GEM-Pack Berries of Irvine, CA, is a grower-focused, family-proud organization that holds quality, sustainability and consistency of deliverability as key priorities to its sought after California strawberries.  

With year-round distribution, GEM-Pack’s season kicks off in Mexico each winter, with Florida coming online soon after.  Southern California begins harvesting late winter, followed by Santa Maria, offering volume late winter to early summer, then restarting in the fall for a smaller harvest to complement volume coming out of Northern California. The NorCal districts in Watsonville and Salinas ships spring through fall.

Michelle Deleissegues, director of marketing, said the big focus this year is the merger between GEM-Pack and Red Blossom. Announced this past October, the merger has been in the works for a number of months, as both companies realized their shared philosophies and production priorities had the potential to create a powerful union.

As both companies have a long standing history of quality growers and cultivation practices, Deleissegues said, “It’s a large undertaking to get all parties in California, Florida and Mexico on a unified system for all facets of cultivation, especially mid-season.” She added, “the company’s focus is to maintain the quality we are known for, while diligently working behind the scenes to systematically integrate 5,000-plus acres.”

With the Mexican season winding down, Deleissegues reports a strong overall season. GEM-Pack’s Florida operation has another month to go, and while supply has been lighter than anticipated, quality has remained high.  

GEM-Pack’s California strawberry season is just getting started in Oxnard and Santa Maria.  Deleissegues said, “the freeze last week caused some damage in Santa Maria and Watsonville, but they should bounce back steadily as temperatures warm up this week.”  They remain confident that supply will be strong out of California, in March and through the spring.

Deleissegues offered an overall picture on the market, reporting strong and steady demand throughout 2021, and bringing us up to this year’s Valentine’s Day — a big run for strawberries. Deleissegues said it’s typical to see a market drop following the holiday with an increase in supply and post-holiday letdown.

“We had great weather in the combined growing districts leading up to Valentine’s Day,” said Deleissegues, but noted the winter weather in the Midwest and East has been a recent factor – slowing demand somewhat in the past 14-days. Deleissegues affirmed, “we are very positive about the spring outlook and foresee big demand for March and April.”

GEM-Pack notes labor supply continues to be an ongoing challenge. Since Covid, transportation and supplies — particularly packaging and pallets — has become a consistent challenge as well, but one they will weather.

“We are working to increase truck capacity to combat increasing freight rates,” said Deleissegues. GEM-Packs new 4/2# will be packed 160 per pallet allowing for 4160 cartons per load, and they will be transitioning their 1# to 132 per pallet an increase over the traditional 108 count, again in an effort to increase packages per load. Deleissegues highlighted the innovation and persistence of the sales and operational team, “we are always researching dynamic and flexible solutions to not only help ourselves, but our customers too.”

While 2022 is already a big year for GEM-Pack Strawberries, Deleissegues and the team are confident, the future looks considerably bright.