Australia could soon become one of the leading overseas export markets for Italian kiwifruit brand Jingold, according to its international development manager Federico Milanese.
“Australia is a market that’s growing strongly for us and one in which we really believe,” he tells Fruitnet. “There is a lot of potential there and we are sure that it is an important market for high-quality products.”
Having established new links with retail buyers in the country a few years ago, Jingold has steadily but surely forged a strong reputation in the country.
“In the last three years we have increased the volume of fruit sold through the main supermarket chains, and we’re really interested in continuing to grow that business,” Milanese reveals.
“Australia could really become one of the markets that values our brand the most. Because in the end, we see that a lot of Australian consumers recognise the level of quality we offer. The amount of yellow fruit we sell in Australia is moving up, and we are selling green there too. At the moment, we are selling more or less 50:50 yellow and green, and there is lots of room for further growth.”
Unfortunately, in the case of yellow, the market remains a distinctly seasonal one for Jingold. Unlike for green, which is well supplied from domestic and New Zealand sources during Australia’s autumn and winter, for various reasons there is currently no feasible option to supply Jingold-branded yellow kiwifruit from New Zealand or Chile.
“Our high-quality Hayward kiwifruit however is available from November to the end of March, with local production in the market from the start of April and New Zealand fruit just after that, so there is year-round supply of green,” Milanese confirms.
When it is in season, Jingold’s yellow fruit is sold either in clamshells, mainly containing eight pieces of fruit, and loose; its green offer, meanwhile, is also sold loose. In all cases, the Jingold brand is visible.
Since breaking into the market, the group has apparently found reaching major urban centres like Sydney and Melbourne to be relatively straightforward in terms of the logistics and distribution, and while hardly any of its kiwifruit currently goes to other cities – for example Brisbane or Perth – the fact that the fruit can arrive in top condition after a 30-day journey by ship and then be easily transferred to its final destination means there is certainly plenty of potential for further expansion.
