Jennifer Dunn

"Several factors have helped the development of new beef products jump exponentially since we began concentrating checkoff resources around the category," said Jennifer Dunn, Coordinator of Consumer Relations for the Georgia Beef Board (GBB)."The beef industry helped fuel the fire, and now independent companies are discovering the potential for profit that others have achieved by adding value to undervalued beef cuts.By increasing the value of cuts from the chuck and round, everybody profits," she said.

In order to get the most out of checkoff resources, the beef industry's new product development team has shifted its focus to support product concepts that have emerged as being most interesting to manufacturers, supermarkets and restaurant operators.The team labeled these concepts "fast track" products.

"There are four product concepts, according to market research that have the ability to produce the greatest volume increases for producers in the fastest amount of time, capitalize on consumer trends and increase beef carcass value," Dunn said.

One of the products, the Boneless Beef Filet was launched recently and is now available to retail supermarket chains and foodservice operators from No Name Steaks@ of St. Michael, Minn., and Chicago Meat Authority headquartered in Chicago.The Boneless Beef Filet is a tender, marinated and thin beef chuck steak that offers an easy alternative to the boneless, skinless chicken breast.

Other "fast track" products are rotisserie beef, ground beef crumbles and a marinated beef roast with a popup timer.

"As busy consumers and restaurant and cafeteria operators look for convenient, nutritious, and versatile meals, these `fast track' products offer an easy alternative to other proteins," said Dunn.
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"Through new products, we can increase the market price for traditionally undervalued cuts, ultimately improving the price paid at the producer level," said Dunn.

"Several factors have helped the development of new beef products jump exponentially since we began concentrating checkoff resources around the category," said Jennifer Dunn, Coordinator of Consumer Relations for the Georgia Beef Board (GBB)."The beef industry helped fuel the fire, and now independent companies are discovering the potential for profit that others have achieved by adding value to undervalued beef cuts.By increasing the value of cuts from the chuck and round, everybody profits," she said.

In order to get the most out of checkoff resources, the beef industry's new product development team has shifted its focus to support product concepts that have emerged as being most interesting to manufacturers, supermarkets and restaurant operators.The team labeled these concepts "fast track" products.

"There are four product concepts, according to market research that have the ability to produce the greatest volume increases for producers in the fastest amount of time, capitalize on consumer trends and increase beef carcass value," Dunn said.

One of the products, the Boneless Beef Filet was launched recently and is now available to retail supermarket chains and foodservice operators from No Name Steaks@ of St. Michael, Minn., and Chicago Meat Authority headquartered in Chicago.The Boneless Beef Filet is a tender, marinated and thin beef chuck steak that offers an easy alternative to the boneless, skinless chicken breast.

Other "fast track" products are rotisserie beef, ground beef crumbles and a marinated beef roast with a popup timer.

"As busy consumers and restaurant and cafeteria operators look for convenient, nutritious, and versatile meals, these `fast track' products offer an easy alternative to other proteins," said Dunn."One of our main goals is to get processors interested in developing these new products and marketing them on their own.We have generated considerable interest with several large companies and our research has helped them more clearly see the opportunities."

The "fast track" products have attracted national and international attention.The beef industry shared its top new checkoff-funded beef product concepts throughout the year at events such as an International Meat Secretariat Meeting, a new product open house during the AMI World Food Expo in Chicago, and at the industry's Beef Summit in New York City.Leading meat manufacturing companies, including Excel and Advance Foods, are among those who attended such events and who are now on board to start marketing some of the product concepts.
...
"Through new products, we can increase the market price for traditionally undervalued cuts, ultimately improving the price paid at the producer level," said Dunn.

Other top opportunities for new product development include beef appetizers, such as cheeseburger fries, and sandwich meat items, such as beef ham and cheeseburger by the slice, all from undervalued cuts.

Additional activities surrounding value-added products, spurred by cattle producers' beef checkoff dollars:

Supermarkets

"Several factors have helped the development of new beef products jump exponentially since we began concentrating checkoff resources around the category," said Jennifer Dunn, Coordinator of Consumer Relations for the Georgia Beef Board (GBB)."The beef industry helped fuel the fire, and now independent companies are discovering the potential for profit that others have achieved by adding value to undervalued beef cuts.By increasing the value of cuts from the chuck and round, everybody profits," she said.

In order to get the most out of checkoff resources, the beef industry's new product development team has shifted its focus to support product concepts that have emerged as being most interesting to manufacturers, supermarkets and restaurant operators.The team labeled these concepts "fast track" products.

"There are four product concepts, according to market research that have the ability to produce the greatest volume increases for producers in the fastest amount of time, capitalize on consumer trends and increase beef carcass value," Dunn said.

One of the products, the Boneless Beef Filet was launched recently and is now available to retail supermarket chains and foodservice operators from No Name Steaks@ of St. Michael, Minn., and Chicago Meat Authority headquartered in Chicago.The Boneless Beef Filet is a tender, marinated and thin beef chuck steak that offers an easy alternative to the boneless, skinless chicken breast.

Other "fast track" products are rotisserie beef, ground beef crumbles and a marinated beef roast with a popup timer.

"As busy consumers and restaurant and cafeteria operators look for convenient, nutritious, and versatile meals, these `fast track' products offer an easy alternative to other proteins," said Dunn."One of our main goals is to get processors interested in developing these new products and marketing them on their own.We have generated considerable interest with several large companies and our research has helped them more clearly see the opportunities."

The "fast track" products have attracted national and international attention.The beef industry shared its top new checkoff-funded beef product concepts throughout the year at events such as an International Meat Secretariat Meeting, a new product open house during the AMI World Food Expo in Chicago, and at the industry's Beef Summit in New York City.Leading meat manufacturing companies, including Excel and Advance Foods, are among those who attended such events and who are now on board to start marketing some of the product concepts.
...
"Through new products, we can increase the market price for traditionally undervalued cuts, ultimately improving the price paid at the producer level," said Dunn.

Other top opportunities for new product development include beef appetizers, such as cheeseburger fries, and sandwich meat items, such as beef ham and cheeseburger by the slice, all from undervalued cuts.

Additional activities surrounding value-added products, spurred by cattle producers' beef checkoff dollars:

Supermarkets

Jennifer Dunn begins work in August as GBB's new Coordinator of Consumer Relations.She is a native of St. John, Kansas, having completed her BS in Food Science at Kansas State and her Masters in Meat Science at the University of Georgia.Dunn will focus her work on building consumer demand for beef through education, healthcare, and public relations programs for the Georgia Beef Board.