ZEITGEIST: The Organic Debate Heats Up

By Paul Hargreaves

With organic food fortnight coming up, organic food is back in the news as I mentioned briefly in my post at the beginning of August. I notice some more coverage on this in the September Speciality Food Magazine. This debate has been brought about by the fact that organic food sales are falling for the first time since organic appealed to the mass market around 10 years ago.

The decline in sales is clearly due to the public not having as much money in their wallet as they did and switching to non-organic is an easy way to save a few shekels. Some journalists have used the opportunity to wonder whether organic is all it is cracked up to be and doubting the health benefits.

My own personal view on all this is that organic within the baby and children's sector will remain strong. Indeed the tremendous growth of brands such as Ella's Kitchen are testament to this. However, there is a certain amount of sceptism amongst the general public that if the organic message is pushed too hard by the supermarkets they must be getting something extra out of it - i.e. extra profit! But then people are generally sceptical about a lot of things the multiples do - and rightly so. Let's look at organic food within the independent sector.

Through talking to retailers and consumers, I am convinced that if organic is the main message on the packaging of a product, this will not, in our sector, be enough to sell the product. There has got to be another good reason to buy, whether that be provenance, local, a good story or simply a great brand. The fact that the product is organic is then a good additional or secondary reason to buy the product. The yogurt-knitting brigade are not growing as a food-buying group within the UK, but those who care what they eat, and want good quality real food made by real people are. Let's remember them when making our buying decisions.


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