Bill Mares asked:

> Can someone define the "niche market" for retail honey?

Given that the overwhelming bulk of honey sold at retail
is extracted, micro-filtered, and heated to within a inch of
its life, anything else would be a "niche market".

> Secondly, how much of the 400 milion+ pound U.S.
> honey market is that niche?

No idea.  "Niche" implies "small".  I doubt that anyone
bothers to count the output of the smaller producers.
I know that no one has ever asked us, and we are
clearly a "boutique producer" of honey.

Why do we use the term "boutique" around here?
For no other reason than to create the perception of
a "niche product".

The competition sells a "Wall-Mart" product.
A "sweetener" that has about as much in
common with real Honey as a Budwiser has
in common with a 1992 Philippe Rothschild.

When the competition is a bottom-feeder, the only
place to go is up.  Way up.  Sure we are more
expensive, just like a dress from Ungaro (a dress
designer in Miami) is more expensive than something
found on the rack in the women's department of K-Mart.

But our honey is worth it.
Why?
Because we say so!
That's "niche marketing".

Comb honey is an obvious niche-market product.
So is honey that has not been excessively filtered or heated,
but only if these points are made clear to the buyer.
Varietal honeys are also (however, one finds mass-market
honey described as "clover honey" so often as to render the term
"clover" meaningless.)

The most common example of a niche-market product is honey
that stresses its local origin.  How "local" must one be?
There is a Confederate cemetery in Lynchburg, VA that
has a very large collection of old-fashioned roses and
other flowering plants.  There are few hives on the grounds.
They do a brisk business in their own brand of honey,
and use the profits to help maintain the place.  "Local" to
them means "right here among the gravestones".

But if you want a real education in marketing and product
positioning, look no further than olive oil.

Go look at the "wall of olive oil" in a big Italian market.
Realize that these are the products of producers no bigger
than you, mostly tiny family outfits on the other side of
the planet.

Realize also that 99% of the population cannot not tell the
difference between one and another in a "taste test".
Regardless, these same people demonstrate "brand loyalty"
to one or more of these obscure brands.

Then why are there 200 different brands on the shelf?
Is the grocer insane?  No, he is very, very smart.
All of it sells, and the wide variety alone draws customers.

Why do all the bottles and labels look so different?  Each
company has an ad budget of about $1.98, so they put
their effort into making a package that is distinct enough
to be seen and selected from the visual riot of the 200
brands of olive oil found in a typical Italian market or larger deli.

Be humbled at the beauty of their packaging, their planet-wide
distribution network, and the clear implication that these people
never give a thought to selling their products at wholesale in bulk
to a "packer".  They are making a profit shipping cases of glass
bottles from Sicily, through customs, through several layers of
food brokers, and a retailer.

These are all "niche" products because they all have learned
"positioning".  Most of them aim for the high end of the
market, and make no attempt to compete on price.  Does it
work?  Most decent cooks have multiple bottles of olive oil,
all different brands.  (I just went and counted - my wife has
18 different brands in the pantry right now, but she may be
an extreme case, being of Italian descent, a person who reads
cookbooks as if they were mystery novels, and the unquestioned
benign dictator of a kitchen that takes up half the ground floor of
our house.)

The output of these small producers is tiny.  Some brands are
only available at certain times of year.  This only adds to the
aura of exclusivity and perception of desirability.  (Betcha
some of them do that on purpose!)

What's the real difference between all these olive oils?  An
"educated" pallet can taste differences, just as one can taste
differences with honey, but most of the difference is nothing
more than perception.  This means paying lots of attention to
bottles, labels, and presentation.

The "niche" concept is more complex than something like
simply promoting "Florida Orange Juice", since a "niche"
implies that you are filling a specific need or serving a
specific set of customers.  "Florida Orange Juice" is not
a niche product, since they say nothing about why their
juice is different than other orange juice.

Honey with a label printed in Arabic or Farsi is clearly a
niche product.  One is targeting an ethnic group with
the same honey, but merely a different label.  If you
have "ethnic populations" where you are, try it.

So go look at the mass-market low-end sweeteners,
and do something different.   You can't be bigger than the
mass-market folks, but you can be "smarter".  If you
can't be smarter, you can at least be "different".

"Different" sells.

Death to the Queenline bottle and the generic label!
Overthrow the evil reign of the squeeze bear!

        jim