RECENT years have seen UK iceberg operating in trying times. With increasing competition within the market, iceberg may have a battle on it his hands. However, with lettuce breeders working on new varieties there is hope for a bright future.
Jonathan Tremayne, chairman of the British Leafy Salad Association (BLSA), is not one to condemn its chances of success in the future. “With the season only just underway it's difficult to assess the main issues with iceberg this year. But availability has been pleasing and with recent improvements in the weather, demand is rising. The only concern at the moment is due to some variable and cold growing conditions. The crop may be short in approximately 10 days time,” he says.
Steve Parrott of Seminis Vegetable Seeds believes the lettuce is facing a hard season. “The feeling among the growers I have spoken with is demand is not particularly high and that prices are poor. Furthermore there has been an overlap with the beginning of the Spanish season ñ so all told, I can see nothing more than an average year ahead,” he says.
Nick Bolton, product development manager at Nickerson-Zwaan, agrees with Parrott's sentiments. “Many of the growers that I speak to are not full of optimism this year for iceberg, it does have a problem pitching itself within the market, but they do remain hopeful for the future,” he adds.
Tremayne agrees with Parrott regarding a slow start but remains confident. “There has been no gap between Spanish and UK produce. However, the poor early demand is slowly disappearing and there has definitely been a welcome increase of late,” he says.
Iceberg lettuce has to contend with the inconsistency of the UK weather which has caused difficulties with the crop. This can cause all manner of problems. “The spring weather was a mixed bag, with warms spells followed quickly by heavy downpours. Crops that have not been grown under cover have experienced some problems,” says Parrott.
Tremayne believes there have been additional weather concerns. He says: “Some of the cold weather has had an affect and there could be some problems with continuity.” But growers know not to rely upon the UK weather and are usually prepared for what nature throws at them. However, it can't be easy for them when you consider that this May has been even more strange than usual ñ weather wise. Temperatures throughout May were at their coolest since 1997, while the last day of the month was the hottest of the year with temperatures peaking at a scorching 30°C.
So, how do constant temperature changes in the UK affect sales of the iceberg? Michael Fairey, managing director at Merrymac Salads is decidedly upbeat about the forthcoming season. He says: “Sales are of course largely dependent upon the weather. Orders have been good for the last seven days as they are for the next seven days. And we are very positive for sales over the coming months. With the problems seen world-wide due to the SARS virus and the threat of terrorism, it is hoped that more people will holiday in the UK which will be good for our business.” Bolton, meanwhile, has a different take on the situation. “We expect an increase in sales of iceberg when hot weather comes, just like ice-creams ñ as soon as you get some sunshine the demand rises rapidly, and with the weather improving over the last few days sales should improve,” he says.
Tremayne is feeling positive for sales in the coming year while erring on the side of caution. “For the whole year iceberg volumes are up but recent weather has meant that recent like-for-like sales on last year are slightly down. But prices are running slightly higher than this time last year. Also, we have witnessed some switching back from prepared lettuce, but it's important to remember we are comparing with some unique pricing of two years ago, which saw high prices on wholehead lettuce and subsequent switching to prepared variety. This is now undergoing a small reverse and the significance will become evident in the coming weeks,” he says.
Parrott, however, is unconvinced by a potential rise in demand of iceberg. “In the last couple of years there has been a shift in consumer demand. Consumers want variety and unfortunately iceberg doesn't offer this. Supermarkets may use two-for-one offers to entice customers but this will only resolve to shift larger volumes. It will not increase growers' profits. In my experience the growers we deal with are decreasing their acreage year-on-year,” he says.
Bolton agrees that iceberg has a lot to contend with right now in the market. “It has been predicted for a long time that iceberg is on the wane. The cos variety has been growing rapidly in popularity in the US as consumers are looking for new tastes. And as is the case for most things the UK tends to mirror actions taking place in the US, I wouldn't be surprised if cos lettuce pushes itself to the forefront very shortly. It is also worth considering that the variety is slightly sweeter than iceberg and it is easier to prepare making it more convenient ñ and in this modern age convenience is everything,” he says.
Furthermore Parrott has noticed that the behaviour of growers is moving with the times. “As a seed company we have noticed that growers are asking for new products,” he says.
Fairey believes that the future of UK iceberg is now in the hands of a smaller number of companies. “There are only a small band of companies involved in iceberg, and to those involved business is good, but I doubt you will see many new players entering the market,” he states.
Tremayne maintains that iceberg has a prominent role to play. He says: “It must be remembered that iceberg sits with a group of products and is not in isolation. The varieties of gem and romaine combined with iceberg make up one part of the salad category. This is why we changed our name from British Iceberg Growers Association (BIGA) to BLSA giving greater focus on all leafy salad crops, both in a technical and marketing sense.
Parrott remains unsure of ways to increase the profile of iceberg. “How I see the problem is that iceberg can only be offered wholeheaded or shredded. Whereas the cos variety can be offered to consumers in a variety of ways; little gems, large, chopped, in Caesar salad and with more variety in turn comes greater appeal,” he says.
It was suggested last year that iceberg could increase its potential by increasing exports. However, Parrott remains unconvinced by this. “I recently visited a breeding station in Nimes and I can't see iceberg being a big product in France ñ the French favour the batavia lettuce,” he says.
Fairey believes the export market is a niche market, and comments: “It really is an opportune area and so much of it is dependable upon the exchange rate,” he says. Tremayne does not believe that exporting will increase sales dramatically. “Despite the weakening of sterling to the euro it doesn't present a long-term solution to the lettuce crop.”
Meanwhile, Bolton has noticed a change in the demand for growers having been involved in lettuce breeding for several years now as growers look to improve iceberg standards to maintain their market position. He says: “European iceberg has been very popular with UK lettuce growers in recent years. This is mainly due to their uniformity of head size and downy mildew resistance over traditional US varieties like Saladin.”
However with less producers of iceberg lettuce and larger farm sizes a new problem has surfaced, namely the harvest window. Bolton explains: “The harvest window is the time a mature crop can remain un-harvested in the field before it becomes over mature and unmarketable.”
Whereas the European varieties seemed to have a very short harvest window and growers moved back to slower growing American types like saladin, the variety is less uniformed than European types ñ leaving lower marketable yields. Nickerson selected a variety of iceberg from its screening trials and it is being marketed as benson. “This variety has the advantage of being a slow-growing lettuce, as being more uniform than many existing US types. Also, where the Saladin is often too big for UK supermarkets the Benson remains small enough to fit the UK specification,” he continues. “In the future we hope to take the best of the US attributes for iceberg lettuce and combine these with the best European attributes to produce more uniform, compact size iceberg lettuce crops with a wide harvest window.”
Although iceberg has endured difficult seasons, innovation could still mean full-steam ahead for the small number of players left in the market. As Fairey says: “Iceberg is a very adaptable and dependable product and it's here to stay.” l
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