How three small producers managed not to sell their work on anything. “Now I do not cope with orders”

They knew how to produce healthy foods, but as often happens with producers, years in a row they were almost forced to sell their work on nothing. Until they stayed, they counted and decided to complicate things a little and put their mark on what they do.

Cosmin Măndică has customers from all over the photo: Alina Mitran

Today they collaborate with a well -known national chain of stores and their products are in a few big cities in the country. In parallel, they are present at traditional fairs and continue to maintain their direct relationship with customers. Success came only when they had the courage to ask how to differentiate their products, otherwise qualitative, from other producers.

Cosmin Măndică, a reserve army officer, is passionate about bee, only for years has given pure honey, so appreciated abroad, either at export or to the wholesale. For two years, while studying, he began to produce truly special assortments, in addition to the “classic” polyphlorine, acacia, rapeseed or hand. Today it has a multitude of assortments that attract customers and does not sell any kilogram of honey to the buyers.

Vedet products this season: Alina Mitran

“The stars of the moment, according to the sales figures, are apiforte and honey with turmeric and ginger. It is very looking for a lot in the Brasov area, for example, but the products are more. Every week for that honey with turmeric and ginger I receive orders. Every week ”,
explains the beekeeper.

Whoever reaches his stand does not receive the dry information, but is invited to taste and is widely explained what are the qualities of each assortment, which distinguishes them, what can be combined, etc.

“The turmeric is absorbed by the human body only in the presence of piperin, the ground black pepper. In this product, pepper and ginger are accentuated on each other and the combination gives a spicy taste. I use it in salad, for example, but customers came who told me things that surpass me. Gastronomic subtleties. With fish, with all kinds of fools ”,
explains the beekeeper.

Cream honey, with blueberries, raspberries, strawberries, has also found its place on the shelf, besides the classic acacia honey, honey with nuts, honey, honey with goji.
“These have become somewhat normal. The world still wants them, but knows them, while new assortments are still customers who now discover them”adds the beekeeper.

Cosmin Măndică expanded his photo assortments: Alina Mitran

Honey with cinnamon, honey with redcove powder, peanut cream honey, honey, all passed the customer test. The product that no one has done so far in this formula, says Cosmin Măndică, is Apiforte, a combination that has reached many attempts and analyzing many specialized studies.

“It's my biggest achievement. It has classic elements, such as pollen, such as propolis, such as tincture, such as the milkman, but I took them to a certain level. It is a product made on honey -cream rapeseed honey. Why honey rape cream? It is neutral, in terms of taste intensity. The product also has very rich content of raw pollen. The combination of honey and raw pollen is a hepatoprotective, liver protection and pancreas. Then comes the second part of the product, the gross propolis, the most powerful natural antibiotic. The tincture of propolis, for the emollion of the product, the raw daisy – raw, insist, raw – which is very astringent and unpleasant to taste, but in combination it is something else. Ginger powder, dog powder and orange peel ”explains the beekeeper who can be found in the product that more and more customers ask for. As for the properties and how it is recommended to be consumed, it is also a lot to talk about, and customers usually take their time.

The diversification of production allowed to sell with good price. Although there is a lot of work and headaches, the sale through the supermarket and with what it manages to sell at the profile fairs now ensures its sale for almost all the production, which is not to be neglected, about 3,000 kg/year.

“I have three certified products as a traditional product”

Emil Dobre is a farmer also from Olt County that sold until recently the cheese with extremely low price. He had begun to expand their assortments, but in the ordinary market people were not willing to pay extra. Today, the cheese, the telemea with cumin, the telemea with negrilic or dill have a special segment of customers in the supermarket.

Emil Dobre grows 750 goats and sells products in two counties and Bucharest: I have

“I sell in Vâlcea county, in Olt county and in Bucharest. The best for the simple telemea, then the telemea with cumin, the one with the dill, the one with the negrilic – it is a new product that I put in the offer – and I have a new product, the telemea with lavender. Here I have a cheese,” The farmer presents the products that he sells next and at fairs.

He has 750 goats, almost doubled his number of animals in a few years, but everything has grown when he diversified the assortments.

Telemeau with dill, cumin, with negrilica quickly found photo buyers: I have

“I think I sell somewhere at almost 1,000 kg a month, when the fairs go, that for example from June to September the fairs were on break. On Monday I took the first order in Bucharest, five new stores were opened. In Bucharest there are the customers that I have already formed.” says the cheese manufacturer.

For those who still wonder why the goat telemea with 50 lei/kg is sold, Emil Dobre explains that for a kilogram of cheese are required, on average, 5 – 5.5 liters of milk. A goat produces less than one liter of milk daily and would be more advantageous, says, to sell milk, for which the price starts from 10 lei/l. Only for Telemea he has formed a good market for now. “I have analysis bulletins, I have three traditionally certified products – simple goat cheese, cheese and urda. And sales are going well, almost no longer”, says the farmer.

The secret? Work and seriousness. “It's hard, but anyone can succeed if it is serious. First of all, they need seriousness, keep the quality. Do not keep the quality of the products, take the customer once, after which he does not take it,” The conclusion comes.

From specialties from roses, to figures from figs

Another producer who passed the test of the big retailers is Mili Costache. The plantation of roses developed with a lot of work and involvement on 1,200 square meters was, for a few years, the place from which they started for the whole country as well as aromatic goodies. Sweet, syrup, tea petals, rose water, etc. The products have a great search in the profile fairs in the big cities, only now the bad news comes: the plantation lives for the last few years.

The figs will take the product of producer from photo roses: A. Mitran

“We gradually replace it. We planted 23 varieties of figs, we have 40 in the third year of fruit, we hope that in five years will produce at full capacity. The rose plantation was affected by the action of herbicide of our neighbors, repeatedly, with the tractor. Made, and now it is not easy at all.explains the manufacturer. Slowly, slowly the new products find their place in the clients' prefers.

Roses and figs, profitable photo cultures: I have

“It's all my wife's madness Which after suffering from the losses, he said – we must replace something, something resistant. Let's put figs -. We had six figs in the yard and we authorized at DSVSA for the production of sweets. The figs I put them will enter the fruit later, we will have to take a break. In the southern area the breakup goes quite difficult, people are not so used to the roses of sweetness, nor with the figs ”, says Mili Costache. The fairs in the country and, from now on, the delivery in the stores ensures the sale. Prices are still last year, although in the meantime the costs have increased, because the electricity bill is higher, the jars have another price, the lemons have increased …

As for the products that have conquered customers, besides those in roses is sought, for example, sugar-free fig jam. “I tried sugar -free jam because there are still diabetic people. They are quite tasty and appreciated. We only use fruit, water and lemon.”adds the manufacturer.