Florida grower-shippers are gearing up for another productive season following an unusually wet fall/winter deal.
Sweet corn volume at South Bay, Fla.-based Branch — A Family of Farms typically heats up just after Easter, said owner Bret Bergman.
Although Branch ships year-round, movement spikes from late March through Labor Day, especially around the Memorial Day, Independence Day and Labor Day holidays, he said.
The company grows yellow, white and bicolor corn for customers mostly east of the Mississippi River.
Quality looks good this season, Bergman said, despite a “challenging winter.”
“The prediction was cooler and wetter, and it seems like they were 100% accurate,” he said.
At Palmetto, Fla.-based West Coast Tomato, company President Bob Spencer hopes the coming months will see a continuation of the momentum built up during the fall.
“The fall season was just a wonderful season,” he said.
That’s because less product than usual came out of Mexico, and fewer tomatoes were planted in Florida.
“The two things together made a wonderful pricing scenario,” Spencer said.
The company, which packs round and roma tomatoes, will start up again in early March following a four-week break. Shipments will continue to June, when summer rains roll in.
Spencer was hopeful that spring will be drier than fall and winter, which were wetter than usual. Wet conditions can cause fungus issues and result in product being tossed out.
Peter Leiferman, vice president of sales and marketing for Homestead, Fla.-based Brooks Tropicals Inc., perceives the spring season as “the quiet before the storm” for Florida tropical produce.
Local SlimCado tropical avocados finished in January, and carambola and passion fruit wound down by late February.
“Here at Brooks Tropicals, we are busy with annual maintenance on our hydro-cooler and facilities,” he said. “In the groves, we are fertilizing and making sure our irrigation systems are all doing their jobs while we’re in the dry season.”
The company is importing SlimCado avocados from the Dominican Republic and dragon fruit from Ecuador. Caribbean Red Papaya from Guatemala and Brooks’ Solo Papaya from Brazil are both in good supply, Leiferman said.
“Our Dominican Groovy Coconuts are popular for the spring feasting holidays such as Easter, Passover and Mother’s Day,” he said.
Brooks Tropicals is “optimistic for a bountiful summer” as a result of new acreage coming into production for avocados, carambola and passion fruit, Leiferman said.
“Overall, we expect demand to continue to grow for each of our Florida tropical crops,” he said.
Packaging, especially the sustainable kind, continues to be a prime concern for Florida grower-shippers.
Branch — A Family of Farms packs in reusable plastic containers and wood crates, but what it calls its white sustainer box seems to be garnering the most attention, Bergman said. It’s made from No. 5 plastic, so it’s recyclable.
“Some chains have realized that there’s a recyclable benefit and an extraction value to it,” he said.
The effects of inflation also are top of mind.
“We went through really intense inflation,” Spencer of West Coast Tomato said. “It’s not going up at the same pace, but it’s not really going down.”
Growers’ break-even point is much higher than it was four years ago, he said.
To a certain degree, inflation affects everyone, Leiferman said, but he added that consumers continue to buy products from Brooks Tropicals.
“Our tropical produce offers things that consumers are looking for during any economic cycle,” he said. “Nutritionally dense, high-quality fruits are always on the menu for shoppers.”
