Airfreighted watermelon tops $100 as price of out-of-season produce rises

Tuesday, 7 June 2022

A 10kg watermelon was $102 at an Auckland supermarket on the weekend.

Fruit salad is yummy yummy no more, as out-of-season fruit prices soar – but is the price we pay fair?

An Auckland shopper was shocked to see an-out-of season watermelon with a $102 price tag on it at Farro at the weekend.

A Twitter user posted a photo of the watermelon to the app with the caption: “Was thinking about fruit salad but changed my mind now that watermelons have broken the $100 mark”.

The melon had a unit price of $9.99 a kilogram, and the whole thing topped the scale at 10.2kgs.

Some Kiwis say they're thinking more carefully about the amount of food they're wasting amid high prices. (Video first published in June 2022)

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Watermelon halves were priced at $40.

A Farro spokesperson said the high price of watermelon was because the fruit is out of season and was shipped from Australia.

“The seedless watermelon in this instance was sourced from Australia as there is no watermelon available in NZ, hence was subject to the high supply chain costs being experienced currently.

“Both costs and produce quality can be significantly affected depending on whether the produce is shipped via sea or air.”

The average weight of a watermelon is 9kg to 11kg but generally there is about 6kg of edible fruit, leaving the remainder of the weight in the rind.

But it’s not the first time the price of out of season fruit and vegetables have made eyes water.

Limes hit $58.99 a kg earlier in the year.

A post to Reddit in October revealed red chillies and green chillies at Pak 'n Save Queenstown were $120.99 per kilogram.

The price of out-of-season limes topped almost $60 a kg at a Christchurch Pak ‘n Save in January.

When limes were in-season and harvested locally, retail prices were normally about $10kg to $12kg.

Through the winter, most stone fruit are out of season in New Zealand are therefore imported, including peaches, apricots and plums.

Yellow flesh peaches were $7.99 a kilo at an Auckland Pak ‘n Save, while plums were $6.99 a kg.

Richard Burke, chief executive of LeaderBrand, one of New Zealand’s largest local producers of broccoli, corn, lettuce, spinach and bagged salads said the watermelon was an “extreme case of pricing”.

“It’s these types of examples that are giving Kiwis the wrong idea about the price of fresh produce.”

He said vegetable prices were generally driven by supply availability and prices did fluctuate, but as supply lifted, the price would stabilise as well.

Last week, a head of broccoli was back to $1.90 a head, the same price it was in 2012, he said.

This week, the price had increased slightly to $2.30, but was still cheaper than this time last year, he said.

“Also, lots of fresh produce isn’t just for one meal, it could last you a couple of meals, so the cost per serving drops significantly.”

Burke said shoppers needed to make sure that they were shopping seasonally for good pricing.

“There are loads of fresh winter vegetables at great prices right now such as broccoli, spinach, carrots, potatoes, cabbage and cauliflower.”