The Groupement Europeen des Producteurs de Champignons (GEPC) has made a successful application to the European Union, to fund a marketing campaign promoting the attributes of mushrooms to consumers within the EU market.
Subject to closing out the application in the coming weeks, this grant will represent the single largest award for the promotion of any fruit and veg within the EU over the next 3 years. This is a tremendous endorsement of the health and sustainable attributes of our small but highly progressive sector.
Background and participating countries
“Under the auspices of the GEPC and mushrooms growers’ organisations from Belgium, Spain, France, Germany, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands and Poland, we came together in early 2022 to work collectively and submit via the GEPC Promo association a 3-year mushroom promotion campaign to the 2022 EU call for agricultural products”, said Paul Wilson, the new President of GEPC last week. The budget for this project is €5,000,000 in total over the 3 years. Under the terms of the call, approved campaigns are co-funded on an 80:20 basis, with the industry providing 20% of the expenditure and the European Union providing the remaining 80%.
Next steps
After consultation with the GEPC representatives and the participating countries, it was agreed that the optimal way to administer the mushroom sector contribution of €1,000,000, was through a levy on Agaricus spawn sales. It is proposed to start collecting the levy of €0.04/litre on spawn sales commencing 31st of October 2022. Wilson: “In conclusion, we believe this is a unique opportunity for the sector to work together, to grow the market for mushrooms, to the benefit of the entire European mushroom sector!
On behalf of the Board and all participating countries, I would like to take the opportunity to thank you for your support and look forward to working together over the coming 3 years as we promote mushrooms to a wider audience.”
The campaign in short
The main message for the campaign is ‘Mushrooms fresh from Europe’. The campaign is intended to develop the market with the objective to raise awareness of the health benefits and sustainability of European fresh mushrooms, to achieve a positive buying attitude, leading to consumption growth and therefore more sales in the proposed target markets.
The campaign focuses on the communication mainly towards the younger consumer,
Millennials 26-41 years, who are the most recent newcomers on the market with own households. Younger people consume less mushrooms, but are strongly interested in less meat, meat replacements, healthy, sustainable, and vegan products. The promotional strategy is divided into an awareness campaign and an economic strategy to increase sales.
The main activities of this 3-year promotional – mainly – B2C-campaign in short:
▪ Online with an overall European promotional website, social media and strategic advertising.
▪ Public relations focusing on influence marketing and media partnerships towards millennials and trade media.
▪ Remarkable media and influencer events to highlight the benefits of mushrooms.
▪ Communication tools with a digital toolbox and video content to spread on all channels.
Foto paddenstoelen Champignondagen
