Walmart-owned Asda is using in-store sampling, on-pack advertising and discounts to boost seafood sales through Lent and Easter.
The UK retailer Asda is stepping up marketing of salmon this Lent season after realizing healthy sales last year. The 180-store grocery chain snared a 26.8 percent share of the whole salmon market during last year’s Easter season and whole salmon sales spiked 77 percent in 2014, compared to the 2014 Easter season.
“Easter and Christmas are two key periods for seafood,” Melissa Petty, Asda’s category planning advisor for fish, told SeafoodSource. “Christmas tends to have a focus on ready-to-eat smoked salmon (starter occasion), while Easter focus is more towards whole salmon and fresh salmon, with smoked salmon experiencing signficiant uplifts.”
On 23 March, Asda began a month-long promotion with the Norwegian Seafood Council, promoting Norwegian salmon fillets on-pack, in its Asda magazine and via online communication. Packages of salmon fillets and Young’s salmon fillets feature stickers with the message: “Norwegian salmon from the cold, clear waters of Norway. For recipe ideas, seafoodfromnorway.co.uk.”
Asda is also offering discounts on several salmon products through Lent, including salmon fillets, smoked salmon, breaded fish fillets, cod, smoked mackerel, “Extra Special” coldwater prawns, smoked haddock fillets and select ready-to-eat appetizers.
This year, Asda will once again focus on the profitable Thursday before Easter and Good Friday. “Historically, Good Friday has been an exceptionally strong sales day for chilled seafood, with Christians abstaining from meat on Friday. Also, this combines with the tradition of fish on Friday, culminating in one of the strongest sales days in the seafood calendar,” Petty said.
In fact, seafood sales were up 48 percent on the Thursday before Easter and Good Friday, compared to an average week, according to Petty.
Earlier in the Lenten season, Asda also conducted in-store sampling and provided recipes to push sales of cod. “Norwegian counter cod fillets were used to demonstrate the versatility of seafood and the recipe demonstrated was included in the January Asda magazine,” Petty said.
