Status quo working for Desert Fresh
Status quo working for Desert Fresh
While change can be a good thing, the old adage “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” seems to be the philosophy of Desert Fresh, located in Coachella, CA.
For 20 years, partners Tony Bianco and Blaine Carian, two third-generation Coachella Valley grape growers and marketers, have been participating in the short-lived local grape deal and doing quite well. “It works great for us,” said Mr. Bianco, who serves as the president of the company and lone salesman. Mr. Carian is the grower for the partnership.
The company brokers grapes from other areas during the rest of the year but they have not started any other growing deals and don’t intend to.
Most of the firm’s production is in Flame Seedless and Sugraones, and for the first time the firm will have a marketable crop of Scarlet Royals, as well as some Sweet Scarlets. Mr. Bianco said the Scarlet Royal is a good grape with great holding capacity, so he also expects to export some this year. “We think it will be a good export grape, which just gives us another customer (classification) to sell,” he quipped.
He said the Sweet Scarlet is fairly similar but has a sweeter taste as the name implies.
Mr. Bianco said the firm’s production should get going during the week of May 13.
He said the crops look good and should be fairly similar to the 2012 crop in terms of volume, quality and timing. “The Flame Seedless is on the large side but I expect that to get knocked down to normal as it gets thinned,” he said. “The Sugraones look good. Our early ranch is on the light side but I expect that variety to size up as we move through the deal. For the most part I think we will have a fairly average crop.”
