Zespri braces for summer fruit competition after stellar start

After one of its strongest-ever starts to a campaign in 2024, Zespri is now in the midst of the summer fruit season where it traditionally sees more competition, according to a media release from the kiwifruit marketer 

Around 75 per cent of this season’s record crop of more than 190m trays of New Zealand kiwifruit has now been shipped to Zespri’s customers around the world. 
 
After the positive start to the season, chief executive Jason Te Brake said Zespri’s in-market teams are focused on driving sales and preserving value for growers through the competitive summer fruit season. 
 
“There has been significant effort from the industry to deliver a fantastic crop of high-quality fruit which allowed us to capitalise on early season sales opportunities,” he said.  
 
“We’re now in a period that is traditionally more challenging on the back of the arrival of summer fruit, which is something we see every year.” 

According to Te Brake, this period typically brings strong competition from the likes of peaches, berries, melons and grapes. 

“[These] are more available in volume and at lower prices than expected,” he said. “While strong competition has seen sales rates in most of our major markets ease back from the record highs we’ve seen in the early parts of the season, feedback from our customers has been clear that they have huge confidence in the quality of our fruit this season, and they want more of it.” 
 
As well as the challenge of domestic summer fruit, Zespri faces stiffer competition in the kiwifruit category, including increased volumes of Chilean green kiwifruit in the US market. 
 
Te Brake said Zespri’s teams have been well prepared with season planning focused on getting the campaign off to a strong start before hitting the summer fruit period. He added that summer fruit has experienced tough growing conditions this season and is likely to be off shelves earlier than usual easing competition within the next month.  

“This season’s fruit quality has us well placed to close out the season strongly in the remaining months as this summer fruit exits the market, capitalising on clearer space in market to support returns to our growers,” Te Brake said.  
 
“Zespri and our partners remain focused on delivering a record crop, with our teams in market executing some outstanding campaigns to drive sales rates and deliver the season well.”