"consumers" news and stories

One might expect price or taste to be the primary considerations when purchasing any food items, including beer and wine, but consumer research in the UK has shown that neither characteristic is more important to shoppers than brand is. 62% of men rate the brand of their beer as the most important consideration when purchasing it. Only 20% of men feel that price is the most important factor (30% of women rate price as a primary concern). It seems that label recognition is just as important when it comes to beer as when it comes to buying designer clothes.

To counteract this, more stores and bottle shops have been using special pricing to try to get consumers to buy certain brands. 33% of shoppers say that "they would be encouraged to go for a good 'offer' on a brand of beer that was not their first choice," almost double the percentage from last year. As a result, beer is sold in increasingly larger packaging, and although the bottles are smaller, to give the impression of value. The same applies to wine, where consumers look for promotions and money-off deals when making their purchases.

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Although cranberries have long been a favorite part of the holiday meal, it seems like craisins have finally come into their own. The sweet, dried cranberries are popular year round, although 80% of sales are still around Thanksgiving and Christmas. Craisins, made by Ocean Spray, are probably the single biggest brand of dried cranberries and account for most of the sales. Their sales have doubled in just the past two years, prompting Ocean Spray to plan the opening of a new factory for processing them. The berries are first dried and, unlike some other brands of dried cranberries, they have the juice removed and it is later injected back into them, creating a slightly sweeter final product that helped the catch on with fans of sweeter raisins and other dried fruits. Craisins go well in salads, baked good and with main dishes, in sauces or on their own, and company executives say that the sales are split evenly between retail consumers and manufacturers of cereals, baked goods and other products. They also attribute their continued popularity to the fact that consumers are constantly seeking out snacks that are at least as portable, but healthier than some of their less good-for-you favorites.

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Last year, the HJ Heniz Company received a score of 91 points out of a possible 100 on the American Consumer Satisfaction Index (ACSI), a ratings system based run by the University of Michigan and independent consulting firms, which tracks American consumer preferences and overall satisfaction. It was the highest rating in the history of the index and there was some small speculation that the company could not sustain that level of performance. But this year, for the seventh consecutive time, Heinz is coming out on top of the ACSI list again. Their score did dip slightly to an 87 out of 100, but a spokesman said "the survey results illustrate once again, that Heinz offers high quality food products to our consumers" - and that the customers are clearly satisfied.

Heinz may have some real competition next year, though. They only narrowly beat out their three closest competitors on the ACSI list - Hershey, Kraft and Mars - each of which scored 86 out of 100.

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One grocery executive recently said, when explaining the lack of interest in the organic pasta sauces and cereals that prompted the store discontinue them, that "most of [the] consumers couldn't care less" about whether products were organic or not. The executive is part of a growing segment of retailers that believes that the push towards organic foods is not much more than a passing fad and, although it probably won't fade out in the way that the low-carb craze did, that it will return to a niche segment. Manufacturers, too, are cutting back on organics after discovering that consumers aren't always eager to pay double the price for a frozen pizza with organic flour when it is next to a regular one.

But the trend isn't fading everywhere. Upscale groceries, where consumers are already paying premium prices, are continuing to stock their shelves with organic options and consumers everywhere are still showing interest in buying organic meat, dairy and produce. Perhaps part of the problem is an overuse of the label. In unprocessed goods, such as produce and dairy, shoppers can see and taste the difference in organic products. In processed foods, most people only see the price difference and the word "organic" but only a few, if any, can taste the difference in the product.

So, organics might not be on the way out; they market is merely being refined as consumers become more educated about what organics are and more likely to overlook a potentially overpriced product that only has a small portion of organic ingredients in it.

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In contrast to American consumers, who regularly request that the nutritional information be presented in the absolute simplest form possible, European consumers are now saying that they would prefer to have the calories in foods on their nutritional labels. The reason for this is not that they have some deeper understanding of nutrition than Americans, but that energy-based labeling is the most widely understood system and that many consumers would like to see an EU-wide system that does not vary from place to place. The US system seems to be their model, with the most recent drive being for foods to have "front-of-pack and back-of-pack nutrition labeling, based on a uniform list of nutrients, nutrition information per serving and the introduction of Guideline Daily Amounts (GDAs)." Once a standard is in place, then simplifications can be made or additional labeling systems added, but you can't simplify what isn't there, so shoppers will have to wait for a basic system first.

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