Tru-Cape Fruit Marketing, the largest exporter of South African apples and pears, is wholly owned by the growers from Ceres Fruit Growers and Two-a-Day in Grabouw. Well over half of all the apples and pears produced in South Africa are grown on Tru-Cape farms.
When the business began in 2001 with a view to tackling the sudden abundance of exporters in the newly deregulated market, the decision by the largest packhouses to combine their marketing effort and create a single brand – Tru-Cape was made to return the maximum income to the grower to allow for further investment in trees and infrastructure.
“It is in Tru-Cape’s DNA to maximise efficiencies within the costs chain so that the grower earns the maximum possible amount from the entire bin of fruit picked and delivered to the packhouses. Tru-Cape is funded by a tiny percentage off each carton of fruit sold which is invested in creating and supporting the brand and, essentially, in a fruit marketing operation that places our fruit onto supermarket shelves in 105 countries around the world,” says Managing Director Roelf Pienaar.
Marketing Director Conrad Fick says what while the company is targeting women from all walks of life, new market segments include parents with small children and, more recently, we also included teens, and dads in the 25 to 45 age group.”
“All our marketing and sponsorship efforts support a healthy lifestyle with activities the family can do together and we have seen tremendous success with our game apps: Fruit-Full, Tru-Sort and Fruit-Match which educate the player about the processes in agriculture and also entertain. Following its success, we launched a TV game-show with kids and their guardians that mimicked the tasks in the game. We sponsored a school-goers TV cooking programme (Skole Kook) which had, at its core, rewarding people for skills in preparing healthy eats. More recently we created a YouTube lifestyle programme targeted at teens with messaging about a healthy diet, being active, beauty and fun and accessible fashion,” Fick says.
According to Fick, the show consisted of eight episodes of 10-15 minutes each to draw in #TruCapeTeenz and to give them a voice, and a platform whilst growing the brand in innovative ways. “The show acted as a positive influence on teenagers and created an interest in Tru-Cape as a caring brand through the show and its correlation with current internet trends. The goal was to encourage young people to want to buy into the brand. The Tru-Cape YouTube series engaged with teenagers by showcasing topics that are relevant, entertaining and important to them, being a source of news and trends, whilst putting a positive spin on overall health. The aim was to create an authentic connection between Tru-Cape and our younger audience through a fun, informative and engaging show. The competition element was engaging and prize driven. The show was supported by a full digital campaign where we used Facebook, Instagram, TikTok and Twitter to promote the show.” Fick explains.
In December, Tru-Cape is running a #FunInTheSun campaign. “With Covid-19 still a threat, families are engaging via online platforms as seen in previous and current campaigns. However, with the change to level 1, we now see more families travelling so we have integrated the campaign with Summer Fun. The objectives are brand awareness and engagement, to increase gameplay and increase sales. The campaign will have three executions. Firstly, the game integration will consist of a splash screen. We will incorporate increased sun points (the game’s currency) with purchases as Summer Sun bonuses into the game. Summer levels of gameplay with rewards will also be added to the game. On social media, we will ask entrants to link their game to Facebook to count as an entry. The content used for this campaign will be adapted to the game layout to familiarise potential new players with the game. There will be main prizes for this campaign and spot prizes as seen in previous campaigns as they boost activity.” Fick ends.
