(stud) farm to fork

It’s been a while since the last post - a busy few weeks at this end, but not as busy as it’s been for supermarket PR departments across the country.

Over the past fortnight, ‘horsemeat’ has been on everyone’s lips, if not their palate. And as of yesterday, it became something more than a couple of rogue suppliers when facilities in the UK also became implicated.

Who will suffer? I’m not sure retailers will, almost all of them are affected by the controversy thanks to their supply chain which makes switching stores difficult, not only that, retailers still stand to benefit from changing shopping habits as a result. The problem could be more serious for brands such as Findus if the category suffers. Every year the likes of Hugh, Gordon, Jamie et al highlight the reality of what processed meat actually contains and it’s not pretty. While slightly different, this particular scandal has achieved far more reach and could do irreparable damage to some processed food categories.

Government regulation both domestic and European is inevitable, but will that be enough to encourage shoppers back to the products? What will be interesting is how those brands and retailers affected begin to adjust their approach to quality and provenance after the horsemeat fiasco.

This episode highlights the gap between the marketing promise and the supply chain reality. At the moment brands are in damage limitation mode with apologetic letters, emails and adverts bombarding us on a daily basis. But once the dust has settled, how will retailers and manufacturers win back trust in the category? Will ‘home grown’, ‘animal welfare’ or ‘farm to fork’ promises be enough? I think consumers will begin to demand more than a smiling farmer and an authentic stamp on the box. Which in turn means that brands and retailers alike, will need to deliver more ‘proof’... and make it more appetising than a DNA certification.

This reminds me of a great feature length ad from last year that was produced by Chipotle, a US based Mexican (fast) food franchise. They weren’t sneaking horses into their burritos, but their business had moved to a much more ethical supply chain including naturally grown beef, pork and chicken produced without antibiotics. Despite that, the vast majority of their 800,000 daily customers came for the taste, value and convenience of the food, and knew little of where that food came from. What Mark Crumpacker (Chipotle’s chief marketing officer) did next was to tell an important story “in a more approachable way... making the message interesting and entertaining”. You can watch the film below, and read a longer article from The New York Times about it here, and maybe this time next year, we’ll be watching the Findus version....

 

McIlroy & Brailsford - a tale of two sports deals

Later today Rory McIlroy will step out at Abu Dhabi’s Fairmont Hotel as the new face of Nike and as a result will take home a rather tasty £156m (ish) over the next 10 years.

Given Nike's track record, it's widely expected that he will have severed ties with his other sponsors including Jumeirah, Oakley and Titleist. That last one's interesting - Titleist, widely regarded by amateur golfers around the world as the leading innovator and manufacturer of golf balls. They are also a heavy weight player when it comes to the design and production of golf clubs themselves, in fact McIlroy has used them for his entire professional golfing life. Their wedges, irons and drivers are considered some of the best quality products on the market along with the likes of Callaway, Ping, Mizuno and TaylorMade. One name you won't see on that list is Nike. Because despite their future £156m investment (and even bigger past investments in Tiger), Nike equipment is still seen by many amateurs as an inferior product to that of its rivals, a large multinational that was late to the game and lacks the focus of other golf 'specialists'.

Rory's new clubs snapped yesterday by golfdaily.com

For Rory, a young sportsman with a finite number of years to earn his crust as a top sportsman, you simply can't turn down 156million quid - even if it might impact on your performance for the first year. I could't turn it down.... but you know what? I think (Sir) Dave Brailsford probably would.

Last week, the biggest (and currently the most successful) cycling team in the world launched their new ultra modern, innovative kit for the 2013 season. But Team Sky's clothing is no longer made by adidas. In a year when the team will recieve more exposure in Europe and particularly the UK than ever before, Sky have opted to move suppliers to Rapha, a tiny british manufacturer based in Kentish Town. Rapha has just 65 staff and sales in 2011 of £13m. To put that in perspective, Adidas has 47,000 employees and sales of around £10.8bn, so it seems fair to assume financial motivations didn't top the list of priorities for the team principle at Sky.

Rapha has been around for just 8 years, they design and manufacture beautiful (and rather expensive) cycling gear for the well heeled enthusiast. It is a great coup for Rapha and you can read more about their ethos and how the business has grown in this recent FT interview with the founder Simon Mottram (the fact that this article is even appearing in the FT says a lot about the transformation of cycling in this country over the last 10 years).

Imagine seeing a decision like this made by Manchester United - you won't - because it simply wouldn't happen anywhere else. But Dave Brailsford does things differently.

“Team Sky has achieved this year’s level of success because of a strong and steady vision to find improvement at every level to help our riders win. I see Rapha joining us next year as another step in that direction. They share our ambition and vision for cycling," said Sky team principal Dave Brailsford.

Famed for this attention to detail and desire to find small incremental improvements across every aspect of the sport, the only public inkling of what may have brought this decision about came last summer from a SportsPro interview with Sky Pro Cycling's head of operations Carsten Jeppesen, he alluded to the point that adidas often outsourced its cycling manufacturing to specialist 'white-labelling' outlets in Italy that produce equipment for all of the teams.

"Some of it is made in Italy through Moa," Jeppesen said. "They make a lot of bike kit for different brands. So you do get a set of gloves that are made somewhere, and maybe they have another factory that is Adidas-approved that makes something else. The expertise comes from Adidas, but they get it manufactured wherever there is manufacturing expertise. They outsource it"

For Sky to gain that micro advatage in their clothing, they need something no one else has got, and if that means dropping one of the biggest sports brands in the world for a home grown local shop, then so be it.

I'm not used to seeing that - a decision in sport, based on what's good for the sport. I look forward to appreciating the difference it makes to the team on the French roads this summer, now let's just hope Rapha can get some more server space and keep their online shop functioning for more than 5 minutes.

 

Happy ormering

Who needs the glorious 12th when you can have the soggy 11th? If you happen to find yourself on Guernsey in the Channel Islands today, you could be taking part in the first official day of ormering this year.

A good day for ormering (once the tide goes out that is)

The green ormer (Haliotis tuberculata) is a species of sea snail and belongs to the abalone family. The flesh of the green ormer is prized as a delicacy on the island so as a result, you can't just don your waders and go searching under rocks on any given day of the year - there is a strict code of conduct in place...

"... persons are permitted to collect ormers on the days of the full moon, new moon and the two days following between January 1st and April 30th, 2013 (inclusive)."

 

If you've overlooked the soggy 11th and double booked yourself today, fear not, there's a full list of future dates here but leave the scuba gear at home....

"A person may not take or gain possession of any ormer whilst totally or partially submerged and either breathing with the aid of submarine breathing apparatus (including a snorkel and any other diving device whatsoever), or wearing a diving suit, face visor, mask or goggles: and cognate expressions shall be construed accordingly."

Ormers shells (sadly empty when i found them on the beach)

An ormer will take around 4 years to grow to 9cm in length, they can reach as much as 15cm in length and can live for over a decade. After a successful forage, all that's left is to cook it up for tea tonight. Traditionally, they are used in a casserole recipe that dates back to the 17th century, here's a modern day equivalent recipe from esteemed local chef Tony Leck.

Good luck finding one (and managing to eat it all).

Grocery shopping Guernsey style

Fed up of buying fruit and veg wrapped in plastic and stored at sub zero temperatures in your local supermarket? Longing for the days of a proper green grocer experience, with wonky veg that tastes great and travelled less than 5 miles from soil to plate? Maybe you should be booking a weekend break in Guernsey next Spring.

Yes, this is a shameless tourism plug for the island, but it's also a great reason to play this short film produced by Spike Productions all about the Guernsey institution that is Hedge Veg.



It also means i can post my favourite hedge veg stall just up the road, clearly this grower recognises the importance of roadside presentation.

Now all you have to do is book your flights and find somewhere to stay on the brand new Visit Guernsey website. Enjoy.

A John Lewis Christmas

Christmas ad season has well and truly arrived and thanks to the increasing use of on demand TV, you tend to find that LIVE 'shared viewing experiences' like the X Factor become the sole focus for such spots. This year it feels increasingly like all of the ads are merging into one.

They're all doing a great job for Christmas and for that festive feeling, but are they doing anything for the brands?

It seems that every retailer has decided that after years of unrivalled success, they too, need to produce a John Lewis ad or an M&S one.

The likes of Matalan, TK Maxx and Debenhams have all produced ads that feel incredibly similar in tone and content (though not quite as good), and it begs the question of whether the spots will benefit the brand in question anymore than it will benefit John Lewis for being misattributed.

Here's John Lewis & friends...

Here's what could be an M&S ad...

And finally there's the uncanny similarity of Morrison's and Asda. It's no surprise that this is all about their primary customer, mum, but the angle is almost identical. I'm not sure what i'm supposed to think of the Morrison's brand at the moment and it shows in this ad which is a major departure from the fresh food and provenance themes of 2012. The pay off at the end doesn't really do enough to rescue what is quite a depressing ad - so much so that rather than cast mum as the heroine, they find themselves being investigated by the ASA for reinforcing gender stereotypes. Compare that to the upbeat take on 'Mum's Christmas' by Asda and there's only one winner.

Christmas at Waitrose. Or is it Virgin Mobile?

Retailer's Christmas decorations seem to go up earlier and earlier each year - this time it looks like Virgin Mobile and Waitrose have inadvertently clubbed together to promote a 'knitwear' theme....

Waitrose have made a better job of their look & feel. It works well across the store creating impact at the checkouts, pulling out specific seasonal products and creating a 'pared back' feel through the tree decoration at the entrance.

 

It has an authenticity about it that you'd expect from Waitrose and it reflects their primary advertising message about giving more to local good causes this year rather than spending it on a 'fancy TV advert' as Heston insists on telling us every single evening. All very apt for these recessionary times.

How can small High Street businesses compete?

It's hard enough for small businesses on the High Street in a recession, but when you factor in the never ending growth of global chains (some of which avoid their UK tax obligations), you really get the feeling that the odds are stacked against the sole trader.

But there is hope. I've already written about good old fashioned customer service like at this brilliant Fishmongers in South London.

Then there's cross category reward schemes to take on the might of Nectar. Ice Rewards is an interesting example i came across recently...

"a flexible customer reward programme whose mission is to mitigate climate change via mass consumer purchase power. The Idea is that by changing small things we do and buy every day, together we can minimise harm to the environment, help mitigate climate change and preserve the ice caps."

...providing a heightened sense of reward for the shopper and a further hook for the retailer.

Now it seems that even Amex is getting in on the act. The notoriously pricey payment method is rarely found in independent stores, so Amex has put a scheme together to tackle exactly that problem and drive footfall for stores in the process.

"Small Shop" aims to support small businesses by offering £5 cash back to shoppers when they spend over £5 in participating shops throughout November. Having received the mailshot, a relatively smooth sign up on line quickly offered me an interactive map. It's incredibly clunky but to my amazement, there are plenty of participating shops, and not just in London, even darkest Lincolnshire can boast a handful of participating retailers.

While the flyer has limited impact, it does do the job of creating momentum which quickly moves online to forums like this.

It's a compelling offer for consumers, and provides footfall for retailers, it's just a shame that the user experience isn't better. Mobile would seemingly be the ideal medium by which to communicate this activity and keep it front of mind. Sadly the mobile experience isn't up to scratch. Yes you can link it to your foursquare account but i imagine that this is simply a relic of past campaigns in the U.S. as the Foursquare user base is still minimal over here in the UK. I would have thought that integrating the map into the existing Amex app or even creating a new one would have been highly beneficial to shoppers without too much hassle in the development phase.

Still, user experience aside - it's a great way for small independents to benefit from increased footfall without having to foot the bill for the awareness raising activity - hopefully it works, and could maybe become a permanent offering at a slightly reduced reward rate. Even double points would go a long way to maintaining this new 'small shopping' behaviour amongst the rewards hungry Amex card holder.