Capilano 'Did the Right Thing'

  EDITORIAL: BRUCE ROSCOE 

By Bruce Roscoe

While there might be serious questions as to the accuracy of Capilano’s claims about New Zealand mānuka honey, the Australian honey behemoth has made the right move as far as the marketing playbook goes.

The Capilano Honey leaflet that berates New Zealand mānuka honey as inferior to Australian mānuka honey in seven categories reads as an enemy act. Yet from the viewpoint of marketers, Capilano has done the right thing.

Two countries each claim that their mānuka honey is authentic and superior to that of the other. Retail shop customers and trade show visitors will say, ‘Please tell me the difference’.

The Capilano leaflet provides succinct talking points that answer that question. As important, the question can be answered in a uniform way by staff who may be generalists without expert knowledge in a single product category. In retail, such staff are usually the majority.

(Leaflet content quality is a different issue. Capilano has modified the "First simplify, then exaggerate" tenet of some news media to "First simplify, then fabricate". But it has given staff what they need and customers what they want.) 

Staff at trade shows of the scale held in Vancouver in late April routinely face scores of customers who ask similar questions. They must perform as actors who have studied a script, which handouts such as leaflets amplify.

No comparable marketing materials are made available by the UMF Honey Association. Nor does any UMFHA website content compare New Zealand mānuka honey with Australian "manuka" honey. Neither is any media kit available to those who ask.

In New Zealand's case, mānuka honey marketers each must develop their own materials that convince about origin and authenticity.

As a result, many conflicting and perhaps confused accounts are floated.

This shortcoming was used against New Zealand in the mānuka honey certification trademark case. Among evidentiary points cited in the ruling in Australia's favor, the New Zealand assistant commissioner for trademarks quoted this Australian Manuka Honey Association observation:

"There is no consistent promotional material educating consumers that the words MANUKA HONEY mean honey only from New Zealand". (377.1; p 118 of the Intellectual Property Office of New Zealand 22 May 2023 ruling [2023] NZIPOTM19.)

Bruce Roscoe is a Japan-based New Zealander providing honey importation and distribution consultancy. He is a former director of research for Deutsche Bank Securities Japan, with extensive experience as an equity research analyst and as correspondent for both leading New Zealand and global media publications.