AMS Exotic enjoys an active Mexican grape season.

If you listen to the media, this side of the Atlantic is falling into total paranoia about terrorism but as the weather warms up and people start to relax it does not seem all that bad to live in America after all.

AMS Exotic are basically split into three entities all working under the same roof: Domestic foodservice deals with wholesalers all over the country with the baby veg that we grown in Mexico, Guatemala and Costa Rica. Domestic retail, packs these same baby vegetables into extended shelf life bags that are then placed into retail chains all over America but predominantly the West Coast - it is a big country after all!

Whilst Export has been shipping all USA fruit and veg to Europe for the past 13 - 14 years already. it started when Martin called up looking for strawberries in 1990 and hooked up with Well-Pict Inc. So since this magazine comes out four times a year I think it would be quite fitting if I pick the subject I know best i.e. the export side, that way whoever needs to write for the next issue can pick one of the other two activities and we have three issues covered.

Back in 1990, when Martin started importing berries I remember him saying very seriously to Tim the owner of Well-Pict that he would be thrilled if we could ship 500 cartons a week. 1 year later we were shipping 10,000 per week! The berry business to the Uk started us over here and kept us busy until 1997 culminating at 300,000 cartons in 1994.

By 1994 we could see that berries would be grown in bigger volumes in the Uk or Europe at least and that they would be covered. We needed more than just berries if we wanted to stay in business. Martin put us in touch with PrimaFruit and this was the beginning of a very good trade relationship between primafruit and AMS.

AMS Exotic ships grapes and stone fruit from USA, Mexico and Canada to Primafruit. Our season really kicks off with mexican grapes and we are in the middle of it as I am writing this. let me run you through what it takes to get grapes packed in Mexico and on to the retail shelves of Tesco.

First we set up the deals with the Mexican growers in wintertime. Most require some kind of money advance, banks do not loan money to growers in Mexico, and if you want grapes you have to  become the bank. Of course you try and deal with growers that you know are good or excellent since the UK only buys from the best. Some are EUREPGAP certified already, next year they will have to be certified or there will be no business.

the season kicks off early May. This year was particularly active early on since Indian supplies in the Uk ran out early.

The biggest problem with packing grapes in Mexico is to handle the packaging. We have boxes made in Texas, bags made in Spain, SO2 pads mad ein Chile, all this has to somehow converge on the individual farm just before harvest. Before the season starts, Gary runs around the ranches gathering pesticide information, EUREPGAP certification, checks the facilities, living quarters for the staff, cantines etc.

The town of hermosillo in the Sonora State is where the main production is. it is in the middle of othe Sonora desert very well known for it's rattlesnakes, straight south from Tmbstowne. Actually it is only three hosue away from the Arizona border but you are definitely in Mexico. grape production started there in the late seventies. As the Palm Spring area in the USA became more known for its golf courses than its vineyards the Mexican growers saw a competitive advantage with much cheaper labour. Nowadays the Palm Spring area produces about the same amount of grapes as Mexico, about 9 million boxes x 18 lbs each. remember this is all packed in 4-5 weeks. Every year in the early days of May a contingent of very pale human beings descend on the sleepy town of hermosillo. they happen to be UK importeres, supermarket buyers and technologists, i think this year I counted at least 7 different companies present in the same hotel at the same time. Nedless to say the bartenders are busy. Lisa and myself trade places between baby sitting the brits in mexico and handling the logistics of the business in the office.

Once the deal starts in hermosillo it is a mad rush to the border for the growers. The ones that have the earliest fruit are sure to make good money although it is all relative: to be early you need to sacrifice a lot of yield. The problem with the US market is that it requires only 15.5% of the sugar.

On the other hand the Brits like the sweet grapes and the very minimum for the UK market is 16%. We hope that the sugar goes up fast enough so that there are still grapes left for us to pack and that the Americans do not take it all. The first few days are a bit unnerving but this year anyway it all turned out fine.

To ship to the Uk we have a few different routes. Airfreight for which the fruit has to cross the border to the US and go to Los Angeles airport, two days later it is in Heathrow.
Airfreight with a lower cost by trucking to the East Coast and flying from Miami or another gateway. Sea freight is again cheaper but in order to get a relatively fast transit time of about 14 days we truck the fruit to New Jersey. All this takes a lot of co-ordination between the growers, the cold storage at the US/Mexico borders, trucking companies, airfreight forwarders, shipping lines, but hey that is what we are paid for!

The first white grapes get packed very quickly, over two weeks usually, this year was particularly fact it seems that all the production came at once, we packed 75000 cartons with a value of 2 million dollars in no time. Flames follow shortly afterwards, there was not such a high demand on red grapes since Chilean crimson were still available.

As I am writing this, the first sea freight containers have arrived and are fine. We were not really worried about the quality of the fruit but problems can happen if the reefer contains malfunction.

A good Mexican grapes season will set us up nicely for the American grape season that runs from August to November. Our main grower castlerock got the top award from tesco and is now "Nature's choice" approved this shold get us a bigger share of the total order.

Summer 2003