The previous Pacific Northwest cherry season was perceived as excellent in terms of quality, but one cherry grower labeled it as one of the most exasperating seasons. The reason? The superior produce was left unsold due to excessively high prices in California.
Northwest Cherry Growers' President, B.J. Thurlby, explained that the high prices deterred some buyers: “You know when we started to pick around the 15th of June, California had around 3-4 million boxes on the floor still and was still picking, got behind because their fruit was, it was okay but they were shipping old fruit. They got behind and once it got to the market it was sitting on the shelves between $10.99 a pound to $5.99 a pound and it just didn’t move.”
Thurlby continued: “Our particular target price for ads would probably be in the $3.59 to $3.99 range because at that price the consumer continues to get a good deal and the growers can actually make a little bit of money on the back end. You know, at the same time, there needs to be some hot ads out there during the season too, whether they’re, you know, $2.99 or whatever, we need to see that and we didn’t really see that pricing last year until the third week of July."
Thurlby revealed that discussions between California and northwest cherry growers are ongoing to prevent similar issues in the future.
Source: rfdtv.com