Iceland, Danish supermarkets primed for Thai delicacies

On Saturday, Jurin visited Copenhagen’s ILLUM luxury shopping mall and met its owner.

“ILLUM will let us set up in-store promotion booths for Thai luxury products,” Jurin said. “So, I asked the trade representatives to select high-end products that can be put on display here.”

Later in the day, he visited the MANY supermarket, which has more than 100 outlets in Denmark and 200 worldwide.

Jurin said MANY sells Asian food products, but there are not many Thai products on the shelves. Since the Danish supermarket chain gets its supplies from the Netherlands, Jurin instructed the delegation to contact the Dutch suppliers and encourage them to export more Thai products.

“We plan to open a direct channel for Thai products and put them on the shelves without changing labels or going through middlemen, which will help reduce costs,” the minister said. “The first batch will include ready-to-eat meals, seasoning, organic foods and fruits. These should be on the shelves in the next three to six months.”

On Sunday, Jurin took the delegation to Reykjavik’s Kronan supermarket, which has 23 branches across Iceland and sells products imported from China, Vietnam and Thailand.

“The supermarket buys Thai products from traders in the UK, Germany and the Netherlands, so the choices are very limited. Thai products available at Kronan are coconut, seasonings and frozen meals, but the choices are limited,” Jurin said. “This is a good opportunity for us to start exporting Thai products directly to Kronan. We have spoken to the owner and they have allowed us to hold in-store promotions.”

Jurin expects to add coconut milk, ready-to-eat meals, fruits and organic foods to the shelves at Kronan and has instructed the Department of International Trade Promotion to coordinate with manufacturers, exporters and the Icelandic supermarket to add Thai products to the shelves as soon as possible.