Last Wednesday a discussion was raging in the Tomato Experience Centre of De Ruiter about the upcoming variety choice. The open day coincided with the day that Holland went to vote en masse. Enough reasons for De Ruiter to play into this with a fanatic 'Choose Merlice!' campaign. Marketing Manager Nico van Vliet said the variety looks good in this years estimates.
De Ruiter presented a number of small developments in a number of segments, but there were no real innovations during the open day. "For us it's the moment to see all the faces again, and to hear what going on among the growers and in the chain," says Nico. "So no big developments this time, although we have new introduction varieties. In a time that company stability and sustainability are becoming more and more important, it's not sensible to take huge leaps. At the moment a grower just wants to be sure of their variety. Switching annually is increasingly less popular."
A striking development this year is the increasing interest for large truss vine tomato variety Merlice. "We have had a good asset in Komeett for years in this segment," explains Nico. "Despite being market leaders with an area of over 400 hectares, there are still some growers who have switched to a different variety in the last few years, because they just couldn't work with Komeett. For these growers Merlice is an exceptionally good alternative. The even higher production and mildew resistance are the motive for many growers to come back to us. Last years it proved its self on 140 hectares and this year it looks like that will be doubled."