Magazine: The barbecue grills are already sizzling

Although manufacturers do their best to offer alternatives for the autumn-winter period, barbecues have remained a spring-summer thing, so the category of grill products is very much seasonal and sales performance depends on the actual weather too. Grill sausage sales are bigger than marinated meat sales, but the proportion of the latter has increased within total sales.

János Weisz
commercial director
Pápai Hús

János Weisz, commercial director of Pápai Hús Kft. told our magazine that their marinated meats are sold both with bone and deboned, on tray and in plastic containers, in Hungarian-style and gyros-style versions. The majority of the company’s volume sales is realised by Hungarian-style and cheese grill sausages, in 400g vacuum-packed format. Newly launched Gardengrill products are available in three flavours, in 300g tray version.

Krisztina Bódi
marketing director
Kométa ’99

According to Krisztina Bódi, marketing director of Kométa ’99 Zrt., shopper demand is on the rise for special and high-quality products. Last year the company launched the Kométa by Lázár Chef product line, which quickly became popular. This year they are also working on many new products with chef Kovács Lázár – these will be available in shops soon.

Zsolt Kazai
sales manager
Wiesbauer-Dunahús

Hungarians like their grill products in Hungarian style (garlic, paprika, pepper) and cheese-flavoured. We learned from Zsolt Kazai, sales manager of Wiesbauer-Dunahús Kft. that Hungarians are glad to try new products, but afterwards they return to the good old flavours. Many consumers are looking for gluten-, lactose- and soy-free grill products, they prefer products with few additives and high meat content. This year the company puts a new product range on the market: Griller products not only look nice but taste delicious too; cheese, BBQ, pepper, honey and garlic, and paprika versions are available. Two family-sized products are also launched this year, 650g Családi grill products contain something tasty for each family member.

Ferenc Ledó
president
DélKerTÉSZ

Slowly but steadily vegetables are also finding their way to the barbecue grill. Ferenc Ledó, president of the Southern Great Plain Horticulturist Cooperative (DélKerTÉSZ) told Trade magazin that Hungarians eat tens of thousand tons of vegetables a month, but not much of this quantity is purchased for grilling purposes.DélKerTÉSZ’s top products in the market are fresh vegetables. They sell products in bulk and packaged too – 60 percent of their vegetables belong to the latter category, because consumers prefer ready-to-eat products. The cooperative tries to satisfy this demand with solutions such as the Piknik pack (various peppers and tomato) or the 1kg Grill pack (large kápia peppers). Grilled tomatoes are also more and more popular. DélKerTÉSZ’s experience is that shoppers prefer small and sweet tomato varieties, so they are adding such tomato types to their product portfolio this year.

Ágnes Vattamány
marketing specialist
Bio-Fungi

Ágnes Vattamány, marketing specialist of Bio-fungi Kft. told our magazine that for barbecues they recommend their pack of 6 white grill mushrooms, brown Portobello mushrooms and oyster mushrooms. A great advantage of grilling mushrooms is that they can be prepared quickly, and thanks to this the mushrooms stay juicy and tasty. The company feels that consumption is growing and the demand for special mushroom varieties is on the rise. Ms Vattamány added that grilled mushrooms are perfect to combine with hamburger, for instance if they are chopped and mixed with the meat, the calorie intake of burger eaters gets lower, while vitamins D and B, plus antioxidants are also consumed. She added that consumers should never forget: farmed mushrooms should never be peeled, just quickly washed under running water.

Zsuzsanna Lóczki
key account manager
Eisberg Hungary

Last year Eisberg Hungary Kft. sold 7,200 tons of ready-to-eat salads. Key account manager Zsuzsanna Lóczki revealed to us that sales data indicate it very well how demand is growing for convenience products. From March the company’s salads are available in new packaging, which makes the salads more visible to consumers, because nothing gets the message through better than the sight of fresh salad. From May to August Eisberg markets the 280g Grill mix product; in July it is made more special with fennel. //