It seems that even the recession can’t kill our appetite for ready-made meals – with sales for some product lines up 20 per cent
IF YOU thought the recession would sound the death knell for ready meals, particularly those upmarket ones with exotic names and lovely (if not always representative) pictures on the packaging, you may be surprised to learn that it seems to have had the opposite affect.
In recent months, as the nation was getting used to its hairshirt, green shoots started sprouting from the pancetta-wrapped chicken with a butternut squash risotto (main course), the Caesar vegetables with Parmesan shavings (side dish) and the wild berry panacottas with a kiwi coulis (dessert) that line the shelves of the most tempting – and expensive – aisles in our supermarkets.
Tesco’s Finest ready meals, which dipped in popularity in 2008, have bounced back strongly in recent months with sales reportedly up by as much as 20 per cent on last year. Tesco chief executive Sir Terry Leahy said earlier this month that people “have stopped down-trading. Convenient ready meals have started to sell again, which is quite telling, because ready meals had a bit of a bad run going back to Jamie’s School Dinners and then the recession.”
Keen to exploit this resurgence, Tesco Ireland is rolling out a new offering which it has called Tesco Finest Restaurant – it is, apparently, even finer.
These dishes aim to part consumers from the cash they would, in better times, have spent in restaurants. Having tried the slow-cooked lamb with a redcurrant and port jus and the peppercorn beef with Armagnac sauce last week, Pricewatch can confirm that they are very fine indeed, although we’d fear for our waistline if we ate too many of them.
Without referring specifically to Tesco, Marian Faughnan, a nutritionist with the Safefood forum, says our fears are well-founded. She cautions against eating too many ready meals, no matter how good they are, and points out that price and appearance are no guarantee that the meals will be nutritionally sound.
She points to a report from the UK Food Standards Authority, which found very high levels of salt in some of the most highly regarded ready meals, including those of Marks & Spencer, retailing’s ready-meal king.
“You can see the meal deals out there and the supermarkets pushing them very hard, but you never see fruit and veg given the same push,” says Faughnan. “Everything is fine in moderation, so once a week would be okay, but really, nothing beats making food from fresh ingredients.”
While they spend the most on advertising, and consequently attract most attention, the big supermarkets do not have a monopoly on the posh ready meal. Retailers such as Avoca, Donnybrook Fair, Fallon Byrne and Butler’s Pantry all have extensive ranges and are widening their appeal to cash-strapped consumers who can no longer afford to eat in restaurants but still fancy eating restaurant-quality food.
Vicky Casey set up KC Blake’s Pantry in Knocknacarra, Co Galway, five years ago. In May of this year she opened a second branch in Oranmore. While opening a shop selling pricy ready meals during the worst recession in the state’s history might sound a little foolhardy, Casey insists the timing was perfect.
“We got all our electrical work done at half the price it cost five years ago and we were able to haggle for the rest of the work in a way that could not have been possible when we opened the first outlet,” she says.
She claims that business is booming, with two main strands: young couples with children who want to treat themselves occasionally without going to the expense of taxis and babysitters; and people who used to go out three nights a week but can’t afford to be so quite so lavish any more.
“The food we offer is a big step up from the ready meals available in the supermarkets,” she says. “I’m not knocking them, but good and all as it is, it still has to be prepared by machines and it needs to have a long shelf life – but everything we sell is prepared by hand every day.”
Purely for research purposes, Pricewatch ate its way through KC Blake’s fish pie, its chicken and bacon Caesar salad, the chicken curry, the beef bourguignon and the shepherd’s pie – not, you understand, in a single sitting – and can confirm that it all tasted home-cooked and excellent. The meals cost between €7 and €9 and will feed a hungry adult (or two, if a side dish is added).
The most popular dish KC Blake’s sells is roast duck, not cheap at €14.95. High price notwithstanding, “people go cracked for it – we have to have that in store every day,” says Casey.
On the other side of the country, is another pantry business, the Butler’s Pantry. Set up by Jackie Marsh in 1987 when Ireland was also on its knees economically it is weathering another economic storm. “People said we were mad and the first few years were very tough but by the early 1990s it started to pick up,” she says.
“We have three main competitors – the likes of Marks and Spencer, with their ready meals, then the likes of Donnybrook Fair and Fallon and Byrne but we are also competing with restaurants and the good takeaways like the Bombay Pantry. The other thing that we have seen picking up is the smaller dinner party. A lot of people who may have entertained in restaurants either can’t afford to any more or realise that there is better value to be found elsewhere.” Incidentally, she says she frequently gets people asking her to prepare the meals in their own pots so they can lie to their friends about who actually did the cooking.
MARSH EXPECTS SINGLEdigit growth this year. "We feel that we've hit the bottom and we will see a more positive trend. What's happening in the sector in the UK is indicative but we might be a little behind them."
Suzanne Campbell co-authored the book Basketcasewith her husband Philip Boucher Hayes, an excellent book focusing on the food and supermarket industry in this country. She claims to have never bought a ready meal from a supermarket: "I have simply done too many stories on the negatives behind the production process," she says. "Another thing that bugs me is the ridiculous level of packaging that goes into the presentation of ready meals."
She says that while companies like KC Blake’s and the Butler’s Pantry do have merit because they contribute to the local economy and use locally produced products and no additives, there is precious little merit in supermarket equivalents.
“Some ready meals tend to be very high in salt, sugar and saturated fats and often have a very low meat content,” she says. She points to the trend towards mashed potato, which can cost as much as ten times the constituent ingredients.
“Senior executives at M&S or Tesco don’t lie awake at night thinking about Irish jobs or waistlines, they just want to get you to shovel as much of it into your gob as you possibly can.”
