July 6, 2010
FMCG
The Big Apple
Originally published in NZ Marketing March-April 2010, page 6
Cider, with its green plastic bottles and made-from-concentrate connotations, has always been seen as a fairly low-rent and, for most male drinkers, slightly effeminate beverage in New Zealand.
Cider rules: Russell Browne says sales of Monteith’s cider have “far exceeded what we anticipated”.
But this summer has been something of a watershed for the cider category, with 131,513 more litres sold in December 2009 than the year previous, a stonking 139 percent increase.
Monteith’s marketing manager Russell Browne says its crushed apple cider, which was released in September and is not made from concentrate, is now the most popular cider on the market with nearly 30 percent of the total category.
“It’s far exceeded what we anticipated. We thought we’d sell about 7,000 hecta-litres [by September 2010],” Browne says. “But we’re going to end up on 12,000. So it’s been huge.” And it’s also been selling very well in Australia, which Browne says is “slightly ahead of New Zealand” in terms of its cider-drinking culture. Initial predictions were for exports of 2,000 hecta-litres, but that’s now been revised to 4,000–5,000 hecta-litres.
Browne puts the growth spurt in New Zealand down to the fact that a couple of reputable brands, Monteith’s and Mac’s, which released its made-from-concentrate Isaac’s Cider in November, have given the category an image overhaul. Putting the crushed apple cider in glass bottles has given it more credibility (Magners did the same in the UK a few years back) and it found most favour with 25–40-year-old males and females, and particularly those from the South Island, who took to it faster.
The marketing spend for the launch of Monteith’s new product was around $300,000, which Browne says is very reasonable, especially as it’s taken just a few months to go from nothing to equal footing with Monteith’s pilsner. Of course, the brewery has had to invest a lot more in storage capacity to hold the brew, but in terms of profitability he says it is broadly in line with its other products and is a “great addition to the stable”.