I cannot speak for anyone else; I can only speak from my own experience. These are the things I have learned about marketing honey:
1.
Be wary of giving away free honey for the response may overwhelm you. It will include everything from surprise to effusive thanks but above all, the assumption that what you are offering is merely a "sweetener" in expectation of future sales.
Now, this may indeed be your strategy and I say, be prepared for a wave of orders to follow. When you are giving out those gifts, even as a gentle form of bribery to colleagues, ask yourself "do I have enough stock for the business that is bound to follow?"
2.
Think outside the box. Do not just do what everyone else has done before you - selling 1 lb jars of honey for a straight £4. I do not believe this is a successful strategy any more and, what's more, I will tell you why.
- People, consumers, your customers have too much choice these days. In earlier times, honey was the only sweet thing you could spread on your toast, or dip in your tea, or add to your chicken or salads. Nowadays there is so much more to choose from - maple syrup, sweet chillis, jams, conserves, preserves, jellies and syrups. Also, there are so many different kinds of other "toastie" toppings - peanut butters (crunchy, not-crunchy), Marmite (love it or loathe it), Vegemite and more.
- No-one gets through an entire pound jar of honey anymore without it crystallising (which a lot of people, myself included in days of yore, incorrectly think means it's time to chuck it in the bin). So, what people like to have on their shelf is a little taste of everything.
- Sell small. Go 120 oz, or even 8 oz. Firstly, you can sell these at a premium, instead of a pro-rated portion of £4 for a pound. People love the novelty of little jars to keep. And they will come back for more. Particularly if they can proudly say, "look! I finished your honey". In an age where people are learning the thrift of the post-throw-away age, it pleases them to actually finish something all up.
3.
While Chunk Honey is exotic and lovely and interesting and artisan, it confuses people. It is not advisable over the product they all know, love and recognise: clear or set honey in a glass jar.
It is also difficult to price (how can I justify £1 for an 8oz chunk of honey in the comb compared to blasted Sainsbury's selling a 1 lb jar at an excrutiatingly low £1.95. How on earth can they justify that? It's outrageous!)
This has been my first season experimenting with the sale of honey in the comb, as Chunk Honey, and I am bemused by the number of friends, family and customers who proudly show me how they have decanted the honey from the comb into a jar. Or chewed the honeycomb and made strange shapes out of the remaining wax. Or asked me how to eat it.
4.
Labels, and names, are important. Make your own, I urge you. It's a gloriously creative process. Easy to do. Costs less, no matter what they tell you, than buying bog-standard ones in.
I loved winding my way through the maze of Food Standards Regulations about labels. You have to make sure no single flower can be identified in the pictures, unless of course your bees have foraged over a certain percentage on one single flower, like Lavender Honey from the fields of Grasse, in France.
Your name and address has to be on there - which unnerves all Europeans, who freak out about the Data Protection Act and intrusions on their privacy. Not I. I carry my name and place proudly on that label. Except of course, it's not Slough, it's "Upper Windsor", darling! (Always confuses the postman, poor dear.)
The size and weight must be in minimum 10-point print. You could spend hours with a ruler and a magnifying glass, working that one out.
Try now to think of an Expiry Date, when you consider that 5,000 year old honey was found in the tombs of the Ancient Egyptians - and considered to be still edible. I have resisted the temptation, so far, of putting "Best Before: 7012 AD" on my labels. Haha!
And people remember your honey, if it has a name. And you sell your brand with more heart, because it has an identity.
First, I called my honey "Jack's Honey". It saddened me beyond words that my dad, that irascible old codger, died just before he could have a taste from my first-ever honey harvest. But nowadays, I will not market a sad thing. This is a happy thing, my honey, and it will carry my name.
"Margo's Honey" it is then.
