Supplies of California pomegranates are coming in steadily.
“We’re seeing good supplies,” says Bill Purewal of PureFresh Sales based in Selma, CA. He notes that while PureFresh is finishing up harvesting the Early Foothills variety of pomegranate, it’s moving into its Early Wonderful variety.
“We are generally the first one to start every year and we started in mid-August with Slayman Marketing’s Granada pomegranates,” says Purewal, noting it began that harvest on August 15th. “From there, when they finish up, we move into the Valley to harvest Early Wonderfuls and our peak variety are the Wonderful variety and that starts mid-October,” he says. He adds that current volumes look to be similar to last year’s volume at this time and sizing looks to be the same as well. “Nothing is different—the heat hasn’t really changed things,” he adds.
Following stone fruit’s lead
Meanwhile demand has been good for the fruit. “Coming into the Jewish holiday Rosh Hashanah, demand was very good globally. Domestically we also had great demand,” says Purewal. “Demand is stronger than last year. Everyone wants fresh, healthy fruit and it’s following the trend of California stone fruit. Its demand was exceptional with people are home for the pandemic.”
That has left pricing slightly above last year, largely due to the increased demand. “We haven’t seen a price drop or a market slowdown as of yet,” says Purewal. “Looking ahead, we’re just expecting business to be brisk and volumes to come off very slowly.”
For more information:
Bill Purewal
PureFresh Sales
Tel: +1 (559) 896-2500
bill@purefreshsales.com
www.purefreshsales.com