How is watercress performing from a sales perspective? What’s driving the performance?
April and May are generally growth months for our business and year on year we have seen healthy performance. This is partly driven by in-store promotions, but also increased industry demand as we introduce new businesses to our company. These include restaurants, foodservice, online food services and box schemes looking to add value to their existing range.
Sales are also being driven to an extent by the growing adoption of flexitarian and vegan lifestyles. As people seek ways to make food healthy and tasty they are discovering the versatility of watercress and its numerous health benefits.
Juices and healthy smoothies continue to be popular and again watercress is increasingly being used as an ingredient. There is also a general interest in medicinal-related diets with large tranches of the population becoming more health aware, actively seeking out produce with a proven health track record and this is something we have been trying to communicate about watercress for the last decade.
Shopping habits are changing too and having a positive impact on watercress sales. The shift to more frequent shopping trips rather than one weekly shop means that people are prone to picking up a bag of fresh watercress each trip. To reflect this move we have also noticed a demand for availability of watercress in more stores.
Are there any new formats or ways of presenting the crop?
We are working closely with our customers to explore possible plastic-free packaging. Of course, traditionally watercress was sold in bunches without any packaging whatsoever but because of the delicate nature of watercress and in order to keep it fresh for as long as possible, some kind of packaging is necessary. However we are looking at alternatives to plastic.
Do consumers fully understand the many uses of watercress and what is being done to improve their knowledge?
Awareness of the many uses of watercress is slowly increasing – we have actively been promoting its use in recipes and its various health benefits for over a decade, however the educational process needs to continue.
We held the 14th Annual Watercress Festival in Alresford, Hampshire on Sunday 20 May. Over 15,000 visitors descended on the Georgian market town to celebrate the start of the UK watercress season. Stallholders sold foods that are infused with watercress and cookery demonstrations all help to communicate the vast array of recipes in which watercress can be used.
The Watercress Company runs an educational programme with schools and local groups, inviting them to visit a watercress farm to see the unique method of growing and running talks to explain the history and health benefits associated with this leaf.
Last year we completed trials at Dorchester Hospital, providing cancer patients with watercress smoothies while being treated for the disease. The response on the ward was fantastic, with patients responding positively to the smoothies offering a healthy boost, but also something flavoursome at a time when their taste buds are jaded due to the treatments they are undergoing. Production of the smoothies continues on a daily basis and we hope to roll the trial out into other local hospitals in the near future. We also support local events such as the Dorchester Marathon where this year we will be offering watercress smoothies to runners at the end of the race as it has been scientifically proven that watercress aids recovery and reduces DNA damage after exercise.
For over a decade, UK watercress growers have worked with scientists on medical research to better understand and communicate the health benefits of watercress, which in turn has led to major breakthroughs in research for diseases such as cancer. Collaborations between The Watercress Company and medical researchers continue today with the conviction that further benefits of eating watercress will be revealed before the end of the year. New positive scientific revelations will help to re-engage with the media and the public, substantiating further our claim as a superfood and give even more reason to eat it.
In the meantime, we are very active on social media and with traditional PR to engage with the public and reinforce our health and versatility messages.
What is being done from a promotional point of view by the industry?
We are very responsible for the industry as we represent a large part of the supply. We have a team of PR experts both in traditional media and social media-facing skills. The move to introduce in-house design has helped immensely with transporting messages from our farm and the scientific community we work with to consumers by way of video, infographics and paper supplements.
We are engaging more with other countries, understanding the opportunity to collaborate on ideas that can be brought home to the UK. We are working on promoting watercress in the NHS with one particular retailer with an on-pack promotion which will forge links between our consumers in Dorset & Hampshire and the financial support this health crop can deliver to charitable developments that aid the success of patient treatment in the area.
How much further growth potential do you see for watercress?
There is huge opportunity for watercress as it’s already sold in over 4,500 stores in the UK and the message of health per pack puts it way ahead of any other salad pack on the shelves. We have seen growth increase significantly since 2000, although there has been a slowing down in the last six years which coincides with the effects of the recession on retailer performance and rationalisation of store salad packs sold. Watercress has not been delisted in any stores but larger packs or organic watercress offers have dropped off the shelves. We expect our core growth to come from these units being reinstated based on gaps in the market, new retailers looking to incorporate watercress into their range and true organic growth led by consumer awareness generated from our successful marketing campaign.
We will always continue to work to educate the public about the benefits of eating watercress, and we hope to publish a new significant finding later this year, just a little over a decade since our last major study published in 2007. I believe there is scope for improved packaging to be developed that better delivers a message that consumers can identify with and are motivated by, be that through emphasising the health benefits or including more recipe ideas to demonstrate watercress’ versatility. We are in the process of applying for specific health claims for watercress packaging and these have been substantiated by clinical research based on human participation.
As consumer concern for health and eating healthily continues to grow, together with an increase in vegan and flexitarian diets where less meat is consumed, demand for produce with naturally high nutrient content, such as watercress, will grow too.
This expected increase in demand and the growth in usage of watercress in recipes such as smoothies where the product is blended, means that we are hoping to utilise produce grown in the UK but which currently doesn’t meet retailer specifications. We are keen to explore means of diversifying so that UK watercress, especially that grown in the winter months, can be used, and would welcome interest from any retailers or food manufacturers willing to discuss this opportunity.
Finally, we generally see a small downturn in sales in the winter months, most likely because many consumers still associate watercress with the UK and find it confusing that there are offers on the shelves from USA or Spain, essentially watercress as a very British brand. We have another educational job to do and that is to reassure British consumers that while the produce may be grown abroad it is still grown on British-owned farms and so consumers eager to eat ‘crops that benefit Britain’ still can. After all the primary reason for buying watercress is by far for health benefits and this is not affected wherever it is grown.
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