In this installment of the ‘Agronometrics In Charts’ series, Cristian Crespo F. illustrates how the U.S. market is evolving. Each week the series looks at a different horticultural commodity, focusing on a specific origin or topic visualizing the market factors that are driving change.

In other Agronometrics in Charts articles we addressed the Honeycrisp apple variety, and from the beginning, we were struck by the difference in prices in comparison to other varieties and relation to the average prices in the U.S. market.

In the following graph, we see the reported historical average prices of apples in the North American market and the prices of the Honeycrisp variety in the North American market in the last 15 years.

Historic Honeycrisp apple prices reported | USD

(Source: USDA Market News via Agronometrics) [Agronometrics users can view this chart with live updates here]

As we will see in the graph below, even though during the first half of 2020 the prices of Honeycrisp decreased in comparison to previous years, in the second half of 2020 and during the first weeks of this year, the prices of the variety increased significantly compared to 2020.

Honeycrisp reported prices | USD

(Source: USDA Market News via Agronometrics) [Agronometrics users can view this chart with live updates here]

But over the last couple of seasons, a serious competitor seems to have emerged during this "reign" of Honeycrisp in the North American market: the Cosmic Crisp variety.

It hasn't been possible to show a comparative price chart how we would like to between Honeycrisp and Cosmic Crisp as the USDA has not yet reported prices for the latter variety.

With mouthfeel characteristics similar to Honeycrisp, and also thanks to strong promotional campaigns that the Washington variety has had, Cosmic Crisp has attracted the attention of North American consumers, showing strong growth and great potential to become a key variety.

"The volume of Cosmic Crisp is set to be more than double this fall and double again for the 2022 harvest. This volume will rival the current volume of major varieties."

"Regarding consumer prices, in March alone, the variety ranked 11 with US$4.3 million in sales and 1.8 million pounds, with an average price of $2.52 per pound, right in line with Honeycrisp at $2.55 per pound. Looking from an annual perspective, the variety has made $20 million in sales, with 7.7 million pounds."

We still have to wait to see what happens throughout the rest of the season and the beginning of the next to see who will hold the throne of apples in the North American market.

In our ‘In Charts’ series, we work to tell some of the stories that are moving the industry. Feel free to take a look at the other articles by clicking here.

You can keep track of the markets daily through Agronometrics, a data visualization tool built to help the industry make sense of the huge amounts of data that professionals need to access to make informed decisions. If you found the information and the charts from this article useful, feel free to visit us at www.agronometrics.com where you can easily access these same graphs, or explore the other 20 fruits we currently track.