OneHarvest’s Marketing Team has won the PMA-Produce Plus Marketer of the Award 2014 for its launch of ‘Love Beets’.
OneHarvest’s Marketing Team, led by Andrew Francey, was announced as the winner on Wednesday 25 June at the PMA Fresh Connections conference and trade show in Auckland.
OneHarvest’s team was chosen for its marketing work on Love Beets, a range of fresh baby beetroot that’s peeled, placed into, and gently cooked in a vacuum-sealed pouch with no additives.
OneHarvest launched the Australian-grown product in early 2014 from a purpose-built processing plant in Bairnsdale, Victoria, following the positive consumer reception to trials of an imported version of the product from the UK.
Starting with the development of an Australian look and feel to the Love Beets brand and livery, the well-integrated marketing campaign succeeded in giving beetroot a vibrant and contemporary new personality.
Love Beets delivered a fresh experience for consumers, and OneHarvest’s team was singled out for communicating the convenience, culinary versatility and health attributes of the product effectively to its target ‘foodie’ and upmarket audience.
The campaign’s branding and messages were highlighted by the award’s judges as being clear, concise and consistent, centring on the product’s ease of use.
The wide outreach of the campaign was also commended. OneHarvest’s team deployed a diverse range of marketing tools to reach consumers and the trade, securing extensive profile. As well as using traditional channels such as promotion in in-store catalogues, ‘shelf talkers’, recipe leaflets and sampling, the campaign featured a PR strategy encompassing mainstream consumer, retail, business and agricultural media outreach. It also used social media platforms effectively, including blogger outreach.
A well-funded campaign, Love Beets’ sales results delivered a highly impressive return on investment. As of early April, the submission deadline for this year’s Marketer of the Year Award entries, the product was stocked in over 1,700 outlets across Australia, from major retailers to independents, according to OneHarvest, which also reported interest from new customer channels including online stockists and convenience stores.
“We’d like to congratulate OneHarvest’s Marketing Team on their highly integrated and professional campaign,” said John Hey, managing editor of Produce Plus. “Beetroot has a somewhat iconic status among Australian consumers, but the local industry has been suffering difficult times and stagnating consumption. This well-marketed and innovative product has given a new lease of life to the category and the local industry by delivering the flavour and attributes of fresh beetroot in such a convenient and attractive package.”
“PMA warmly congratulates Andrew and the OneHarvest Marketing Team on their excellent Love Beets campaign,” said Michael Worthington, CEO of PMA Australia-New Zealand. “It was a worthy winner amongst our strongest-ever set of entries.”
An interview with Andrew Francey and the OneHarvest Marketing Team will appear in the upcoming Spring 2014 issue of Produce Plus.
Now in its third year, the PMA-Produce Plus Marketer of the Year Award is the premier award for marketing in the Australasian fresh produce and floral industries.
