In terms of prices, this year's cauliflower season has not been anything to write home about, until recent weeks. "All year, sales were extremely difficult, starting right from the winter cauliflower season, but now that has completely changed. Cauliflowers are currently selling for over 2 euros each, whereas in June and July we still had weeks where the market price was around 45 cents," says Ruud Slagter of P.N. Slagter.
Ruud is one of the five members of the Slagter firm. The company grows cauliflower on about 200 hectares and also markets cauliflower for five other firms, with a combined area of around 230 hectares. "Supply is much lower now. Our yields are not entirely disappointing yet, but I can see around me that here in the polder in West Friesland, the harvest is significantly reduced. In England, too, there are substantial shortages, which will certainly help explain the extremely high prices."
© P.N. Slagter
The difficult start to the season took some getting used to, says Ruud. "For the past three years, we were quite spoiled with a seller's market. This year, it was tough until August, and now we are seeing this price surge right in the middle of the traditional summer holidays. If you have cauliflower now, you're in a strong position, and fortunately, that makes up for a lot. The quality of the cauliflower is reasonable, although it has been lower in recent weeks."
From Andijk, P.N. Slagter serves a wide range of customers, from supermarkets to exporters and wholesalers. "We have customers who buy by the pallet and by the truckload. Sales to supermarkets are mostly through contracts, but we also have retailers who buy weekly."
For more information:
Ruud Slagter
Fa. P.N. Slagter
Kadijkweg 43
1619 PJ Andijk
Tel: +31 (0) 6 37351433
[email protected]
www.pnslagter.nl
