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FUTURE TRENDS IN TOMATO PACKAGING: CREATING NEW MARKETS FOR A HEALTHY AND SUSTAINABLE FUTURE.
Like it or not, fresh produce in Australia is sold into a developed market. Our consumers know what they want, and how
they want it. Consumption of produce in Australia is relatively high, but growth in any one sector comes from the
decline in sales of competing produce lines. In Australia, we are often told that the future growth of truss tomatoes will
come from a decline in field tomato consumption. But is marketing into this developed market, a sustainable model for
the future?
R ecently, I received an inspirational “shot in the arm”
when I attended the Produce Marketing Association
2012 Fresh Summit. Swamped with a plethora of new
and innovative products, I was blown away by the ex-
ceptional creativity of the North American tomato producers. Driv-
en by a critical oversupply earlier in the year, American producers
knew that now was the time to stop resting on their laurels and to
create new markets.
As it stood, driving increased demand in their existing markets was
becoming ineffective. "It's hard to sell more produce, to people
who are already buying your produce. We really had to look at who
was buying our produce and why they were buying it... The con-
sumption patterns of Americans is changing rapidly and we need to
change with it" said an Ontario Greenhouse Vegetable Grower. It
was clear that this years’ oversupply had resulted in a much need-
ed wake-up call for the industry, resulting in a quantum shift in the
goals of the North American producers. No longer were producers
focused only on producing the largest quantity of produce for the
lowest possible price. Now, producers were focused on increasing
consumption into markets that yielded a higher return. In order to
meet this goal producers realised they needed to create new mar-
kets.
Defining A New Market?
After assessing the existing market conditions, producers under-
stood that their major source of competition was not coming from
competing produce lines such as field tomatoes. Instead, growth of
the product was constrained by the existing market of processed
alternatives. For the consumer, cooking pasta or preparing salsa
with fresh tomatoes seemed impractical and unaffordable. For
mothers, choosing between "quick and easy" and "the right thing
to do" often resulted in kids going to school with highly processed
confectionery snacks. After a little market research a list of key
objectives began to appear for many producers. In order to create
new markets it was clear that the consumer’s perception of cook-
ing and snacking on fresh produce needed to change from:
Impractical to practical
Unaffordable to affordable
And from, inconvenient to convenient.
For marketers, this was always going to be a difficult task. "It's easy
to create awareness about new products with consumers, but it's
much harder to change behaviour" said Bryan Silbermann
PMA President & CEO. The research clearly shows that consumers
know they should and want to eating more fresh produce. To meet
these objectives marketers need to determine who their consum-
ers are and develop strategies that give these potential consumers
a new reason to purchase their product.
From the existing market research the two biggest untapped
growth areas in the market is the “health conscious parents" and
the "home chef" looking for that healthy alternative to the junk
food that their kids so desperately crave.
Loose truss tomatoes ready to hit the market.
By Benjamin Smider
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Marketing To A New Generation of Health Conscious Parents
Winning over the health conscious parents was always going to be
a big task. Children these days are very picky about what they
want.. They are inherently brand loyal and are easily influenced by
superficial features. The established junk food and confectionery
lines know this and target the childhood snack market very effec-
tively. As a result kids currently perceive fresh produce to be un-
cool and old-fashioned. In order to counteract these perceptions
North American marketers chose three very effective strategies.
By reducing the portion size of pre-packed cherry tomatoes and
incorporating attractive yet superficial marketing material, market-
ers were able to get cherry tomatoes "a seat at the cool kids table".
Larger packages containing small pre-packed portions made pack-
ing children's lunchboxes more practical and convenient for the
health conscious parent. Despite the increased quantity of cherry
tomatoes purchased, consumers felt that they were getting more
value for their money as a higher quantity of smaller individual
portions seemed to go further. One company that clearly adopted
these strategies were Mucci Farms. Releasing their new Veggies-To
-Go line at this year’s Fresh Summit the Macci’s team realised that
the childhood snack market offers exciting potential over the com-
ing years. “We have presented the Veggies-To-Go on line to chil-
dren in our local elementary and grade schools, so far the “red
candy” (cherry tomatoes) has been quite well received ” “Most
[school aged consumers] like the kid friendly aspects, like the easy
to open packaging, the inclusion of temporary tattoos and colour-
ful graphics” Joe Spano, Vice President of Sales and Marketing for
Mucci farms.
Now that marketers have created a new strategy that not only
targets a new demographic of consumers, it also increases con-
sumption in a previously untapped demographic.. It is now up to
retailers to implement action plans that will help this new product
line to grow. Such strategies could include promoting the new line
by incorporating the snack packs into the impulse buy section of
supermarket chains or getting large fast food giants to incorporate
these small pre-packaged portions of produce into their children's
menus.
Veggies-to-go by Macci Farms, new snacking line debuting at this years Fresh Summit.
Strategy 1. Choose small, colourful and sweet
produce lines, such as cherry tomatoes.
Strategy 2. Decrease the individual portion size of
pre-packaged produce.
Strategy 3. Incorporate into the packaging,
colourful mainstream cartoon characters that kids
can easily identify.
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Marketing to the “everyday home chef”
In targeting the “home chef" North American marketers creatively
attempted to redesign the perceptions of their product through
innovative new packaging strategies. The ready to cook market in
America, much like Australia, is growing at a rapid rate. Despite
making the use of fresh produce seem more convenient the ready
to cook market also gives the consumer an idea of the products
alternative uses. With this understanding, North American market-
ers incorporated these elements into their new packaging strate-
gies.
When not presented with the full suite of competing products con-
sumers decisions are biased. A great example of this would be the
taco section of your local supermarket. When buying the ingredi-
ents for tacos consumers often overlook fresh tomatoes as an in-
gredient instead choosing the pre-made salsa sauce on display next
to the taco shells. For this reason it is important to get fresh toma-
toes out of the produce section and into the aisles where they can
be seen as an alternative to the processed goods. Unfortunately,
current display methods of truss tomatoes make it hard for mar-
keters to display their product outside of produce section. For this
reason, North American marketers are experimenting with new
packaging techniques that can be conveniently and temporarily
hung next to competing products in the supermarket aisles. New
packaging materials that are being considered include netting and
stronger flow wrapped cartons that can be hung next to shelves.
Having the fresh product available as a choice next to the pro-
cessed alternative is only the first step. it must be blatantly clear to
consumers that the fresh product on display is a more convenient,
cost-effective and healthier alternative to its processed counter-
part. Cleverly, North American marketers created this image by
including recipes and ready to cook sachets of instant seasoning.
Debuting at this year’s Fresh Summit was Euro Fresh’s new Cam-
pari Sonoran Salsa Kits. Pairing a 400 gram serving of cocktail to-
matoes with a custom salsa packet, this new product conveniently
creates a serve of preservative and additive free salsa. According to
Euro Fresh “Salsa has surpassed ketchup in the condiment category
and our new kit gives customers a way to make great tasting, fresh
salsa that you can’t get out of the jar”. Netted trusses, great for hanging in supermarket aisle by Millennium Pacific located in British
Columbia, Canada.
Strategy 1. Redesign prepacks so that the
product becomes more versatile and can be
displayed outside of the produce section and is
next to competing products.
Strategy 2. Determine the processed
alternatives in the ready to cook market and
create competing product lines.
New ready to cook pre-packs debuting at this years Fresh Summit; Top: Bruschetta mix by
Mastronardi produce located in Ontario, Canada. Middle: Campari Sonoran Salsa Kit by
Eurofresh located in Arizona, USA Bottom: Fried Green Tomato Kit, Nature Fresh located in
Ontario, Canada
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Creating New Markets In Australia
Maintaining growth in the developed market is always going
to be hard. Too often in Australia we see a focus on new
products targeting the same developed market. The sheer
variety of cherry tomatoes, cherry truss, truss, coloured and
no mess tomatoes on offer in mainstream Australian super-
markets is phenomenal. Each product maintains that it is
more tasty and /or more healthy than the competition.
While it is great to see a focus on taste and functionality, it is
disappointing to see such a large variety of different prod-
ucts, competing to capture the same consumer. As the Aus-
tralian greenhouse sector develops, it will become harder to
market more product to this same consumer. If we can learn
anything from the recent oversupply into the North Ameri-
can market, now is the time to start thinking about new
markets. Targeting new consumers now may seem difficult,
but the children of the health conscious parent market are
going to be your market of the future. Educating this new
generation of consumers, by feeding them tasty, high-
quality vegetables from a young age, it is much more likely
to increase fresh produce consumption into the future.
Moving forward Australian marketers need to creatively use
the qualitative attributes of their products to capture new
markets, leveraging the brand equity of a product that is at
risk of becoming a commodity. By creating new markets,
Australian producers are helping to drive this sector towards
a healthier and sustainable future.
References
OnResearch (2012). Primary Shoppers/Moms with Kids 10 & under,
On behalf of Produce for Better Health Foundation.
About the author
Benjamin Smider is a University of Sydney student who attended
PMA Fresh Summit 2012, as a PMA Pack Family Scholar. He has just
recently completed his masters thesis in the field of intensive green-
house horticulture.
For more details: [email protected]
Overwhelming choice on display in Australian supermarkets.