The Brussels sprout job has had one of its most successful seasons ever.
Sprout quality was top notch and demand boomed in the run up to Christmas, with more consumers taking advantage of tastier varieties on offer, Roger Welberry, president of the Brussels Sprout Growers’ Association, told FPJ.
This rampant sales success continued right through the festive season. Welberry said: “It’s a good news story for the sprout job and the trade demand has been one of the best years ever for us. The price has been good enough because we have had a reasonably good volume and less waste because the quality has been so high. Our sales have been up by 20-30 per cent and most of the time we’ve not been able to keep up.”
He said supplies at his farm in Boston will probably come up a little short, and the season is more likely to run until late-February rather than March, as is traditional.
He attributed the growth to a number of factors including better varieties and more in-store promotions, but a downturn in acreage has also caused plants to produce smaller crops, which has reduced tonnage per acre. “We had a dry time in June then rain in July, so the sprouts were stunted, making them a bit smaller,” he said.
While other brassica growers are fighting the effects of the UK’s extreme cold winter weather, the low temperatures might even have played a small hand in sprout growers’ success.
“The frost hasn’t hurt sprouts at all - if anything it’s kept the disease and aphids away, which has helped us,” said Welberry. âóè
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