Not many new packing stations have been founded in recent years, yet Wouter Snippe and Thijs Geerse from organic outdoor vegetable company WeGrowOrganic from Zeewolde, the Netherlands, took this step two years ago. “We thought it was important to have the entire supply chain in-house. We grow, pack and distribute our vegetables from our own production, but increasingly also from colleague growers to bundle supply,” Wouter says.
A packing station can’t just be run on the side. That’s why the partners have appointed a company leader to run the packing station. Because of this, they can focus on the organic production of potatoes, red and yellow onions, beetroot, carrots and various vegetables like spinach, beans and green peas on an area of 250 hectares.The dry weather has been very much felt in the new onion season. “For those who managed to irrigate in time, damages aren’t too bad, but yields vary from good to bad. However, this also gives us confidence in the market. The red onions appear to be slightly less affected by the dry weather than the yellow onions,” Wouter says.
He was personally affected by hail damage in his onion fields, after which heavy rain during the growing season was followed by a long dry period. “We won’t have a record yield, but the situation isn’t dramatic either. We now have to make sure we can grub up in time to get onions with a good colour and quality. The most important thing now is how the onions will be once in storage.”
The organic onion area has grown considerably in the polders in particular. Yet the grower isn’t too worried about an oversupply in onions. “Within Europe, local product is always preferred, and during good production seasons, we fill the gaps more and more, but on the other hand, the market is growing along with us as well. In the Netherlands, we’re specialised in the production for long-term storage, and we’re getting quite good at that with the organic onions in the polders as well.”That doesn’t mean the organic onion production is a sinecure. “In the past, mildew was the biggest issue, but with the current mildew-resistant varieties, we can do much more. Managing weeds does remain tricky. Manual weeding results in an intensive production with high costs, but it can also be very good.”
Compared to the conventional onions, the sales of organic onions mostly remains limited to Europe. “You don’t want to go farther with organic onions,” Wouter says. “But within Europe, we can supply all markets, from Germany to Scandinavia and from the UK to France. The majority of our buyers are located abroad, and we would like to continue growing along with the packers we supply.”Wouter hasn’t once regretted the decision to start their own packing station. “Our goal is to shorten the supply chain and to be as close to our final customer as possible, and we definitely succeeded in this. Our packing station is focused purely on organic products, and that’s very important to our buyers. Because we have our own product, we can fill orders flexibly and last-minute. We always know what’s in our stocks. Thanks to our knowledge of organic products combined with minimal processing times between storage and processing, we can guarantee an optimal product quality. If packing were to be done externally, we wouldn’t be able to serve our customers as flexibly. This is bearing fruit, because we’re quite busy, and more and more customers are joining us.”
More information:
WeGrowOrganic
Wouter Snippe