North American growers see saturated shallot market

“There’s more than enough supply,” says Bas Melissant of MEN’s Farming Inc. in Norwich, Ontario. MEN’s grows largely for the U.S. market but also supplies shallots to Ontario buyers. On top of the Ontario crop, Melissant notes that there’s an excess in supply thanks to European growers.

“France had a huge crop and in Europe, they dump their surplus on the market in the U.S.,” he says. “That’s the problem. They probably had a good crop as well so after there’s enough in Europe, they send the rest here.” At the same time, European growers, which tend to grow smaller-sized shallots that Europeans prefer, send their larger by-product shallots to North America. European growers also aren’t as likely to grow on contract or commitment basis similar to how North American growers do.

“They’ve been dumping shallots already for the whole winter but the prices have dropped in the past six weeks,” says Melissant. He estimates prices have fallen some 20 percent.

And while demand is growing for shallots notes Melissant, it’s not increasing as fast as growers might want. He also notes that shallots are being used more on the foodservice side of the business and home cooks are also increasingly using them. “And convenience foods are becoming more popular as well so the peeling companies are also selling more to the big food processors,” he adds.

Looking ahead, Melissant doesn’t anticipate price to drop any further. “Most of the buyers have commitments with growers already. So nobody wants the price to drop further,” he says. “I think it’ll stay at this level for awhile. And I think we’ll have shallots from the last harvest until mid-August or so.”