Citing higher lemon sales, Santa Paula, Calif.-based Limoneira Co. reported a 3% growth in revenue in the fiscal quarter ending Jan. 31 compared with year-ago levels.
“We achieved topline growth in the first quarter, with revenue increasing 3% compared to the same period last year, driven by higher avocado volume and pricing and higher lemon sales,” Harold Edwards, president and CEO of the citrus marketer, said in a news release in mid-March. “We expect these trends to continue throughout fiscal year 2022.”
Lemon demand and pricing were challenged in the quarter ending Jan. 31, as the industry is experiencing a surplus of inventory, Edwards said in the release. Some of those factors, he said, were a bigger supply of lemons in the California and Arizona growing regions compared with year-ago levels, combined with unfavorable weather conditions on the East Coast and the omicron COVID-19 variant negatively affecting demand, particularly in Asian markets.
“We are beginning to experience improved demand domestically, but we expect lemon pricing to remain pressured this fiscal year until we see the Asian export market beginning to open again this year,” he said in the release. “Partially offsetting our overall revenue growth was higher packing costs due to inflationary pressures and higher third-party grower and supplier costs.”
The company reported that approximately 1.207 million cartons of U.S.-packed fresh lemons were sold in aggregate during the first quarter of the fiscal year 2022 at a $20.48 average price per carton. That compares with about 1.32 million cartons sold at an $18.91 average price per carton during the first quarter of fiscal year 2021, according to the release.
With an additional 1,000 acres on non-bearing lemons estimated to become full-bearing over the next four years, Limoneira said in the release that it expects the additional acreage will increase its domestic supply of Limoneira-owned lemons from its 2021 level by approximately 50%, or by about 900,000 to 1.3 million additional fresh cartons.
