Strawberry milk sausage sales set to sizzle

In a bid to boost declining sales of fish-meat sausages, Nippon Suisan Kaisha, Ltd. (Nissui) has come up with a new flavor designed specifically to attract children -- strawberry milk. The company will begin selling the sausages on Sept. 1, and is expecting them to be a hit, aiming for sales of 200 million yen in the first year.
Sausage sales in Japan have leveled off in recent years, totaling 46.5 billion yen in fiscal 2004. In 2005, the figure is expected to rise only slightly, to 47 billion yen. When Nissui conducted a survey as part of a project to create sausages that children would like, it found that strawberries were children's favorite fruit. The firm decided to use the flavor in its products and seasoned the sausages by adding strawberry juice and milk to them, creating a product that had a strawberry flavor.
The texture and flavor of the sausages are reportedly close to those of regular fish-meat sausages, with the exception that the aftertaste of strawberries remains.
"It's an unexpected combination, but a taste that children will like," a Nissui official said. "Strawberries go well with minced fish." Customers will be able to buy the strawberry milk sausages in packs of five, and they will go for a retail price of 148 yen, about the same as regular fish-meat sausages. ...via