Demand for Alaska king crab remains weak, but prices are unlikely to get lower than they are now, says the seafood buyer for a Florida-based restaurant group who thinks prices remain too high to spark increased consumption.
“King crab prices are dropping. People are getting tired of paying too much money,” the buyer says. “Prices on the 9-12s, they dropped from USD 21 (EUR 15.30) last year to USD 16 (EUR 11.66), and now I’m hearing prices in the low-USD 15s (EUR 11). There is no retail involvement at all, Japan is having financial difficulties — they still bought a pretty good chunk, though — but there is a lot of product.”
Those factors, plus a crackdown on illegal Russian king crab catches, are keeping crab in the water longer, allowing them to grow to larger sizes, “so the price of crab drops,” he says. While prices are lower, they remain prohibitive for many markets, the buyer says. “It went past the price of the retailers, because even the smaller ones said it was too expensive. You don’t see it in retail hardly at all, you see snow crabs right now.”
He would rather steer restaurant customers to a top-quality fresh fish at the pries they will pay for king crab, though he remains committed to keeping kings on his menus. “If you want to spend your money on king crab, I’m more than happy to take it from you. Do you want to spend USD 50 (EUR 36) for a king crab plate? Or would you rather have a fresh Alaska halibut with some crab on top for USD 32 (EUR 23)?”
King crab legs and claws f.o.b. West Coat ranged from about USD 10 (EUR 7.28) for counts of 20 and up to more than USD 18.50 (EUR 13.48) for 6-9s. Golden king crab legs and claws were going for around USD 8.75 (EUR 6.37) for counts of 20 or more to more than USD 15 for 9-12s.
The price reduction is “strong enough where the pipeline is getting built up because purchases are not that strong,” the buyer says. “You have no retail, so you’ve got the pipeline built up for the first time in I don’t know how many years. I’d lay money on it. When I’m being offered a USD 1.10 (EUR 0.80) less a pound for large legs, they have got to have some sitting in a freezer somewhere. Otherwise they’d be holding product back trying to drive up prices again. I’m not even asking for them and I’m getting offers coming in.”
That said, the buyer says prices won’t go any lower. “I don’t think they’re going to come down, I think they are now at their lowest point for the year,” he says. “But I don’t see people sucking it all up now. I used to buy 80,000 pounds a year, now I’m down to 30,000 pounds.”
