SANTA PAULA, CA - Limoneira has finished off its second quarter for fiscal year 2018 with a bang, boasting record lemon sales, a 50 percent increase in operating income, and promises to keep on expanding its fresh citrus programs. Harold Edwards, the company’s President and Chief Executive Officer, was happy to chime in about Limoneira’s progress over Q2.
"Record lemon sales combined with strong orange sales and leverage from our packing house drove a 50 percent increase in operating income,” he shared in a news release. “We have built a tremendous platform at Limoneira and are very well positioned to dramatically expand our fresh citrus offering nationally and globally for many years to come.”
Digging deeper into what helped push Limoneira’s results upward, the company reported:
- Agribusiness revenue for the quarter was $41.9 million, compared to $35.4 million in the second quarter last year, which, as Edwards mentioned, is primarily due to stronger lemon sales.
- $33.6 million of that revenue was in lemon sales, up from $26.2 million of lemon sales during the same period of fiscal year 2017.
- The company credits revenue increase primarily to higher volume of fresh lemons and higher prices compared to the same period in fiscal year 2017.
- In total, approximately 1,157,000 cartons of fresh lemons were sold during the second quarter of fiscal year 2018 at a $23.42 average price per carton, compared to approximately 958,000 cartons sold at a $21.50 average price per carton during the second quarter of fiscal year 2017.
"As we enter the third quarter of fiscal 2018, we remain confident the key drivers of our agribusiness that drove our record first half performance will remain in place in the second half,” Edwards continued. “Even with lower avocado pricing compared to last year, we are confident we will achieve our full year fiscal 2018 guidance targets.”
As for Limoneira’s continued goals in the near-term and long-term, the company shared it expects to sell between 3.1 million and 3.3 million cartons of fresh lemons at an average price of approximately $24.50 per carton, and expects to sell approximately 6.0 to 6.5 million pounds of avocados at approximately $1.30 per pound.
Keep an eye out for 1,600 acres that are currently non-bearing lemons and become full-bearing over the next four years, the company added. Beyond these 1,600 acres, Limoneira also intends to plant an additional 500 acres of lemons in the next two years that will further build its long-term pipeline of productive acreage. The company anticipates this additional acreage will increase annual lemon supply from its current level by approximately 30 percent.
The horizon is looking bright for this citrus and avocado provider, so stay tuned for continued updates.
