A berry mixed start to the year

The only thing that’s predictable about British weather is its unpredictability.

Remember the first lockdown? Hard to forget it, admittedly, but it was almost wall to wall sunshine with temperatures in the low to mid 20s for much of April. I spent most of it outside, working on the garden or cycling, given I was unemployed at the time.

The farm team were especially grateful for the Indian spring as demand for strawberries went through the proverbial roof. Orders for hundreds of boxes were coming in and flying out the packhouse doors daily, because when temperatures rise, so too does demand.

Sales would have been even higher last spring and summer if it wasn’t for the lockdown as the hospitality trade is a big customer. Many of our berries end up in New Covent Garden where they’re snapped up by the capital’s wholesalers and restaurants but with the sector forced into dormancy, this stream of income all but dried up.

With the country emerging from Covid hibernation hopes were high for a decent spring and improved sales to make up for last year’s dip. The surprise warm spell in late February only boosted that sense of optimism further and the first Westlands Farm strawberries of 2021 were on the shelves a few weeks later as the plants made the most of the heat.

While the glasshouses are now full of berries with tens of thousands of more to come, a decent spell of warm weather has yet to arrive. Indeed, with the mercury still regularly hovering around the freezing mark at night, we’ve often been forced to cover the polytunnel plants in fleece to protect them from frost.

Our strawberries have survived and are tasting great – the new Centenary variety we’re growing is especially delicious, with the berries often the size of golf balls – but other farms haven’t been so lucky.

A typical centenary berry. Believe it or not, this is actually quite small with the berries typically weighing around 20-30g. There's a competition going on to find the weightiest....

Strawberry plants are generally hardly and will survive the winter no problem, but a late frost can be deadly when the flowers start to bloom. We’ve learned through Christian that a Scottish farm recently lost most of its crop because of frost, with their fleeces not sufficient enough to protect the plants from the cold.

To make matters worse the Dutch made things tricky for Westlands and their counterparts in April by clogging (ho ho) the market with cheap strawberries, prompting supermarkets to snap up berries from Der Nederlands instead of those from Blighty. It’s very disheartening to see first-hand how much leverage supermarkets hold when it comes to filling their shelves.

I’ve learned a lot about the nation’s buying habits because of this job and I’ve certainly changed mine as a result. My fiancée and I buy most of our fruit or vegetables from a greengrocer but whenever I have to peruse the supermarket produce aisle, I’ll make sure the supplier is British. I would never buy strawberries or raspberries that have been grown in the likes of Spain or Morocco when they can be grown here. The more I work in this industry, the more I appreciate the argument for seasonality.

But despite all this gloom I’m pleased to report the farm seems to be in a good position and we’re processing orders for 100 boxes or more on a near daily basis.

Our good position comes, I’m slightly sorry to say, from the misfortune of other farms which rely on polytunnels. Their crops have been susceptible to the unusually cold spring while we have been able to whack up the heating in the glasshouses with the temperature often hovering around 30c inside.

I wrote a few months back about a mad push to swap the infrastructure in the glasshouses to support strawberries instead of raspberries. That decision seems to be paying off handsomely now because the plants are producing some blooming wonderful berries, and lots of them.

And because we’ve got a secure supply of big, juicy and delicious strawberries, we’ve been able to command a decent price and nice position in the market. I’m pleased to report we’re now supplying two supermarkets with one recent delivery getting top marks from the QC team at the Maidstone depot, much to delight of Christian. I understand it’s a very rare achievement to get the fabled blue tick, so he was understandably rather chuffed.

The various teams seem to be working well with Christian leading the pickers and his other half, Katarina, overseeing the packhouse on busier days.

My working day typically starts at 8am and begins with a glance of the order board. The first order of the day is always for Paul Edwards (a wholesaler) and will usually involve filling 20 to 50 trays with eight 227g punnets apiece. The final order is usually for New Covent Garden and is usually for 70 to 110 boxes, each containing ten 400g punnets. We try to get it all packed and wrapped up by 2pm so Mike can deliver the load to the distribution depot near Arundel before traffic gets hefty on the A27 Chichester bypass and its many roundabouts.

Mike has been a revelation since joining and provides the perfect link between the pickers and the packhouse. Once the (mostly Bulgarian) pickers finish in a glasshouse, Christian puts in a call to Mike, who will arrive a few minutes later with his refrigerated van. He will make a note of the variety, size and quality of the order before delivering it to the packhouse and a cooling off period in the chiller. When it comes to packing we will refer to his note, thus ensuring traceability, with every order being broken down on a daily report.

Not a bad effort but the current winner isn't far off 90g. Hopes are high that the 100g mark could be smashed in the coming weeks.

There’s a lot more paperwork to do this year but I quite enjoy it and the set up feels very professional. The temperamental label machine has been replaced with an Italian model that is built like a tank but works like a Juventus midfielder, quietly but perfectly doing its business with minimal fuss. It’s a joy to use and I’ve mastered changing the label, as we often flit between 227 and 400g boxes.

Katarina is settling in well and we’re getting on fine. I believe it's her first experience of working in a packhouse and although it’s a lot for her to take in, she’s getting the hang of things very quickly and calls upon the help of two fellow Bulgarian pickers when things get very busy.

She’s not based in the packhouse full time at the moment, though, because orders are relatively small due to the weather and market. More often than not I’m the only person around but I can run the joint on my own quite easily when orders are manageable. Steve has called me a one-man packing machine, as I do seem to be the sole packhouse worker most of the time.

To be honest there’s rarely a day when I don’t feel in control of the joint, from paperwork to packing, whenever I go it alone. Having said that, it’s nice to be the face of experience and I’ve enjoyed passing on my help and guidance to Katarina. I’m convinced I’m not going to be the fastest worker forever, as Katarina and her colleagues are getting speedier at every job from checking the berries to making boxes.

Don't these strawberries look delicious?

The one downside to working in the packhouse is there’s very little contact with the pickers. The rotor is all but complete but is very different to last year, with only Constantine and Rumyana returning from the class of 2020. The latter often helps out in the packhouse and seems to be getting on well on the packing line so I suspect I’ll be writing more about her over the coming months.

Most of the new pickers also come from Bulgaria and seem to be called either Ahmed, Mustapha or Jamal, while the incumbents also include Constantine’s two brothers, so at least he’s got another two people to speak in Romanian to.

One of the Ahmeds occasionally swings by with the minibus to drop off a few dozen trays with Constantine and a couple of the other pickers in tow. They’re a good bunch and I’m looking forward to the day we I can buy the non-Muslim pickers a drink in The Hampshire Bowman or Square Cow.

Whilst I hope this entry and indeed this blog has given you a good idea of what work is like at Westlands, there's a great promotional video on our Facebook and Instragram page if you fancy something more visual. Keep an eye out for the masked man around the 1.30 mark, as he looks strangely familiar.