Mother Nature Attacks Again!

Most people don’t realize the effect that the weather has in the restaurant world. I am not referring to the dramatic loss of business during every snow storm, but more the cost of doing business. With the excessive rain, snow and earthquakes, restaurants are going to be facing a dramatic increase in food cost. Take the biggest and most tragic event, the massive earthquake in Chile. Most people don’t realize that Chili was the primary source of plums, peaches, nectarines, and grapes during the winter months. Chile is also the chief supplier of Salmon all year long. In 2009, we imported $1.5 billion worth of fruits and fruit based products, including frozen juice, followed by fish and shellfish at $737 million, and wine and related products at $275 million.

What does this mean…

In a global economy, a disaster in one area means far-reaching effects for everyone, Food shortages, poor quality, and price hikes. But what happens if more than one area has a disaster?  For instance, the cold and rain in Florida right now is expected to cause a temporary price increase and shortage of tomatoes. Growers lost about 70 percent of their crop in January where temperatures hit record lows, according to the Florida Tomato Grower’s Exchange. Florida normally ships 25 million pounds of tomatoes a week, but currently they are shipping less that a quarter of that. Prices of produce around the world are going to be hitting record highs. For how long… no one knows.

The only thing we can say is Thank You Mother Nature for making what was an already difficult economy even worse.