Fresh Tastes Retailer Development Program
2007 program overview
Brisbane Produce Market invites all Queensland independent fresh fruit and vegetable retailers, who are Brismark Credit Service buyers with a storefront, to join the Brisbane Markets Fresh Tastes Retailer Program.
This program is for you if you want:
- A strong independent retailing sector
- Free professional promotional material for your store
- Mystery shopping program including Retailer of the Month and Retailer of the Year Awards
- Confidential feedback on components of your store such as customer service, product knowledge and produce quality from an unbiased source
- Your store listed on www.marketfresh.com.au
- Opportunity to participate in the Fresh Tastes display at the Royal Queensland Show (the Ekka)
- Regular industry and retail sector updates
- Regular newsletters
- Annual in-store consumer competition
- Public relations and media activity
- School partners program
Fresh Tastes is a custom designed program that supports independent fruit and vegetable retailers. The program's main objectives are to reinforce the role of independent retailers and to strengthen the overall industry. Fresh Tastes is designed to provide independent retailers, like you, with information, materials and support to increase sales of fresh fruit and vegetables in your store.
Joining the Fresh Tastes program is FREE and only available to Brismark Credit Service Buyers with a shopfront.
Registered Fresh Tastes retailers are expected to get involved in all promotions.
In this section you will find information about:
Registration
To register your store to be part of the Brisbane Markets Fresh Tastes program, contact the Fresh Tastes team to obtain a registration form. Contact the Fresh Tastes team on telephone 07 3379 1062 or visit us from 7.00am in the BML Marketing and Communications Office, Ground Floor, Brisbane Markets Commercial Centre, Sherwood Road.
Once registered you will receive a free registration kit, which contains a supply of Fresh Tastes brochures, a Fresh Tastes apron, brochure holders, a set of posters and information about the program.
If you require any further information about the program, please contact the Fresh Tastes team on 07 3379 1062.
Point - of - Sale materials
As part of the Fresh Tastes program, Brisbane Markets has produced a series of brochures and seasonality guides.
The brochures are designed to encourage your customers to buy more fresh produce. They feature easy recipes demonstrating the simple preparations required to turn fresh produce into a healthy meal. Remind your customers just how easy, quick and simple it is to ‘Create Fresh Tastes' using these brochures and seasonality guides.
The following materials are available exclusively to Fresh Tastes retailers. Click here to down load a sample of these materials.
- Eating Well with Low GI recipe brochure
- Kids Snacks and Lunches recipe brochure
- Healthy Kids and Growing Bodies recipe brochure
- Low Fat Lifestyles and Healthy Hearts recipe brochure
- High Energy and Sports Performance recipe brochure
- Women's Health and Well-being recipe brochure
- Seasonal Fruit Guide
- Seasonal Vegetable Guide
- Asian Vegetable and Herb Guide
- Tropical and Exotic Fruit Guide
A selection of these brochures are included with your Fresh Tastes registration kit when you register for the program. When you run out, just drop in to the Brisbane Market's Marketing and Communications Office to pick up more.
Brisbane Markets is regularly contacted by various industry and commodity specific organisations, such as Horticulture Australia, to assist with the distribution of promotional materials. Fresh Tastes retailers are allocated these materials on a priority basis through the Brismark Credit Service.
As well as brochures, your registration kit will also contain two Perspex brochure holders, a set of Brisbane Markets posters and a Fresh Tastes apron.
Extra Fresh Tastes Aprons are available for purchase. If you would like to buy more aprons, they can be purchased from the Brismark Credit Service at a cost of $22 per apron (GST inclusive).
If you need extra brochure holders for your store, please contact the Fresh Tastes team for further information.
Freshen up your store
Remember strong point-of-sale prompts sales
The Royal Queensland Show (Ekka)
Brisbane Markets has been a major sponsor of the Royal Queensland Show (the ‘Ekka') for many years. This sponsorship provides benefits such as naming rights to the Hall (i.e. Brisbane Markets Agricultural Hall), signage, and access to display areas.
The Ekka is Queensland's largest annual event. Between 500,000 and 600,000 visitors attend the Show each year. The Ekka is a family-oriented event and attendees are predominantly residents of South-East Queensland, with only 15% of attendees residing in rural and regional Queensland, interstate or overseas. Approximately 50% of Ekka visitors surveyed last year said that they had visited the fruit and vegetable displays in the Brisbane Markets Agricultural Hall.
Brisbane Markets holds two display areas within the Brisbane Markets Agricultural Hall. The first area is adult focused and promotes fresh fruit and vegetables, the Fresh Tastes program and Fresh Tastes retailers. The second area is child focused and promotes the Brisbane Markets Queensland Kids Fresh Net (QKFN) program and healthy eating for children.
The Fresh Tastes cooking demonstrations and taste testing have traditionally been a popular display within the Brisbane Markets Agricultural Hall. Visitors are attracted to sessions run by 'real' fruit and vegetable industry people, particularly if the session is run by a retailer that the visitor identifies as their 'local'.
The Fresh Tastes retailers who have participated in the Ekka promotion have found it to be a worthwhile experience, which successfully promoted their business and independent fresh fruit and vegetable retailers.
Fresh Tastes retailers who support EKKA will earn additional points towards the Retailer of the Year Award. For further information about the Fresh Tastes Ekka display, pelase contact the Fresh Tastes team on 07 3379 1062.
School partners program
The Brisbane Markets Queensland Kids Fresh Net (QKFN) program operates with the goal of improving the health and well being of Queensland's youth by increasing the consumption of fruit & vegetables. This is achieved by educating children, their teachers, parents and tuckshop coordinators.
All components of this highly successful school-based healthy eating program are provided free of charge to over 650 Queensland primary schools. Activities include school visits (which educate school children about the benefits of eating fresh fruit and vegetables) a tuckshop campaign (whereby children are given incentives each time they purchase an item containing fresh fruit and vegetables from the tuckshop), provision of posters and recipe brochures, the Fresh For Kids website, a colourful and informative newsletter called Canteen Fresh for Tuckshops to encourage the use of fruit and vegetables at the canteen, and tours of the Brisbane Produce Market.
As a registered Fresh Tastes retailer, we ask for your commitment of support and your willingness to assist with the QKFN program.
Fresh Tastes retailers who actively support the QKFN program will earn additional points towards the Retailer of the Year Award.
Many retailers are already strong supporters of their local communities and schools. Fresh Tastes retailers are encouraged to develop partnership relationships with their local schools that will benefit both parties. Partnership activities may include:
- Tuckshop supply
- Providing expertise about how to select, store, handle and present fresh produce
- Donating product for fundraising activities (such as fruit drives or the school fete)
- Fruit and vegetable co-operatives for members of the school community
- Discounts for the school community
- Hosting school groups at your store (to teach students about fruit and vegetables)
- Attending QKFN school visits with Brisbane Markets staff
- Opportunities to promote your store in the school newsletter (such as special advertisements in the school newsletter once a week in return for a weekly comment on "What's In Season")
- Advertising in school publications
- Sponsorship of sporting teams
- Organising and/or judging a competition (with Fresh Tastes staff support where necessary), such as food art or recipe design
- Displaying student's work in your store or on your website
Fresh Tastes newsletter
As a Fresh Tastes retailer you will be sent a monthly newsletters to keep you up-to-date on all aspects of the program and issues of importance to the retailing sector. The newsletter also features Retailer of the Month and Certificate of Excellent winners. It highlights upcoming competition and events, industry issues such as County of Origin labeling, retailing tips, seasonality, supply/demand changes, special events at the Markets and major industry news.
The Fresh Tastes team will be continually working to expand and improve the program, keep an eye on the Fresh Tastes newsletter to keep up-to-date with what is new.
Annual consumer competition
Each year Brisbane Markets organises an in-store competition for Fresh Tastes Retailers to run in their stores. The competition gives customers the opportunity to win $1,000 worth of fresh fruit and vegetables and other prizes by shopping at their local Fresh Tastes store. The in-store promotion gives Fresh Tastes Retailers the opportunity to reward existing customers for their loyalty and introduce new customers to the benefits of shopping at independent fruit and vegetable stores.
Stores are supplied with posters, entry forms and entry boxes for shoppers to submit their completed form and Brisbane Markets provides the winning store with $1,000 which it then uses to set up a prepaid account for the lucky winner.
Internet marketing
The Market Fresh website is an excellent tool for Fresh Tastes retailers. The site can be used as a training resource for staff, a useful source of information and recipe ideas for customers, and an effective advertising tool for retailers.
All Fresh Tastes retailers will be listed on the Queensland retailer's page.
Public relations and media activity
Throughout the year, Brisbane Markets will focus on maximising the promotion of Fresh Tastes retailers through public relations activity and the promotion of Fresh Tastes retailers via the Brisbane Markets website and the distribution of a promotional flyer at special events such as Ekka.
Retailer of the Month Award
The Fresh Tastes Retailer of the Month Award rewards excellence in fresh produce retailing. The award is recognised widely by industry and attracts significant public and media interest.
Registered Fresh Tastes stores are independently mystery shopped twice a year and rated against a standard set of criteria that includes customer service, produce quality, freshness, quality of displays, cleanliness and store layout.
A Retailer of the Month award is announced each month along with Certificates of Excellence for high achieving stores. Retailers of the Month will receive a trophy to display in their store, $1,000 to spend on promoting their store and a press release announcing the win is released to the store's local media outlet.
The Retailer of the Month and the Certificate of Excellence winners are also featured in the Fresh Tastes newsletter, on the Brisbane Markets website, in the Brismark Credit Service window display and in the Brisbane Markets Fresh Source magazine
An independent research company does the mystery shopping on behalf of Brisbane Markets. The mystery shopper's report and an explanatory letter are provided confidentially to each store shopped as a form of constructive feedback. Each store only receives their own results. Stores do not know which other stores were shopped in the same month or what their individual ranking is.
Reports from the shoppers are used to select Retailers of the Month and ultimately the Fresh Tastes Retailer of the Year, which is announced in March at the Brisbane Markets Gala Dinner.
Retailer of the Year Award
The Brisbane Markets Fresh Tastes Retailer of the Year Award is presented to a retailer who consistently achieves at the highest level, operates a store that is appropriate to the needs of their locality and is held in high standing within the industry. Innovation and contribution to the development of the fresh produce industry is also taken into consideration.
After the second round of mystery shopping concludes in November, all eligible Fresh Tastes retailers are ranked using the average of their scores from round one and round two mystery shopping.
Additional points are awarded for active participation in the program, for example retailers will gain extra points for attending Ekka and supporting the Queensland Kids Fresh Net (QKFN) program.
The top stores are selected as the finalists for the year. The finalists are each shopped twice more in January to determine the overall winner of the Retailer of the Year Award. The same mystery shoppers will be used to mystery shop the finalists to ensure consistency.
The highest scoring store is then awarded Retailer of the Year.
The winner is announced at the Brisbane Markets Gala Dinner in March. The Brisbane Markets Retailer of the Year receives the perpetual trophy to keep in their store for a year, a $5,000 promotional prize package to spend on promoting their store and a press release announcing the win is released to the media.
The Retailer of the Year is also featured in the Fresh Tastes newsletter, on the Brisbane Markets website, in the Brismark Credit Service window display, in the Brisbane Markets Fresh Source magazine and announced on the Brisbane Markets display board.
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