After a short period in which strawberry production fell slightly for a while, supply is currently picking up again. "Nevertheless, we are generally experiencing almost no peaks," says Benoit Demedts of Belgian nursery Demedts - De Mey. "The transition from many to everbearers has taken some of the pressure off the market and I don't expect to see any more big price fluctuations."
"We planted the everbearers, mostly Karima and partly Furore, in different departments, at different times with different plant types," he continued. "As a result, you can see that some blocks are coming to an end and others are still in full production. This way, we can realize less difference in supply at the different waves, keeping it all a bit more stable. Still, we are all figuring out how best to deal with everbearers and which plant types to have."
"In other years we were now at the autumn peaks of strawberries under cover or plastic, but these have mostly been replaced by everbearers. We have now additionally started our late departments under glass, though. There we now have the first crop of Elsanta and because they have had the warmth they needed this year, the production looks good with a good spread. It remains to be seen what the pricing will give as I am not the only one who planted late, I expect."
Weakening peaks
Still, the grower does not foresee any more major fluctuations in the coming months. "As mentioned, I think the pressure is somewhat off the market because of the everbearers, so we won't get oversupply. Besides, with us, demand is still good. If we look at the farm shop, 
we see that customers still keep asking for a strawberry with breakfast or dessert. I think it also has to do with the fact that we did not raise our prices so high in August/September that customers continued to come and stay when the general market price drops sharply again."
"We have been doing this for several years and see that during this period it is the best way to keep customers loyal to you. Grapes and Clementines come back on the shelf as competitors and people quickly opt for something else. And once you get rid of them, you can hardly get sales going again. Here, we also have the advantage that we grow our own, which allows us to soften the peaks in pricing, which we can use to fill the troughs. In the end, we too try to get the most out of it, but in a different way and you can see that this is appreciated by customers, but also beneficial for us."
Nice sales towards the end of the year
Benoit has not yet experienced competition from a Spanish product. "I think we only have to worry about that from November onwards, but actually it's always not too bad. We don't buy it ourselves anyway. If we have nothing ourselves, we buy from fellow growers and we also know that our customers appreciate the tastier Belgian strawberries, even if it's a bit more expensive. For now, there is still enough room on the market."
He therefore speaks of a good season. "I think it has been above expectations. We had a dip in the summer, but that was short-lived. After that, prices always rose a bit in September, but now they went through the roof. We may have had a little less production with the everbearers than in other years, but if you look at the financial picture, we can't complain. It has been a fun year of growing, where we didn't have to fight nature. It also took some time to build up a buffer again. Now we have to wait and see what the coming weeks do. If it gets warmer, things will speed up again, but I don't expect that. I think we can work steadily towards the end of the year."
For more information:
Benoit Demedts
Kwekerij Demedts - De Mey
Middenstraat 97z
8830 Gits, Belgium
Tel: +32 479 69 08 67
[email protected]
www.demedts-demey.be