Turkey: specialist trade becomes supplier of fresh food

The number and size of the 40 - 50 wholefood stores in Istanbul (13 -17 million inhabitants – no precise data available) have probably scarcely changed in the last five years, but what has changed is the product range and the ability to attract customers. Far more Turkish manufacturers are now represented in the shops, and the share of organics in the assortments has increased and above all the offer of fresh fruit, vegetables, milk and dairy products has improved enormously. Many store operators have now realised that fresh foods bring customers into their shops! (Picture: Yildiz Mutlu from Vitaminera)
“In the last two years in particular the producers of fresh food have improved their offer dramatically,” says Yildiz Mutlu from Vitaminera, a 20 m² organic shop in the Atrium Shopping Centre in Bakirköy-Ataköy in the north of Istanbul. She apologises for not having any vegetables in the shop at the time and says it is all at the nearby organic market where Vitaminera has a stall once a week. Vegetables apart, the customer can buy all the basics, including cheese, yogurt and milk, in this tiny shop. Once a week, on Saturdays, all hell is let loose. As Mutlu explains, 300 bags of vegetable are delivered that the customers have ordered. Hardly three customers can shop there without getting in each other’s way, and when she is getting the fresh food ready the place is choc-a-bloc with bags of produce. Of course, at the same time customers are buying noodles, rice, olive oil, tomato sauce and lots of other products stocked by the shop. In contrast with earlier times, when the scene was determined by expensive imports from Germany, Italy and England, today it’s pleasing to see Turkish brands on the shelves. Mutlu estimates that a good 80 % of the goods are of Turkish origin. You see German brands particularly in the categories natural cosmetics, detergents and cleaning materials (picture).

Vitaminera was founded seven years ago by Mrs Asuman Cakiroglu, who also operates a chemist’s shop in the shopping centre. At 5 o’clock in the morning she fetches fresh vegetables from the market, where retailers can buy at a discount. About 30 organic manufacturers are represented in her shop, which means the share of organics is especially high in her case. On average, about a hundred people a day shop there, and their spend is often 100 – 200 Turkish lira (40 – 80 euros), with some customers spending as much as the equivalent of 160 euros at the weekend. Vitaminera is open every day except Sunday from 9.00 to 21.30.

The organic shop Organik Dükkan (picture) in upmarket Bebek on the Bosporus stocks more domestic health food brands without the Turkish organic logo. This causes the proportion of organics to be an estimated 60 %. The shop, that was founded eleven years ago, is located in a side-street in the middle of town, and it too has proved to be very popular.

Hasibe Öztürk (picture) in Akatlar has recently concentrated more on fresh foods in her shop called Serente (larder). She has 2.5 m of chilled cabinets with sliding glass doors, where she stocks some of the vegetables and three sorts of yogurt and fresh milk. “On Tuesdays there’s nothing doing,” she says in fluent French, having lived for over ten years in France. But on all the other days there’s either fresh fruit and vegetables or milk, dairy products and eggs or meat. The 50 -100 customers a day organize their shopping accordingly. Three times a week she drives at around 7.00 in the morning to the organic markets to fetch what she needs for her customers. For a month now there has even been a supplier of yogurts who sells his products in glazed earthenware pots. The price of 11.50 TL (4.90 euros) includes one lira (42 cents) deposit - a genuine innovation when the normal practice is to throw away empty milk or juice bottles, both plastic and glass, and at best to recycle them.

Elta Ada is one of the suppliers of fresh products. Gökce Ada is an island in the south of the Sea of Marmara (not far from Canakkale on the mainland) where a quarter of the land is cultivated organically. This is where the Oktay family has leased 300 ha from the state for 55 years and has developed a sophisticated marketing concept. Under their own brand, they produce a good range of fresh and processed vegetables (e.g. tomato products), olive oil, milk, and several sorts of cheese and yogurt. Elta Ada products are delivered to practically every wholefood shop in Istanbul. For two years, they have also had their own 25 m² shop in Moda on the Anatolian side of Istanbul, where they sell the full range of Elta Ada products, other Turkish manufacturers’ brands, baby food by Hipp and chocolate by Stella. A digital picture frame in the display window shows pictures of life in the country and food production on Gökce Ada. During the week, around 60 customers a day shop there, and this number rises to nearly 100 at weekends. Elta Ada also supplies100 supermarkets and shopping centres in Istanbul and 25 in Ankara - Migros, Tesco Kipa, Carrefour and Real. (Picture on right: Dairy products by Elta Ada in the shop in Moda)

Turkey does not yet have a wholesale wholefood trade that takes and delivers the goods of a range of manufacturers. So producers and manufacturers still do their own marketing. Then there are the importers, who are mostly exclusive marketers of well known European brands. You see a clear price difference between imported and domestically produced goods in the case of, for example, pasta. A 500 g pack of spaghetti from Köyüm Harmanyeri costs 4 TL (1.68 €), but for wholemeal noodles from Alce Nero you have to pay nearly twice as much (7.50 TL). To buy chocolate by Vivani or Stella (Switzerland) you must usually have 11 TL (4.62 €) at the ready – with incomes that are a third to half of what people earn in Germany. (Picture on left: Customer at the dairy counter in Serente)

For this reason, it’s heartening to see that the number of manufacturers and processors who are intent on opening up the domestic market has increased significantly. Whilst organic dried fruit has been exported for three decades, it and much more besides are now on sale in the organic markets and wholefood shops. An example: Hasan Karaman cultivates 250 apricot trees and buys in from seven other organic farmers in the region round Malatya on the south coast of Turkey. The goods are packaged under his producer name Ekozel and supplied exclusively to the specialist trade. He also sells dried apricots, figs, sultanas, walnuts, hazelnuts and sea salt at all the organic markets in Turkey. (Picture: Hasan Karaman at one of Istanbul’s markets)

Other manufacturers’ brands that you find in wholefood shops in Istanbul (the products are examples, not a complete list) are:

Ekoloji Market	www.ekolojimarket.com	salt, spices, pulses
Sade organik ürünler	www.sadeorganik.com	pasta
Ecoliva	www.ekoorganik.com	honey
Ekozel	www.ekozelorganik.com	dried fruits
Sinope	www.sinope.com.tr	fruit juices from the Black Sea
Yakatarla rare blossom	www.rareblossom.com	organic cosmetics, dried fruit strips
Grünn	www.grunn.com.tr	hazelnut creme with grape juice
Orgalife	www.orgalifetea.com	black tea
Yesil Iris	www.teksergida.com	olive oil, apricot jam
Ekotepe	www.ekotepeorganik.com	pomegranate juice
Rasayana	www.rasayana.com.tr	muesli, tea
Damiana	www.safranorganik.com	tea
Karahan un	www.karahanflour.com	flour
Dimyat	www.dogaevinizde.com	quinoa, rice
Saffion	www.saff1011.com	honey from the black sea

Picture on left: Plenty of greenery in front of the shop Serente in Istanbul-Etiler

Picture on right: Selection of well chilled yogurt – some in returnable earthenware pots