Lettuce tell you the news: Best of British Back in Baskets

Tesco is first to offer fresh British lettuce this season to customers.

We're coming into British lettuce season which means we're able to move away from selling the more expensive Spanish lettuce. The seasonality of lettuce means that to supply lettuce all year round we need to import from Spain during the British winter. 

Rains in Spain

This winter, the rains in Spain were quite a pain, as they caused floods that destroyed many of the crops. It was the worst weather to hit production in over 30 years. This unprecedented weather led to price rises and shortages with some products such as courgettes, peppers and leafy salads. In some cases over 40% of the crop was lost.

The price of lettuce also rose as supplies affected by the floods became short. Tesco managed to absorb the price increase in December while still supporting our suppliers. We were one of the last retailers to increase the price in mid-January and never sold an iceberg for more than 79p. Despite the weather conditions impacting on our supply in December, we continued to be one of the cheapest in the market for lettuce.

British suppliers

Now that our British suppliers are ready to send us their lettuces we will be able to reduce the price for customers as we lessen our reliance on the Spanish supply. The reduced costs in transporting fewer lettuce from Spain and the extra costs associated with this winter's supply shortage, means we can reduce the price of lettuce overall.

We always strive to provide customers with high quality products at affordable prices. Our goal is also to support our suppliers in times of hardship which we were able to do through this weather affected harvest. We continue to work closely with our suppliers to ensure that we have consistently high quality produce and availability for our customers.

We're pleased to be first to offer the best British lettuce at the reduced price of 50p to customers.

Working with and supporting our partners

Our supplier, G's Fresh has been supplying Tesco with lettuce for nearly 30 years from both the UK and Spain. We wanted to support their business during this tough winter and they have worked with us to bring customers our first British Iceberg this year.