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When potato prices shot up to ₹80 a kilo, it made more sense to buy the ready-to-cook mashed potatoes brand Vegit. After all, buying a kilo of the dehydrated potato offering for ₹130would have been similar to buying 6 kg of potatoes.
As the evergreen potato is the largest consumed vegetable in India, domestic and multinational (MNCs) companies have been quick to use this ubiquitous vegetable as the base to expand their ready-to-cook offerings.
MNCs such as Canadian giant McCain Foods to the home-grown Merino Industries have graduated from supplying potatoes to the likes of McDonalds, PepsiCo, Haldirams, Balaji Snacks and Nestle, to unleashing their own potato-based brands in the market.
“Potatoes form nearly 80 per cent of the snacks and ready-to-cook segment.
"Since most snacks are potato-based, the segment has been growing anywhere between 15-25 per cent. We want to target those using raw potatoes to prepare snacks into buying our frozen snacks that are ready-to-cook and eat,” said Vikas Mittal, Managing Director, McCain Foods.
Mc Cain Foods set up its potato processing plant in Mehsana, Gujarat, in 2007.
Its French fries and chilli garlic potato bites are its largest-selling products today. It is not just MNCs who are dabbling in this segment.
Even Indian players have joined the fray.
Diversifying from being the largest provider of potato storage and processing, Mumbai-based Merino Group introduced the Vegit brand in 2008with potato flakes and instant snack mix, and has been steadily increasing its offerings.
“Consumption of potatoes in India stands at 42 lakh tonnes and the figure is only going up.
Potatoes clearly are the largest consumed vegetable and its longer shelf life makes it easily the most preferred vegetable for Indians,” says Madan Singhi, Regional Head, Merino Industries, the makers of Vegit brand.
Better solutionGoing forward, he believes potatoes would drive the ready-to-cook segment, as the dehydrated offering can offer a better solution for the time-consumer.
Vegit now has potato-based instant snacks such as aloo bonda and burger patty.
With a sales turnover of ₹80 crore this fiscal, Vegit is growing at a compounded annual growth rate of 25 per centas a brand.
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