About Birds Eye beef burgers…

[Minfilia]

They’ve been a guilty pleasure of mine for YEARS. My perfect comfort food was always burgers with potato waffles and spaghetti hoops - a childhood treat that always makes me feel happy.

Imagine my horror to discover they changed the recipe and they now comprise 20% pea protein and 55% beef.

I don’t want a plant burger. I want my BEEF(ish) burgers.

Yes, I know they’re unhealthy. And ultra processed. And probably about as meaty and nutritious as dog food. But why did they have to go and ruin it.

(PS - has anyone actually tasted them and are they as awful as I’m imagining? I do eat a lot of plant based alternatives but I HATE pea protein based stuff with a passion!)

(Also happy to accept that I may be acting like a highly unreasonable, tantrumming toddler)

Not the point

Is it really that big of a shock that a cheap birds eye frozen burger contains some fillers?

Pea protein is cheaper than beef. It's also more environmentally friendly. So two reasons why they might do it.

If you want 100% beef go to the butcher.

Yes, 45% fillers is shocking. Tesco frozen are 82% beef and £8 a kilo, birds eye are £10.50 a kilo.

If Pea protein is cheaper why are Birds Eye beef burger so much more expensive then others with higher meat content.

YANBU.

I am still mourning the loss of the Cheese Hamwich. They went from a slice of processed cheese crap on top of fake ham turkey stuff, all covered in breadcrumbs, to some revolting chobbled up fake turkey ham and cheese pieces all mixed up together.

Because the ones with a higher meat content mentioned on this thread are supermarket burgers. Supermarkets make their profits based on the sheer scale of their company. They have lower marketing costs as a percentage of sales, and massive buying power. It's also a highly competitive business model, which keeps prices low.

Tesco has famously made billions of profit - but their net profit margin was under 3%. Their gross profit margin was 6.6% average over the last 4 years. Birds eyes gross profit margin last year was 28.2%. (I'm not comparing like with like because I'm basing it on a quick Google - if you want to look further into figures, go for it).

Because Birds Eye are a massive for-profit company and their goal is to make as much money as they can.

The fact that it's cheaper doesn't mean they'll pass the saving on to the customer.

But if they change a recipe then there is no reason for customers who liked the previous product to transfer their loyality to the new product and keep paying more. Anyone with any sense would then try the other options available to find a new favourite at a good price.

Sure. But it's their prerogative and they've presumably done enough market research to know that 90% of customers won't read the ingredients.

It's right on the front though that it's a new recipe and contains plant protein. Why would you pay substantially more for something that you don't even know if you like?

Give Farmfoods own mini chicken Kiev balls a try, I think they're way better and a nice creamy filling.

Try the Aldi Wagyu ones instead. Delicious.

People will keep buying them precisely because it's Birds Eye. Just like people keep buying Heinz or Kellogg's or Hellman's. It's the brand they know and trust, and they want to believe that supermarket offerings are inferior.

Also, they won't have just gone blindly into making the change. They will have had a panel of consumers testing the product, and they will have made their decisions based on that.

Leading brands don't become leading brands by accident. They do understand the market. That doesn't mean they don't make mistakes - and this might be one. But they will have looked at things like what consumers think of the product - including things like flavour and environmental impact - before making the change.

There's plenty of all beef burgers in supermarkets, had excellent ones yesterday from Lidl, just beef and seasoning, nothing else.

@NeverEnoughPants

Fair enough, I just don't understand brand loyalty myself. Change in recipe is a different product, the one you liked doesn't exist anymore. So when considering what to buy I would look at all the options available and the price.

I'm exactly the same. And imo some supermarket products taste better than some branded ones.

But some people do love their branded goods.