Vietnamese Consumers Sample U.S. Red Meat at ‘Hot Pot Day’ Promotion

Further building the U.S. red meat brand in Vietnam, USMEF partnered with a leading importer to promote using U.S. pork and beef in hot pot dishes.

Funded by the USDA Market Access Program (MAP) and the National Pork Board, the retail activity with Thao Tien was designed to engage Vietnamese shoppers with education and tastings.

“Thao Tien is one of leading importers of frozen meat in Vietnam and the company distributes widely to both the country’s foodservice and retail sectors,” explained Sabrina Yin, USMEF director in the ASEAN region. “Their customers include all the major supermarket chains in Vietnam, such as Aeon, Big C, Lotte, Emart and Vinmart. The company also supplies popular restaurant chains.”

USMEF’s “Hot Pot Day” was held at an Aeon retail location in Ho Chi Minh City. Along with samples of U.S. pork and beef hot pot, customers who purchased U.S. pork and beef items were given special gifts such as U.S. pork cooler bags.

Yin noted that keeping U.S. red meat in the spotlight in an emerging market like Vietnam is key to growing demand.

“Vietnamese customers are familiar with U.S. beef’s quality, but it is important to refresh their knowledge of the product’s availability through events like this,” she said. “On the other hand, U.S pork is quite new to Vietnam, in general. There has been a concern about the quality of imported frozen pork versus local fresh pork. But this event was able to show them that U.S. frozen pork is of superior quality to local pork.”

SOURCE: USMEF