In another successful Food & Beverage Exporters Forum last Monday, Export Connect offered access to a panel of experienced Australian food & beverage exporters and an international buyer. Discussion covered a range of markets including Sri Lanka, North America, China and the Middle East; and also explored building an export community.

Panelists were: Mr Lalith Withana | SriLankan Airlines & SriLankan Catering; Nicholas Simms | Chief Executive Officer, Bubs Australia; Rob Eustace | Business Development Manager Export – Macadamias & Ginger, Buderim Group; Jackie Barnes | Export Sales Manager, Brookfarm; and Emma Greenhatch | General Manager, Food & Agribusiness Network. 

In this piece, we hear from Jackie Barnes on lessons learned from exporting to the Middle East.

“As far as the supermarkets go, they’re very much similar to here. But, what I did notice was very UK and European orientated. And they also do have a lot of gluten-free, free-from products, that are highly manufactured – whereas ours is much more of a natural product.

It’s just about getting our message across as well. Our USPs and why we are different to other products. Being from Australia, everything’s made in our factory. We don’t compromise on quality – and things like that.

Even still, price-wise we are limited in the market. Therefore, we need to look at other different avenues like food service, airline menus.”

If you liked these insights and you’d like to see more, reach out! And be sure to check back in for more snippets to learn more about every aspect of selecting the right market, connecting with buyers and growth strategies.

This forum was delivered in collaboration with Fine Food Australia, Export Council of Australia and Food Bank Victoria, on 10 September 2018 in Melbourne at Fine Food Australia. Photo by Hasan Almasi on Unsplash