Northwest Cherry Outlook Pt 2

With today's Fruit Grower Report, I'm Bob Larson. A promising cherry harvest is getting under way in Northwest orchards and they could be getting a running start from growers in California.

Washington State Fruit Commission president BJ Thurlby says our West Coast neighbors are having a great year ...

BJ THURLBY ... "Their fruit has been outstanding, some of the best California cherries I've seen. And, I can tell you that the sell-through has been great. I travel a lot into foreign markets and when you're talking to people in China and Korea, along with people in Seattle, that sell cherries, they're saying we are really selling a lot of cherries so that's good news because consumers are responding to the California fruit and if California fruit is good then that should mean that Northwest fruit is going to be even better."

And, Thurlby says their good news should be our good news ...

BJ THURLBY ... "When the California fruit comes into the market and it's in great shape, it does nothing but help our growers. And the reason is, because we all tend to shop with our eyes and we all tend to make assumptions when we go in and we eat a cherry and we say wow, the cherries are good this year. And that's kind of where we live the rest of the summer. So, we think it's great when consumers actually get a great product, whether it's ours or not, because we know that we're going to deliver a great product here from the middle of June all the way this year, possibly, till September. So, there's going to be cherries in the market a whole month longer this year than they were last year."

Thurlby says Chelans are the first cherries to come off the trees, with Bings starting later this week, and Rainiers cherries coming along sometime next week.