What do Anne Shirley and Wagyu beef have in common?
Tuesday, February 16, 2010
Prince Edward Island farmers are putting marketing before substance as they prepare to crack the potentially lucrative Wagyu beef market in Japan.
Prince Edward Island has no Wagyu cattle and it has no federal beef packing plant.
PEI's powerful marketing weapon is its slim, redheaded celebrity, Anne Shirley, the star of Anne of Green Gables.
Prince Edward Island's advantage, according to the Globe and Mail, is that 97 per cent of Japanese women recognize the iconic Canadian farm girl, and they plan the weddings in their island country. It is that highly specialized wedding market where Prince Edward Island marketers hope to sell their pricey beef products.
It's going to take three years to get PEI cattle ready for the Japanese market and it may take that long anyway for Canadian and Japanese regulations to change. Thanks to the tail end of the BSE crisis, beef products from cattle older than 20 months of age can't be exported to Japan.
Wagyu production techniques call for slaughter between 30 and 36 months of age. BF