After years of selling fish to wholesalers and retailers, Zurich, Switzerland-headquartered tilapia farming firm Regal Springs is expanding into direct-to-consumer sales.
“We have very strong foundations, and that’s recognized in our trade equity,” Head of Marketing and Business Development Vernon Bradley told SeafoodSource at Seafood Expo North America (SENA), held 15-18 March in Boston, U.S.A. “What we don’t have a lot of is consumer equity.”
The expansion from business to business (B2B) sales into business to consumer (B2C) sales was inspired by the company’s desire to introduce consumers to the brand on its own terms.
“When we go to retailers, when we go to wholesalers, everybody knows Regal Springs,” he said. But “when you are a B2B supplier, you have less control of your outcomes.”
Regal Springs provides two thirds of the tilapia that is sold under the Kirkland brand at Costo in the U.S., and is a supplier of a number of other major retailers. Because Regal Springs currently sells most of its product under other company’s branding, however, consumers don’t recognize the company or, its leadership says, what sets it apart from other tilapia producers.
Founded in 1988 by former U.N. aid worker Rudi Lamprecht, the company has been sustainable from the beginning. Lamprecht’s goal in starting the company was to help an impoverished lakeside community in Java, Indonesia, build wealth and employment opportunities while producing a healthy, sustainable protein, CEO Alois Hofbauer said at SENA. Lamprecht took “doing well by doing good” as his motto, and the phrase remains the firm’s guiding principle to this day...
