A recap of the Bellavita and WorldFood Warsaw trade fairs.
Who makes better products, Polish or Italians?
Who will sell faster and more?
These are some of the questions that popped into our minds during this year’s edition of Bellavita, where we were the Judges of Excellence. Gauging the chances of Italian companies entering the Polish market and advising them how to do it best, we’ve also decided to visit the WorlFood Warsaw hall hosting mostly Polish exhibitors.
The main conclusions from the trade fair are the following.
Italian companies pay more attention to the flavour experience. They possess the advantage based on tradition, perfected recipes, and a higher competitiveness inside the niche. This makes their products in the same category have distinctly different, independent ideas behind them. They offer experiences that make them stand out among each other. On the other hand, marketing and its message are not so great. Italian companies clearly name and promote their product in a manner mostly understood by people familiar with their language and culture. This makes it difficult for a regular customer to familiarize with them properly. A customer doesn’t really understand why should he give the product a chance.
Polish businesses, on the other hand, focus more on riding trends, marketing, and availability. They make it much easier for a consumer to understand the offer and its advantages. That said, it’s often the case that competing products project a very similar marketing message. This can make you lose interest in trying them after you visit a couple of booths. If, however, you want to dig deeper and learn why you should buy the particular product, it may be difficult to elicit the information from the seller.
If you ask “which product is your favourite?, or which is the best, in your opinion?”, you’ll often hear “they’re all great and top quality”. This makes the offer and seller lose credibility. It’s also harder to break through in the market and make sales. It’s way better to have a single leading product and a number of complementary ones. It’s easier to sell someone on one product that on all of them.
Going back to the initial questions, it’s difficult to provide clear-cut answers. Italian products may be slightly better, although combining the best of both worlds would be the perfect scenario.
Being the Judge of Excellence is a sheer pleasure involving getting to know new people, flavours, ideas, and worldviews. All this while solving problems and showing the way.
This year we got to know a couple of interesting businesses from other parts of the globe. These include A.Tosh and Sons, Doshirak, Arolive, and many others. Dive into our wonderful adventure by browsing the photo gallery below.
See you next year,
Sulma & Sulma
#KeepGivingBack
PS. Special shout out goes to Kacper Sulma for his great support. 🙂
