marketing


Strawberries get a fresh push


Spring promotion campaign set to take advantage ofmarket resurgence. By Grant Ullyot


T sales.


Long known for its high quality and sweet taste, the B.C. strawberry is popular with both the U-pick clientele and those who prefer to buy their berries at the local farm market or retail outlet.


Lisa Craig, manager of the


association, expects the promotion will launch in mid-May and run to the end of June. It is what she calls ‘a drip campaign’, with ads in print and on radio extolling the virtues of fresh strawberries.


At the annual general meeting of the association, two new directors, Steven Neufeld and Mike Lept, were elected for two-year terms.


Strawberries have been grown in the province for many years and at one time were the biggest among the berry industries in the Fraser Valley-Lower Mainland regions.


Krause Farms has a large U-pick field as well as a retail sales store and bakery offering consumers a choice — either pick your own or purchase the ones they pick. The bakery produces strawberry short cake, pies, jams and jellies. They also feature a strawberry wine among the listings of berry wines in their ultra-modern wine shop. Association vice-president Alf Krause said it was 42 years ago that he planted his first strawberries. “At that time it was the big strawberry growers against the processors battling over price. It was all under the Vegetable Marketing Commission, which helped the industry to negotiate a price to be paid for the berries before harvesting began. We also negotiated fruit rot and quality. Hard to believe by today’s


British Columbia Berry Grower • Summer 2016 9 GRANT ULLYOT


Steven Neufeld is one of two new directors of the B.C. Strawberry Association.


he B.C. Strawberry Growers Association has laid out a plan it hopes will lead to increased


standards but production back in the 1970s reached 50 million pounds. “However, that has changed slowly over the years with huge increases in both blueberry and cranberry production.


Strawberries ceased to be a dominant crop after Lucerne Foods, the dominant processor, stopped processing


strawberries. Since then our market share of the


processing industry is down to 100 to 300 thousand pounds.”


With 95 per cent of the crop now being picked fresh, the rejuvenation of the fresh market is happening, says Krause.


“When you are


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