We are less fervent grillers than we used to be

The current economic situation does not favour the organisation of open-air grill parties and this inevitably affected grill product sales. Zoltán Szántó, PICK Szeged Zrt.’s product manager says: – Because of the economic recession, the number of shoppings and the number of products bought both decreased. When buying meat for grill parties, consumers preferred cheaper meats. Promotions, price reductions and promotional leaflets became more important than in past years. Our answer to these trends was reducing packaging sizes; for instance, in the case of grill sausages from 230 to 160 g.

Zsolt Kazai, Landhof Hungária Kft.’s managing director is of the opinion that private label products are getting stronger, but at the same time the importance of strong manufacturer brands also keeps growing. His experience is that consumers are looking for substitutes products instead of convenience products: traditional wieners end up on the barbecue grill instead of classic grill products. Dr Endre Tamás, the managing director of Wiesbauer-Dunahús Kft. expects a growth in the premium category, with grill products in the lower and medium price categories losing momentum.

Zoltán Szántó’s forecast for 2010 is that grill product sales will only be significant in promotion – the more so, because prices will be rather high (partly due to the increase in VAT last year). PICK Szeged’s novelty for the season is the introduction of the PICK Grill product range. Marketing manager Éva Kulich told our magazine that this is going to be a complex brand-change, as PICK basically transformed the products in the former Délhús grill range; a rather wide selection of products will make up the PICK Grill family, for instance five types of griller and four types of grill sausage will be available. It is important that the products will have a long, 60-day shelf life – without preservatives, by applying heat treatment.

Landhof Hungária Kft. is in the lucky situation of simply taking over the numerous innovations by its Austrian parent company. They also reacted to the crisis with smaller packaging units. Landhof Grill spit is two types of grill sausages in 250-g protective gas packaging, while Landhof Mini Grill Party is a classic grill party selection. Wiesbauer-Dunahús tries to ‘catch’ consumers by offering their grill products in several versions. From 2010, in certain stores all of their 7 products are also available in bulk. Their assortment consists of 5 Partygrill products, Stuttgart Grill and Country Grill.