To the uninitiated, it might be possible to conjure up memories of a certain character. With demand for fruit soaring and supplies running low, Anna Baumhoff is starting to wonder how long she will last. On a daily basis, I wonder what I am doing in this crazy business. It is a Wild West show.
The price of a pound of huckleberry has doubled in the past two years, as more people discover the fruit, which has been affected by the heat in the American West. She spent more than $125,000 buying every berry she could, and she fears that may not be enough. She says that their website is going crazy.
The majority of the berry comes from public lands in Idaho, Montana, and Washington, where the bushes are knee-high and the fruit is purple and green.
The activity of gathering huckleberries used to be a lot of fun for recreational pickers. The price of the fruit has gone up in the past two decades due to increased commercial sales. The wild habitat of the huckleberry is difficult to replicate because of the right mix of soil, sun, and shade.
Word can travel fast thanks to a Facebook group that has swelled to nearly 10,000 members and has been growing as much as 20% per year. An author of books about wild foods says global warming has made it harder to find large quantities of berries. Cook, who has a favorite spot in the mountains of Washington that he and his daughter call "huckleberry heaven", says that the erratic weather patterns have made for more of a wild card.
Hundreds of thousands of dollars change hands every night in a market that looks like something run by a drug gang during peak growing season. Pickers hand the fruit to drivers who take it to buying stations where gun-toting brokers pay for the fruit and resell it to jam and Jelly producers.
Malcolm Dell, head of the International Wild Association, which studies the fruit, says that he has not heard of anyone shooting each other over a patch. The commercial berry market has grown to over 3 million pounds a year, with a total value of $50 million last year, according to Dell. He says there are squabbles among various groups about who should get to pick the fruit and how to harvest it. He says that the berry is becoming a problem.
That is bad news for Baumhoff, whose mother started homemade jams in 1986 and sold them in Idaho. She took over the business in 1992 and now makes almost two dozen products.
She is paying more for everything she buys, it can take months to get certain jars and bottles, and Covid-19 has forced some distribution centers to shut down. Even as her sales surge, it is hard to find workers to help with cooking, packing, and shipping. Normally, she employs 15 people, but this year she has had to make do with 11.
Baumhoff is on track to sell $500,000 this year, compared to $300,000 in 2020. She has sold more than 7,500 jars of her best-selling jam this year, up 40% from last year. She fears that she may not be able to replenish her frozen reserves next summer, so she will have to turn down several new wholesale accounts. She says that nobody is stocking this stuff in the world. It doesn't work that way.
The price of an 11-ounce-jar of jam went up from $9.95 to $12.50 in September. She hoped the increase would reduce demand, but she is selling more than ever because of the rising prices. She says that sales have not dipped. I keep getting hit with more orders.
