Pears Are Coming
Pears Are Coming. I’m Greg Martin with today’s Fruit Grower Report.
This has already been a year for the record books when it comes to northwest fruit and that hopefully will continue with pears according to Kevin Moffitt with Pear Bureau Northwest.
MOFFITT: We’ve already started shipping. We started our first crop report as of August 14th and there was a whopping 3000 boxes sold. But I think next week it will ramp up quick so we’ll probably be in the 30 to 50-thousand boxes next week and we’ll just start doubling from there.
Yes, you heard right. Pear season is underway. Consumers are really going to have a great selection to choose from at the supermarket. Moffitt says the pear market has really held up.
MOFFITT: We’ve been sort of lucky last season we were not the most expensive item in the department by any means. We’re sort of in the middle of the department in terms of price, we’re not on the high end; we’re not on the low end but right in the middle so for the most part our mainline varieties were not affected too dramatically by consumer cutbacks or downshifting.
And Moffitt says they have been working to make sure there is a good market for northwest pears.
MOFFITT: Our guys are out, they have been out for the last 2 months talking to retailers, getting promotions set up and retailers have been fairly optimistic about pears. I’m looking forward to getting this thing off to a good start because our recent crop estimate which was completed in early August, August 7th was our update, it’s reporting 19.8 million boxes which is a new record.
More Monday.
That’s today’s Fruit Grower Report. I’m Greg Martin on the Northwest Ag Information Network.
