Retailer Expansion Offers New Opportunities for U.S. Beef in Taiwan
USMEF partnered with Taiwanese importer Yu-Ho Foods on a retail seminar about U.S. beef for Yu-Ho and its retail customer PX Mart. The retailer, already Taiwan’s largest supermarket chain with 1,200 outlets, had recently purchased a 20-outlet hypermart chain and expressed interest to Yu-Ho in seeing a wider range of U.S. beef items to consider for both chains.
USMEF conducted a technical seminar for the fresh foods department staff of PX Mart and Yu-Ho Foods at Yu-Ho’s headquarters. The first half of the seminar included an industry overview about U.S. production, grading standards and the quality characteristics of U.S. beef. USMEF Senior Marketing Manager Alex Sun and Kevin Ho, sales manager of Yu-Ho Foods, were also on hand to answer questions about Taiwan’s beef import market, available U.S. beef products and new marketing ideas.
“Inflation continues to impact consumer spending in Taiwan,” said Sun. “The seminar was an opportunity to sell the quality of U.S. beef and present a wide range of affordable, alternative cuts.”
The second half of the seminar included a cutting demonstration of an alternative cut that USMEF and Yu-Ho believes to have strong potential for the retail and hypermart chains. Ho demonstrated the cutting process and discussed various commercialization options for the under blade of the chuck. The session showed different ways to hand-cut the steak and included explanations about how to use chilled U.S. beef items to generate revenue and improve profitability.
The seminar was made possible with funding from the Beef Checkoff Program and USDA’s Regional Agricultural Promotion Program.