Seafood products continue to be very important in the Spanish shopping cart, representing 11 percent of the total expense in the shopping cart and being the second most important group in value.
Seafood products “make up as a whole 11 percent of the annual expense that consumers make in their shopping cart for products such as food, cleaning, cosmetic, and hygiene,” Roberto Butragueño, Client Business Partner and Distribution Expert for the information and measurement company Nielsen, told SeafoodSource. He also noted “a certain transfer in the last four years, where fresh fish is losing something of its weight, although it continues to be the most important item making up 7 percent of the expense; in comparison to canned (2.1 percent) and frozen (1.6 percent) products, both gaining market share.”
Regarding consumption of seafood products in Spain, Butragueño said that in the last year the three types of products “have suffered falls of sales in volume, though less than other products of the sector like meat, fruits and vegetables.” Nevertheless, he said, 2014 got off to a good start and “there are some signs of recovery symptoms of sales in the segments of fresh fish and canned products, but it is not replicated in frozen seafood products.”
Regarding the seafood market´s future in Spain, Butragueño pointed out some key needs, like working in research, development and innovation to launch new formats and presentations. These new ideas, he said, would need to solve the demands of consumers according to their convenience and making easier the consumption of seafood products, especially for children, and the diversification of species, among others.
The retailer is the most important commercialization channel for fresh fish in Spain, as Roberto Butragueño explained, though big surfaces like hypermarkets and supermarkets are getting an impulse and they are gaining an important role progressively.
Butragueño was a speaker in the AECOC’s conference of seafood’s commercialization, where the market of seafood was analyzed in depth. Representatives of the canned sector such as Jorge Arrizabalaga took part, as well as marketing manager of the canned seafood group Garavilla, who highlighted some aspects of their strategy of innovation.
The AECOC conference also addressed the key points for the retail sale of seafood. Carles Galve Farré, president of Catalonian Peixaters's union explained how to be a good fishmonger and how to increase the sales and image of such healthy products. Internationalization was another key point for the Spanish sector. According to Butragueño, This is an action that usually "is tremendously positive" to the Spanish companies, because "it allows diversifying the risks of the Spanish market affected by very low paces of growth due to crisis.”
