This week, the cherry harvest began at Royal Ridge Fruits in Washington. Incentive and piece-rate payment systems are in place for all crops in the United States.
Incredible - the PET-Tiger electronic token on the phone, or visual token on the eye, or printed token - the latest innovation for your workforce management needs! The PET electronic token system provides employees working on piece-rate with a tangible and real-time record of their piece count, revolutionizing traditional methods like physical tokens or punch cards.
From humble beginnings in 1962, with a few acres of prairie in central Washington, the Dorsing family has grown to become one of the largest cherry growers in the western United States. Today, Dorsing Farms continues to thrive in Washington's fertile Columbia Basin. Under third-generation family management, the farm has expanded to over 2,500 acres of conventional and certified organic sweet cherries, blueberries, raspberries, tree fruits, and other crops.
Agricultural labor contractors, growers, and traders share real-time data, enabling operations to maximize labor efficiency. PET-Tiger allows personalized payment calculations for individual workers and teams with multiple payment systems, improving employee management and incentives.
Field and office managers receive special real-time mapping notifications on production by variety and packaging style, as well as efficiency reports for harvesting and packing. The versatility of PET-Tiger allows customization and localization for any crop, geographical area, payroll system, wage order, legal compliance, operational policies, piece-rate, and bonus calculations.
Exports are mainly concentrated from November to March, with a volume for the 2023/24 season estimated at 4,000 tonnes. For the 2024/25 season, exports of fresh cherries are expected to increase to 5,000 tonnes, the second highest ever recorded.
The “cherry glow” promotion highlighted the benefits of cherries for health and beauty to boost consumption and movement of Northwest cherries. The promotion was launched across the United States, reaching retailers, media, influencers, and social media users.
U.S. tart cherry production is forecast at 91 million pounds in 2026, down 36% year on year. Spring freezes hit Michigan and Utah, cutting the crop and increasing pressure on inventories, processors, product availability and grower prices across the domestic market now.
A study on sweet cherry dormancy combines plant physiology, metabolomics and NDVI/FAPAR vegetation indices from Sentinel and Landsat imagery, highlighting scalable tools to monitor canopy senescence, physiological activity and orchard phenology across the seasonal cycle.