Lamb Makes a Comeback to Scottish Kitchens

New results from Quality Meat Scotland, the red meat industry body, show that lamb sales in Scotland jumped by 11% over a 52 week period* with consumers spending nearly £30 million on lamb in shops over the year. That's a £3 million increase on the year before.

Chairman Donald Biggar said: “This turnaround in the popularity of lamb is a welcome boost for Scotland's sheep sector with sales topping the 4.1 million kilo mark, that's up nearly half a million kilos on the year before. It's not just volume that's increased though, the value of product being sold is also up by 9.5%.

“The challenge for us now is to build on this and encourage even more consumers who are looking to buy lamb from livestock born, reared and processed in Scotland, backed by unique guarantees on animal welfare, to choose Scotch Lamb when they go shopping.”

The new figures provide a good signal that Scots, who traditionally eat less lamb than their English and Welsh counterparts, are starting to include more lamb in their diet.

QMS undertakes in depth consumer research to identify the factors that determine what consumers choose to buy to produce marketing campaigns that will trigger sales.

The final touches are being added to this year's Scotch Lamb promotion, to be launched in late August. As with last year, the media campaign will run in two bursts – in the autumn months with the strapline “Scotch Lamb – It's Hot this Autumn” and again in February, “Scotch Lamb – It's Easy”, promoting late season lamb.

Spend on last year's campaign topped the half million pound mark as QMS drew down on its reserves and secured extra funding from the Scottish Government to help counter the impact of the Foot and Mouth Disease outbreak on the already hard pressed sheep sector.

*TNS – Retail sales data for the 52 week period ending 24 February 08.