Teach your customers how to cook it and they will buy it!!!!!
We are doing interactive demos now. Not just a plate of food for you to grab but actually cooking it and showing you how it is done before you eat This weekend we will be doing stir fry. Everything you need for it will be in a bunker next to the demo with the demo guy actually telling you how to stir fry as he does it and then serving the food after he makes it
I also did a carving for the holiday. Made a couple of whole beef ribs one weekend and carved them up, served them on our fresh baked bread
I KNOW EVERYONE OF YOU JUST HAD A HEART ATTACK!!!
"A WHOLE BEEF RIB??? ARE YOU NUTS????"
Well that little demo resulted in my shop getting well over 400 orders for Christmas alone We did 50k in 2 days because of it
Time to think outside the box people
We need to educate the consumer!!!
If you do they keep coming back
__________________
Joe Parajecki
Operations Manager/ Partner
Kettle Range Meat Company, Milwaukee WI
Member Meat Cutter Hall of Fame and The Butcher's Guild
We have a butcher when introducing a new value added line as well as highlighting the product and having it in the window hotspot gives customers he thinks would buy the product a sample to take home. He has had great success in launching new products as the sales do follow as Big Beef says in his comments. Consumers tend to be wary of new products therefore by sampling or giving them one free to take home and cook [it also makes them feel special] the results follow.
We have scheduled and impromptu cooking classes that both demonstrate and educate for about 7 years. We show different cooking techniques for a broad range of product (generally cross merchandising with as many depts as possible) as well as informing the attendee exactly where and by what method the animal was raised etc. 90% of our beef, pork, lamb and poultry is locally raised and I've met and know the rancher/farmer personally. We ask them to come and do demos whenever possible...I'm currently trying to get administration to back me on developing signature products from local providers. I hope they listen. It's a great opportunity.