Samenvatting

This research report shows a market research and situation analysis of the ethnic market including several recommendations towards Coroos. This was conducted due to a shift in the population compositions within West-European countries (by the emergence of new ethnic groups) which would possibly effect the overall demand of preserved products. Therefore, the aim of this project was to gain better insights regarding these developments and the current situation of the ethnic market including the potential of preserved vegetables and pulses.

The following information gaps were determined as guidelines of this project:
1. The developments and trends on the ethnic market need to be determined in more detail and research is needed on whether these are expected to continue in the nearby future.
2. Coroos lacks insight on how these typical products reaches the ethnic customer. Therefore more information is required about the stores, retailers, distributors, producers etc., that are involved in the distribution channels.
3. Coroos lacks insights on what possible opportunities are created by these ethnic developments in the West-European market / food industry.

In order to answer these information gap, a combination of desk and field research was conducted. The desk research consisted of a population analysis, in which the current migration situation and the cultural background (of the most occurring/developing ethnic groups) were examined. Further research was conducted on current trends in consumption behavior, distribution channels of brands, multicultural stores, etc. The field research consisted of several data collection methods. This existed of face-to-face interviews with multicultural grocery store owners/managers and people with an ethnic background, phone calls with importers/wholesalers, and several store checks including a store check/product analysis.
Results showed that the large migration to West-European countries has led to an increase of multicultural stores which all offer preserved products. Especially the Mediterranean market is for Coroos interesting due to multiple opportunities which were identified in a SWOT analyses (Please see 3.4)

The following recommendations as follow-up steps of this project were described:
1. Consider the Mediterranean market as the preferred market to enter.
2. Enter the ethnic market by engaging a co-manufacturing partnership with importers and/ or wholesalers like Tema Fine Foods, UnidexBV and/or TOK GmbH.
a. 1st choice: Take over the production of existing brands like Valle Del Sole (UnidexBV)
b. 2nd choice: Launch a new brand with own product range.
3. Enter the ethnic market providing a higher quality of preserved pulses. Starting with chick peas and white beans, in cans of 425/850ml and pots of 570/720ml. This while developing and benchmarking these products with premium brands like Miras.
4. Conduct further research on consumer behavior (by means of a larger sample), revenue data, other West-European countries, and, product characteristics.

By following these recommendations, Coroos will gain a competitive advantage by having more knowledge about the ethnic groups and its buying behavior, by having more collaborations with other distributors/wholesalers within the ethnic market and by having their products distributed to a greater client base. Furthermore, they will have enough data to create a more feasible strategy.