From confinements to restrictions, the pandemic has brought down the consumption of popcorn in cinemas, but it has taken off its microwaveable version, exported by millions of sachets from the Gers, cradle of the largest European manufacturer.
Covid has severely limited cinema attendance and therefore the consumption of popcorn in dark rooms. The ban on consumption in cinemas decided at the end of January 2022 did not help. On the other hand, the health crisis has made popcorn take off in its microwaveable version, exported by millions of sachets from the Gers, cradle of the largest European manufacturer, the Nataïs company.
At the bend in a road that winds through fields, between dovecotes and farmhouses topped with tiles, stand the Nataïs silos. Trucks from across the continent load dozens of pallets of popcorn there.
The health crisis has had negative consequences on our network of distributors who supply cinemas (…) and positive because sales of microwaveable popcorn have increased sharply.
Michel Ehmman – CEO of Nataïs
At the entrance to his small factory, a red and white vintage machine, straight from Kansas, evokes how this Franco-German farmer discovered popcorn corn in 1989 in the country of his American wife.
Back on his farm near Bézéril (Gers), 42 km from Auch, he carried out tests. Then in 1994, he created his company, which today has 140 employees, holds nearly 40% of the European market, with a turnover of 65 million euros.
At a dizzying rate, three robotic lines produce up to 300 bags per minute of microwaveable popcorn. Others fill bags of traditional popcorn, from 25 to 930 kg, intended for cinemas, amusement parks and wholesalers. Following a path secured by green barriers, forklift operators load the pallets, wrap them in plastic, stack them up to the roof of the storage shed.
If the Covid crisis has affected the bulk sales of Nataïs, which supplies more than 80% of French cinemas, those of popcorn in the microwave have soared with +25% since 2019 and 207 million sachets sold the last year.
Hélène Ricau – Nataïs commercial director
The commercial director of Nataïs explains that “during the confinements, people discovered in popcorn a somewhat comforting product in these gloomy times”, while the “pop, pop” of the golden grains make the lid of the stainless steel machine jump. of the test laboratory.
To make its different varieties of “butterfly” popcorn, in the shape of a butterfly, or “mushroom”, round like a mushroom and therefore easier to coat with caramel or chocolate, Nataïs works with 220 growers, 28 of whom are organic. A few in South Africa compensate for supply disruptions thanks to reversed seasons. But most of them are on these Gers lands famous for their ducks and their cornfields.
Thus the farm of Pierre Alem, 33, has belonged to his family since the Revolution and today covers 199 hectares in the town of Aubiet, about twenty kilometers from Bézéril.
Between wheat, rapeseed, barley and sunflower, he developed the cultivation of popcorn corn launched by his father in 2008 on around twenty hectares, an area that has since doubled, with an annual yield of around 200 tonnes.
Nataïs provides seeds and pays for growing grasses or legumes between harvests. This agro-ecological method aims to “sequestrate carbon in the soil, fix atmospheric nitrogen and prevent erosion”, he explains. “Popcorn corn (…) brings more added value compared to corn for animal feed”, argues this farmer, who pilots irrigation by tensiometric probes in order to “manage the best” the consumption of water. “We are going to sow for the 14th time”, he rejoices, as he walks through his fields which undulate on hills swept by a winter wind, with the snow-capped Pyrenees in the background.
Warm in the hall of the CGR cinema in Blagnac, near Toulouse, Rayan Aguilar, a 16-year-old high school student, does not hide his disappointment at not being able to snack in front of a film since the end of December: “Cinema without popcorn, it’s weird!” He is not the only one to “impatiently” wait for the measure to be lifted on February 16.
Popcorn is one of the top products at the confectionery counter.
Jean-Baptiste Salvat – CGR multiplex director of Blagnac
The director of this 15-screen cinema in the Toulouse metropolis deplores a direct loss of “between 20 and 30% of turnover”. For the record, he started his career selling… popcorn.