Rockit Apples

Hawke’s Bay pipfruit grower Phil Alison grows and markets a small apple with a big future, called Rockit.

Plant & Food Research bred the apple in about 1989 and Phil started playing around with it in the late 1990s. “Then I learnt Plant & Food were keen for orchardists to plant some of their varieties out in their orchards. I did that. After a couple of years the trees bore a few fruit. I got more and more trees. Prevar then took over the whole breeding programme and I required a trial marketing licence, which I got from Prevar.”

“Prevar was assigned the variety by Plant & Food under and agreement. The licence went back to the industry for further expressions of interest. Everyone else dropped out, saying the apple was too small and that it would never work.”

“That left me with the opportunity to negotiate a licence, which I did. During that time I had been busy strategizing around how I thought the apple could fit in, and where. Rockit is similar to Pacific Rose, but tastes creamier. It has thin skin, and because of its size, you are always eating the skin and flesh. As a result it always taste fresh.” Phil has trademarked the Rockit name, expanded his orchard, and is now trying to increase production.

Phil says one of the keys to the marketing strategy is that it is promoted as a convenience food. “I am trying to get Rockit out of the produce section and into the convenience part of the supermarket, hence the packaging.”

Rockit apples come in a tube of five and are about one and a half times the size of a golf ball. “My target market is the water bottle market. I want you to have a tube of apples in the pushchair, trundler, car, instead of a water bottle. It is better for you, and very refreshing. I believe it is the first fruit that is convenient – four bites and you are done.”

Rockit apples are the smallest on the market. Phil says other small apples that are being sold, “tend to be ones that haven’t made the grade”. Rockit has extremely high natural flavours and sugars and stores unbelievably well.

Phil identified Marks & Spencer as the leading global upscale retailer. He went on their website, contacted their technical director and told him he had a wonderful apple out of New Zealand. Phil asked M&S to sample and evaluate it. The feedback was encouraging; with the technical director telling Phil that although he received many hundreds of samples a year, Rockit was outstanding.

In the 2010 NZ Food Awards, Phil’s Havelock North Fruit Company won two awards and was a finalist in the supreme award.

Rockit was also nominated for an international award at Logistica, a fresh produce trade show held each February in Berlin. There were 55,000 people there. Phil says although they didn’t win, it was good public relations and attracted a huge amount of interest. He is now being chased for supply from overseas countries.

Some people don’t like the tube (they believe there is already too much packaging of foodstuffs) but a lot of people appreciate the hygiene and convenience the tube brings. Phil says, “Think about mid-winter when everyone has the flu and you go to the supermarket where lots of people handle the fruit. Sometimes it rolls off the stand, gets put back on. People forget it is food they are handling.”

Phil is aiming now to manage a global programme of plantings and sales.

Rockit has just come out of quarantine in most of the major apple producing areas of the world. They are in negotiations at the moment with potential licensees in those countries.

In Europe there’s a lot of consignment selling of New Zealand pipfruit. But with Rockit, Phil is aiming for fixed price sales. “We won’t ship unless we have that. Our terms of trade are better and we certainly don’t let people sell willy-nilly. They have to sign up to a plan.”

The rewards of operating like this are significantly higher. Phil says they are getting good returns. “People really like it. It’s a good size for kids. And we’ve had feedback from diabetics because it’s a good way to keep up sugar levels.”

He is targeting non-traditional apple eaters. “It’s a true global apple. The Asians love it because it’s sweet, it’s different and it looks pretty. Taiwan is our biggest market presently. I’ve even had Taiwanese consumers ring me at home asking where they can get more.”

Phil said he knew he was onto a good thing because when he was building up numbers, he couldn’t commercialise it and so had to give the fruit away, and the feedback he got from everybody who tried it “said it was the nicest apple they had ever eaten.”