“We are really optimistic and excited about the upcoming crop because we are back to a ‘normal’ year,” following a shortened crop in 2013, said Craig Morris, a salesman at Homegrown Organic Farms in Porterville, CA.

“Last year as we came into the season we had a borderline crop failure with regard to Navels” due to a freeze on Dec. 5 and for several nights following. That created “a difficult situation,” he said.

“As it turned out, in the end of the year it wasn’t nearly as bad as we thought.” But the industry did not have enough supplies to meet customer demand.

“With the growth of organics, we want to make sure we can supply that demand, so we want to get back to more normal numbers,” he said Oct. 9.

Morris expected Homegrown to start the Navel harvest the week off Oct. 20 this year, which is “about two weeks earlier than years past.” The size structure “looks very favorable for bulk and bag business,” he said.

The Navels will be followed by “our fist Mandarin variety, the Satsumas,” starting about Nov. 10, and also by pumelos, grapefruit and clementines, Morris said. “We have a start-to-finish program of eight or nine different varieties” of citrus. “The season is looking very good. Demand is outstanding.”

Homegrown expects to be up in volume in all citrus categories except pumelos, which are down about 10 percent this year, he said. “We have increased acreage in all categories. We are definitely in a growth stage right now for the company.”

Homegrown’s business is heavy to retail customers, Morris said. “Every meeting we have with our customers, they indicate that they want to continue to grow their [organic] program — grow the business,” Morris said. That is “obviously driven by consumer demand. There is a lot of interest in organics.”

Virtually all retail chains are either in organics or interested in organics, “and you have to be very strategic about who you want to partner with,” he said. “We have had the luxury of really carving out some good partnerships with our retailers.”

Reiterating, he said, “It is good to be back to a normal year. We’ve got a wonderful crop coming up with good size structure and good quality, and we look for a good year of growth.”