In the space of 10 short years asparagus has gone from being a niche and little understood vegetable line to being one of the darlings of the fresh produce category. As recognition of the limited British asparagus season has grown, so household penetration and sales have increased substantially.
The past year has seen a further continuation of that trend, with the category growing 11.2 per cent to £52 million, and volumes increasing at 14.2 per cent [Kantar Worldpanel, 52 w/e
3 October] - no mean feat for a supposedly premium line in times of economic instability.
“The sales increase has been achieved thanks to a collaborative effort by the leading players,” says Graham Young, chairman of the 2011 PR campaign for UK asparagus. “We’ve been very successful in the last seven years, increasing penetration of UK asparagus from four per cent to
16 per cent.”
Industry spokesman Adrian Barlow agrees that drawing in new customers has been key to the growth. “People who previously didn’t know how to cook asparagus and would have regarded it as a very strange product eaten only by the upper classes [are now buying it],” he says. “The industry-funded campaign has been very successful in attracting a considerable amount of publicity and achieving the widespread publicity of recipes by celebrity chefs and others using asparagus in a wide range of dishes. The campaign has made the public much more aware of the outstanding culinary properties of asparagus - it’s seen as a very special food, but it’s affordable.”
And there will be no sense of sitting on the recent sales success and simply maintaining the current level, adds Young, who insists next year’s campaign will “put pedal to metal” to increase sales further. In fact, the campaign is targeting an ambitious 25 per cent increase in penetration in the next three years to get 20 per cent of UK households buying home-grown asparagus at least once a year.
That may not be as straightforward as it sounds. At least part of the sales increase might be attributable to rising prices, with the average retail price dropping 2.7 per cent to £7.63/kg in the last year.
And that has led to concerns that returns will not be enough to convince growers it is worth the sizeable commitment in planting more crops to meet the rising demand. “Asparagus is like champagne, but it’s not like caviar,” says Barlow. “It’s a luxury food which is affordable, but there’s a great danger the price could be reduced to a level which could adversely affect growers. Putting in asparagus beds is an eight- to 10-year investment and people won’t invest unless it is justified by future returns. Asparagus is yet another example of where improved returns to growers are absolutely essential to ensure growth in production in future.”
It might be an “affordable luxury”, but the massive overtrade by Marks & Spencer, Waitrose and Sainsbury’s suggests there is still some work to be done to make asparagus appeal to a wider demographic than has traditionally been the case. As if to emphasise the point, Morrisons, The Co-operative and Asda in particular significantly undertrade on the line.
And pricing will continue to be an issue both at retail and the farmgate. Certainly, Young predicts a re-balancing in pricing could be on the cards, with farmgate prices rising as demand might outstrip supply. The most forward-thinking growers will plant more, he claims, but there are others who have been put off by the low returns received over a number of years.
If they don’t get them, people will continue to eat asparagus but it will be imported produce, according to Barlow. The short British season currently accounts for more than half of all the asparagus eaten in this country throughout the year.
That said, imported asparagus, particularly from Peru, plays a vital role in ensuring the product is available on UK shelves for the full 12 months of the year, and leading producers like Camposol and Danper continue to supply quality product when British is unavailable.
British growers are working on extending the season, but they will be mindful to keep quality at the top of the agenda.
So the challenge for asparagus now is to propel itself firmly into the mainstream while still retaining its “luxury” status and allowing growers to build production and ensure demand can continue to be met.
BUILDING THE ASPARAGUS BRAND
The 2011 British asparagus campaign will be taking a longer-term view to try to enthuse younger consumers in ‘brand asparagus’, as Michael Barker finds out.
The British asparagus campaign, managed over the last decade by Pam Lloyd PR, has been highly successful in helping the product become recognisable in more homes than ever before.
For 2011 though, there will be a shift in focus as the agency and industry committee take a new tack towards increasing sales and penetration across the board. So far, much of the attention has been focused on the key demographic of older consumers, but next year there will be a fundamental shift as the campaign goes directly for the younger shopper’s pound.
Statistics show that the highest proportion of asparagus consumers fall within the 45-64 age bracket, with a significant undertrade among younger shoppers in the 18-24 group. It is enthusing these and twentysomething singletons and young couples that the new campaign will focus on.
Central to that will be the recruitment of a celebrity chef - shortly expected to put pen to paper on the contract - who will appeal to the younger shopper and help bring a whole wave of new consumers into the market and help hit the 20 per cent household penetration target within three years. Meanwhile, the core thrust of the campaign will continue to use “tried and tested” tactics of getting the message across to the media, according to Pam Lloyd PR’s Dieter Lloyd, such as recipes, online and media engagement.
“Kantar says 85 per cent of brands grow by getting in new customers,” says Lloyd, explaining the decision to recruit a celebrity. “The focus has always been on older people, the heavy purchasers - we should start trying to appeal to a younger demographic. This is the first time we are looking at that.”
The celebrity chef will get involved with endorsements, quotes, host a press trip, develop recipes and take part in a field to fork feature in a national title.
Lloyd cites the success of the Tenderstem broccoli campaign - which employed chef Jo Pratt as a way of getting recipes into national publications - as an example of the impact well-known personalities can have.
Ultimately, it’s all about building the British asparagus ‘brand’, says Lloyd, and trying to “move towards British asparagus behaving like a brand.” That includes more people understanding the tangible benefits of British asparagus - great taste, not forced and produced by the idiosyncratic British weather.
“You don’t want asparagus to be commoditised,” Lloyd continues. “That’s not in anybody’s interest. It must deliver an income to everybody. People are prepared to pay more for brands such as Pink Lady, Tenderstem and so on.”
One other focus of the campaign will be to educate people on “asparagus etiquette”, with the celebrity hosting a day for journalists informing them on the best way to eat the vegetable.
Since the campaign began in 2001, household penetration during the British season has improved from just 2.7
per cent to 16.2 per cent and purchase frequency has gone up from 1.3 times per year to 2.7 times. In the period from 2005 to 2010, the PR campaign has reached an audited circulation of 300 million readers, listeners and web users, with the 2010 campaign recording an advertising value equivalent on print coverage alone of £1.2m, with high profile appearances on BBC Breakfast, Countryfile and The Hairy Bikers.
Now there is a three year strategy in place, and with the new celebrity on board, organisers are hopeful that the growth spurt can continue now the product is very much a part of the mainstream.
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