Sunions are back in stores mid-Nov.  The game-changing onion follows a tightly controlled brand promise that certifies them both tearless and sweet before they are able to be shipped to grocery stores. 

As the 2022 onion crop ships full steam from Owyhee Produce in Nyssa, OR, the company is also moving ahead with its promotional plans for the year, according to Bailey Myers in marketing.

Like other onion grower/shippers in the Treasure Valley, Owyhee Produce got a later start to the season and is seeing lower yields than normal due to weather conditions during planting and growing seasons. But Myers said the shed had been “putting in storage and shipping out from day one, which was the end of August.”  

Noting the 2022 early crop had been moving well, Weiser Onion Produce Sales/Management Consultant Herb Haun said harvest crews were well into the season’s storage crop.

After the first month of shipping 2022-03 onions from his company’s Nyssa, OR, facilities, Snake River Produce General Manager of Sales and Marketing Joshua Frederick said in late September that demand had begun to level and movement to be good.

“Things have been moving at a steady pace,” Frederick said. “Demand out the gate was in abundance, but now that we here at SRP are in our fourth full week of shipping. It’s leveled out, which we needed to happen so we can focus on getting our crop put away in storage for the season.”

Mid-September saw Idaho Falls-based Eagle Eye Produce’s Treasure Valley operation transition from fresh-run onions into its storage crop, and Joe Ange, director of business development, said early season demand had been good and movement brisk.

With several weeks of 2022’s onion harvest and shipping in the rear-view mirror, Idaho-E. Oregon shippers are assessing the season to date, with many comparing it to the 2021-22 short-crop year.

Yields are down throughout the Treasure Valley as the result of unfavorable weather conditions during planting as well as relentless heat during the growing season, but consensus on quality has been “very good” to “excellent,” and sizing in the storage crop is said to be trending to jumbos with fewer colossals and more mediums.