Making Borscht Cool Again

Borscht: Nutrischtious, Delischtious, and Sustainable (Image courtesy of Muffet via Flickr)

I read last month in The Wall Street Journal about how the Gold Pure Foods Product Co. is trying to make borscht cool again. For those of you who don’t know what borscht is—it’s a soup you can eat hot or cold made mostly from beets, cabbage, and potatoes.

I took an interest in this as it’s a pretty sustainable food—low on the food chain, filled with vitamins and minerals, adapted to many bioregions of the United States (so possible to grow locally), stores well in the fridge (and can be frozen), and filling but low in calories (so good for helping Americans become thinner).

So, after reading the article, I applied the Transforming Cultures formula to borscht: how would I make borscht cool again? Below are some highlights from a letter I wrote to the Gold family:

On rebuilding the long-term taste for beets:

My key suggestion is to target babies and toddlers with a baby food (e.g. steamed and pureed beats) and a fun children’s borscht. This could be a very strategic move that makes beets and borscht a normal (and fun) part of childhood and will create a customer base for many decades into the future. Borscht purchases are declining in part because fewer families have served it over the past 30 years and now adults do not have the taste for it today. By addressing this with the next generation, you rebuild the long-term viability of your product chain.

Selling a healthy organic baby food could be a natural step in this, as could a well designed kid’s product, complete with a cool cartoon character mascot. I suggested a similar path for the Baby Carrots Farmer Coalition. It is a valuable strategy that has worked for many many brands, from Trix and Nesquik (rabbits), to Lucky Charms (leprechaun) and Keebler (elves), to Cheetos and Frosted Flakes (tigers) plus a long list of other breakfast cereals and kid-targeted foods. At one level I think this is truly manipulative, especially when selling candy or nutrient devoid cereals to kids, but it is not going away any time soon, so the best solution in that case is have healthy foods using this strategy too.

On targeting the Whole Foods crowd:

One new target audience—if not already on your radar—should be the LOHAS demographic (Lifestyles of Health and Sustainability), made up of consumers who think of themselves as such but still typically do not have the time to cook from scratch. Many are still buying toxic, microwavable meals that practically contain more additives and sodium than food (but are branded as healthy). Providing them with a new tasty option that they can feel good about and prepare in a hurry would be a natural expansion of your marketing efforts.

Following this path, it would be important to use organic ingredients whenever possible. As the main target markets would be places like Whole Foods, Yes! Organic markets, and other greener, upscale markets you could sell these at higher prices. (And possibly one way to reduce costs slightly would be to include beet greens in the recipe. They’re very nutritious—and “in” with the foodie crowd—and if they are currently going to waste and could be added cheaply to the recipe, that might offset some of the additional costs by switching to organic.) You could even launch this product without changing your current product line as these would be sold in a different market (and could serve as a good new market experiment).

On targeting a very different audience:

To target a very different audience than the Whole Foods crowd, I could imagine trying to get Borscht the official drink of an ultimate fighter or WWE wrestler. Perhaps with a tag line along the lines of Guinness’ classic slogan: “Borscht for Strength.” While sponsoring this type of fight might be controversial, sponsoring one fighter in this or WWE might be less so and more effective and affordable (especially if you again think long-term and build a relationship with a few fighters that are still young and rising—and thus could be valuable later but could make affordable partners now).

Concluding thoughts:

In decades to come, meat prices will increase significantly as grain becomes more scarce—due to increasing natural disasters and droughts, a growing human population, and inevitable reductions in subsidies for grain production (as government resources contract). And beets will thus once again be recognized as a valuable food. Rebuilding your brand now could help expedite this shift in dietary trends and get people adopting the healthier, more sustainable diet of the future today.

Now go out and make yourself some borscht. Or if you are a time-stressed LOHAS consumer, then I guess go out and buy yourself some pre-made borscht. Better that than a microwaved pizza or TV dinner, no matter how healthy the marketing says they are.