Raspberries are a delicious type of fruit that goes well with smoothies, yogurt, and other dishes.
Raspberries are also known for their health benefits.
However, a quick trip to the grocery store can make you aware that raspberries tend to be on the expensive side.
Considering that they’re small berries and similar to blackberries, you may wonder why they’re so expensive.
Why Are Raspberries So Expensive? (10 Reasons)
The average price of raspberries is around $6.
Certain factors like the complex process of growing and harvesting raspberries, the fact that they’re healthy, and import cost all impact the price.
Let’s look at these factors in more detail.
1. Healthy Fruit
There’s no question that raspberries are very healthy when it comes to fruit.
One of the reasons raspberries are healthy is that they contain potassium.
Potassium is essential for a healthy heart.
It even helps lower blood pressure which is ideal for those suffering from heart disease.
Raspberries also contain omega-3 fatty acids.
This particular molecule is usually something you find in fish.
If you don’t like fish or don’t eat meat, then you can get a healthy dose of omega-3 fatty acids through raspberries alone.
Omega-3 helps prevent both stroke and heart disease.
Essentially, it can help reduce your chances of suffering from a heart attack.
Another healthy aspect of raspberries is that they also contain manganese.
Manganese helps build strong bones.
It also keeps your skin clear and healthy.
For those suffering from diabetes, manganese is especially helpful.
It helps lower blood sugar.
It’s also high in fiber.
A cup of raspberries provides eight grams of fiber.
That tends to make it more fibrous than other types of fruit.
Fiber not only helps your digestion, but it makes you feel full faster and longer.
This can help prevent overeating which can lead to obesity and other health problems.
These health benefits make raspberries expensive because it means there’s high demand for them.
People want to stay healthy, so they eat more raspberries.
Healthy fruits and foods also tend to just be higher in price naturally.
Something healthy tends to just artificially receive a higher price.
2. Handpicked
Harvesting raspberries isn’t easy.
They have very soft bodies.
As such, it’s easy to crush them.
Since it’s easy to crush them, most farmers can’t use machinery to pick their berries for them.
They have to employ help.
Workers end up handpicking every berry on a farm.
They’re the only ones who have delicate enough hands to carefully remove raspberries from their bushes and store them.
This makes raspberries expensive because it increases the amount of time it takes to harvest the berries.
Workers are only able to pick so many berries at a time.
Because the bushes are low to the ground, they’re often bent over or on their hands and knees.
It’s slow progress, but since humans are the only ones who can pick the berries without crushing them, farmers have no choice but to hire them.
Since it takes such a long time, farmers end up having to pay their laborers longer.
That cuts into their revenue.
They’ll need to charge more for their raspberries to make growing and selling them profitable.
The length of time it takes to handpick berries also means that farmers aren’t earning money on them for a while.
They have to make up for that loss of time by charging higher prices.
Finally, there’s some marketing going on that also adds to the price of raspberries.
When raspberries have the label “hand-picked” on them, they make the raspberries seem like they’re more luxurious.
That perception makes the berries more expensive, too.
3. US Raspberries Exported To Canada
A lot of raspberries that come from the United States don’t end up selling to those in the United States.
Instead, the US exports its raspberries to Canada.
While some raspberries certainly remain in the United States to sell to its own citizens, a lot of farmers end up selling to Canada.
That’s because they can earn a bit more money selling to Canada.
They’re able to raise their prices since it’s an imported good.
This makes raspberries expensive in the United States because it means there are fewer cartons of raspberries to go around.
If farmers weren’t exporting raspberries to Canada, then they’d have ample supply to give to everyone in their own country.
Since the supply would be high, it might be able to meet demand.
As such, the price would be quite low.
By making raspberries a bit scarcer by selling to Canada, raspberries end up becoming more expensive.
4. US Raspberries Imported From Mexico
If it wasn’t bad enough that the US exports raspberries to Canada, they also import raspberries from Mexico.
In an effort to lower costs, some farmers end up selling their raspberries to Canada, then buying inexpensive raspberries from Mexico.
They’re then able to sell those raspberries to those in the United States at higher prices.
The farmer gets a pretty decent paycheck by selling high in both instances.
Mexican raspberries are cheaper because they don’t pay their workers as much.
The cost of living is lower in Mexico than it is in the United States.
Since they don’t pay their workers as much, they’re able to keep costs low.
That means they’re able to sell to farmers or fruit companies at low prices.
Those individuals are then able to put a higher price on the raspberries and sell them for a profit.
While Mexican raspberries tend to be on the cheaper side initially, there are import taxes placed on them that make them more expensive.
That added expense also causes farmers and companies to make raspberries more expensive.
They need to cover the cost of those import taxes.
Since the United States relies on Mexico to provide the bulk of its raspberries, that also means they’re subject to any problems that might occur in Mexican farming.
For example, if something happens in Mexico that impacts their farmers’ abilities to grow raspberries, then a shortage is going to occur.
Whether it’s drought, a freeze, the cartel, or some other problem, if a shortage of raspberries occurs, then the price is going to increase.
5. Seasonal
Raspberries are a seasonal type of fruit.
The plants only produce berries in July, but the harvest can last for a month or so.
Certain species of raspberries might also grow berries in other months, but they typically aren’t ripe until July.
This impacts the price of raspberries because they’re not always available throughout the year.
Farmers in the United States will be able to sell their raspberries come summer, but once fall and winter hit, they don’t have the right climate to grow them.
That’s why the United States also imports raspberries from Mexico.
Mexico has a greater chance of producing raspberries year-round since they have a warmer climate.
That said, the very nature of the bush means that the raspberries that do grow might not be ripe until summer.
You’ll find that raspberries are a lot more expensive in winter than they are in summer.
During the summer, the supply of raspberries is a bit higher.
Since more supply is available, the price is a bit lower.
They’re also fresh.
During the winter, you may be buying raspberries that are from Mexico or another country and come with higher price tags.
Import taxes are to blame for the higher price.
Some might also come from US-based farms.
The farmers may have frozen the raspberries to ensure they could sell them during the winter as well.
Either way, raspberries are expensive because they’re seasonal, and that impacts the supply chain during the winter.
6. High Labor Costs
Another big expense that farmers have to pay is labor costs.
Since berries need handpicking, farmers have to employ human workers.
Depending on where the farm is, those labor costs can be pretty high.
In the United States, for example, laborers usually receive minimum wage, at the very least.
To cut down on costs, some farmers will employ immigrants.
With higher restrictions on the borders, it means farmers have fewer immigrant workers.
They have to hire American citizens instead.
American citizens aren’t going to want to work for low wages.
They need a living wage, especially since the work is hard.
Since farmers don’t always offer health insurance benefits either, it’s up to the worker to pay for medical procedures caused by hard work on the farm.
As such, they expect high pay.
Farmers need workers.
They can’t harvest all their raspberries themselves.
If they don’t hire workers, then they’re losing money since their raspberries will become rotten before they’re harvested.
As such, the farmer has to spend a good amount of money on labor wages and passes that expense on to consumers.
7. Short Shelf Life
Another problem raspberries have is that they have a short shelf life.
They turn rotten fast.
Because of that, farmers have to harvest them fast and sell them fast.
That usually means they take on certain expenses to speed up the process.
If they get a carton full of rotten raspberries, then they can’t sell them.
That’s a wasted product which means they’ve lost out on money.
Some of the raspberries will inevitably rot before the farmer can get them out to grocery stores.
As such, the higher price of raspberries allows them to cover some of the losses they gain through rotting.
Farmers also have to invest in cold storage to further ensure their berries last longer.
In the grocery store, retailers also have to move fast to get their raspberries out on the floor.
They’ll also invest in certain storage methods to ensure they last longer.
Those added expenses make their raspberries more expensive.
When it comes to the consumer, they’ll also find that their raspberries rot fast if they don’t put them in the fridge.
As such, they end up having to buy more since their previous carton didn’t last.
Consumers end up spending more on raspberries to replace the ones that became rotten.
Raspberries are expensive because they have a short shelf life.
8. Population Pressure
Raspberries grow in warm, tropical areas.
While you can find them in colder climates as well, they do best in warm climates.
The problem with warm climates is that there’s where humans like to live, too.
The warm temperatures are pleasant for them.
This ends up creating a situation in which raspberries are under a lot of population pressure.
Farmers find themselves with limited land options because civilization wants to build homes and businesses on that land, too.
This ends up making land costs skyrocket.
There’s a lot of demand for good tropical land.
Farmers end up having to pay a lot of money for the land which then impacts their costs.
They have to pay back their loans fast.
Since they bought the land to grow raspberries, it’s the raspberries that are going to help them pay off those debts.
That means raspberries end up being expensive.
The lack of land also means that farmers aren’t able to grow as many raspberries as they might like.
That further creates a shortage.
Raspberries are expensive because they like to grow on land that humans also like to inhabit.
9. Cold Storage Costs
One of the biggest expenses that farmers face is cold storage.
Since raspberries have a short shelf life, they have to try and extend that shelf life by keeping them cold.
As such, farmers have to end up investing in large coolers to store their raspberries.
However, because raspberries are delicate, they also can’t pack too many into a single container.
Otherwise, the weight of the berries would start to crush those on the bottom.
That usually means farmers need quite a few coolers to ensure the weight isn’t too much for the berries.
Farmers aren’t the only ones facing cooler costs either.
Transport vehicles also need cool units to keep the raspberries cool.
Those types of trucks tend to be more expensive than standard semi-trucks.
They have electric bills or some sort of power source that they need to pay to keep their coolers running.
Then grocery stores have to put the raspberries in cool environments to extend their shelf life.
Each step of the supply chain has to take on more costs to keep the raspberries cool.
Since they’re taking on more costs, they have to offset those costs by raising the price of raspberries.
10. High Demand
A final reason raspberries are expensive is that they’re in high demand.
A large part of that has to do with the COVID-19 pandemic.
In an effort to stay healthy, a lot of people started eating more fruits.
The vitamins found in fruits can help stave off disease.
Since COVID is still around and there are always seasonal cases of flu to worry about, consumers have continued to buy raspberries and other fruit to stay healthy.
Raspberries are also quite popular as toppings for yogurts or even cakes.
They have many uses beyond just improving one’s health.
Certain cosmetics use them and their fragrance is popular among candlemakers, perfume makers, and others.
Since there’s a lot of demand for it across different industries, it makes the price more expensive.
Conclusion
Raspberries are a delicious fruit that are great on their own or when added to a dish.
However, because they’re not easy to harvest and have a lot of demand, raspberries have expensive prices.
