Hungarian customers are increasingly demanding

By: Trademagazin Date: 2025. 04. 10. 12:17

With consumer awareness growing, the demand for quality and smaller-packaged ham products is increasing, according to a survey published on Thursday by the National Chamber of Agriculture (NAK) and the Hungarian Meat Producers’ Association (Hússzövetsége).

Processors are looking forward to this season with cautious optimism and are hoping for a similar demand to previous years. Demand for ham products will increase by 80 percent during this period, while the turnover of tied hams will multiply in the days before Easter, they wrote.

There is a significant demand for higher-quality, long-matured products. Consumers are relatively sensitive and treat innovations in the range of traditional products with reservations, despite this, manufacturers expand their product range from time to time with new products, for example, high-quality, long-matured ham products in wine are also appearing in the range. However, the market share of these more special products is still quite low – they said in the overview.

This Easter season, there is an ample supply of domestic pork available to the meat industry. The market is significantly affected by the influx of cheaper imported raw materials from Spain, Germany or Poland. The same can be experienced in the case of products, such as quick-cured, cooked or heat-treated meat products, which arrive from abroad on the shelves of domestic stores in poorer quality and at cheaper prices

– experts warn.

Although consumer habits have not changed in terms of product quality, price sensitivity determines buyers’ decisions. Buyers are paying more attention to buying as much of everything as they will consume during the holidays.