Next season more than half the British strawberries and raspberries grown by KG Growers, now part of the international Berry Gardens group launched this year, will be proprietary varieties specially tailored to meet specific consumer tastes.
Berry Gardens md Nick Marston told the industry at Fruit Focus in Kent last week that strawberry varieties such as Cordelia, Hermione, Juliet and Ophelia had completed successful trials and would become commercial in 2008 and 2009, joining winners such as Jubilee and Camarillo, of which 10 million and 7.5m plants respectively were provided for members annually.
KG chairman Angus Davison called the move “a step change in the flavour and appearance of UK fruit” at a time when growers needed advice from their marketing desks when deciding what to plant, because of the wide range available.
KG accounts for some 40 per cent of total industry production.
Total sales this year, which embrace Spanish marketer Alconera and US breeder Driscoll, will reach €296 million (£198m).
The effects of the unseasonable weather seen throughout June and July were also up for discussion and, while pick-your-own growers are counting the cost of recent torrential rains, protected crops have come through the latest cycle of bad weather relatively unscathed.
“Fortunately, the majority of our berry crops have been covered with tunnels,” Davison said. “Although the conditions have been undeniably difficult for our growers, there is no doubt that tunnels have saved their crops.”
Marston said the bad weather had not made an impact on sales until recently. “In spite of the difficult and extraordinary wet weather in June and July, our sales of strawberries to the week ending July 15 were up 17 per cent on 2006,” he revealed.
But he estimated that over the last three weeks, total retail sales by value were still down by 15 per cent on last year, because consumers had stopped buying.
Marston said growers are looking forward to a “reasonable August and September as growing conditions had been ideal for everbearers”.
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