The California finger lime season has begun and volumes of the specialty citrus item continue to grow.
“We’re increasing our volumes year after year because we’ve planted new trees consistently over the last eight years,” says Megan Shanley Warren of Shanley Farms in Morro Bay, CA. She notes the most recent planting for Shanley Farms is the Emerald variety which came into production for the first time last year. This year, the season began in the third week of June.
While sizing on the fruit tends to run smaller in the early part of the season and the latter part as well (the season runs June through December) Shanley Warren notes that as the trees mature, the fruit is getting larger. Shanley Farms also carries a variety of colored fruit as well from what it refers to as the Champagne variety, which has translucent green to rosy pink pearls, as well as the bright green color found inside the Emerald variety of finger limes.
Foodservice demand boosting sales
The return of foodservice sales is boosting demand. “We’re seeing our old customers coming back along with new customers and there’s a renewed interest from retail as well. Demand is definitely picking up,” Shanley Warren says, adding that the grower-shipper is headed back to the PMA Foodservice Conference this month in Monterey, CA as well as PMA Fresh Summit in October.
Shanley Farms will also continue to focus on expanding online business due to consumer demand. “We’ve really seen our online sales grow over the last year largely due to information we’ve been able to impart to our end users. Seeing the results of that, we felt we needed to develop a program to support our retail and foodservice partners by providing instant access to health and use information on our finger limes via QR codes on our packaging,” says Shanley Warren.
Also helping boost that demand is the smaller package Shanley Farms is developing, a 20 g. size to meet a different price point customers were asking for.
Pricing this year is matching historical pricing levels. “When we get into promotional volumes, we’ll be working with customers on promotional pricing late August into September-October,” Shanley Warren says.
For more information:
Megan Shanley Warren
Shanley Farms
Tel: +1 (805) 234-8533
[email protected]
https://www.shanleyfarms.com/