Strawberry prices have been very high in the weeks leading up to Valentine's Day. Valentine's is obviously the best time for strawberries, but Dutch and Belgian supply is, as we know, extremely limited. "Add to that the fact that the Spanish supply also became scarcer and it results in high prices. Moreover, Spanish strawberries varied greatly in quality," says Ellen Sebrechts of Sebrechts Groenten en Fruit.
"We still prefer to work with the domestic (Netherlands and Belgium) supply. These beat the Spanish in quality, in my opinion, but only a handful of growers are picking," Ellen continues. "As a result, we notice that, in the absence of Dutch and Belgian strawberries for Valentine's Day, people reach for the Spanish supply.
"However, these are also very expensive, so you have to make it attractive to your customers. A baker is quite willing to pay extra once or twice for his fruit on the cake, but if the prices are stuck around 6 to 7 euros, the additional costs can't be passed on to the consumer."
It caused the entrepreneur to try a special packaging around Valentine's Day. "One of our importers had jumped on that; a plastic heart with the strawberries inside. We can certainly say this was a big success. Customers who normally absolutely only wanted the homegrown product were now suddenly trying the Spanish strawberries. We had bought a lot, but everything was sold out in one day. By the way, we did the same with the blueberries. This was very nice to be able to offer and, moreover, you saw that packaging does everything for a customer. It makes the rest matter a lot less. It was popular, especially with our female customers, to decorate their stalls with."
Now after Valentine's Day, on the other hand, the demand for strawberries also seems to be collapsing again. "We immediately had half the demand yesterday compared to the day before. People are a lot less willing to pay the expensive prices again after the holiday. It also remains extraordinary that some things continue to sell. Everything has become so expensive, but Saturday was the first day of spring. This means people are hungry for fruit again. It is very nice to see how the sunshine affects sales and how well the market vendors and shopkeepers sell consequently," Ellen explains.
Citrus and grapes
Runners-up at Sebrechts at the moment are mainly citrus and grapes. "Spanish citrus is really super right now. The quality of the clementines and oranges is good and also we can offer many different varieties. We get a lot of positive feedback about that. The advantage of this is also that prices are at a good level. Not too expensive, because the supply is sufficient at the moment."
In addition, the grapes at wholesale are running well. "Certainly the grapes from Peru are very good. It's top supply around this period, in terms of grapes. Only, these have also been on the expensive side all winter because of the high transport and growing costs."
Finally, Sebrechts Groenten en Fruit has also recently purchased the first asparagus of the new season. "It is always a great time when the asparagus season starts again. We are looking forward to the next few months when the sun will shine again and the homegrown supply of asparagus, berries and then cherries will come back to the market."
For more information: 
Ellen Sebrechts
Sebrechts Groenten & Fruit
Kielsbroek 4
2020 Antwerp, Belgium
+32 32374192
[email protected]
www.sebrechtsfruit.be