Surprises can be good or bad, said David Newman, senior vice president of market growth for the National Pork Board.
“The current economic situation of the U.S. pork industry is certainly in the latter category,” he pointed out in a previous column.
The National Pork Board has reallocated funds to support market growth initiatives and further sharpen its focus on market growth – particularly enhancing long-term demand.
“Today’s pork is nutritious, versatile, accessible and… unexpected. The often-overlooked value pork brings to the grocery store and dinner plate gives the pork industry significant – and perhaps surprising – opportunities to meet the needs of consumers and retailers,” Newman says.
In order to grow long-term demand, Kiersten Hafer, vice president strategy and domestic market development for the National Pork Board, discussed how the pork industry plans to get there during a webinar following the release of USDA’s September Hogs & Pigs Report.
She said she is often asked the same questions over and over:
- With beef prices increasing and availability decreasing, why isn’t pork volume growing?
- What can we do to drive demand now?
- When will we see the impact of NPB efforts?
Although those aren’t easy questions to answer, Hafer explained how NPB is addressing each.
“We have to win more households, more consumers and more eating occasions – we need a penetration strategy that helps us grow the base of consumer,” she explained. “We need a purchase rate strategy – we need them buying more often and growing the share. We need a consumption strategy that grows their use and reminds them there is more to pork and a particular cut than they realize and have been raised with.”
Source: National Pork Board
In short, she said it’s not just about selling more pork. It’s about creating long-term demand and connection to pork that will sustain the pork industry and create a more stable base of sales.
“If you think about that, there’s really a spectrum. On the left, you see shopper marketing and on the right you see consumer marketing. That shopper marketing piece is really about getting right down to where you can influence and impact that consumer at the time of purchase. It’s the opportunity to drive immediate sales, it’s the opportunity to go after share and purchase rate and drive volume,” she explained.
The National Pork Board is working to bring pork into the forefront to talk about easy meals tonight or cross-selling within the portfolio of getting people from process pork over to the fresh pork case, Hafer added.
Source: National Pork Board
To the far right of the spectrum, brand-driven programs are doing a lot to change perceptions of consumers in market through a longer-term proposition and plan.
“When you see things like ‘Ponle Pork’ or hear about ‘Don’t Miss the Flavor’ or discover the new campaign around nutrition called ‘Surprisingly Pork,’ you get into the things that are positioning pork for the longer term,” she says.
The National Pork Board is thinking about both long-term and short-term and balancing of efforts to ensure they are growing simultaneously.
Perhaps most importantly, Hafer said they are leading with taste and flavor.
“That’s our opportunity to really disrupt everything else that’s out there, to break through in a very busy time of year, and help consumers realize that pork could bring them something that they may have been missing, or may be craving,” she said. “We’re going to lead in all of our consumer messaging and everything that we’re doing in retail with taste and flavor.”
Some of the ways the National Pork Board plans to meet the consumer where they are and make pork part of the consideration are:
- Tie cuts and recipes to cooking methods (appliances) they are using.
- Think about pork as an ingredient, and not just center of the plate.
- Give them confidence they can cook pork and it will be a great meal and eating experience.
- Help consumers cook with confidence and make their meal.
Gene Noem, Iowa pork producer and past NPB board president, said, “A person in the food industry told me one time that the biggest mistake you can make in food is to imagine that people like the same thing that you do. You’ve got to listen to what people are saying. And you’ve got to listen to why they’re making the choices that they are.”
