10 Tips for New Product Developers*

Retailers' advice for getting products on their shelves

• Test products on people outside the seafood industry.

• If you're a small producer, use size to your advantage by being flexible and moving fast to bring products to market.

• Ask the market what it needs and wants.

• Understand the retailers' business; i.e. what they have to do to sell the product.

• Partner with retailers to promote and entice consumers to try the product.

• Pay close attention to restaurant trends; consumers respond to what is new, but also familiar.

• Seek strategic partnerships with other seafood producers or packaging companies.

• Make packaging as consumer-friendly as possible with accurate cooking instructions.

• You know seafood is easy to use, but your customers don't.  Whether your product is in raw or heat-and-eat form, sell the inherent convenience of seafood.

• Keep in mind that adding the wrong kind of value -- i.e. burying the flavor of fish in the wrong breading -- can actually devalue the product.