This year’s summer may have been a damp squib, but stonefruit sales still took off in the UK this year.
Retail suppliers reported a rise in imported European stonefruit volumes and value for the summer season to date, despite the lacklustre July and August British weather.
Growth was driven mainly by sales within the cherry and peach categories, they said, and this surge was largely powered by lower retail prices than last year.
“We have seen a growth in volume and value for the [European] summer stonefruit season to date,” said Jon Clark, commercial director at Total Cherry, part of Total Worldfresh, which supplies fruit to all major UK retailers. “Prices in general have been lower on a pound sterling basis, and we have seen strong early season activity on stonefruit in Tesco, followed by strong promotional deals in Aldi, Coop, Morrison and Asda.”
Overall quality from Europe has been good this season, say suppliers, although storms reduced the Spanish picota cherry crop and affected shelf-life, which resulted in more stemmed fruit arriving into the UK from Greece and Turkey.
Spanish peaches, meanwhile, enjoyed a resurgence in the UK this summer, suppliers report, bucking several years of sales decline.
At the same time, UK demand for domestic stonefruit – cherries, apricots and plums – has exceeded supply in all quarters this summer, according to suppliers.
“It has been a great season for UK growers, retailers and consumers,” Clark said. “The quality has been exceptional, with growers benefitting from a longer growing season, hanging the fruit on the trees for longer, which has delivered great tasting fruit.”
