Some companies need serious help to market their products.
I have been in Shanghai for many years, and am an avid yogurt eater. At least three times a week my breakfast consists among others of yogurt with muesli. The problem is that the yogurt for sale in every Chinese supermarket is of the sweet variety. You just cannot buy unsweetened yogurt in a normal supermarket (Carrefour may be an exception, but likely at astronomical prices, and I hardly ever go there). It does not taste bad, but it’s full of chemicals, and I prefer to have the original sour variety in my fridge.
Therefore I was pleasantly surprised to see an article in Shanghaiist a few weeks ago called Bebemamie, fresh unsweetened yogurt delivered to your door. It turns out that there is a French company in Shanghai that has been producing fresh yogurt since 2004 and selling it directly to its customers. And I did not even know about it… I think they should get a new marketing person right away. It is not so difficult to reach your target group in Shanghai, which probably mainly consists of foreigners. But if you wait for 4 years before blogs start writing about you, you may have lost some sales. Their website seems to be blocked in China (did they ever check?), and when I used a proxy server to see the site I got an empty page with the text ‘Opening soon. (c) 2005 Bebemamie’…
Maybe I am wrong, and they just do not want more customers because of production capacity restrictions. Or they feel it should be a niche product that not too many people should know about. If that is the case, I am sorry for this additional promotion, because your product is perfect!
My wife and I started ordering right after reading the article, and are very happy with the product and the easy home-delivery. Every Monday a delivery person brings us 10 new jars of fresh yogurt, and picks up the old jars. Exactly enough for one week. And although the price is not low (RMB 10 per small jar), the convenience and taste completely compensate for this. It is a thick, sour tasting yogurt, exactly the same as the yogurt I had when I lived on the island of Curacao as a kid. I don’t think I had it anywhere else since.
Interestingly, my wife also says that this is the kind of yogurt she had in Beijing as a kid. So it seems that in the past Chinese also ate the unsweetened ‘real’ yogurt. Did people’s taste change after they introduced the sweet variety? Or was it cheaper to produce a more artificial product?
Whatever the reason, I am happy to have real yogurt again. Real yogurt without any added chemicals or preservatives, and made from imported Australian milk. If you live in Shanghai or Suzhou and want to order as well, call Bebemamie at 021-6269 1701 or 6269 1702. The yogurt is also available at Kommune, Slice Deli, Enoteca and House of Flour. Look for small unlabeled glass jars with yellow tops. Bon appetit!
Thanks for the info Marc, i’ll try that as well, as all yogurt is also much too sweet to my liking
Hi Erwin, I suppose you are Erwin den Breejen? Did you move to Shanghai in the meantime? I added your blog to my RSS feeds, but it seems you never started posting – or your RSS feed is broken. Let’s have lunch one of these days to catch up.
marc,
been reading your blogs for quite a while. very interesting and genuine stuff. however, you rarely mention your own culture or life back in holland, from a living-in-china perspective. do you also wanna share the experience? as far as I’m concerned, life in holland is radically different…
@anonymous: I normally only write about Holland when I am there, which has not been often since my wife became pregnant. Main reason you don’t read much about it here is that I left Holland over 12 years ago already, after I graduated university in 1995.
Actually GuangMing (???makes unsweetened yogurt as well but most stores don’t sell it, you can only get it delivered to your door.
I did this for several months, it was about 2-3rmb per bottle delivered daily. As just one guy a bottle of yogurt a day became just too much after awhile.
Of course it’s probably chock full of chemicals but it is an option. I like the idea of BeiBeiMama even though it isn’t cheap, but I just can’t do a bottle a day.
The unsweetened yogurt that we enjoyed years ago in Beijing is still available, and still in the same little gray ceramic pots… but you have to search high and low for it!
We also ordered yogurt from Bebemamie a couple of weeks ago, and we are hoping they will start delivering this week.
S
Heard about this company once it started business in Shanghai a few years back. If I remember correctly, the founder is a French magician.
I sent him an email to enquire about the yoghurt and learnt that they recollect the bottles from you again.
Environmentally friendly, but my mother, who is super concerned about cleaniness in the house, refused to try even I wasted so much time convincing her that the bottles are clean.
No luck trying this delicious yoghurt till now. I’m sick of Danone’s sweet yoghurt (they simply call it sour milk here?)
PS: One interesting note, the little emperors and empresses here love to serve their mango pudding with yoghurt instead of evaporated milk and they’re proud that they know what yoghurt is 🙂
Super helpful info – I often go back to Shanghai for extended trips and always would find myself hungering for good yogurt.
Curious – taste- and texture-wise, how would you say Bebemamie compares to Fage? (Fage isn’t distributed in China, right?)
I don’t know Fage, so I can’t compare it… Guess it’s not sold in China.