Late-August everyday demand beats 2019 Labor Day produce sales

Fresh produce retail sales growth fell in the final week of August to roughly 5%, down from 10% or higher for much of the summer.

The timing of Labor Day, which was later this year than last year, had a significant effect, Anne-Marie Roerink, principal of 210 Analytics, wrote in a news release.

“Labor Day has always been a massive holiday week for grocery, making it a much harder holiday to beat than ones that had more of a split retail-versus-foodservice nature in typical years, such as Mother’s Day,” Roerink wrote. “Additionally, sales were negatively affected by more extreme weather events, impacting large parts of Louisiana and east Texas.”

Produce retail sales totaled $1.26 billion the week ending Aug. 30, up $56 million from the same time in 2019, according to IRI. The pandemic average for additional weekly dollars over 2019 has been $179 million.

For the week ending Aug. 30, fresh vegetable sales were up 8.3%, while fresh fruit sales were up 1.4%. Overall, fresh produce sales were up 4.7%.

“At first sight these results look surprisingly low after settling into a comfortable 10 percentage points above last year’s levels for weeks on end,” Joe Watson, vice president of membership and engagement for the Produce Marketing Association, said in the release. “However, when realizing this week is going up against the Labor Day performance in 2019, the near 5% gain is actually quite remarkable. It indicates that today’s everyday fresh produce demand actually lies higher than last year’s holiday demand, particularly on the vegetable side.”

In fruit, only berries (up 15.9% to $131 million), tangerines (up 17.5% to $23 million) and cherries (up 33.4% to $18 million) saw double-digit sales increases over 2019.

“The impact of going up against Labor Day 2019 can be seen in items, such as melons, which resulted in down results in both dollars and volume,” Jonna Parker, fresh team lead for IRI, said in the release. “But I fully expect to see that turn around in next week’s report, when we will see the effects of the holiday week this year.”

The top sellers in vegetables have been steady in recent weeks, with lettuce (up 10.5% to $163 million), tomatoes (up 10.1% to $68 million) and potatoes (up 4.4% to $60 million) reigning supreme. Peppers, mushrooms and cucumbers also saw double-digit growth over 2019.

“Much like melons on the fruit side, we see the holiday effect here in items like corn,” Watson said in the release. “Corn is big for the last official grilling holiday of the season, and everyday demand this year just could not top holiday demand in 2019, resulting in dollars being off 13.6%.”