Mom-and-Pop stores are an integral part of India’s retail landscape, providing a remarkable range of products to serve consumer needs, but they seldom sell fresh produce.
New Zealand kiwifruit marketer Zespri is eyeing an opportunity to change all that, and open up this distribution channel for its fruit.
“We are planning to tie up with Mom-and-Pop stores in Mumbai, Delhi, Bangalore and Ahmedabad as a pilot project,” explained Zespri India’s market manager Ritesh Bhimani. “We are going to target 20-30 stores in each city to begin with and supply them with Green and SunGold kiwifruit.”
Zespri plans to support the stores with training on how to handle the fruit as well as with point-of-sale materials. “It’s relatively expensive to deliver fruit to the stores but we plan to take two orders per week – one on Monday and one on Thursday – and deliver the fruit the following days.”
Despite the challenges of servicing Mom-and-Pop stores, Zespri believes such outlets could hold the key to wider consumer penetration. “The idea is to increase Zespri’s distribution channels through them, as these stores have a good customer base and also the right target audience for us,” Bhimani told Asiafruit.
India has been one of Zespri’s highest growth markets over the past year, with sales jumping to more than 1m trays in 2015. Delivering kiwifruit to consumers in convenient three-piece punnets has been a key driver of that growth, according to Bhimani. “Instead of trays, Zespri has been supplying fruit to wholesalers and street vendors in three-piece punnets through its distributors –and they’ve taken off.”
Zespri is now looking at trialling other types of packaging, possibly a four-piece punnet. “Indian families often have four members or more, so this might be more convenient for them,” said Bhimani.
Indian consumers got their first taste of SunGold kiwifruit last year, and Zespri is looking double sales of the variety this year as well as ramping up its green sales once again. “We’re eyeing growth of 50 per cent for green this season,” he noted.
Zespri has also been expanding its team in India to support the growth. Bhimani is joined in Mumbai by market development associates Manasi Chitlangia and Rahul De, and the company is now recruiting a Bangalore sales manager.
Ritesh Bhimani will be speaking on Zespri’s marketing and brand-building efforts in India, which span a range of retail channels, at Fresh Produce India on 24-26 April. Visit www.freshproduceindia.com for more information.
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