Travel log Spain, October 2016

From October 25th to 27th Marco Romein (director) and Jeroen van de Ende (commercial manager) have been to Spain. They visited our partner Hortosabor and the newly constructed warehouse. They also visited several growers together with one of our new customers. Marco and Jeroen like to share their travel log to give you an idea of what is happening behind the scenes.

Although a typical business trip to Spain involves visits to all suppliers in a certain area, we decided to do things differently this time. This trip was dedicated to visiting our partner in Almeria, Hortosabor. We started our cooperation with this company 6 years ago with just 4 hectares of bell peppers. Today we market 32acres of bell pepper. And other products like cucumbers, courgette and aubergine have been added to the range.

Tuesday October 25th
The day starts bright and early so we arrived at Malaga airport around 10am and were at the new warehouse of Hortosabor around noon. The time before lunch was used to catch up with our colleagues. We had a good lunch with the two directors Aron and Giorgio. Unfortunately Marco brought stomach flu along from Holland and was forced to finish this day sooner than expected.

Wednesday October 26th
Completely recovered after a long night sleep, the day-to-day trading was handled during breakfast. We went to visit the newly constructed warehouse and logistical facilities of Hortosabor. The facilities were brand new and had been running for two weeks. Peppers, aubergine, cucumbers and tomatoes can be graded and packed. The products are transported directly from this warehouse to various customers in Europe.
Sales managers Gabri and Jose were clearly taking their work seriously spending most of their time on the floor checking the quality of the products. We were very pleased to see that an unannounced BRC audit was in progress and seemed to be under control. Quite a performance, taking into consideration that the facilities have only been running for a couple of weeks.

Together with Nacho we went to visit the individual growers. Nacho is the technical manager, supervising the growers on the technical side of production. An important role in the growing process. As ‘Tecnico’ he consults with the growers to decide when to harvest or apply any form of crop protection. During the visit we noticed the high temperatures in October have affected the crop a lot. The production is peaking and the crop likely needs significant cooler night temperatures in order to slow down production. For now we will have enough pepper available from Spain.

The rest of the afternoon was used to see another new supplier. This new supplier also operates in same way as our current supplier, by harvesting directly in the field. By sourcing through various suppliers we can create continuity in availability, price and quality and facilitate the volume growth at Snijpunt.

After this we went back to the office of Hortosabor to discuss the expectations for the coming winter season. We were able to make clear agreements that can further improve our cooperation. Because we have more insight into the new way of working and the problems they encounter, we can help finding matching solutions. This way together we can create a more ideal working process that benefits the needs of our customers.

Thursday October 27th
Today a new customer came over form Holland to visit several of our Palermo pepper growers. Two completely different growers. The first one growing on 2 ha and the other on 10ha. The first grower has planted a month earlier and thus the differences associated with the continuing heat were easily visible. The 2ha crop seems to have handled the high temperatures very well, where the other crop was clearly desperate for low night temperatures.

After a late lunch we have visited a third grower. This particular grower is growing the little Sweetbite also called Vitapep variety. These mini snack peppers are available in red, yellow and orange. We currently process these for an ‘antipasti’ manufacturer who fills the Sweetbite with creamy cheese.

In conclusion it has been busy days in which a lot is seen and discussed. The choice to visit a selected group of partners and growers proved to be the right one.