Before harvest, the opening price for Thompsons was $300 per ton, $35 more per ton than last season. Several wineries kicked that up to $310 as harvest started, and during the weekend of Aug. 10-11 one winery bumped it to $325, more than 22 percent over last year’s price.

It’s all about supply and demand. The Thompson crop is off at least 25 percent from last year, according to Nat DiBuduo, president of Allied Growers.

This is turning into another season of brisk bidding for Thompsons from wineries and raisin packers. No field price has been set for raisins, but already a $2,000 per ton price is being bantered around. That is $300 more than packers paid last year. Last season, as wineries increased the price for Thompsons during the crush, raisin packers sweetened their bid for raisins by $200 from the pre-harvest negotiated price of $1,500 per ton to maintain their supply of raisins.

The $65 per ton over the $265 2011 would give growers an additional $650 per acre in income and bump the income from a 10-ton Thompson crop to more than $3,200 per acre.

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