People willing to pay the price for pumpkins
Glen Vienneau
Northern News Services
Yellowknife (Oct 30/00) - Northerners are paying a high price to keep Jack-o-lantern tradition alive.
In the NWT capital, any ghostly goblin can pick up an average-size pumpkin for slightly more than $2.
It's not so further North, says Kip Rouse, manager of the Aklavik General Store.
"The only way to get them up here without getting them damaged, you got to fly them up," said Rouse.
"If I sold a pumpkin, it would be like $30 for a half-decent size pumpkin."
Mischievous spirits were truly in play when it came time to ship pumpkins to Holman.
"We tried to order-in small pumpkins, five to 10 pounds, but I guess they interpreted that as kilograms. We ended up getting huge pumpkins," said Northern Store manager Mark Woolridge.
Woolridge turned this trick into a treat for the community, donating eight pumpkins to the Helen Kalvak Elihakvik school, something he did before figuring out the retail cost.
Last year, he charged $30 to $35 a pumpkin.
"So, they will be a little pricey, but I'm going to try and give people a deal on them, just to move them," he said.
In Tuktoyaktuk, the Northern Store also received a shipment of large pumpkins.
"We normally try for the small, but this year they sent us the bigger size ones. So, the prices are quite expensive," said manager David MacLean.
He expects to sell them for about $30 each.
The evils of high-priced pumpkins have even spread to Sahtu and South Slave communities.
Store managers Jim Craig, Fort Good Hope Northern Store, and Phil McGarvey, Lutsel K'e Co-op store, are both dealing with high shipping costs.
While McGarvey estimates it cost him 50 cents a pound for shipping, Craig figures shipping cost more than one-third of the pumpkin price. But, the purest thoughts come from Chris Mitchell manager of Ikahuk Co-op in Sachs Harbour, who says there's nothing wrong with shippers making a dollar.
"I haven't worked free in all my life. So, I'm sure that nobody else has."
