Monthly Shipping and Marketing Report | January 2024

Council Update

Council Meeting: The next Council meeting will be held on February 27 in Las Vegas prior to the North American Mushroom Conference. If you are interested in attending the Council meeting, please let us know so we can be sure you are accommodated.

Exemption Applications: The exemption applications for the 2024 calendar year have been mailed/emailed to those who are currently exempt. If you do not receive an application and would like to apply for an exemption, please email [email protected] or download an application here.

Mushroom Council Nominations – 2025-2027 Term

A call for nominations will be sent on or about February 1, 2024, for four open positions on the Council for the 2025-2027 term.

Region 2 (PA) – two open positions
Region 3 (CA) – one open position

Mushroom growers have ideas, skills, experiences, and perspectives that would benefit the industry; be a voice for your industry by becoming part of the Council.

To qualify as a nominee, you must be a producer of over 500,000 pounds of mushrooms, on average, annually and not be exempt.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture and the Mushroom Council encourage all eligible producers, including women, minorities, and individuals with disabilities to participate and seek nomination.

Shipment Summary

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Channel Highlights

CONSUMER

December:

The Mushroom Council featured top recipes and holiday gatherings, as well as laying groundwork for next year’s iteration of the Feed Your Immune System campaign.
- There are a variety of assets available for the industry to use and download; Please review this email to see everything all in one place.
  - Engage with the December content (like, comment, share):
Derek Sarno developed a 5th mushroom recipe to add to his grilling and holiday series. Please amplify these recipes across your own platforms.
- Follow Derek on Instagram
- Share the “Double-Double Big Portabella Burger” recipe. Download the high-resolution photo and use this swipe copy for your caption.
- Engage with the ” Double-Double Big Portabella Burger” content (like, comment, share):
  - Facebook
  - Instagram
  - Youtube
  - TikTok
  - Pinterest
2024 Planning:
- Please refer to the below calendars for details on consumer messaging and all channel activities for 2024:
  - All Channels Calendar
  - Consumer Marketing Calendar
onsorship content for Produce For Better Health. Using materials from the Real Fast. Real Food. campaign, we’ve been featured in several e-blasts and campaigns throughout November.

January:

The Mushroom Council will kick off Feed Your Immune System messaging on social channels the beginning of January. Amplify social posts across your own platform (like, comment, share).
- There are a variety of assets available for the industry to use and download; Please review this email to see everything all in one place.
Mushroom Monday: The Mushroom Council creates enthusiasm and builds awareness to keep mushrooms top of mind and on the plate at least every week, leading to a daily dose of mushrooms; introducing MushroomMonday.

Consumers will be provided mushroom recipes to inspire home cooking and will be reminded of ways to celebrate Mushroom Monday when dining at restaurants or ordering delivery.

Registered Dietitians will be educated and equipped to build Mushroom Monday awareness and excitement and to encourage client and retail participation.

Foodservice operators will be motivated and supported to engage with the campaign by featuring an existing or new mushroom dish on their menu on Mondays.
- Develop materials for Mushroom Monday activation.
- January 1st is officially the first Mushroom Monday of 2024! Amplify Mushroom Monday social posts across your own platforms (like, comment, share).

MUSHROOMS IN SCHOOLS

December:

During December, Mushrooms in Schools celebrated 5 Days of Mushrooms! Our annual event, 5 Days of Mushrooms, received great interaction and our target audiences were really engaged with entering. We provided additional resources via social media and newsletter. Utilizing our newsletter, blog, and social media platforms, we have reached a wide audience this month. Many school districts are sharing mushroom recipes and tagging our social media platforms on their posts. On our social media platforms, we highlighted the following school districts: Donegal School Food Service and Ashwaubenon Food Service.

January:

In January 2024, Mushrooms in Schools will be discussing our resources and recipes to answer the question – Why do kids eat mushrooms too? We plan to use our educational lessons, recipes, and activity sheets to reach more of our audience, such as CACFP and families. We will highlight resources and recipes all month long. Our giveaways for schools and CACFP will occur to increase engagement from these stakeholders as well as gathering wonderful mushrooms recipes. We encourage other channels to amplify Mushrooms in Schools by sharing posts on Facebook and Twitter.

Marketing Summary

Notable Highlights for November

Although monthly spend decreased per our Q4 strategy, we saw an increase of traffic to the website MoM. This could be due to our A/B test using the “easy mushroom soup” recipe on YouTube Pre-roll.
We had a 58% increase in spend MoM for Pinterest, which led to a 61% increase in impressions and a 54% increase in link clicks.
Our email performance increased 332% MOM due to an increase in clickable content between Derek Sarno’s recipe series and a “5 Days of Mushrooms” series to encourage mushroom consumption in schools.

*YouTube engagement metrics have changed. Digital metrics are constantly evolving, so we created our own updated Engagement metrics (comments + shares + likes + dislikes + subscribers lost + subscribers gained)

Special Campaign Impressions
Includes paid promotions, partnerships and advertising activities.

Topline Report

Tracker Highlights – Period ending 12/31/2023

The latest mushroom performance data, including year-end, fourth quarter and December are now available. A few of the key takeaways are:

Inflation continued to take the headlines in most of 2023, with consumer’ concern driven by the cumulative impact of several years of rising prices in many areas of life.
Nearly three in 10 shoppers include more value-focused retailers into their store rotation, moving fresh produce dollars from traditional supermarkets to value-focused channels.
Consumers estimated that about eight in 10 meals (79.7%) were prepared at home in December. This was up a few percentage points from November and typical for this time of the year.
Mushroom sales increased month-over-month with November and December having some of the biggest weeks of the year.
Year-over-year, sales remained down by around 5 percent.
All segments were down, but crimini had the strongest performance.

Download your copy of the quick two-page summary, the plug and play PowerPoint ready for use, and the in-depth Excel data file.