Growing Truffles in AZ

[Lunchbox]

Aaron and Liz Eckburg from Go Lb. Salt just launched a really cool new project who's goal is to grow French Perigord Truffles in the Desert Southwest... Their goal is to raise $3.5 million to get started via Crowdfunding. An ambitious project to say the least. You can read more about it here...

http://www.indiegogo.com/aztruffle

Their goal is to start producing a harvest in 5-8 years. Just like the AZ wine industry is starting to product their own distinctive varieties, the truffiere hopes to produce truffles that can only be found in AZ.

I think it's really neat that AZ has such diverse growing regions that can support such a multitude of crops. You really can grow anything here in our state!

LBX

[alextkh]

Problem with this project that it's 10 times more expensive as it should be. Cost to plant and maintain truffle orchard per acre per 5 years is aprox. $13K. Another troubling thing is that they can't disclose who is the expert?! There are few orchards that sell inoculated trees in US, and they would love to have free advertisement. Looks cheesy

[golbsalt]

Far from cheesy. And, by your math, our project is 15 times more expensive (13,000 per acre x 10 acres x 2 increments of time = 2,600,000)

Dr. Charles Lefevre is just one of the experts we have approached as a resource. However, as is true of many industries, even more so in the truffle industry, things are HIGHLY competitive. Disclosing that you are working with one expert will usually close other doors. One of our goals is to utilize the input of as many as possible and for that reason we are not disclosing who we will be working with. As we mention, some even require the signing of a non-disclosure. We will not be doing that either.

As for the costs. Your information is partly correct. That $13k figure is per acre for start up. It does not include annual maintenance costs or processing facilities or storage facilities. It is also based on a smaller operation of 2-3 acres.

As proof of point, the Manjimup, Australia project planted more than 40 hectares (80 acres) of tuber melanosporum. They went to a great deal of expense (far in excess of $13k per acre) and are FINALLY (in their 11th year) producing sale-able quantities of truffles. Approximately 80 lbs. of truffles arrived here in the US on Monday evening (June 11th). At last word there were still about 5 lbs. of that initial 80 left for sale if anyone is interested in fresh perigord truffles. The project will not be a break-even for another 6-8 years. Current costs are in excess of $25M and they were able to take advantage of some cost savings due to economies of scale. They had to go looking for a second round of investors because they underestimated the amount of money it would take to keep the truffiere going.

We don't intend to make that mistake. If we don't have enough to start, we won't start and risk failure. At last count there were more than a dozen failed truffle orchards in the U.S. - all because they failed to completely count the cost.

The total calculated cost for our project is $4.2M inclusive to reach sustainable sale-able harvests and includes facilities that will by similar to a Napa or Sonoma-style vineyard/ winery.

As for the orchards in the US that sell inoculated trees, not all are equal. One is currently in litigation over a previous sale of trees. One will not sell trees unless you sign their non-disclosure. And only one currently offers tuber magnatum innoculated trees. Most orchards selling trees are doing so because their orchards have not yet successfully produced truffles and that is how they choose to offset operating costs.

[BarbaraToombs]

Good on ya, golbsalt! There are lots of people who know you know what you're doing and we're behind you all the way! Let's make Arizona truffles happen!!

[alextkh]

It's funny you mention Dr. Charles Lefevre. That's what he emailed me about your project back in April :
"I saw that project too, and I'm a bit mystified. I'm wondering whether they've received good advice regarding the climate. I have not yet found a place in Arizona with both a mild enough summer and a mild enough winter for black truffles, .............."
Price of $13K per acre is not a start up , it's for 5 years and was quoted by Garland Truffles. They didn't ask me to sign non disclosure, so I can share this info.
When you launched the project you forgot to mention the high risk of getting nothing, truffles require a lot of science and GOOD LUCK as well.
Why would you invest so much money into high risk project?

[golbsalt]

We would be more than happy to discuss any of your legitimate concerns in a forum that is more appropriate. My last email with Dr. Lefevre indicated an interest in knowing more about the regions we were looking at because he had postulated that some of the higher elevation areas in the state might actually support truffle growth if all other conditions were agreeable. Based on his comments as quoted below, I highly doubt Dr. Lefevre made the statement you suggest in your post.

His comments on point from his email to us on January 16th, 2012 were as follows:

"The basic climate criteria is a place that is neither too warm in the summer, nor too cold in the winter. I have no doubt that there are suitable places in the mountains of AZ and NM, but I have not found one yet. Unfortunately, we really don't know what is too warm. All we have to go by are the warmest places where truffle production is known to occur.

I will be glad to work with you through the site selection and orchard planning process. I can be involved at a couple of different levels. One element of the site selection that I strongly recommend is to have a consulting soil scientist visit the site prior to purchase to ground-truth the soil survey and to verify whether it meets the basic soil criteria for truffles."

(bold highlighting ours)

It was Dr. Lefevre, not Garland Truffles who (indirectly) provided the $13k per acre price. You can find the basis here: http://www.oregontruffles.org. This information is publicly available to anyone with the internet and some search acumen. In addition to the other expenditures required, the $13k per acre price assumes that you already have land in place. We have made clear that we do not. Again, I'm not sure where you are getting your information, but it's clearly inaccurate. As you mentioned the $13k per acre price is a QUOTE and that suggests a beginning benchmark. And, for the record, to our knowledge Garland doesn't ask for a non-disclosure.

We know that truffles have been grow with limited success in the Piedmont, North Carolina region. A region with a climate very similar to some areas of Arizona.

As for why you would invest so much money into a high risk project we again direct your attention to the Manjimup project and answer the question in the simplest way...FOR THE LOVE OF TRUFFLES! As for the risk, you are correct. But the more important truth of the matter is that all agriculture is speculative - highly speculative. If you don't want to invest in the project, you don't have to. The entire purpose of opening the project up to crowdfunding was to seek other like minded people. You clearly are not one of those like minded people.

We have tried to be as transparent and as accurate as possible and we find your suggestions to the contrary unsavory at best. This is clearly not the forum to air your negativity, and so we welcome any offline conversation you wish to have by contacting us at contact@dutchmanstruffiere.com.

We wish you well in whatever endeavors you are pursuing, and kindly request that you please stop filling this thread with misinformation.

[golbsalt]

on a related but unrelated note, i am a bit remiss for not welcoming you to the board earlier. welcome! your initial post on this board was to this thread...now that we know you are here, please feel free to introduce yourself alextkh.

Dom has provided an area for this so that we can all get to know each other better, become more aware of others interests, experiences, etc. that shape our views and beliefs. we'd love to learn more about you!