Retailer said it’s expecting to sell 25 per cent more strawberries than last year after warm spring brings crop on
Tesco has cut the price of a 400g punnet of UK strawberries to help shift a glut of fruit that has been brought on by the warm weather.
The punnets will priced at £1.50 instead of the usual £2.50, with the promotion rolling out in 750 Tesco stores across the UK. It comes after the homegrown season began just before Easter, thanks to the beneficial spring weather.
“The fantastic UK weather recently has brought on the strawberries faster than expected with growers reporting that the extra hours of sunshine has made the fruit larger and sweeter than usual for this time of year,” said Tesco berries buying manager, Callum Baker.
“With the extra amount of strawberries coming through right now we expect to sell about 25 per cent more crop this year than last.”
Tesco supplier and Mansfields’ commercial operations manager Dave Slaughter said: “The sudden growth spurt has taken many growers by surprise and couldn’t have been more different to last Spring when we experienced a much colder and wetter start to the fruit growing season.
“With the predicted cooler weather and rain in the next week adding to the great sunshine we’ve had already, it looks like we will have a really good quality crop this year.”
The extra sunshine has led to bumper strawberries for growers in Kent, East and West Sussex, Berkshire, Wales, Norfolk and Herefordshire and Scotland, with reports of super-sized fruit making news in the mainstream consumer press.
The Met Office has reported that last month was the warmest April since records began 100 years ago, and the driest since 1956 with only half the amount of usual rainfall.
