Lettuce supplies appear to be stable in California. “As far as romaine lettuce goes, it’s pretty easy to get right now,” says Wayde Nichols of Buy Fresh Produce Inc. According to Nichols, the price of romaine lettuce is on average, ranging from $10 to $12 a box and will increase over time remain constant in the coming months unless unforeseen events occur.
Green leaf lettuce appears to be in the same situation, with a stable supply at approximately the same price and availability. Both green leaf and romaine lettuce are native to the Salinas, California area.
Buy Fresh Produce Inc. is a fruit and vegetable processing facility that provides salad kits to wholesale customers Retailer from all parts of the western Rocky Mountains. Primarily uses romaine and green leaf lettuce in its processed wholesale products and for Retailer. “There’s always demand,” Nichols said. “If there are normal prices and the quality of the product is good, that means there are no anomalies like flooding or insects or whatever.”
Challenges
In 2022, Salinas suffered from the necrotic spot virus Impatient (INSV) as it was extremely aggressive on large areas in the area. Nichols says he hasn’t heard any concerns about the issue or about weather events like Hurricane Hilary this season. “It only brought us rain, even though we had stronger storms than the hurricane in the winter,” he says.
Looking forward, romaine and green leaf lettuce supplies will continue to flow out of Salinas in November through December and then move on to Yuma, Arizona, Central and the Imperial Valley. “With these transitions, the availability of the product will be affected because it will take a while to get there and get things moving in the right direction,” concludes Nichols.
