New Products and Advertising Budgets
Bolster Frozen Food Growth in Britain
By MARY DAVIS, QFFI Correspondent

Packaging for Birds Eye Fish Fingers points out the 100% fillet product’s natural Omega 3 content. The 360-gram twelve-pack retails for £2.

Fish leads increase, with Young’s and Birds Eye vying for dominance. Retailer strategies at mainstream and specialty chains also factors in stimulating value and volume increases.

Retail frozen food sales increased 4.2% in the United Kingdom during the 52-week period preceding March 2008, according to the British Frozen Food Federation (BFFF), with fish the leading sector in growth. Potato products ranked second, followed by meat and poultry, and vegetables.
Reasons for the upswing, according to the BFFF, included a raft of new and revised products supported with creative and educational advertising, and advocacy from outside the industry.

The most influential cheerleader for frozens at the moment would seem to be Delia Smith, who has a weekly prime-time television program about cooking on the BBC and a popular website, www.deliaonline.com. In her recent book, Delia’s How to Cheat at Cooking, readers are told how to rid themselves of unjustified prejudices against frozen food. “With modern techniques of blast freezing, the ‘freshness’ of foods is not impaired,” she explains.

The author is not shy about mentioning specific companies. Needless to say, they have not been slow to build on her views in promotional campaigns.

The total increase in retail sales of fish for the twelve months prior to late-March 2008 was 10.9% in value and 7.3% in volume. Competition between Young’s and Birds Eye, the two leading brands, which launched new products and waged vigorous advertising campaigns, propelled the sector forward; but major retailers are also helping to achieve the positive results.

Packaging for Birds Eye Fish Fingers points out the 100% fillet product’s natural Omega 3 content. The 360-gram twelve-pack retails for £2.

Young’s underwent a structural change on Feb. 1, 2008, as the private equity firm CapVest, which acquired Young’s in 2002 and Findus in 2006, ceased operating the holdings as separate sister companies and joined them in a single structure called the FoodVest Group [See page 81 of the April, 2008, issue of Quick Frozen Foods International].

With the change, Young’s was split into two branches – Young’s Seafood, which is operating as a brand-name business developing frozen and chilled products; and the Seafood Company, which is concentrating on private label.

Early this year Young’s launched a new brand, Great Grimsby, with much publicity. On Jan. 22 the first Great Grimsby Day was celebrated in London, with a photo shoot at Westminster and free samples distributed at Waterloo Station. In Grimsby, home of Young’s, a supplement appeared in the local newspaper, along with a celebration with the Grimsby Town Football Club, among other initiatives.

Research released by Young’s shows that customers prefer seafood that is sustainably sourced. The initial Great Grimsby line is composed of seven traditional frozen or chilled products, using wild Alaskan cod, caught by long line in the Bering Sea and Aleutian Islands fishery and certified by the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC). Among the items is 2 Smoked Haddock Fish Cakes, which can be oven baked or grilled.

In competition with Young’s are Birds Eye Fish Fingers, which the company has rebranded and repackaged as Omega 3 Fish Fingers. Packaging text explains that the fish content is 100% Alaska Pollock fillet material sourced from an MSC-certified fishery. The species is naturally rich in fatty acids, which are believed have a positive impact in the prevention of heart disease, stroke and possibly diabetes. Therefore no Omega 3 need be added to the fillets. A box of a dozen fingers weighs 360 grams and costs about £2.

Sainsbury’s Inspired To Roast Chicken Breast boasts a Union Jack-waving British pedigree for buyers to see while shopping at the grocery.

Birds Eye invested heavily in magazine and television advertising emphasizing the product’s healthfulness. Three entities complained to the UK Advertising Standards Authority, charging that the fish fingers do not contain enough Omega 3 to support the association.

In the end, however, Birds Eye succeeded in substantiating its claims (independent testing shows that the fish contains an average of 135 milligrams of Omega 3 per 100 grams of fish), and thus the Authority required no action from Birds Eye.

Sainsbury’s is selling an upscale Taste the Difference Fishcakes product under its own label.
Marks & Spencer, meanwhile, offers a variety of new seafood products including packages of 12 semi-peeled Madagascar Prawns for £5.49, and Cod in Butter Sauce sold raw in a boiling bag for £1.99. Cod makes up 57% of the 184-gram product; butter, 4%. The box identifies the source of the cod as Northeast Atlantic waters, but does not state that this fishing ground is sustainable.

At Iceland, a supermarket chain specializing in frozen food, the introductions include 2 Seabass Fillets with Lemon and Parsley Butter and 2 Trout Fillets with herb butter, each £3 for a packet. As is normal with Iceland, the price is in whole pounds (no pence) and is written in large black letters in a conspicuous yellow box on the front of the package. The presentation on the package and in the stores, where posters state prices prominently, emphasizes price as well as healthy and nutritious content.

Meat Product Sales Rebound

Star Captain Birds Eye to Ground Control: These new Space Shapes feature an “out-of-this-world” combination of breaded chicken breast meat, peas and sweet corn. Eight pieces come per 320-gram box, which shoppers can lift off their retail freezer case in exchange for £1.49.

Meat and poultry has undergone a dramatic turnaround in Britain, although growth in value is slower for this category than for the fish sector. In 2006 sales of meat and poultry were in decline, with retail market statistics for December 2006 showing a 3.9% drop in value and a 4.8% decline in volume over 12 months. By December 2007 statistics for the past year reflected a 9.1% advance in value and a 3.4% growth in volume. The increase in value over the year preceding late March 2008 was 6.6%.

Frozen joints of meat designed to go directly into the oven, without first being thawed, were vigorously promoted by Iceland shops in 2007. The Deeside, Flintshire-headquartered retailer is continuing to push cook-from-frozen joints, and by Easter 2008 offered pork, lamb, beef, chicken, and, in a turn to seafood, stuffed salmon as roast joints. The joints are boneless and packaged in an ovenable tray
Prices vary with the meat offerings; a 900-gram beef roast with sea salt and black pepper crust, serving four to six people, cost £7. The stuffed salmon carried the same price. However, a one-kilogram basted pork loin or a one-kilogram stuffed turkey was only £5.

Other companies are addressing the trend. Sainsbury’s has a new British Chicken Breast Joint with a sage and onion stuffing that is boneless, marinated, easy to carve, and priced at £3.99. Text on the front of the box proclaims: “Inspired to . . . roast from frozen.” The back of the pack elaborates on the theme: “Be inspired to cook. Be inspired to roast with our fantastic range of ready to roast joints.”

This reporter did not identify any roast-from-frozen joints from Tesco, but did find Cook from Frozen Minced Lamb (£3.88 for one kilogram) and, in Tesco’s Healthy Living line, Cooks from Frozen Ground Minced Steak (£1.69 for 500 grams).

Lots of Mash for not too much cash is this Cheddar Mashed Potato offering from Iceland. Promoted as a “vegetable side dish,” the 350-gram product retails for £1.

George Foreman Enterprises, in conjunction with Northallerton, North Yorkshire-based Dalepack Foods, launched the George Foreman’s Lean Mean Grillers line in January. It boasts nine innovative products ranging from red meat and chicken to fish [See QFFI’s January 2008 issue, page 56]. The emphasis on packaging and in advertising is on the healthfulness of the Grillers, as the content is low in fat. A package of four Lean Mean Lamb Grillers or four Lean Mean Beef Grillers sells for £2.99 and weighs 520 grams. A variation on the Grillers, Barbecue Salmon Fillets, are £2.99 for two, weighing 200 grams. A full-page advertisement in the Spring 2008 Fresh Ideas magazine published by Sainsbury’s was one of the means of publicity.

Also running a full-page advertisement in Sainsbury’s magazine was Birds Eye. The subject was its Chicken Grills and Chicken Chargrills. The Chargrills are available in a number of flavors including Garlic, Honey Mustard, and Chinese with Szechwan Pepper. The Original Chicken Chargrills are characterized by Birds Eye as “succulent chicken breast, seared, glazed and quick frozen.”

Birds Eye has increased the healthfulness of its shaped chicken pieces favored by children by adding peas and sweetcorn to the recipe. The chopped, marinated and breaded chicken breasts are presented in eight “Space Shapes” resembling stars, moons and rocket ships. The whole is coated in breadcrumbs. Sunflower oil rather than hydrogenated oil is used to precook the product. Its packaging does not state the percentages of chicken, corn, and peas, but does provide percentages of the recommended Guidelines Daily Amount in the product as a whole. A 320-gram box costs £1.49.

In March Morrisons began offering a new low-fat Chicken Tomato and Mozzarella Bake from Birds Eye, which has a calorie count of 400 and contains no artificial colors, flavors or preservatives. In the same line were low-fat Spaghetti Meatballs and Tuna Pasta Bake. They illustrate the emphasis on health in British frozen products overall.

Spuds Top of Frozen Chart

Billed as “Suitable for Vegetarians,” this Margherita variety is new to the Thin Classic range of Goodfella’s Delicia pizza products.

Chicago Town makes an offer hard for some consumers to to refuse: “Big pizza taste, anytime!” This Thin Dish treat, featuring a topping of cheese, tomato and basil pesto, features two 110-gram pizzas per box. The producer is Schwan’s Consumer Brands UK Ltd.

Statistics from Geneva, Switzerland-based market research specialist Food for Thought (www.fft.com) on the combined retail and foodservice sectors indicate that in tonnage, sales of frozen potato products far outranked volume of other classes of frozen food purchased in the United Kingdom during 2006. Potatoes tipped the scales at 1,085,000 tons, accounting for approximately one-third of total sales by weight.

In value they represented only £867 million, less than ice cream, meat, or fish. However, in value growth in the year ending in late March 2008, the sector was second in retail sales only to fish, as potato’s growth rate reached 7.8%.

The British Frozen Food Federation notes that the value growth in potato products is partly a result of inflation, but more importantly a result of McCain Foods’ introduction of new products and its advertising.

Last October, with an eye on boosting sales during the busy Christmas season, McCain introduced roast potatoes basted in goose fat. Subsequently, in early 2008 it launched an advertising campaign for rebranded and repackaged Home Fries, with the slogan: “Chips as chips should be.” The background of the new packaging features a deep shade of blue. Against it are the words “Home Fries” in red, the slogan, and a simplified picture of chips in a black bowl.

In January McCain Foods announced that its Rustic Oven Chips had been voted Product of the Year 2008 in the Home Cooking Category by the independent Consumer Survey of Product Innovation. Approximately 12,000 consumers participated in the balloting.

The packages of skin-on Rustic Oven Chips carry four green lights, one each for: low in fat (3.8 grams), low in saturated fat (0.5 grams), low in sugar (0.8 grams), and low in salt (0.3 grams).

To make them extra nutritious, the chips are cooked with their skins on. A British homemaker told this reporter that she is especially partial to buying frozen beans, broccoli and chips for health reasons.
“Chips?” a third person present during the interview said in surprise.

“Yes,” she matter-of-factly replied. “Tom has a heart problem and must not gain weight. Frozen chips are better for him than potatoes I fry myself.”

At just 99 pence a pop, this offering of 3 Cheese & Tomato Pizzas under the Sainsbury’s store brand is a bargain.

In October 2007 two new packages of frozen potatoes, Extra Crispy Roast Potatoes (£1.69 for 907 grams) and Crinkle Cut Chips (£1.69 for 800 grams) appeared under the Aunt Bessie label, produced by Heinz under license from Tryton Foods, owner of the Aunt Bessie brand. In 2008 Heinz’s publicity stressed that two older favorites, Homestyle Mashed Potatoes and Homestyle Roast Potatoes, had been praised by Delia Smith as “cheat ingredients” for preparing delicious meals.

Aunt Bessie’s inventiveness burst forth in April in a warm treat, “the banger and mash in a cone,” an all-weather alternative to the ice cream cone and thus an answer to 2007’s extremely wet summer. The cone contains heaped-up mashed potato from which a sausage (the “banger”) sticks out like a wafer, and is topped with peas and gravy

Iceland maintains a competitive position in this growth area, as new potato products under its own label were prominently displayed in its frozen food cases during March. They included Criss Cross Fries, Potato Shapes in a southern-fried coating (750 grams for £1) and Cheese and Ham Potato Skins filled with potato, mature Cheddar cheese, Monterey jack cheese, and smoke-flavored ham (260 grams for £1).

Also new at Iceland are Cheddar Mashed Potato, marketed as a vegetable side dish. The contents are mashed potatoes (76%) with mature Cheddar cheese (12%) and diced red onions (4%) with whipping cream from milk, and sunflower oil. The product, which costs £1 for 350 grams, was marked to indicate that it contained no hydrogenated fats, artificial colors, flavors, preservatives, or genetically modified ingredients, and was “Veggie friendly.”

Vegetables, retail sales of which were up 5.8% in value for the past 12 months as of March 2008, are also well represented at Iceland. Among new vegetable side dishes found in the frozen food retail specialist’s shops are Garden Vegetable Mix and Green Vegetable Mix, each 350 grams for £1. On the other hand, McCain has launched Sweet Potato with Rosemary and Garlic to be sold at Sainsbury’s.

The reference price is £1.99 for 400 grams. An unusual item at Tesco’s was Tesco Chargrilled Mediterranean Vegetables, £1.49 for 700 grams.

Pizza Product Launches

Apple & Blackberry Crumble offered by Sainsbury’s Supermarkets in the UK features four servings per 600-gram box. The dessert is ready to serve after 50 minutes of baking.

As of late March 2008, retail pizza sales in the United Kingdom were up 4.7% in value and 6.7% in volume over the past year. Not surprisingly, given the increase, display cabinets are loaded with recent launches.

Goodfella’s from Green Isle Foods in Naas, County Kildare, Ireland, has added a trio of new flavors to its line of single-serve pizzas: Speciale, Chicken and Pesto, and Tuna Melt, the last combining flaked tuna, red onion and garlic dressing with tomato sauce and mozzarella cheese. Meanwhile, Margherita has been added to its Delicia line. The thin, stonebaked pizza is topped with tomato sauce, mozzarella and cheddar cheese. Finally, its Deeply Delicious range now features Pepperoni Perfecto, which combines pepperoni with a spicy tomato sauce and creamy melted mozzarella and cheddar cheese.

For Chicago Town, Schwan’s Consumer Brands has reorganized the individual line, dividing it into Deep Dish and Thin Dish, adding and revising recipes, and enhancing the packaging. The Deep Dish segment has one new product: a Four Cheese Pizza.

Thin Dish has two: Garlic Mushroom; and Cheese, Tomato, and Basil Pesto. The thin pizzas can be baked on a special disc designed for preparation in a microwave oven, or in a conventional oven at 400° F. All the pizzas are made with real cheese and contain no artificial colors, flavors or hydrogenated fat. A package of either Thin Dish or Deep Dish sells for under £2.

Dr. Oetker has introduced Pizza Piccante, featuring hot jalapeño peppers, sweet grilled peppers, and red onions, together with cheese, to its Ristorante line. In January the German company began placing Guideline Daily Allowance (GDA) information on the front of all its packages, either as a single icon or as part of a larger set. This is in addition to nutritional tables on the back of the packages. The GDA is based on a 2000-calorie per day diet.

Among the new private label pizzas is an economy 3 Cheese & Tomato pizza pack offered by Sainsbury’s. The chain’s color-coded nutritional information on the front of the box indicates that the pizzas are good as regards total sugar and salt, but moderate (orange level) in calories, fat in general, and saturated fat. The cost for the 273-gram three-pack is 99 pence.

In what could seem to be a category of its own, the distributor Belfield has introduced ready-to-use frozen herbs produced by the Israeli company Dorot. The line includes garlic, ginger, coriander, basil and mixes popularly used in French, Italian and Mexican dishes.

New to Unilever UK’s Magnum range of ice cream sticks is Mayan Mystica. Featuring milk chocolate accented with delicate spice flavors, three 252-gram bars come per box.

The products, which contain no preservatives, have been chopped and frozen in trays with individual compartments. While preparing a meal, the consumer pops out the number of frozen cubes necessary for a given recipe. A package with 20 units of crushed garlic weighs 2.8 ounces (80 grams) and cost £1.49 at Sainsbury’s.

In desserts, as in other sectors of the market, healthfulness tends to be emphasized. ASDA has introduced a frozen Tropical Smoothie Mix, featuring a blend of mango chunks (31%), pineapple (31%), papaya (31%), and banana (7%). The 500-gram package, which sells for £1 , bears green labels, one of which notes that it is a “source of vitamin C, for your gums.” The other one points out that four tablespoons equal one of the recommended five portions of fruit and vegetables a day.

According to instructions on the package, the product is to be blended with 500 milligrams of fruit juice or simply thawed and used in any recipe. A consumer has posted on the “Good to Know” website a statement that this product is her favorite smoothie mix and that, by blending it with juice, she can make three pints of smoothie for a total cost of only £2.50.

In March ASDA began lobbying for a reduction of the Value Added Tax (VAT) on juices and smoothies composed of 100% fruit. It argues that consumers should not be penalized for making healthy food choices. Currently shoppers pay a 17.5% VAT on juices and smoothies, which are considered in UK regulations to be luxury products. Meanwhile, there is no VAT on such “essential items” as milk shakes, frozen pizzas and chips. ASDA asks that the tax on the fruit products be reduced from 17.5% to 5%.

In Delia’s How to Cheat at Cooking, the author recommends numerous frozen foods by name and brand. Among them are Black Forest Fruits from retailers Sainsbury’s, Tesco, and Waitrose.

Quick Frozen Foods International gave a package of Sainsbury’s fruits – a mix of dark sweet cherries, black grapes, blackberries and blackcurrants – to an English friend who had previously proclaimed that she never purchases frozen foods. After being pleasantly surprised with the quality, the former skeptic declared that the Black Forest Fruits were excellent and that she was intending to buy more. In other words, the challenge on the back of the package, “Try me! ...we’re sure you’ll love this product. If you don’t simply return for a full refund,” is valid.

Three large tablespoons equals one of the five recommended fruits and vegetables a day, the front of the package states, but consumers will not want to stop with three tablespoons.

The article “Jamie’s Cupboard” in Sainsbury’s Spring 2008 edition of Fresh Ideas suggests using food from cupboards in the early spring: “There are some great frozen, tinned, and otherwise preserved foods out there, like beautiful frozen berries . . .” The recipe for a dessert using one 500-gram bag of Sainsbury’s frozen fruit is provided.

New cooked recipes with fruit are also being introduced. One of Sainsbury’s latest frozen products includes an Apple & Blackberry Crumble, described as “Bramley apple and blackberry filling with a butter enriched crumble topping.”

Color-coded health information on the package spells out that the product is in the green zone for salt (0.3 grams, or only 5% of the GDA for women), but in the orange for calories and fat in general, and in the red for saturated fat (6.4 grams or 32% of GDA) and total sugars (26.0 grams or 29% of GDA).

The sweet treat is nonetheless suitable for vegetarians, the package notes by sporting a green leaf graphic on the front, and Sainsbury’s presumably expects the luscious-looking picture of the dessert topped with a dollop of cream to draw attention away from the health-food information, at least for non-dieters.

Marks & Spencer offers a new Apple and Blackberry Pie (545 grams for £1.99). It also has introduced a Strawberry and Raspberry Torte (500 grams for £3.99) and a Lemon and Raspberry Terrine (540 grams for £4.99). The Terrine is composed of layers of creamy Sicilian lemon mousse, raspberries, and West Country cream.

Other new sweets at Marks & Spencer include 12 Mini Cheesecake Brownies, 12 Ecuadorian Chocolate Cups, and 12 Classic Recipe Puff Pastry Mince Pies. For introductory purposes three packages of the individualized sweets were being sold for the price of two.

In the serve-after-defrosting category, Iceland recently introduced a Summer Fruit Panna Cotta (700 grams, eight portions); a Tiramisu dessert, with layers of golden sponge and mascarpone mousse flavored with marsala wine, amaretto, and coffee-flavored syrup (700 grams, eight portions), and a Chocolate Profiterole Mousse (550 grams, eight portions) composed of choux buns filled with cream, covered with chocolate mousse, covered in turn with chocolate sauce and a creamy topping and flakes of dark chocolate. Each costs £3.

Producers are already trying to reignite the ice cream sales that flagged last summer due to bad weather. For the year ending in late March 2008, retail sales of ice cream declined 5.6% in volume and 1.5% in value. The trend needs reversing.

As such, a new Magnum ice cream on a stick from Unilever entered retail frozen food cabinets during March: Mayan Mystica. It features chocolate ice cream coated with milk chocolate (25% cocoa), blended with cinnamon, nutmeg, and honey.

According to the package, Unilever searched “ancient Mayan traditions and the original chocolate recipes known as Liquid Gold to create a magical Magnum chocolate recipe.” The company is backing the Maya Mystica with a £7 million advertising campaign, consisting of luscious TV ads featuring Desperate Housewives star Eva Longoria in a Mayan temple, and advertisements on billboards. The campaign will build on the launch of another Magnum in 2007, Ecuador Dark (vanilla ice cream, coated with dark chocolate [a minimum of 62% cocoa]).

On the healthy side, Tesco has introduced in its Healthy Living line 4 Pomegranate and Blueberry Lollies, a blend of pomegranate juice and blueberry purée on a stick. Each 100-gram serving contains almost no fat and no artificial preservatives, flavors or colors, although it has 19.3 grams of sugar.

Healthy Living is a Tesco club that gives useful tips on diet and exercise. Healthy Living foods belong to many product lines, from soup to yogurt.

A Tesco spokesperson told QFFI: “The factors that have helped to contribute to the growth of our frozen department over the past year include the redevelopment of many core ranges. This ensures we are offering customers the best possible product, at great value, at the right time; accessible ingredient specifications . . . [such as] removing things like MSGs, superfluous salt, artificial flavors, hydrogenated fats.

“Another contributing factor has been the recent TV campaigns by the likes of Delia Smith and Birds Eye that have both gone a long way to reassure customers that frozen foods are a nutritious, convenient, great tasting cooking solution that provides fantastic value for money.”

Along with reports on sales of frozen food, the British Frozen Food Federation is issuing reports on sustainability initiatives in the industry.

In recent months BFFF has met with representatives of a number of organizations and agencies working in the field, including Envirowise and the Carbon Trust. In January, 2008, it held a workshop with the government subsidized non-profit Waste & Resources Action Programme (WRAP) to examine how frozen food producers can reduce packaging and food waste. It has met with the National Industrial Symbiosis Program, which maintains a database of industry waste streams and through using it matches producers with companies that can use this waste.

A BFFF technical committee is forging relationships with scientific and academic bodies with the aim of stimulating research on the industry and sustainability. The Federation would like to see an independent, respected body calculate how much carbon is released in production and preparation of a meal made from scratch, a meal made from frozen foods, and a meal made from chilled foods. “It is incumbent upon us to develop objective, scientific data, whatever the outcome,” said a BFFF spokesman.

One option the Federation is looking into is the possibility of raising the temperature of the supply chain by one, two or three degrees in order to reduce energy consumption. At present European legislation insists that food labeled “quick frozen” be maintained at -18°C, although a temperature of -5° or -6°C is regarded as sufficient for stopping microbial growth and, except for ice cream, a temperature -10° or -12°C is generally low enough to maintain quality. Any change in the legislation would require data and education, and likely could not be put into effect for 10 years. Meanwhile, BFFF believes that companies need to make sure that they are working at appropriate temperature tolerances and not building in excessive safety margins.

Individual firms are working on sustainability in varied ways. Young’s, which received the IGO Environmental Sustainability Award in 2007 for its sustainable fisheries program and other initiatives, aims to reduce packaging by 25% by 2010, and has already begun using a new type of light-weight structural packaging for its frozen salmon fillets.

Tryton Foods (Aunt Bessie’s) has made changes in packaging and vehicle loading that have slashed packaging costs and tonnage of packaging material and have cut the number of road miles a given product travels.

ASDA, which is working to reduce all of its packaging by 25% by the end of this year, is replacing diesel-fueled refrigerators in its trucks with liquid nitrogen fueled units that reduce noise and cut carbon emissions. Tesco is hoping to phase out hydro fluorocarbon (HFC) refrigerants in its stores, and has installed two alternative systems, one based on carbon dioxide and the other on carbon dioxide and hydrocarbons. (HFCs were introduced to replace ozone-depleting chemicals, but are potent greenhouse gases.)

Frozen foods are on the upswing and seem to be on the right track in the UK, and the market can be expected to grow. The industry is working to match its products to the desire for healthful food among consumers, to educate the public about the value of frozen food, and to make itself an integral part of the move to sustainability.consumers, to educate the public about the value of frozen food, and to make itself an integral part of the move to sustainability.