August 2009 Industry News

In the July issue of Health magazine, mushrooms were featured in the article titled, “9 superfoods for women.” The article highlighted Mushroom Council-funded research and noted that mushrooms are a “super source of antioxidants.” This placement resulted in nearly 5.5 million impressions. To view the online version of the article, click here.

SHIPMENT SUMMARY

Mushroom Council First Handler Reports (millions of pounds; totals may not match due to rounding).

Current Charts	May-09	May-08	% change	YTD 09	YTD 08	% change
Total Shipments	59.53	62.07	-4.09	298.19	317.04	-5.95
Domestic Shipments	52.67	55.67	-5.39	262.47	281.26	-6.68
PA	32.04	33.00	-2.93	156.52	162.43	-3.64
CA	9.06	10.40	-12.93	47.14	52.90	-10.89
Rest of US	11.58	12.62	-8.28	58.81	65.92	-10.79
Imports	6.87	6.40	7.21	35.72	35.78	-0.18

COUNCIL UPDATE

August 7, 2009: Mushroom Producers and Importers Vote to Implement Amendments to Mushroom Promotion, Research, And Consumer Information Order
Click here to read the Mushrooms and Health Global Initiative Bulletin #7 – August, 2009.
PSU Short Course: September 20 – 22 at the Hartefeld National Golf Club in Avondale, Pennsylvania

           Monday, September 21:
                   9:05am – Bart Minor: Mushroom Council report
                   12:00pm – Mushroom Council is hosting a luncheon - Steve Solomon will be giving
                   a Foodservice presentation: Marketing to Food Service: Threats and
                   Opportunities

           Tuesday, September 22:
                   1:00pm – Dr. Michael Holick – Keynote Lecture: The D-Lightful Mushroom and
                   its Health Benefits

Council meeting: Wednesday, September 23^rd, at the Hilton Garden Inn in Kennett Square – Please let Cheryl know if you will be attending.

MARKETING SUMMARY

TOTAL IMPRESSIONS/PLACEMENTS TO DATE:
July impressions overview:

Program	July 2009 Impressions	% of July 2008 Impressions	Total Year Impressions to Date*	% of Annual Goal
Consumer/Nutrition	80,122,978*	158%	595,929,306	119%
Foodservice	754,721	151%	5,392,465	168%
Retail	160,728	94%	1,069,909	74%

*Note, this includes impressions from the mushroom ads running in Times Square from July
1-31. The numbers and percents provided in the above table are based off of this number.
Estimated audience reach is 1.5 million per day.
**Note, total year impressions includes impression numbers from early August 2009.

In July, the Mushroom Council had an average of 60 percent share of voice. While conducting proactive media outreach, we generally expect Mushroom Council coverage to represent between 33-75 percent of mushroom placements, according to average consumer product and commodity industry standards. Note that there are always external factors or industry forces that could change that metric.

Mushroom Share of Voice

Week Ending	Mushroom Council Generated Placements	% of Total Mushroom Coverage	Type of Outreach
July 4	16	80 percent	Proactive
July 11	6	67 percent	Proactive
July 18	0	0 percent	Proactive
June 25	5	42 percent	Proactive
July 31	6	75 percent	Proactive
Total	33	60 percent	Proactive

New Tools/Resources:

The Mushroom Council published two new collateral pieces in July, including a sell sheet featuring Executive Chef Bob Okura of the Cheesecake Factory talking about the important role mushrooms play at the restaurant. In addition, a new sell sheet about mushrooms in meatless cuisine is now available on MushroomInfo.com, which discusses the growing trend of vegetarian meals and how mushrooms are a healthy and delicious meat replacer.

MushroomCouncil.org is getting a facelift. Visit the Retail and Foodservice Sales Tools sections to create your own kits using Mushroom Council resources.

Mushrooms in the News:

Click here to see the July Media Placements Report

Q3 mushroom recipes include the Mini Mushroom Quiche Caps and Portabella Eggs Benedict. To date, the recipes have garnered nearly 3.5 million impressions combined.

On July 7, the Council’s February integration with top talk television show “Ellen” aired again. Ellen DeGeneres mentioned mushrooms are a superfood, which contains the natural source of vitamin D (4%), delicious, nutritious and inexpensive. The mushroom mystery word video was also available on the home page of Ellen’s Web site on that day, along with the Mushroom Council’s logo and Web site link, which generated an additional 5.8 million impressions.

Yahoo! Health highlighted mushrooms as a “power food” in the article, “8 power foods to protect your health.” The article noted that mushrooms are the leading source of selenium in the produce aisle. This placement resulted in nearly 5.5 million impressions. To view the full article, click here.

Shape online highlighted mushrooms’ antioxidant properties in the article titled, “Is your diet healthier than you think?” It noted that mushrooms have serious disease-fighting potential while contributing to a wide variety of nutrients in diets. This placement garnered nearly 400,000 impressions. To view the full article, click here.

Mushrooms’ antioxidant properties were highlighted in 11 placements, which generated more than 7 million impressions in publications such as theYahoo! Healthand Health magazine.

Mushrooms’ vitamin D properties were highlighted in 11 placements, including The News – Press, The Jackson Sun and Diabetic Cooking magazine. To date, in 2009, vitamin D placements have resulted in more than 145 million impressions.

Mushroom Council placements represented an average of 60 percent of total mushroom news, which is withinthe norm of 33 to 75 percent during a period of proactive outreach. To view all July placements, click here.

Nutrition Research Update:

USDA Analysis of Vitamin D in Mushrooms –
Vitamin D values will appear for the following mushrooms as part of the USDA’s National Nutrient Database for Standard Reference Release 22 (http://www.ars.usda.gov/ba/bhnrc/ndl). The values are anticipated to appear when the USDA website is updated later in August.

Mushrooms, white, raw
Mushrooms, white, microwaved
Mushrooms, white, stir-fried
Mushrooms, white, cooked, boiled, drained, without salt
Mushrooms, brown, Italian, or Crimini, raw
Mushrooms, portabella, raw
Mushrooms, portabella, grilled
Mushrooms, enoki, raw
Mushrooms, oyster, raw
Mushrooms, maitake, raw
Mushrooms, chanterelle, raw
Mushrooms, morel, raw
Mushrooms, portabella, exposed to ultraviolet light, raw
Mushrooms, portabella, exposed to ultraviolet light, grilled

Nutrition Research at the September International Medicinal Mushroom Conference, Nantong, China
Dr. Shiuan Chen, City of Hope, Duarte, CA will present his research on the role of Agaricus bisporus in breast and prostate cancer prevention; Dr. Solo Kuvibidila, Oklahoma State University, Stillwater, will present her research on mushrooms’ effect on the production of antimicrobial peptides a-defensins1-3, an important component of innate immunity.

On the Retail Front:

The Council secured a media opportunity with top industry publication, The Packer, and worked with AMI to provide insight on the Mushroom Referendum. To view the entire article, click here. In addition, The Packer’s annual “Guide” was released on July 1 and featured mushroom retail best practices. Both placements resulted in 39,080 impressions each. To view the mushroom section from the “Guide” please click here.

The Council distributed a mid-year press release that highlighted the impressive sales of mushrooms for the first half of 2009. Mushroom sales were up by 6.1 percentin dollars and 7.5 percentin pounds, according to IRI Food Store Sales Research, May 2009. These findings will be featured in upcoming special sections of The Packer and Produce News promoting National Mushroom Month in September. To view this press release, click here.

Mushrooms were featured in three media placements, including Progressive Grocer, Cattle Network and the Beef Magazine’s blog, as a result of the Council’s partnership with the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association on their Veal Made Easy “Free Groceries for a Year” contest. These placements resulted in 84,400 impressions combined.

For a more detailed report click here to see the most recent Mushrooms Top Line report.

On the Foodservice Front:

On July 10, the Mushroom Council sponsored the session, “Celebrating a Vegetarian Future” at the National Association of Colleges & University Food Services (NACUFS) Annual Meeting in Milwaukee. Panelists included Dwight Collins, executive chef at the University of California, Santa Cruz; Ida Shen, executive chef at University of California, Berkley; Paul Komelasky, foodservice director at Northwestern University; and Carla Hall, Top Chef Season Five finalist. Overall, the session offered good exposure for mushrooms to foodservice directors at top colleges nationwide. More than 60 college foodservice representatives attended the session, exceeding the goal of 30 by 100%. Schools represented included Yale, Villanova, Rutgers, University of Texas-Austin and Texas A&M. Each panelist talked about mushrooms’ role in their vegan/vegetarian menus and each detailed specific mushroom menu items.

In the month of July, media outreach efforts resulted in mushroom photographs prominently featured on the front pages of three articles. July’s placements put the Mushroom Council at 168% of its annual impressions goal and kept mushrooms as a key part of ethnic and vegetarian cuisine as well as beef and seafood foodservice stories.

In July, the Council secured several exciting sponsorship opportunities.

In July, the Council received sales results from the national mobile campaign with Moe’s Southwest Grill that began on March 1 and ended on May 31. During the promotion, the Phil E. burrito and quesadilla, filled with sautéed mushrooms, grilled sirloin steak, peppers, onions, shredded cheese and Moe’s queso, accounted for more than 3% of total Moe’s sales. Compared to average mushroom sales during non-promotional periods, 106.1 additional pounds of mushrooms were sold during the campaign and nearly 10,000 registrants signed up to receive Phil E. coupons during the promotion.

For an update on the status of the Council’s foodservice promotional pursuits, click here; to see new mushroom menu items for July, click here.

On the Social Media front:

In July, MushroomInfo.com and TheMushroomChannel.com experienced 11,375 unique visitors combined.

The Council saw a traffic spike on days when contributing bloggers post on the Mushroom Channel. For example, the Channel saw its highest peak in July when the recipe of the week, Shiitake and Spinach Scramble by Cucina Nicolina was posted. The Council can benefit from traffic spikes that coincide with contributing blogger posts on the Channel and will continue to look for more future opportunities.

The Council has 878 total Twitter and Facebook followers to date. Obtaining these followers has resulted in 224,198 online exposures. (Note, this number reflects the total number of Twitter members from January-present who have seen Mushroom Council content, which includes Mushroom Council followers and non-Mushroom Council followers)

Notable Twitter quotes in July: