Opinion From the continued popularity of coloured glassware through to the challenges facing glassmakers, we hear from brands supplying glass to HoReCa and retail, learning more about what’s selling…
“This business is a
constant challenge” over&back Laura Fischer, VP merchandise & tabletop product development Is coloured glassware still popular and selling for you? We could not be more excited to launch our mouth-blown coloured glassware collection in spring 2024 across purple, spoke, and green. With searches for coloured wine glasses surging by over 200 percent year over year, and search trends showing no signs of slowing down, it’s clear that there’s a substantial and growing demand in the market. It is the perfect way to add a pop of colour to the table without breaking the bank. What new ranges do you have planned for 2024? We are launching our mouth-blown collections in early April of 2024. We are so excited to offer a few collections from stemware to coloured. We will continue to expand our colour offering with two new colours, Ink Blue and Amber for Q3. These colours will be perfect for holiday entertainment and add a very dramatic look to the table. We are also expanding for Q3 into bar glassware, perfect timing for all the holiday parties. We will offer both-mouth blown, and machine-made glasses. We will now have our customers covered from breakfast through dinner and everything in between. Do you think traditional stemware is still in vogue or does a wine glass always have to have something extra? Absolutely, there is nothing more elegant or classic than a mouth-blown stem. In fact, sometimes the “extras” take away from the simplicity of a perfect stem. Is there still a market for decorative glass? I think decorative glassware has moved towards coloured glassware. Coloured still offers the “wow” factor of a decorated glass but has a bit more timelessness to it and works with more aesthetics and tableware.
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Zwiesel Glas Lisa Müller – teamlead brand & product management How has the glassware sector performed over the past year? In the past year, not only the glass industry, but the entire tabletop industry – along with various other sectors – was characterised by difficult macroeconomic conditions. The consumer climate (both in B2C and B2B markets) has suffered and continues to suffer from geopolitical conflicts, political uncertainties and the resulting rise in inflation rates. The price-sensitive entry-level segments are particularly affected by this. Despite, or precisely because of, these extraordinarily difficult conditions, we have consistently continued on our path in both sales areas. In our B2C area, we continue to focus on expanding our dual-brand strategy in the digital sector and in stationary retail. In the B2B area, we are continuing to expand the concept approach of the whole table under United Tables by Zwiesel and Fortessa Tableware Solutions. With this hybrid strategy, we were once again able to prove to our partners last year that we will not abandon our strategic path as a reliable partner even in economically challenging times and are consistently expanding our brand and concept business in both areas. With this strategy, we were also able to see successes in our high-quality brand business last year - while at the same time facing clearly perceptible challenges in the entry-level volume segments mentioned above. Is coloured glassware still popular and selling for you? Coloured glassware is very trendy ever since. The colours might change from time to time – currently, we basically see everything from pastel, natural tones to very strong and bright colours. So yes, definitely popular and selling for us – we are even planning about a new range with colour (in addition to our existing coloured wine glass series Ink and our coloured living assortment). Is the hospitality industry your primary market?
Our roots originally lie in the HoReCa market and we have enjoyed stable growth and pleasing success in recent years. For example, we have been awarded Global Market Leader Champion in Crystal glass for upscale hotel sector and gastronomy for many years in a row now, perfectly demonstrating our strong market position. To further expand this growth, we offer concepts for the complete table setting under United Tables in the European and Asian markets and under Fortessa Tableware Solutions in the American markets. Everything from a single source, from glass and dinnerware to cutlery and accessories. However, our strategy as a global group - the Zwiesel Fortessa Group, as recently demonstrated at the world’s largest consumer goods trade fair Ambiente in Frankfurt - does not focus exclusively on the HoReCa market, but also includes the consumer sector in equal measure. Our strategic growth path in our Consumer segment includes the consistent expansion of our two-brand strategy and the stringent implementation of this strategy in our digital and stationary channels worldwide. How much time/research/planning do you plough into each new glassware launch? Usually, the launch process of new items takes up to one year. So right now, we are already in the middle of planning the items for 2025. We start with diverse drawings in the first, then make some handmade samples in our own glass manufactory in Zwiesel to find the right design for our new idea. This can take several rounds till we are sure about the new design. Even sensory tastings take an important part during the design process. Until we then have the final product, it’s mostly one year later. Although, if there are important customer projects or very urgent market needs, we can also be much faster than this