Red onion prices lowest in almost a decade

Red onion supply continues to be good although the market is deflated; Matthew Gideon says the best time of year for consumption and demand is springtime when the industry moves from a storage crop to a fresh crop out of Mexico and Texas. “We also grow a sweet red onion in Mexico, Texas and Georgia,” he said. Supply is coming from California, Washington, Idaho, and Oregon. “We are trying to do something unique and bring a premium by growing a true red sweet variety year round”.

Pricing should remain stable over the next few weeks. Pricing is currently standing at $4 for 25lbs versus $8-$10 FOB Oregon last year. “The next few weeks pricing should be fairy stable. We’re pretty close to the bottom of the market that I’ve seen in the last 8-10 years so I don’t expect it to go too much lower.” Quality is outstanding, however. Growing conditions were just about perfect, Gideon said which led to outstanding yields and a big supply. 

His biggest challenges this year have been, and are to make sure the growers get the best possible returns. “The market is very saturated with onions and there’s ample supply from all over the country: from New York, Michigan, Canada – so we expect the market to stay very low through the turn of the New Year.”

Keystone Fruit Marketing is expanding its program in Mexico, Texas and Georgia next year by adding more acreage to meet demand that’s increased steadily for their sweet red program over the last four to five years. “We’re looking forward to finishing out our season with our Hermiston sweet reds. We’ll have those through February and we’ll have no gaps starting our Mexico sweet reds in March.”