Representatives from Northwest Cherries and the California Cherry Advisory Board in the US have held their first formal meeting to discuss collaboration.
“Historically we have never got the California and Northwest industries together for a formal meeting but now we have done that and looked at where we can collaborate,” said Northwest’s president BJ Thurlby. “It makes most sense to work together on some areas in the US category, for example on what is driving consumers to buy cherries. We can then look at ways we can share our efforts.”
In the UK, California and the Northwest have distinctly different seasons, so collaboration is likely to be more over sharing market intelligence, Thurlby said.
The Northwest pr office in the UK has already begun releasing information to the consumer press in time for the start of the season in late June/early July. This year the focus is again on the fruit as a healthy, low GI snack and ingredient and nutritionist Dr Juliet Gray has been enlisted to support the campaign.
Meanwhile, the crop in the north-western US is running a little late. “There is still snow in some places,” said Thurlby. “We are running about seven days behind on average. It has been a very cold winter throughout the region and spring conditions have been a bit hit and miss. There have been mild days but certainly no warm days.”
Thurlby is hoping for a “relatively normal crop year” with the harvest expected around June 26-27. “We will be close to a normal year once we get some warm spring weather,” he said. “Everything looks good at this stage and we have lots of bud, but it is still possible to get spring frosts even in the first week of May.”
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