Australian cherries have a reason to stand up this season. As retailers look at new ways to cater for time-poor consumers, a growing number of the domestic market’s suppliers are pre-packing their offering into various sizes of punnets and zip-lock bags.
Howard Hansen of leading Tasmanian grower-packer-marketer, Hansen Orchards, says this move is adding value to the category.
“Firstly, they provide consumers with absolute convenience,” Hansen says. “There is no guess work measuring out what they think is 1kg, they just pick up a punnet or a bag and away they go. Both forms of prepack display the fruit beautifully making them really eye-catching, like they are ready to leap off the shelf.”
Michael Rouget, managing director of Koala Cherries, sees innovative packaging as one of the key drivers for growing the cherry category, and thereby a means for relieving some pressure on the domestic market.
'Supermarkets are shifting towards punnets and bags to provide a more appealing offer, and if we can get this right, there will be will be growth in terms of what the domestic market can consume,'Rouget explains.
Some industry sources have put this season’s national crop at around 16,000 - 18,000 levied tonnes, eclipsing the previous record of 14,000 levied tonnes recorded by CGA in 2012/13.
Simon Boughey, chief executive of CGA, suggests that this forecast could be achieved ifthere are no major climatic events and the packout rate exceeds 90 per cent. He predicts this season’s crop will comfortably eclipse the some 10,500 levied tonnes produced last season.
“This year we should see a crop around 15,000 tonnes nationally, maybe even a little bit more,” he tells Produce Plus. “We’ve seen volumes coming through since late October and conditions have been favourable across all regions so far, so the season should extend into February.”
