BEEF marketing experts have identified four key themes from consumer insight research to drive demand on home soil.
While close to three quarters of Australian beef production is exported, domestic consumers make up the largest single market for the industry.
Campaigns from big research and marketing body, Meat & Livestock Australia, have centered on these four concepts throughout the year.
MLA's general manager of marketing and insights Nathan Low provided an overview of the trends, and how they were being applied to beef marketing, at the organisation's annual conference sessions, held as virtual webinars this year.
They are:
The battle of midweek: It's competitive to get into the consumer shopping basket, Mr Low said. A total of 85 per cent of meal occasions happened midweek. Presenting red meat as a key ingredient in easy and good value recipes was key to leveraging this theme.
For the love of meat: Red meat holds the emotional and nostalgic high ground of trusted quality, flavour and 'specialness', Mr Low said. That was one of the main reasons consumers were willing to pay more for beef and lamb.
"Our iconic summer lamb campaign is an answer to this insight," he said.
The 2021 summer lamb promotion generated a 17pc uplift in retail sales.
"What we do in the food service space through our rare medium program, which aims to educate and inspire a new wave of confident red meat food service operators, also speaks to this insight - it's about ensuring our product is showcased at its absolute best in this channel," Mr Low said.
The evolving Australian: This is about the changing lifestyle, eating and living habits of younger generations. It's particularly relevant to lamb as much of the younger generation is far less familiar with eating and cooking lamb, Mr Low said. Only 56pc of under 30s buy lamb compared to 88pc of couples over 60. To this end, MLA this year launched the New Lamb Occasions campaign.
Healthy for You: Chicken and seafood is increasingly perceived as a healthy choice compared to red meat, insights show. As many as 27pc of red meat reducers are doing so for health reasons, Mr Low reported. MLA's winter beef activity this year during the Olympics was all about healthy beef meals.
MLA's domestic marketing manager Graeme Yarding said health and wellbeing was an increasingly important consideration for most consumers, one that had intensified in the past two years on the back of the pandemic.
"There is a lot of noise around healthy eating," he said.
"The rise of social media has fostered so much debate and content around what constitutes healthy eating. Some is well researched, some just opinion.
"This has left consumers confused. People aren't really sure what healthy eating means. There are a lot of fad diets and claims being made."
That's why it is so important beef has a voice in the health space.
MLA was an official partner for the Australian Olympic and Paralympic team in Japan this year, which Mr Yardy said provided a platform for scale in delivering beef's health message.
The program through the games period reached 18 million Australians.
In consumer surveys post the campaign, there was a significant lift in the number of people responding that beef is part of a healthy lifestyle and makes a healthy meal.
"That's a metric that has proven very difficult to push in the right direction in recent times," Mr Yardy said.
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