A burst of creative tea and coffee concepts in the Asia Pacific region has led to the creation of a separate channel within Fonterra’s global foodservice business. Beverage House will provide Anchor Food Professionals products to the growing number of coffee houses, beverage kiosks and dessert bars around the world, and will supply the ever-increasing market of quirky food trends.
“In Asia, consumers are moving from traditional ‘straight’ brews to drinks with dairy, as they look for a more indulgent way to enjoy their daily fix of coffee or tea,” said Susan Cassidy, general manager marketing for Global Foodservice.
One such trend in the cream cheese tea macchiato – green tea topped with a mix of cream, cream cheese and salt.
“This trend was really driven by youth and took off, with people queuing for hours to get the latest creation from their favourite tea house,” said Cassidy. “We moved quickly and as a result the tea macchiato alone grew the volume of our cream and cream cheese sales by 47 percent in the first half of the 2017/18 financial year.”
Beverage House has sold 30,000 metric tonnes of cream cheese so far this year – enough to make 400 million tea macchiatos. The unit has mainly been focussed on China, but the potential growth in other markets is huge, according to Cassidy.
“Having a standalone channel within our Foodservice business means we can be more targeted with the service we offer our beverage customers and gain a better understanding of changing consumer tastes and trends.”
