With summer in full swing, Calavo Growers Inc. is offering its customers fresh avocados from California, Mexico, Peru and Colombia, and will continue with that four-source opportunity into September. Peter Shore, vice president of product management for the Santa Paula, CA-based company, said while shipments from Mexico and Colombia — to a far lesser extent — will continue to increase through the summer and into the fall, California and Peru are churning toward the end of their respective 2023 seasons. “We will be shipping California fruit through the first part of September,” he said. “Peru

By all accounts, 2023 has been a unique year in the fresh avocado marketing business as there may never have been such a disparity in FOB price between large and small fruit. “We are seeing a $50 gap between 40s, 48s, 70s and 84s,” Rob Ybarra, executive vice president at Villita Avocados, based Pharr, TX, said earlier this month. “We are seeing Cadillac prices for the large fruit and very low prices for the smaller fruit.”

Westfalia, one of the leading global suppliers of avocados, has robust plans to grow its presence in the North American market over the coming years. “We will add new ripening and service centers into our domestic portfolio in a manner that reduces carbon footprints for our customers, increase our bagging capacity as well as introduce new avocado products into the marketplace,” said Raina Nelson, president and CEO of Westfalia Fruit Marketing USA. “We draw on our global expertise and unrivalled diversified country of origin portfolio that reduces market volatility. We are ready to provide

Though 2023 has been a challenging year, La Bonanza is still looking ahead to bigger fresh volume as well as an expanding role in the processing sphere. In early 2023 it completed the 100 percent stock purchase of its processing plant, Avo-King, and rebranded it LA Bonanza Fresh Guacamole. Focusing first on the current marketing conditions, Maggie Bezart-Hall, La Bonanza’s senior director of strategic sales and marketing, noted that it has been difficult for the past few months and it appears the same situation will continue into the fall. “The 2023 Loca bloom, generally available June to

It appears that Colombia increased its Hass avocado exports to the U.S. market in fiscal 2023 to near 30 million pounds after doubling the volume the previous year to 24 million pounds. “The Colombia avocado export volume projection for the foreseeable future is year-over-year growth,” said Manuel Michel, executive director of the Colombia Avocado Board. “Many Hass avocado orchards in Colombia were planted in the last few years. New orchards are being certified for export to the U.S. each year and the trees are still reaching full maturity.” Michel, who only joined CAB in mid-July, said there

With a new senior management team in place, the California Avocado Commission is taking a close look at it marketing program and is planning to develop a new campaign for 2024. CAC CEO and President Jeff Oberman said California will continue to promote to its core target market, which he defines as retailers and foodservice operators “who will pay the premium California fruit deserves and promote it as such.” The commission and its staff are currently going through an agency review and plans to have new messaging and new creative material in place for dissemination to the trade before the