The first ever marketing campaign to promote Italian kiwifruit to consumers in South Korea has apparently started well, with the Asian country’s largest retailer E-mart backing the recently formed exporters’ consortium Kiwifruit of Italy to launch a new brand for the imported fruit called Kiway.
Crucially, the consortium has managed to secure a reliable route to market via local distributor NZ Orchard, based in the Gangnam district of southern Seoul. Part of the Associated International Group of Nurseries, the importer is led by former Zespri market manager Hee Jeung Kim and run by Jong Eun Park, who has 18 years’ experience of working for leading advertising firms Cheil Communications and LG Ad. The group was also responsible for introducing the first branded Chilean kiwifruit to the Asian country in 2009.
According to Kiwifruit of Italy consortium president Alessandro Fornari, whose own company Jingold has been at the forefront of breaking new ground for Italian kiwifruit in Asia, plenty of hard work and expertise has gone into gaining market access –the initial breakthrough came earlier this year– and then developing a strategy for commercial success. “To achieve this goal, we have basically worked on two fronts,” he explained. “Firstly, on guaranteeing excellent quality characteristics for exported product and, crucially, working with a Korean importer, thanks to whom we have been able to ripen the fruit at its destination and enhance its organoleptic qualities prior to it entering the market.”
He added: “The second important step has been to organise a marketing plan in collaboration with the same importer and supermarket chain E-mart, focused on the excellence of Made in Italy.”
At a special launch event in Seoul this week, E-mart chief executive Hur Inn-chul was joined by the Italian ambassador Sergio Mercuri and the director of ICE’s Seoul office Guglielmo Galli, who together cut the ribbon on the new marketing campaign.Promotional activities over the coming weeks will include a number of tasting sessions and in-store promotions in retail outlets, designed to give Korean consumers a chance to sample the Kiway-branded fruit.
Alessandro Pernigo of consortium member Frutta C2, based in Verona, said he was pleased with the progress made by Italy’s kiwifruit export industry in the Korean market. “The most positive and significant aspect of this operation is the fact that companies have worked together to common rules and as part of a single commercial organisation in order to achieve a sales strategy for a product branded by the producer, collaborating actively and directly with a retail distribution chain,” he commented. “This is a real novelty for our fresh produce sector.”
