatures may or may not help normalize things over the next couple of weeks.  Citrusy things are also difficult with a severe shortage of California Valencia which is really the only orange grown right now, along with the very last of the Mexican crop, and no new fruit expected until October.  Expect to see less fancy fruit offered and spiraling prices.  A 5% drop in the value of the Canadian dollar over the last 10 days will not help on pricing.  Lemons become more and more scarce, reflected in the pricing, although it hasn’t dampened sales that much.  Really the high points on the fruit front are melons, grapes and strawberries, with continued very strong sales.   The local stone-fruit season is taking off with great movement on cherries, cots and peaches – this will be a short season on cherries and cots, with harvests already winding down in the hottest areas.  Washington will wrap up cherries many weeks early – most packers expect to be done by the beginning of next week.  We are continuing to run major strawberry promotions and “call for volume pricing” means just that!  Esteban has a huge flush on and needs to move a lot of berries over the next 10 days.  Conditions are perfect right now and he has lots of water (one of the lucky ones!)Very high temperatures up until the last couple of days, and low humidity from the desert air invading most of our growing areas have pushed ground-croppers to man the pumps and pull hose around the clock trying to keep soil cool and wet, which is proving very difficult.  Of course, weeds don’t care and grow faster, creating more challenges.  Even the garlic crop has suffered across the province – normally a crop that never gets watered.  Many growers aren’t set up to irrigate – there is usually enough rain through the early summer to keep moisture levels in the soil high enough for the roots, but that isn’t the case this year, and several growers are reporting smaller yields and smaller sizing, as well as earlier harvest dates.   It’s somewhat astounding that we have 170 line items of BC fruit and veg already – but who knew the weather would be this hot and dry for 3 straight months!2 weeks ago California growers were begging to sell broccoli at prices well below production cost.  Well, that heat wave has passed and instantly the price has rocketed and supply has plummeted – now we are doing the begging!  Watch your retails!Eatmore Sprouts Price Increase:  Please note higher prices across the board on all sprouts.  Eatmore has passed along this price increase primarily because of higher seed costs – it’s their first price increase in a long, long time but it’s about 8-9%, so please note this.And to all of you who wake up to a blue sky in the morning – send us pictures of what it looks like, because we haven’t seen the sun for many days behind the brown shroud of fire smoke billowing over us!