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Tammy Lewis has been searching for Purity jam for nearly a year — with no luck.
Every time she’s at the store, Lewis scours the Purity Factories products but she hasn’t seen the jam since last June.
“I had to go all over St. John’s. We went out to C.B.S. Couldn’t find anything,” said Lewis, who lives in Mount Pearl, N.L.
After months of jam-hunting, Lewis decided to investigate the Purity shortage for herself. Things were getting urgent — she had to deliver jam to her Purity-yearning mom in Nova Scotia.
She emailed Purity Factories and got the bad news. Jam production is jammed up.
“We have not been able to produce the two types of jams for the last season due to a poor berry yield,” a Purity Factories staff member said in an email to Lewis.
Tammy Lewis had been searching for Purity jams for nearly a year before learning the company had stopped producing her beloved spread. (CBC)
Purity Factories confirmed to CBC it stopped producing jams in 2025 — there weren’t enough berries to make either its blueberry or apple and partridgeberry jam.
But the company is anticipating a better Newfoundland berry season this year and hope to make jams again in the fall.
Customers may see jam on the shelves again in September or October, said Tyler Cogswell, who works with the order desk for Purity Factories.
The company declined a broadcast interview.
WATCH | Purity expects a better berry season this year:
Purity Factories pauses jam production
An iconic Newfoundland and Labrador food company has had to stop making its jam. Purity Factories says a poor berry season last year jammed up production. The CBC’s Laura Howells reports.Dry summer harder for berry growing
Last year’s dry summer made it tougher for berry growing, says Philip Thornley, owner of Campbellton Berry Farm in central Newfoundland. His farm does not currently supply berries for Purity.
Thornley said some of his fields yielded as little as 25 per cent of their typical crop while other fields did well. But “no field was spectacularly good.”
He had to put in an extensive irrigation network to deal with dry conditions.
“We were right down to the very last drops in our ponds, but we did manage to squeak through,” he said.
Purity says it expects a better berry season this year, with jams both on the shelves in September or October. (Michael Mcarthur/CBC)
Parts of the province experienced drought conditions and historically low water levels last summer, with scientists blaming climate change.
“It made it harder” to grow his fruits, said Thornley.
While his own partridgeberries and blueberries weren’t bad, Thornley said farmers can see variations from field to field.
As for the coming season, Thornley doesn’t know what to expect.
“I just expect extremes of one form or another,” he said. “Plants don’t like extremes.”
Homemade ‘may not fill that same void’
With Purity jams expected back this fall, Lewis says she’ll be monitoring the shelves.
Her family moved away when she was a child, and Purity jams and syrups were always a nostalgic, reliable-tasting treat from home.
“It’s really good on meatballs,” said Lewis. “We love it on meatballs and we love it on toast.”
When Lewis visited her mom in Nova Scotia, she planned to bring homemade partridgeberry jam from a local jam-maker. But it “may not fill that same void in my mom’s heart,” said Lewis, noting her mother usually has about six Purity jams on hand.
“It’s kind of weird to say,” she said, but “sometimes you just don’t want the homemade taste.”
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