March 26, 2010

Sponsored by:

Floyd Wilcox
& Sons Inc.

Sweet Potatoes

Market Snapshot*

The U.S. Department of Agriculture was reporting the following prices on 40-pound cartons of U.S. No. 1 Grade sweet potatoes:

Atwater/Livingston, Calif.: Orange, mostly $16-17; red, mostly $17-18; white, mostly $23; Japanese, mostly $24-25.

Eastern North Carolina: Orange, $15-16.

Louisiana: Orange, $17-18.50.

Mississippi: Orange, $17-18.50.

* Prices from the USDA's Fruit & Vegetable Market News, March 25.

The Shipping Scene

Easter is the third-biggest sweet potato holiday, grower-shippers say, so retailers, foodservice operators and consumers alike should be glad to hear that ample supplies of good-quality tubers will be available at reasonable prices in plenty of time for the April 4 celebration.

Rexburg, Idaho-based Wilcox Fresh has a national co-pack partner network in all the major sweet potato regions, but the company's strongest shipping presence is in California and North Carolina, said Jim Richter, executive vice president, sales and marketing.

Because of good growing conditions last year, quality looks good for the beauregard and o'henry varieties that the company now is shipping, Richter said.

"The market has certainly been good for sweet potatoes this year," he added. "Sweet potatoes continue to grow in popularity with consumers."

Space allocations are increasing in produce departments, and positioning is improving, he said. In fact, it's not unusual to see leading retailers in some areas dedicate almost as much space to sweet potatoes as they do to Idaho baking potatoes.

Wilcox Fresh offers primarily bulk cartons, but the company also packs seasonal boxes ranging from 5 to 15 pounds that appeal to club store shoppers.

Sweet potatoes offer great cross merchandising opportunities for products like brown sugar and marshmallows, Richter said.

Easter is a good time for AV Thomas Produce in Livingston, Calif., to implement aggressive pricing programs to move some of the varieties that the company might be oversupplied with, said vice president Carlos Vieira.

The company's new crop will come on as early as mid-July.

"We do what it takes to make sure our old crop is done so we can start full-bore with our new crop," Vieira said.

However, he said the company plans to have all the varieties on hand, including the beauregard, red diana, No. 1 sweet and Oriental sweet, until the end of the current season.

Quality of this year's crop is "fantastic," Vieira said. "It's one of the best I can remember."

Besides 40-pound cartons, the company is "big on bags," he said, offering 3-, 5- and 10-pounders in high-graphic bins under the Nature's Pride label. AV Thomas also has a microwaveable sweet potato and a baby yam in a bag or tray.

Although Easter is a big sweet potato holiday for Chadbourn, N.C.-based Wayne E. Bailey Produce Co., George Wooten, president and owner, said, "Sweet potatoes have definitely become a year-round thing."

"Quality has been real good" on beauregard, covington, Japanese and o'henry varieties, he said.

The covington, which accounts for most of the sweet potatoes coming from North Carolina, "is very well-shaped and has a great flavor," he said.

Besides 40-pound cartons, the company ships display-ready master cartons of 12 3-pound and eight 5-pound consumer bags of sweet potatoes. The master cartons feature graphics to help draw the consumer in, Wooten said.

Wayne E. Bailey Produce offers an extensive range of sizes with pricing opportunities ranging from premium to value pricing.

The National Agricultural Statistics Service reported in its latest Census of Agriculture in 2007 that 41 states produce sweet potatoes, but Charles Walker, executive secretary of The United States Sweet Potato Council in Columbia, S.C., said 93% of the 2009 production came from North Carolina, California, Louisiana and Mississippi.

Demand has increased 34% over the past five years, he said, and, although 2009 production was up 6.5% compared with 2008, Walker said inventories are dropping faster than the rate of increase in production.

"We will have to manage shipments to have enough until the new crop comes on," he said.

Sue Johnson-Langdon, executive director of the Benson-based North Carolina Sweet Potato Commission, said the organization plans to reach out to dietitians and institutional food editors to promote sweet potatoes as a moderate glycemic-index food that does not spike blood sugar levels and is appropriate for diabetic diets.

(By Tom Burfield, Western correspondent for The Packer. The Packer and Red Book Credit Services are part of food360º, a division of Vance Publishing Corp., Lincolnshire, Ill.)

Resources

Subscriber Service Menu