Fresh produce traders get insight into German, Dutch and Belgian retail

Figures, figures and more figures, images to drool over, and finally a short quiz to test how much of the acquired knowledge had been remembered. These were the ingredients for a successful GroentenFruit Huis members meeting ‘Consumer & Retail,’ last week in Hal4 aan de Maas in Rotterdam.

“Insight into hits and misses for young people, households and the elderly for the first time. An informative meeting, good comparisons between the Netherlands, Belgium and Germany. A great location and inspiring talks.” These were just some of the responses from those who attended. Some remarkable facts: the Netherlands is frontrunner as regards online share. In Belgium, chicory does well with a high listing of the top ten vegetables bought most often. Cauliflower isn’t listed in the top ten by the Belgians, in Germany much money is spent on asparagus and banana is the number one product in the top ten of organic products sold most.

The focus was on market information in Belgium, Germany and the Netherlands. Jan de Boeck from GfK Belgium took care of the developments in Belgium. Belgium, which has 11 million inhabitants, is the third sales market for the Netherlands, with 4.9 million households. In the coming 40 years, the numbers of elderly people will continue to gradually increase, while the number of 0-17 year olds will remain the same. “A fact to keep in mind,” According to Jan. “Furthermore, we see that 44.7 per cent of families pay attention to their cholesterol, and in almost 40 per cent of families, someone’s dieting. That can also be anticipated.”

The number of shop visits has decreased since 2008, from 190 to 156. The average spend on FMCG per shop visit amounts to €33.94. Spending on fruits and vegetables increases annually, but the volume doesn’t grow. The growth is mainly caused by higher prices. These are some facts presented Jan de Boeck.

Henri van Hassel, Jan de Boeck’s Dutch colleague, started his story positively. The start of 2017 was characterised by the highest positivism in many years. More is spent, but not automatically on food. The Dutch spend 11.2 per cent of all their money on food, and buy more and more bargains. The promotional pressure, meaning the amount of products we buy during promotional actions, has risen from 18 per cent in 2014/15 to 21.2 percent in 2016.

Online purchasing is increasing. The market share of fresh fruit and vegetables which is ordered online is now 2.4 per cent and it is expected that it will continue to grow in the coming years. In 2016, three percent of households purchased a meal box, they did so on average 7.2 times per year. Hello Fresh has a market share of 55 per cent in this, followed by Albert Heijn by 27 per cent. For retailers, it remains important to get customers into the shops. It was also looked into that the average spending per shop visit is higher when there’s fresh produce in the shopping basket, than when that’s not the case.

Wilco van den Berg from GroentenFruit Huis briefly touched on devel-opments on the German market for conventional products, helped by Arend Zeelenberg from Buro AZ and advisor for Comité Bio. He talked about the developments of the market share of organic, the importance of quality marks and several interesting facts. For example, most organic products are eaten in the northwest of the Netherlands, but the sales of organic are growing quickest in the southwest. The consumption per person within Eruope is largest in Switzerland, followed by Luxembourg and Denmark. For many consumers, prices are a barrier to buying more organic. In Germany, the market for organic is €9.5 billion and in Belgium it’s €5.5 million. Especially young households and singles buy much organic here.

According to Marjan Ippel from Talking Food, we have to keep an eye on cauliflower. Although it isn’t even in the top ten in Belgium, it is a direct hit with many uses, from pizza bottoms to couscous, and it’s also good grilled, according to her. She reckons that consumers associate fruit and vegetables with health, sustainable, affordable, farmer’s romanticism, versatile, tasty and colourful, and that fruit and vegetables haven’t been caught as having any sort of disadvantage whatsoever yet. Moreover, fruit and vegetables with their wonderful colours and variations are good to put on Instagram, and that’s especially important to the younger generations. 

At the end of the afternoon, Hans Verwegen from Enza Zaden and Barry Raadschelders from OTC Holland went home with a crate filled with vegetables. During the knowledge quiz based on the figures presented, they answered most of the questions correctly. For those for who it all went a little too quickly, there’s the option of reviewing all the figures on the member’s website from the GroentenFruit Huis.