Tyrol/Austria: Growth of a brand

The local daily paper, the Tyroler Tageszeitung, reported recently that in 2016 the organic brand Bio vom Berg (Organic from the Mountains) generated sales worth 8.7 million euros, a sharp rise compared with the previous year.

With turnover of 8.7 million euros, the Tyrolean organic brand Bio vom Berg registered an increase in turnover of 23 percent in 2016. Due to its status as a brand operated by the cooperative Bioalpin and also to the brand orientation the profit of approximately 50,000 euros generated by Bio vom Berg is relatively low. This was explained at a recent press conference in Innsbruck by Managing Director Björn Rasmus: maximising profit is not their main focus - it is much more a question of operating in keeping with the thinking of the members. Heinz Gstir, head of Bioalpin, said they are, after all, a cooperative and a brand dependent on organic farmers in Tyrol, with no big corporation in the background.

With about 15 percent of Bio vom Berg products being exported – speciality cheese selling particularly well - the main priority for Rasmus is producing “in the region for the region”. Rasmus was pleased to point out that Bio vom Berg eggs are especially popular in Tyrol and that every fourth egg in the Tyrol supermarket chain MPreis is one of theirs. Apart from that, their market share in Tyrol is still single-digit. However, since the launch of the brand with eight products in 2002 the range has now expanded to 130 products supplied by 600 organic farmers.

Rasmus sees the future of the cooperative above all in product innovation. In 2016, for example, they put regional organic chicken on the market. Further examples of innovations are products like organic polenta and organic beer from the house of Starkenberg. In his opinion, for Bio vom Berg the future lies mainly in the premium sector.