May 20, 2010

Aeon Group, a large Japanese retailer, hosted a three-week promotion in partnership with USMEF that resulted in the sale of more than 2.6 million pounds of American pork.

The group includes nationwide and regional supermarkets Aeon Retail, Mycal, Max Valu, Daiei and Inageya, that partnered with the US Meat Export Federation (USMEF) for three weeks between late March and early April on a spring pork promotion at Aeon's 1,600 retail outlets. The promotion was developed with support from the Pork Checkoff and USDA Market Access Program (MAP) funds.

To support this multifaceted "Aeon Loves U.S. Pork" programme, USMEF-Japan organised a promotional partnership with Nihon Shokken, a sauce and seasoning manufacturer, to develop a new barbecue sauce to package with US pork back ribs - the newest pork cut to be introduced to Japan.

USMEF prepared a seminar, funded by the Minnesota Soybean Research & Promotion Council, to provide consumers with information on the nutrition and safety of US pork.

Aeon provided its customers with a choice of both uncooked and cooked (ready-to-eat) back ribs.

The group expected to increase US pork sales by 5% over the previous year but made sale returns that jumped up to 48%.

"The sales results were much better than we expected. We appreciate USMEF's great support. The US pork sales totals during the promotion period were the largest ever. The sale of the new item, the back rib, was successful too," said Michihisa Murakami, group buyer for Aeon Global.

The Aeon stores promoted a variety of US pork cuts during the campaign, including pork loin, tender loin, CT butt, belly, jowl meat, spare ribs and back ribs. Pork loins were a major hit for Aeon. Promoted as pork steaks (tonteki), the loins alone accounted for 1.2 million pounds of sales, up 34% from last year.