Kings River Packing Launches into California Citrus Season with Great Quality and Facility Expansion
Kings River Packing recently launched into its Citrus season in California with a great outlook for the holidays and new enhancements to its citrus program. The company started harvesting Navels about a week ago and Satsuma Mandarins a week prior.
Salesman Jesse Silva tells AndNowUKnow, "This is some of the best eating quality we have seen in a long time and right out of the gates. It should bode well for retailers to transition out of imports and right into the new California crop." Silva notes, "We are seeing a lot of high quality fruit in the fields allowing us to begin packing consistently and sugars are presenting upwards of 12 to as high as 14 brix on some early blocks of Navels and Mandarins, so we like what we see so far. It’s going to be a great season to promote California citrus."
Along with looking into adding new varietals to the Kings River Packing lineup, the company has also expanded its facility operations. King's River has added a 50,000 square-foot specialty citrus facility featuring high tech Compac sorters and state-of-the-art equipment which allows for an increase in soft packing.
"The family here at Kings River has invested a lot of money for the future of this company not only in technology but also food safety, as well as growth in additional acreage, Silva notes. We are well known for our high quality oranges but we are a player in other key citrus commodities as well. We can promote steady supplies and offer programs on many other key specialty citrus, not just oranges. We also do this so we can offer our customers a one stop shop.”
The drier, warmer weather has helped with the great eating quality but the company is waiting for cooler nights to bring color on for the Navels. King's River is looking to peak with 72's then 56' the 88's on its navel crop. The grower will move into Clementine’s then Tango Seedless in mid-January, finishing up lastly with Gold Nugget Mandarins. King's River will also have steady supply of Lemons, Cara Cara’s and Minneola’s through May all loading at its facility in Sanger, California.
The company offers private label packaging for citrus as well as a full line of tailored high graphic, high end POS and materials that that tells story of the family and the business.
“We have a full crop on all citrus items and our size looks larger so that will be very good for promotions," Silva states. "With a shorter Chilean crop season due to weather complications coupled with our high eating quality there is a great opportunity for California citrus to have more shelf space and Ad space so we can go to market strong. Once customers get our fruit in their home it will be hard to keep California citrus stocked on the shelf."
Stay tuned to AndNowUKnow as we follow the California citrus season.
