reLAKSation 110.
National Seafood Weak 2: Regular readers may remember that last year we discussed National Seafood Week, a countrywide event to promote fish and seafood to UK consumers. Despite claims to the contrary, we, at Callander McDowell, were not convinced that it had been a great success.
The beginning of October brought a repeat of this event and yet again, we wonder how such promotions can help to increase consumer awareness and consumption? Is it sufficient just to tell consumers that it is National Seafood Week and then expect them to rush out and buy more fish and seafood or do they need more incentive?
We, at Callander McDowell certainly believe that if consumers are to be persuaded to eat more fish and seafood, then more must be done than just say it is National Seafood Week.
For a start, most British consumers would be hard pressed to know that it was National Seafood Week. The level of promotion was certainly low key. According to the National Seafood Week website, most supermarkets had signed up to the promotion, yet, this was not really reflected in store. Asda attached a string of six Seafood week pennants to the fresh fish counter. The Coop had nothing. Morrisons offered a competition leaflet.
M&S displayed a small National Seafood Week label on their chilled fish cabinet and offered a tasting on one day of the promotion in a few selected stores. Safeway carried a two-page feature in their magazine, but displayed nothing in store. Tesco had nothing. Sainsburys did not display any National Seafood Week promotional material, but did discount all their fresh fish lines by 20%. However, their only mention as to why they were offering such a wide range of discounts was that it was 'in celebration of National Seafood Week'. They also advertised the discounts on national radio, but made no mention of its relation to the Seafood Week promotion.
The fundamental question is whether it is sufficient to just announce that it is National Seafood Week and then expect that consumers to rush and buy fish, especially those consumers who never usually buy fish and seafood at all. Clearly, such consumers need much more incentive than that. Even consumers, who do regularly buy fish, will need some incentive to be persuaded to buy more. Of all the British supermarkets, only Sainsburys provided any incentive at all with their offer of twenty percent discount. Yet, even this offer may not be enough to persuade some consumers to buy more fish since those consumers who never buy fish are unlikely to be convinced by money off to begin buying it.
Marks & Spencers adopted a different approach. They had held a tasting in some of their larger stores. They offered customers the opportunity to try some of the ready to eat seafood products. This, at least, gave customers who never buy seafood the opportunity to see if they liked it. However, these tastings did not extend to fresh fish. This means that those consumers, who never buy fresh fish such as the young, are unlikely to be convinced to do so.
Promoting fish consumption through a National Seafood Week campaign may sound a good idea on paper. However, the reality is that unless fish is put into the type of products that non-consumers prefer, it is unlikely that they will ever be persuaded to include fish and seafood in their diets. This is why some groups of seafood producers are hoping that restaurant chains like McDonalds and Burger King will include fish dishes in their menus. It will never be enough just to tell the public that they should be eating more fish. Such statements simply fall on deaf ears!
To promote or not to promote …. that is the question? The latest issue of the IntraFish newspaper includes a company profile of the Belgian Delhaize Group, a global supermarket giant with over 2500 stores of which 716 are in Belgium.
In 2002, the Belgian stores sold fresh fish worth Euro 32 million with cod and salmon topping the list of the most popular purchases.
Unlike many supermarkets, Delhaize decided about two years ago to stop any fish and seafood promotions, preferring instead to follow the market price, providing the best possible value for their customers. Guy Denon, the category buyer for Delhaize Belgium said that they had found that if they put, for example cod, on promotion, then sales would quadruple that week. Mr Denon believed that consumers were simply putting the fish in the freezer for future use. Now, without any promotions, consumers are buying just what they want for immediate use and although they are buying less, Delhaize have not found any drop in sales.
However, we, at Callander McDowell, are not convinced by this strategy. We appreciate that Delhaize are a successful company and clearly know what they are doing. Yet, promotions are not necessarily just about increasing sales; they can also encourage consumption by those who currently eat little fish. They also can encourage consumers to try different species, which is important at a time when many commercial fisheries are under threat of over-fishing. For example, the EU is now considering closing most of the European cod fishery, yet cod is one of Delhaize’s most popular fish. Will Delhaize be able to maintain their sales if cod disappears from European waters or will they need to persuade their customers to try something else instead? If their customers are uninterested in any other species than cod, will they simply stop eating fish and buy a totally different protein instead?
In the UK, supermarket promotions have certainly caused a dramatic change in fish consumption. Cod was always the most popular fish for UK consumers, but as supplies have diminished, cod has been replaced by salmon as the UK’s most popular retail fish. Yet, this change to salmon did not happen without promotions. Consumers always believed salmon to be an expensive purchase and never considered buying it. However, as supermarkets began to promote it, consumers started to recognise that it had actually become a value for money choice and sales dramatically increased.
Some consumers might take advantage of promotions to stock up their freezer, but so what, at least they are buying fish. However, many more consumers may use the promotion to try different species or to eat fish more than usual. This is why any such promotion must be welcomed.
Success - but is it ours! The latest issue of the Salmon Farm Monitor, the website for the Salmon Farm Protest Group has thanked their supporters claiming that their Supermarket Watch Campaign has been an outstanding success. Over the six months of the campaign, they claim to have identified more than 100 incidents of mislabelled farmed salmon. They also claim that by reporting these incidents to Trading Standards, they have forced supermarkets to comply with the legislation.
However, we at Callander McDowell would beg to differ. All British supermarkets have readily complied with the legislation ever since it was enacted. Admittedly, there have been some minor transgressions, but such teething problems are inevitable as supermarkets carry such a large range of products. However, most of the incidents identified by the Salmon Farm Protest Group focused on just one or two examples. One of the these was John West smoked salmon and in their case, the processors responsible for this product had been given a short term dispensation by Trading Standards so they could use up their existing packaging first.
The implementation of the new labelling legislation has been successful. Supermarkets have not needed the Salmon Farm Protest Group to remind them of their obligation, as they have universally accepted their responsibility. The supermarkets have acted beyond reproach. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said of the Salmon Farm Protest Group, which has hi-jacked this legislation to promote their own cause. They have wrongly accused supermarkets of deliberately misleading consumers, when it is they that have actually done so.
The Salmon Farm Protest Group is not the only ones who are concerned about the new labelling legislation. MEP Christine Stihler, supported by Scottish Quality Salmon, has complained to Brussels about the fact that retailers can label fish as coming from more than one origin. Fish Farming Today have highlighted that Tesco label their fresh salmon as being ‘Farmed in Scotland or Norway’. Mrs Stihler says that such labelling misleads consumers who would like to buy Scottish salmon into buying salmon from Norway. However, the labelling is clear since it states that the fish could be Scottish or it could be Norwegian. Any consumer wanting a guarantee that the fish is Scottish can buy their salmon from one of several other retailers all of who are happy to label their fish from one single origin. Clearly, Tesco customers are not so bothered.
However, whilst the Scottish salmon industry accuses Tesco of taking the easy way out on labelling, several other retailers also label fish products in this way, although not on fresh salmon. Marks & Spencer, Sainsburys and Iceland are just three who use multi-origin labelling on some of their products and yet no one appears to be concerned enough to complain in their case. The Scottish salmon industry is using Tesco as yet another excuse as to why consumers appear unselective when choosing the salmon they buy. This is because country of origin is not really a factor in their buying decision. This is why the industry needs to focus on those factors which are important to the consumer, instead of on those which are not.
However, the most immediate challenge to both the industry and the market is not making sure that the fish is properly labelled but rather how to persuade consumers to actually bother reading them!