Divine Flavor anticipating sweet season for its Sonoran grapes

Mexican grape imports are set to expand in a big way for Nogales, Ariz.-based Divine Flavor LLC, company officials report.

With Sonoran volume set to accelerate, Divine Flavor is already well into the company’s Mexican grape harvest, said Michael DuPuis, quality assurance and public relations coordinator at the company.

“We just we just started kicking off with our first location in Guaymas (in southwest Sonora) and then we just concluded our Jalisco season at our newest ranch,” he said May 13.

With overall Mexican grape volume expected as much as 15% bigger than a year ago, DuPuis said Divine Flavor accounts for more than 20% of the Sonoran grape volume. 

That level of importance, he said, has been accomplished with a dedication to quality and being able to supply customers and their consumers with fruit they can enjoy, and become repeat shoppers.

“It’s not a one and done kind of thing,” he said. “We’re trying to not only sell fruit, but sell an  experience so that when people consume these table grapes, they're having a fruit that just puts a great smile on their face.”

 Carlos Bon, vice president of sales for the marketer, said the 2022 season also is the second year of a  new ranch in Caborca, which is the latest growing grape growing region in northwest Sonora.

“We planted late varieties in the latest area, (that will allow us)  to transition cleanly from Sonora to the heart of the San Joaquin Valley,’ he said, noting that Divine Flavor will be packing late season Mexican grapes the first 20 days in July from Caborca. 

The firm  features specialty varieties such as Cotton Candy, Jellyberries, Sweet Celebration and Sweet Globe, he said. “Our volumes are switching over from the older varieties to the newer varieties,” Bon said. This year, more than 50% of the company’s volume is represented by the Sweet Globe and Sweet Celebration varieties, he said.

“Our responsibility with flavors, our responsibility with quality, and our responsibility with the better varieties, is to promote consumption,” he said. “We have been achieving that very clearly in the last couple of years with the right partners, and we are seeing more and more retailers every year realizing that jumping on these new varieties pays off.”

The reason that the company’s percentage isn’t even higher with the new varieties  is that Sweet Celebration and Sweet Globe are later-season varieties, marketed from Mexico in June and July. Flame seedless and prime seedless are still important varieties for May.

The company then transitions to the later, better varieties from Sonora about June 10, he said.

Bon said the crop quality and flavor is expected to be very good.

“There's a big philosophy within our company that we always deliver the best quality possible, never compromising the flavor,” he said. “That is our  main objective, and our main promise to our customers and their consumers. We want to achieve, with every single box, every single bag , every clamshell, that the grapes have the maximum amount of flavor that that variety in particular can deliver.” The company is committed to quality control filters that assure 100% of its grapes have high flavor, he said.

Promotion opportunities are plentiful in the weeks ahead, and Bon said a reported  short crop of cherries in the months of June and the beginning of July could benefit grape promotions at retail, Bon said.

Challenges

Escalating rates for diesel fuel has put upward pressure on truck rates, but Bon said availability of trucks to move its Sonoran grapes is expected sufficient.

“We’re seeing this season to be a little bit more expensive on freight than last year, but for availability of trucks and service, we are actually feeling even better than last year,” he said. “We feel that the COVID-19 contingency was actually more hurtful when it came to availability of trucks. In general, truck availability is not a big concern for the season, he said.

While chatter about inflation does raise concern about consumer behavior, Bon said he doesn’t expect there to be high inflation for  grapes this year.

“Because of our big crop, grapes are going to be sensibly priced, and there is gong to be a lot of promotions,” he said. “(Grapes) are going to be featured tremendously in the month of June with end caps and printed ads, and we believe that that is going to be a very good year for everyone in our industry.

Bon said that the volume of grapes on the vine point to a 15% increase in volume for Mexican grape volume near 25 million cartons.

That expectation could be diminished by the variables of weather, labor supply and unforeseen berry sizing in the last weeks of the season.

While Divine Flavor has sufficient labor this season, helped by its fair trade certification and the company’s Alta Foundation to assist workers, Bon said the industry at large has reported that growers have had some trouble finding enough workers to harvest the grapes.

“That could be a wild card,” Bon said. “(Labor) is something that is going to factor in strongly in future years, because (many) of the new generation do not want to work in the field.”