Aim To Keep Venison In Retail

07-05-2008 | webmaster

One season is barely over and plans are already underway for the next. DINZ venison  marketing services manager Innes Moffat was in Europe recently, putting in a good word for New Zealand venison and organising promotion work for the next European autumn game season. He spent 11 days on the Continent at the end of March and in early April, visiting contacts in Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands and meeting with importers from Switzerland and France.

Innes says a particular focus was encouraging distributors to maintain their contracts for supply to retailers.  "We want them to keep these in the face of what might be easier, more tempting sales to the food service and wholesale sectors - as much as we can within the bounds of commercial reality. The retail accounts have been built up while there was more New Zealand venison and lower pricing. We want to keep the channels for our venison diversified to reduce risk. We don't want to revert to dependency on the traditional game restaurant sector because that's been a factor in price volatility in the past, and also there are signs that it's a sector declining in popularity and number."

"It's always important to get up there [to Europe]," he says. "As you spend longer periods in New Zealand, you tend to get more of a production focus. It's good to remember the importance of a consumer focus and have it reinforced to you."

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