With supply coming out of North Carolina, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana and California, demand for sweet potatoes will increase as the Easter holiday approaches. President of Wayne E. Bailey Produce Company, George Wooten, says despite cold conditions, quality is looking good. “We’ve had a lot of winter weather and that’s hurt us on the delivery up in the real snowy areas, but it hasn’t really affected the product. It may have affected sales a little bit. People can’t get out and buy at grocery stores, trucks have had a little harder time getting there. But these products are stored in refrigerated and maintained facilities, so the product itself is alright.” With sweet potato demand rising each year, Wayne E. Bailey has diversified its fresh market sales items. The company now offers microwaveable sweet potatoes which are receiving great consumer reviews. “The market news service shows that we’ve got a 8% increase in fresh market sales this year, and again when I say this year, I am talking about the crop year, which is actually when we harvest in August, September and October. The next 4-6 weeks will be really good because of Easter. Easter is the 24th of April. There will be some chains that will be promoting sweet potatoes. Some of these items, because of the freeze that occurred in Florida and Mexico, they’ve suffered. But they’ll have promotable volumes over the next 4 to 6 weeks that should move well.” Easter is the third busiest time of the year for sweet potatoes, and this year looks to be no different.<hr class="legacyRuler"><hr class="invisible minimal-padding"><hr class="invisible minimal-padding">
