Florette sticks to its fresh promise

Freshness guaranteed. That’s the promise put forth by salad supplier Florette UK whether it concerns its classic Crispy and Mixed ranges, or its new Spicy and Caesar lines – the latter duo being the result of a whole load of fresh research and analysis, not to mention a multitude of tasting sessions.

“You wouldn’t have seen a spicy Florette salad before,” says Polly Davies, head of category. “That came directly from Lumina data showing the popularity of global cuisines, ‘fakeaway’ meals and the growing desire for restaurant-style experiences at home – particularly in a cost-of-living crisis where people want affordable indulgence.”

Florette’s aim is to give the category a jolt, bringing bold flavours to the market and taking a consumer insight position to inform product innovation.

“Our core sales still come from our Crispy and Mixed ranges, which make up the bulk of our sales and are important to the prepared salad category,” she explains. “They’re the most distributed and the most recognised. But where we’re really moving the dial is with new product development, like our Spicy and Caesar lines. We’re ahead of the curve there.”

Getting the balance of flavours right is, of course, a tricky exercise. “We do a lot of sensory analysis to get the right balance of leaves,” Davies explains. “For example, frisée in the Crispy mix is really polarising – too much and consumers don’t like it; too little and it lacks the texture they expect.”

Getting that balance right then informs what Florette grows and how it is grown. “This consumer-first approach extends all the way to the field,” says Davies. “It’s not field-to-fork, it’s fork-to-field. What people want drives our growing decisions – not the other way around.”

One of the strongest emerging strategies, Davies notes, is elevating the classics. “Take our new Caesar salad,” she says. “It’s already been done, yes – but not in the format we’re doing it. We’re combining convenience, popular flavours and a ready-to-eat format. It’s a triple win.”

With the Spicy salad, the goal was a bit different. “We wanted to create disruption in a pretty bland category,” Davies reveals. “Most bagged salads taste quite similar, but this one certainly doesn’t.”

Fresh lessons

“Consumer preferences vary enormously,” adds Nick White, head of marketing at Florette UK, “so what works in the UK doesn’t necessarily translate in France – or even in Ireland, just a stone’s throw away. Flavour profiles, mealtime habits and shopping behaviour are all different.”

That said, the UK business can take learnings from its European counterparts, including in France and Spain, says Davies. “They are miles ahead when it comes to fresh produce,” she points out. “Go to a supermarket in these countries and produce is taken seriously, shopper marketing is at the forefront and you won’t be surprised to see at least four bays of Florette for ultimate choice. We’re taking cues from that and bringing a more elevated experience to the UK market.”

“The art is trying to divine what you can take from that learning, from say the French or the Spanish, and translating it into what we could do in the UK,” White explains.

Macro-trends are shaping not just flavours but also formats, according to Davies. “We ask, should it be a bag? A bowl? Something else? We ideate together with marketing and NPD. The goal is always to deliver something delicious and convenient that taps into how and where people are eating today, and even tomorrow.”

France’s stricter anti-plastic laws are pushing companies over there to trial paper-based solutions. The trouble is, the freshness can go from nearly a week to around a day, according to White.

“What we’re doing at the moment is promising the consumer freshness guaranteed, in recyclable packs,” he says. “That’s the trade-off.”

“We’re always reducing the amount of plastic packaging we use as a business,” adds Davies. “We’ve brought the bag weights down where it makes sense to, reduced headroom in the bags and reduced the plastic micron.”

On the packaging itself, the key messages of “Farmer-owned” and “Freshness Guaranteed” both speak to the importance of freshness. “For consumers, it’s all a shorthand for freshness,” suggests White. “This sort of information used to be on the back of the pack, and we’ve brought it to the front. People want to be confident that what they buy is going to last when they take it home and put it in the fridge. So we put our name to that, because it shows, ‘Look, these people are confident about what they do’.”

Such is that confidence that consumers are being offered their money back if they are dissatisfied with the freshness they find in the bag. “The reason is,” Davies notes, “if you look at the shopper decision tree, freshness is actually a higher priority than information about the price.”