Fonterra China Foodservices has partnered China’s restaurant rating website with 190 million active users, Dianping.com, to find the best cakes in China using Anchor Cream.
Esther Chu, VP of Fonterra China Foodservices, said the campaign has made an immediate splash among Fonterra’s bakery customers and consumers in China.
“More than 5,200 outlets from 158 bakery customers in 241 cities across China have jumped on board and, in just three weeks, more than seven million votes have been cast by Chinese cake lovers,” she says.
“Before the campaign started, only 54% of the 405 participating recipes were topped with Anchor cream so to qualify all of them have converted, which will have a direct impact on our sales.”
With Christmas, New Year and Chinese New Year, along with a number of major festivals, all falling within the space of a few short months, winter is the peak season for cake consumption in China.
The Anchor Cream used in the competition is sourced from the co-operative’s new ultra heat temperature facility at Waitoa, New Zealand.
“China is a real growth market for UHT cream, so we’re pulling out all the stops to ensure when our customers order Anchor they’re getting the freshest cream,” says operations manager Russell Muir.
“We’ve put a program in place to get our cream to market faster and have managed to cut that lead time down to around 33 days from Waitoa to China.”
The campaign ran in December 2015 and a winner will be announced in January 2016.
