TEXAS & CALIFORNIA - With the month of February coming to a close and the St. Patrick’s Day holiday on the horizon, all eyes are on the cabbage market. When we last checked in on growers in both Texas and California, the market was just evening back out as supplies began to ramp back up following a stormy season. Now, suppliers are expecting the market to pull back up with huge demand for the holiday.
“We except stronger than normal markets for the St. Patty’s day holiday,” says Tonya Hill, Director of Sales for Frontera Produce, which is now growing cabbage in south Texas. “It sounds like the east coast is going to fall short on supplies due to unforgiving weather the last couple of months. Overall demand has been good as well which should shape strong markets for the holiday push.”
Central Texas near San Antonio was hit with a bout of hail and strong weather at the beginning of last week, but cabbage growers located in South Texas say their crops remain unscathed. Take a look at Frontera’s south Texas cabbage fields for yourself in the drone-shot video below.
“Quality has been exceptional this year. Weather has been favorable with little rainfall to disrupt our season,” Tonya added. “Frontera anticipates a much bigger pull this St. Patty’s over last year. We had a very good New Years pull and St. Patty’s day mirrors what we saw during that time period. We have multiple ad commitments on the books at great prices, so we continue to be optimistic going forward.”
For the California cabbage market, we had been seeing particularly damp weather that had slowed down both harvest and growth. Now it seems like the region is back on track for successful St. Patrick’s Day promotions.
“As a Watsonville-based grower/shipper, we are anticipating the cabbage market to skyrocket for the holiday, fingers-crossed,” Lakeside Organic’s Sales Manager, Brian Peixoto, tells me. “Quality is very good for us. We see nice dense heads, and good color.”
Brian also mentioned that while the company currently is focusing only on point of sales materials for its local route stores, the company has plans in place to ramp those efforts up in the next year.
For more on St. Patrick’s Day holiday market and the cabbage market in general, stay tuned to AndNowUKnow.
