"not sustainable for retailers and their suppliers"

Steve Lutz of The Perishables Group shot me an email today with produce retail sales and volume numbers from the month of November. The gist, in Steve's words,

The general story—volume off in every produce category except for berries grapes, avocados and lettuce. Prices up nearly 6% for total produce. Net result…higher overall dollars (+3.8%) but volume continues to decline. The trend is not sustainable for retailers or their suppliers.

TK: More coming on the specific numbers, but is interesting to note that while grape volume per store/per week was up nearly 23% in November, total grape dollars were actually off by 0.2% compared with last November. Average retail grape prices in November were off 18% compared with a year ago.

For more info on The Perishables Group:at www.perishablesgroup.com