Achim Eichenlaub is the CEO of Singapore-based Regal Springs Group, which produces premium tilapia at farms in Mexico, Honduras, and Indonesia. SeafoodSource interviewed Eichenlaub on 26 April at the 2018 Seafood Expo Global in Brussels, Belgium.
SeafoodSource: How would you describe your company’s performance and progress in 2017?
Eichenlaub: It was a good year, in which we were busy putting in place the pieces that will drive our growth in the future. We are more than halfway through a transformation of our executive team. We have a new COO, a new CSR head, a new head of global farming, a new general manager in the U.S., and we recently hired Petra Weigl as general manager of sales in Europe. Together, we have put together a five-year plan that will prepare us for more global expansion and steeper growth in the future.
Generally speaking, I think the biggest achievement or change we have done this year, as part of that company-wide transformation, is moving from having a supply-oriented mentality focusing on farming and production to a business that is more customer and consumer focused in the retail and foodservice channels. This is the underlying philosophy behind our commercial team-building and what we plan will guide the expansion of our product portfolio.
One other major thing that has happened in the last 12 months is the preparation of our new global sustainability program. We haven’t launched it yet – that will happen in June 2018 – but it builds on the community program that we’ve had in place for a long time. That program has always been very strong, but now we want to go beyond that further and on to the production and product parts of the business as well. So it has been quite an exciting journey in the last 18 months.
SeafoodSource: How has Regal Springs’ 2018 been so far and how does the remainder of the year project?
Eichenlaub: Our business has grown in the first quarter and will grow close to 20 percent in the second half of this year.
Regarding our grow-out rates, we’ve proceeded carefully because we wanted to make sure our processes deliver the quality that we have set for our premium tilapia standards. We are now putting a focus into enabling ourselves to grow out the fish much faster. Production-wise, by the end of the year we expect to be up 20 percent in total production to 100,000 metric tons.
On the product side, we’ll launch our first new ready-to-eat products in the second half of this year.
SeafoodSource: Tilapia’s international reputation seems to have suffered over the past year. Can you comment on that and how it affects Regal Springs?
Eichenlaub: Tilapia in the generic sense has taken a beating lately, mostly in the U.S., fresh wasn’t impacted at all only to some extent frozen. And that effect mostly happened in the cheap sector, while the premium sector held up remarkably well. Internationally, the species is doing well. We have a 40 percent volume market share in fresh in the U.S., and there is good confidence now in that part of the market. From what we have seen, a number of retailers and also foodservice companies have been trying to get out of buying Chinese [product], and are moving more to premium.
Personally, I believe that tilapia is much better off in the marketplace as a result of concerns about antibiotics. And I would say we are worry-free on this front, as it helps that we do not use any antibiotics at all in the farming of our premium tilapia.
SeafoodSource: How is the current market for Regal Springs Tilapia in the U.S.?
Eichenlaub: There have been some changes in the market, especially in regard to pricing and availability. We have seen increased demand, and also entered new channels such as home delivery. Our tilapia is now being featured in meal kits from Blue Apron, Hello Fresh [and other] home delivery service providers in the U.S. There we are doing really well.
SeafoodSource: How about Europe?
Eichenlaub: Tilapia has never been big in Europe, and so we are on a journey to reinvent tilapia in Europe. Over the last three to four months, we’ve seen increasing demand for our product, which might have to do with the fact that pangasius seems to be underperforming, and is not quite as available as it was in the past. Tilapia has become more attractive from that point of view, and I think the primary reason it suffered in Europe in past was that it was not available in retail or in restaurants. We want to change that and also put some education behind it, so consumers know what a tilapia is and what kind of benefits it has.
We have been investing in researching consumer interest there and we expect to develop some outputs from that into our organization as a result of that research. We are doing our homework by researching what consumers are expecting from our products – that’s not necessarily different than what we were already doing. But initially, the early signs are that we’re seeing that claims we’re making on our packaging could be slightly different in the E.U. to improve our impact on the customer. In the U.S., origin is important, while in Europe, we’re seeing sustainability and health is a big draw. So in Europe, we’re looking at highlighting things like the vitamin D content of our fish, and the fact that our tilapia is a high-protein, low-fat food, which is on trend and we think we can benefit from that.
There are other key differences between the U.S. and Europe that we are exploring. The U.S. wants bigger fish, while Europe is looking ideally for a 135-gram fish. There are also different perspectives on fresh and frozen which we take into account.
SeafoodSource: How are your other markets?
Eichenlaub: I would consider ourselves a market leader in Mexico. We launched our own brand in Mexico this year, and we’re still expanding it. We’ve enlarged our channels, in Mexico and the U.S. as well, and we’re now seeing the results of that. The Mexican market is very dynamic – it’s growing by double digits, and we are growing there ahead of that.
In Indonesia, we hired our own salesperson there last year and we’re working on launch our own brand into retail in July. We’re following the same blueprint as we did in Mexico but obviously adjusted to what’s needed in Indonesia, which mainly has to do with adjusting sizing and pricing. It’s a very big country of some 262 million people and it’s growing very fast, and there’s no real frozen tilapia available there. So it’s a larger opportunity, and we want to use our home advantage and make it happen.
And lastly, believe it or not, we’re selling tilapia in China, with a premium positioning. We have serious interest from the foodservice sector as well. Food safety has become an increasingly big factor in China. Even though it’s early days for us there, I think we’re positioned well.
