"Rainbow International increasingly a 'one-stop-shopping' supplier"

Positive changes have taken place at Rainbow International over the last few years. Although the team was remained mostly the same in size, a lot of new faces have appeared. The exporter also entered open ground vegetables and recently an oral agreement was made to sell Rainbow International to Harvest House. "It's a big advantage that you can take care of the marketing for the retail directly from the growers cooperation and that you can go straight to the final customer with the grower. It also remains important in the commercial game for the final customer that the trader closes the deals. A supermarket knows that a grower needs to get rid of their trade and so the grower has a weaker negotiation position. This is important in the trade," says Managing Director Trading Wim van der Burgh.

"Despite Harvest House now being our parent company, we have to buy in for market conforming prices at Harvest House. If one of our competitors can pay slightly more, the trade will go there. On the other hand we are also completely free to buy from somewhere else. I believe this is a healthy development," says Wim. "I expect more growers to join Harvest House over the next few years, as it is a strong concept. The cooperation belongs to the growers and transparency is the key word. Harvest House not only focuses on a good price, but also realises added value through casks, packaging and returns from the internationals. We buy around 60% of our volumes as Rainbow International from Harvest House during the Dutch season and on an annual basis it will probably be around 35-40%."



Open ground vegetables
The greenhouse vegetables still form the bulk of sales within Rainbow International, of which peppers form the lions share. But the percentage of greenhouse vegetables in the full picture is decreasing. This is mainly due to the start of open ground vegetables, which is lead by Sales Manager Lex Ophorst. Iceberg lettuce, cauliflower, leek, broccoli, lettuce varieties and onions under the own brand Crown Jewel and carrot and kale also belong to the product range. "We made a good start in open ground vegetables around two years ago with our own growers and direct purchases from the source. We also have various direct lines from Spain and Italy which are good. We also started direct import of sweet potatoes from the US a year ago," says Lex.

"Besides this - and most people don't know that - we still market a reasonable amount of fruit every year. We don't have any direct lines in for instance South Africa or South America with this, we buy the fruit straight from selected companies in the Netherlands with which we collaborate intensively. For us the fruit is a service product to serve our mix customers. They see us as a 'one-stop-shopping', something we are focussing on more and more. Yet the fruit within Rainbow International is around 10% of the total turnover."

Day trade
Rainbow International exports to buyers in around thirty different countries. The company is traditionally strong on the English and Scandinavian market and the export to Russia and south and eastern Europe has been added to this in recent years. "Although the retailers are growing I believe, unlike some others, that the traditional day trade will continue to exist. But, more than before, you will have to be careful."

Russian boycott
When the Russian boycott was announced last month, Wim and Lex were visiting customers in Russia. "That Thursday we were in the taxi when it was announced. From then on it was constant phone calls to fellow traders to see what they were doing with the trade and what the customers' responses were. We had six cars on their way to Russia. One of them was lucky and was allowed over the border. The other five cars had to come back to the Netherlands. The trade was checked for quality by our inspectors, and if necessary, resorted and repackaged. The costs of this were mainly covered by the prices rising in the days after. So for us as Rainbow International the effects of the boycott weren't that extreme." But he is concerned about the flow of Israeli peppers. "Last year most of the Israel peppers already went to Russia and I expect it will be even higher now. Putin is clearly strengthening relations with countries like Israel and North Africa. I hope not, but I expect Putin to stick to the announced boycott term. The man has never shown any lack of back bone."

Wim looks towards the future of the exporting business positively. "We want to lift Rainbow International higher with this team. We use the excellent facilities at Rainbow Kleinpak, which is capable of offering almost every packaging the customer could want. We have an efficient building at a good location and we're ready for the future with the collaboration with Harvest House. The biggest challenge is to grow with open ground vegetables without losing the greenhouse vegetables and fruit package. We also want to be able to continue serving our existing customers and further extend the customer base where possible. We are ready!"

For more information:
Wim van der Burgh
Rainbow International BV
Poortcamp 9
2678 PT De Lier
T. +31 174 52 41 18
F. +31 174 52 41 19
E. wimvdburgh@rainbowgrowers.nl
I. www.rainbowgrowers.nl