Working together to develop the South African berry business

After some harsh lessons in both people and production Well-Pict European is starting to make some real headway into creating a South African berry business. A key issue in bringing the industry on was the lack of quality plant material, but over the last twelve months this has all changed. Working together with the South African growers, retailers, local plant propagators and most crucially Plant Sciences Inc, this hurdle has all but vanished. Here some of the key people and companies put a few of their thoughts together for Growing News.

Until 1996 strawberry production centred around the only two varieties in the country, namely Chandler and Selecta. For this reason, exports were virtually non-existent.

In 1998 trials were conducted with various European varieties, without success. The berries were just too soft to sustain the journey from SA to Europe. In 1999 the 1910 Fruitbox Co was started by Chris Charter, Martin Seymour (through Tim Morton) and Andrew Immelman. The formation of this packing and marketing company was somewhat premature however and during the first year of operation, a turnover of only R276 000 was achieved! In 2000 Mark Miller, a local grower purchased an equal share in the company.

As time progressed, various Israeli varieties were grown courtesy of Mr Immelman. These proved disastroud and in 2001, Immelmans shares in the company were acquired by what is now known as Well*Pict European.

Trials continued with the Israeli varieties and some very inferior quality Camarosa, all of which proved unsuccessful. A mini vegetable project was also started which had mixed results.

The 2003/04 season was the first season that reasonable quality plant material from the University of California was planted and a relatively small commercial trial of two Plant Sciences/Berry Genetics varieties’ were also planted. The results have been spectacular; our market share with Woolworths (our major local customer) grew from a 10% regional split to a national split of 60%! This reaffirms one thing – don’t ever buy inferior plant material! Company turnover should exceed R5 million this year.

Recent developments have resulted in the formation of the Well-Pict European Marketing trust. The trust will function to serve various growers around the country from a marketing perspective and in conjunction with Stargrow Cultivar Development (pty) Ltd will act to protect the intellectual property rights of the new varieties. Building Well*Pict brand in South Africa is one of our main objectives. Consumption of strawberries has increased dramatically over the past year and with these new generation varieties, local demand is set to soar. 5 million plants are being produced this year for local growers. Exports will therefore become a reality for the first time, something we have all been trying to achieve for the past 4 years!

The vertically integrated model on which the Well*Pict brand in South African has been built is now complete. Growers are combined with packers, marketers, the nursery and the intellectual property “guardians”. Retailers are all fired up, growers are busy with this soil preparation – so watch this space.

Winter 2003