MARKET UPDATE 10.23.23
Greetings friends,
HALLOWEEN and the FALL SEASON are here! Make sure to add items like mixed gourds, carving pumpkins, and decorative mini pumpkins to your orders and add a festive touch to your shelves!
KIWI markets have seen a lot of action the past few weeks. With a lighter than expected Chilean season ending and the European season just starting up, California fruit is currently the best of what's around, and believe me, the growers out West know it and are pricing their product at a premium. Unfortunately, it's still early in the California season and sizing is inconsistent at best. Packing houses are struggling to find proper sized fruit for packing clamshells and we have seen them taking some liberties with sizing on VF boxes as well.
Bad weather in Canadian CARROT growing regions are causing a jump in market pricing this week. Not much relief is available out of Mexican fields as the volume is just not there. Elevated prices will probably hold on until our friends up North see better weather and more volume becomes available.
In produce, a little foresight goes a long way. MANGOES, a typically plentiful commodity, are going to be tight the next few weeks. Brazilian import numbers are trending downward, and we anticipate the tropical treat will be a hot commodity soon enough.
As for news out of the Salinas Valley region of California, we are seeing many growers pricing BROCCOLI and CAULIFLOWER to move this week. A drop in demand has the market flush with product and with some cooler days in the forecast, quality should be solid.
There's some good news out West on LETTUCE as well. Fields in Huron, CA are producing good quality and volume in ICEBERG which we will see this week. Not all shippers make this transition to Huron before Arizona, so the market will not completely adjust, but hopefully this short season will once again do a good job of bridging the gap over to Arizona production in mid-November.
That's all for now. We will continue to do our best to keep you informed.
-Robert Bare