You won’t find other pecan products on grocery store shelves like you do with almonds and peanuts. Experts say the lack of supply is a big reason for that.
Executive director of Georgia Pecan Growers, Janis Dees, talked at the California Pecan Growers Association’s annual conference about pecan products or more specifically, the lack thereof. If you think about products for other nuts like peanuts or almonds, you may think of peanut butter or almond milk. The pecan industry hasn’t seen much success moving into those types of products. Dees said, there’s a reason for that. “What we found is when you start a promotion on a new product and it’s going to go international or domestic, you got to have the supply available,” Dees said. “There’s a lot of research, packaging development, labeling and things like that that are not able to be done until you know you have a steady supply. Currently our demand is far outreaching our production, so we have to plant more.”
Dees said the new pecan federal marketing order should help. “Absolutely. I think you are going to find that people are going to get more interested in pecans and they will start growing more because the demand is going to demand it,” Dees said.