Is This New Product Destined To Be
The Potato Chip Of The Produce Department?
We’ve explored the issue of cartoon marketing for kids here, here, here, here and here. The Washington Post picked up on it here and The Associated Press continued with the issue here. Labeling of this sort can help but, in the end, satisfaction with a product is going to be determined by convenience, flavor and […]
Whole Foods And
The Lobster Tale
The decision by Whole Foods to stop selling live lobsters but continue selling lobster meat in other forms has been greeted with some skepticism. David Merrefield at Supermarket News put it this way: The lesson to be learned from this is that in retailing, when it’s necessary to make a change, tout that change as […]
Between Christmas and New Year’s, we are presenting “Pundit Classics,” pieces that ran previously that deserve a second look. Today we are offering a random selection of interesting pieces from the past few months.
Traceability And “Food Miles”
Two big things in Britain that we can expect to hear more about in the United States: The trend for people to want to know where their food is from and who produced it. This goes far beyond country-of-origin labeling. It is a French and Italian trait, always foreign to British culture, but now catching […]
Box Fresh
The Times also devoted a two-page spread to the hottest trend in British retailing, as the headline states: “Box-fresh and delivered right to your doorstep”. The article is basically a review of five different services, all of which deliver mixed boxes of organically grown fruits and vegetables to the homes of purchasers, typically on a […]
Convenience Food Puts End To Buffet Cars
The Times reported that: “The buffet car, one of the few remaining civilized pleasures of traveling on Britain’s over-crowded railways, is to be axed on several routes between London and the West Country.” All the usual reasons were given — it takes up room, adds weight, etc. But many passengers were unhappy: “The buffet car […]
Packinghouse Visits And Dinner Conversations
When I’m back in the US, I’ll write up a lot more about the specific experiences I’ve had in South Africa, especially my visits with many retailers, wholesale markets, exporters and packers. But as I prepare to leave, I wanted to mention two US brands I had occasion to visit yesterday. Went to visit a […]
Dispatch VIII: Marketing Proprietary Varieties
As a world-class exporter, South Africa deals with many cutting-edge varieties. For an exporter, controlling varieties that supermarkets want is a prime way to get their business. But in an age of proprietary varieties, some issues going on in South Africa as well as elsewhere are raising real questions about how these proprietary varieties will […]
Dispatch V: Speeches, Meetings,
Observations And Opinions
ADVANCED PRODUCE EXPORT INDUSTRY A visit to the trade in South Africa is different than visiting Canada or even the UK. For one thing, it is very far from the US, and, for reasons of both geography and history, South Africa is not a natural trading partner to the US. So few Americans make the […]
Dispatch III — UK Weighs In On Obesity
The most annoying thing about traveling to South Africa via Europe is that it is common for the flights to leave the US in the late afternoon or early evening so that you travel at night and arrive in Europe in the early morning. In and of itself, this isn’t so bad. The problem is […]
