Asoex and ProChile are undertaking an intensive grape promotional campaign in major retail stores in South Korea, one of Chile’s biggest markets in Asia.
Charif Christian Carvajal, Asoex’s marketing manager for Asia and Europe, highlighted the importance of the South Korean market, which last season took more than 50,000 tonnes of Chilean grapes, Thompson Seedless being the main variety.
“South Korea is our second biggest market for grapes in Asia and it is therefore vital to strengthen our presence and reputation as a quality supplier, especially in the face of mounting competition, and our objective is to increase sales and product rotation through diverse point-of-sale actions in major retail chains,” he said.
Carvajal added that to date around 570 days of in-store promotions had been carried out, these being mainly focused on informing consumers about the characteristics and availability of Chilean grapes. Last week this involved stores belonging to the Lotte Mart chain in Seoul.
“In-store demonstrators have been carrying out tastings and giving out information,” Carvajal explained, adding that in total some 600 promotional days were planned, running through to May.
According to Asoex figures, Chile shipped 50,686 tonnes of table grapes to South Korea in 2014/15, the leading varieties being Thompson Seedless with 22,555 tonnes, Crimson Seedless with 13,738 tonnes and Red Globe with 10,970 tonnes. Chilen current accounts for 76 per cent of all table grapes imported into South Korea, followed by Peru with 13.5 per cent.
In this regard, Patricio Parraguez, director of the ProChile’s South Korean office said: “In addition to promoting our table grapes, the actions allowed us to enhance the sector image Fruit of Chile and Food From Chile, which allows us to combine actions and image within this market”.
