Wine Grape Growers Meeting

Wine Grape Growers Meeting. I’m Greg Martin with today’s Fruit Grower Report.

Today is the last day of the annual meeting of the Washington Association of Wine Grape Growers in Kennewick and according to Executive Director Vicky Scharlau, it has been a good meeting.

SCHARLAU: It’s actually going really very well. People seem to be very happy. The overall economic slowdown really hasn’t impacted on the grape growing side. The wine sales continue to be strong. Consumers might be trading down as we are hearing it but they’re not avoiding their purchases of high quality wine and Washington State stands for that.

The trade show has been well attended and the vendors pleased with attendance and response. Scharlau says there has been a good exchange of information as well.

SCHARLAU: The sessions have been standing room only so we’ve had a really good cross section of growers from not just Washington State – we’ve got growers in from BC, we’ve got growers in from Montana, from Idaho, from Oregon and I’ve talked to a number of people today from California

This years crop numbers were down overall but quality has been exceptional.

SCHARLAU: From both the winemakers side and from the growers side I think they have been absolutely delighted over the quality of the crop. The crush as it’s coming into the wineries have been one of the best ever and while we say that almost every year, I really think they mean it even more this year.

That’s today’s Fruit Grower Report. I’m Greg Martin on the Northwest Ag Information Network.