There is an interesting graph in the NY Times that shows how the US leads all other nations in pre-packaged foods. This graph shows me three things. First there is a tremendous opportunity for US based food producers to become global and export the convenience of pre-packaged foods to the rest of the world. As the economic picture for citizens of many foreign countries continues to improve, just like the demand for cars is rising, so can the demand for pre-packaged food. The second observation is that we should plan on seeing more foreign food producers entering the US market due to its size. And the third observation is I think we will see continuing pressure from many areas, including the government, to improve the nutritional value of pre-packaged foods as the article also points out how many of these foods are loaded with salt, fat and sugar. Read more here
Posts Tagged ‘national brands’
America Leads in Pre-packaged Foods
Monday, April 5th, 2010Brand Name Foods Make A Resurgence
Monday, March 8th, 2010February brought some good news for brand name food manufacturers. According to the article Branded Foods Tick Up from last Friday’s Wall Street Journal, branded-food unit sales increased 2.4% in February. This is a nice swing from the 0.2% decline in January. This isn’t necessarily bad for private label brands either, as mentioned in an excerpt from the article:
For grocers, giving back market share to pricier branded items is not a bad thing. Over the past year, supermarkets lowered private-label prices to widen price gaps with branded goods. Grocers sought to gain leverage when negotiating prices with big-name suppliers. Now, retailers are slowing those aggressive price cuts, according to a Morgan Stanley price survey.
Will the trend continue? Driven by increased promotional activity and narrowed price gaps, can brand name foods take back some of the market share lost amidst a volatile economy?
The Future of Regional Brands
Friday, December 18th, 2009Regional brands are facing shrinking shelf space and a choice. They can either give up the fight and simply take as much cash out as possible and the ride the brand down and out of business like many other 60 year-old family-run businesses. Or they can stop competing with national brands and private label by making them irrelevant.
You’ve been thinking about your business in the wrong way. If you’ve been thinking about how big you are as a regional brand. Its time to start thinking about how small you are. You aren’t a regional brand, you’re local brand and local is HOT! Consumers want to know where and who their food comes from. In the age of informed shoppers, national and private label brands are perceived as big corporations run by financial interests, not by passion for quality and time-honored traditions.
This is the perfect time to champion your small staff, your unique processes, your age-old recipes, your superior quality. Bring these to life on your packaging, in cool viral campaigns, in the Sunday FSI’s you run. Make it important. Make it cool. Make it hot. Make it different from what you’ve been doing.
Don’t forget your other advantages – because you’re smaller you make decisions much quicker than the big brands. You’re closer to your customers than the brands run by people crunching numbers day in, day out. And get off the low price bandwagon! Look like a brand that doesn’t need to always be on sale. If you’re always on sale you’re the same as every other sale brand. Which choice will you make? To fight or die?
Package Design Levels the Playing Field
Friday, December 11th, 2009In the past, leading national brands could simply outspend smaller brands on paid media advertising to buy brand preference and market share. Thanks to the proliferation of consumer media options, there are fewer places to reach big audiences- and now these audiences don’t trust advertising anyway. Leading brands have woken up to the fact that the most cost effective way to boost sales is to focus on where sales actually happen, in the store, through their widest reaching marketing tool, the packaging.
You can see this by the frequency in which leading brands are updating their packaging, now almost annually. The beauty of this shift is that the playing field is leveled for smaller brands to compete. Where a leading national brand could outspend you in advertising dollars in the past, that doesn’t matter so much anymore. They can’t outspend you in package design dollars. Yes, in actual dollars they can spend more by hiring an expensive national design firm, but that world has changed too. An agency’s big reputation or a big-city address doesn’t mean they can out-design the shop in Topeka who’s cost are inline with what you can afford.
Now’s the time to get off the bench and on the playing field while you still have an advantage, the first place you should look to grow sales is your package.