Newsletter No. 23 – February 2005 Item 5

Newsletter #17 discussed the increasing power of the supermarkets.  Figure 1 demonstrates their dominance in the UK market.  Butchers have only 1% share of the total grocery market.

A survey on customers visiting butchers reported that the customer spends on average 7 minutes and 24 seconds at the butcher purchasing their meat.  By comparison customers buying meat in supermarkets at the pre-packed shelves, spend between 24 and 37 seconds.

The top 3 reasons given for purchasing meat at a butcher are:

• Relationship with butcher 51%
• Better Quality than supermarkets 46%
• Ability to get cuts that they want 45%

The top 3 reasons given for purchasing at the service counters of supermarkets are:
– Request portion size to suit 42%
– See products clearly 38%
– Value for money 33%

Decisions for buying loose meat:
Butcher purchases
– Planned – Know exactly what meat before going to the butcher – 71%
– Semi Planned – Have some idea of meat they are to buy – 21%
– Unplanned – Decide what to buy once in butcher – 4%

Supermarket serve-over customers
– Loose Meat purchase planned – 59%

The primary reasons given by butcher customers for purchasing their meat at the butcher are:

– Trust
– The Personal Touch
– Value
– A special experience
– Good Presentation

The full report can be viewed is no longer available on the Internet.

No single market report should be read in isolation – but I am sure all agree that any strong marketing organisation needs to be continually understanding the markets in which we operate as they are very sophisticated markets?

It is very clear that world volume of ostrich production is so small that it can only be measured in a meaningful manner against the output of single production units of other specie.