Smoked mackerel and biltong: How niche grocers survive in Singapore

SINGAPORE – On a quiet street corner near the entrance of Chip Bee Gardens sits Anna’s Gourmet, a small but airy grocery store where residents can pop in to stock up on tinned fish, cured meat, pickled vegetables, sweets, chocolates and other pantry staples. 

The selection here, however, differs somewhat from what you might find at the FairPrice Finest across the road. Instead of canned tuna, the shelves are lined with seasoned sprat fillets, smoked cod liver in oil, mackerel in vegetables and Pacific saira. 

The rest of its inventory comprises similar exotica. Fancy a bottle of Georgian wine encased in clay? Or a jar of mushroom salad with vegetables? 

Anna’s Gourmet specialises in produce from Central and Eastern Europe, a part of the world slightly more foreign to Singaporeans than, say, Japan or Thailand, whose products have entered the mainstream thanks to household names like Don Don Donki and Thai Supermarket. 

Its owner Anna Jaeger is not the only retailer who has found her niche. In other parts of the island, you will find grocers selling exclusively South African produce or German goods. There is even a members-only Scandinavian store tucked away on Mount Faber. 

But in an industry dominated by casual players, where mass appeal functions as the sturdiest of life rafts, how exactly does a business survive selling things like seasoned sprat and Kreinbacher (Hungarian champagne)? 

An unforgiving industry  

Many of these regional grocers started as passion projects – a homesick expat’s labour of love. 

Before Jaeger took over in 2022, Anna’s Gourmet was situated in Little India and known as Bublik.

The Azerbaijan native in her 40s – who used to work in the oil and gas industry, and moved to Singapore for work in 2020 – was a customer then, and fond of its range of Eastern European produce. 

When the pandemic struck and the project for which she had relocated was frozen, she found herself presented with a new opportunity. “The shop in Little India was closing down because, like many small businesses, it was struggling after Covid-19. Because I’m from that region, I knew the food well and decided to take over,” she says.

Back then, she was still fairly new to Singapore and searching for a community. Food, she thought, was the perfect tool to help build bridges with the people around her. 

Likewise, Oliver Duric, who hails from the German city of Cologne, launched Lebenslust, a German supermarket, because he wanted to be able to access products he missed.

The 53-year-old, who works in IT sales, has lived in Singapore for 12 years, though he splits his time between the Republic and Dubai, where Lebenslust’s other branch is located. 

He opened a store in Joo Chiat Road in December 2025, at the end of a bruising year for the F&B industry. The sector has grown more unforgiving over the last five years, with rising rents and prices snuffing out gourmet grocers like Bootle’s and East Coast Grocers.

Italian grocery store Alimentari Gourmet in Joo Chiat rebranded as Italian Coffee Lab in January. Selling artisanal produce was no longer sustainable, and the team behind the store had to cut its losses and pivot. 

Gus Abdallah, director of Artisans Finder, the company behind both concepts, says: “One of the biggest challenges was that authentic Italian groceries naturally appeal to a relatively niche audience. While there is a passionate community of Italian food lovers in Singapore, many of the speciality products require a certain level of familiarity and confidence in home cooking.”

Things were fine during the pandemic, when people were stuck at home cooking. But after restaurants and cafes reopened, lifestyles shifted again and convenience became a priority. Business was no longer robust enough to offset the logistical costs of importing and storing premium produce. 

So far, the move seems to have paid off. Coffee and gelato, both universal pleasures, attract a broader customer base than Italian groceries, which appeal mainly to foodies, expats and families, says Abdallah. Consequently, footfall has grown by 30 per cent to 40 per cent. 

Finding their niche

Still, analysts are cautiously optimistic.

“Recent data suggests that grocery retail demand remains resilient,” says Yukako Matsuka, director of YCP, a Singapore-based consulting firm with clients in the grocery retail sector.

She cites the April Retail Sales Index and Food & Beverage Services Index, which reported year-on-year growth of 5.8 per cent for supermarkets and hypermarkets, compared with a 0.4 per cent increase in sales for F&B services.

“This may create opportunities for newcomers,” she adds. “But niche players still need a clear point of difference to succeed.”

To Duric, Lebenslust’s value proposition is clear: “We sell pretty much anything and everything you will find in a German grocery store.” 

The store’s products range from Haribo gummies to personal care products from dm-drogerie markt, Germany’s largest retail chain. It even sells trending items like Super Dickmann’s, a chocolate-coated marshmallow dessert. 

“I love getting the latest and greatest. Whenever a new product gets launched and it’s available only in that particular country, we try to have it at the same time,” he says. 

To those from the same region, these stores are a treasure trove of nostalgia. “Many times, our German customers buy emotionally because they miss home, and they want to relive the taste of being at home,” he adds.  

On Anna’s Gourmet, Hungarian native Emoke Sasi says: “No one else has these products in Singapore.”

The 44-year-old event and marketing manager at the European Chamber of Commerce in Singapore first stepped into the store 2½ years ago in search of turo, or cottage cheese. 

She now visits at least once a month to replenish her supply of cottage cheese, kefir, sour cream, pickled vegetables and her favourite Hungarian champagne. “Sometimes, my husband demands a few products sooner. He is more homesick for our cuisine than me,” she says.  

Locals, on the other hand, approach these foreign products with curiosity. Duric tries to catch their attention with sweets – the Haribo shelf is strategically placed by the window for a reason – before immersing them in the perhaps unfamiliar world of German groceries. 

“The locals are very open-minded. They’re willing to try new things. We’ll have a conversation with them on how to cook and prepare things like bread dumplings, and they will actually take that on,” he says. 

To coax them into a more adventurous frame of mind, he makes it a point to price his products “affordably” – $3.90 for shower gel and $5.90 for a bottle of plum jam, for instance. It is not quite level with mass-market chains like FairPrice, but it is the best he can offer.

“We don’t have the same economies of scale, but we try to keep our margins at a reasonable rate because we are still growing. We want to be able to sell to the locals as much as the Germans, and they are used to low prices,” he reasons. 

Jaeger, on the other hand, deliberately brands her offerings as premium products. Upon taking over the business, she overhauled Bublik’s inventory, replacing old goods with higher-quality products from a wider range of European countries. 

“Singaporean culture demands perfection, so it’s easier to position premium products. It’s expensive to bring in even low-end products because of rising transport costs, so I might as well focus on good-quality items,” she says. Besides, she knows she is too small to compete with the bigger players in the market. 

At her store, you will find $29.90 Ukrainian-style brawn and $32.90 cold smoked mackerel. The latter went viral on TikTok in 2025, which helped to draw more local customers to her shop. 

About 40 per cent of her customers are Singaporean, up from 10 per cent when she took over the business. For Duric, the split is 70 per cent locals, 30 per cent internationals. 

Most customers at Baggie’s Butcher & Deli in Joo Chiat are Singaporean too. The South African grocer specialises in biltong, a type of cured-meat snack which it sells sealed in a bag and stamped with the words “air-dried steak” upon request.

“Not many people know what biltong is, but they know what air-dried steak is. So we try to make it a bit more relatable,” says Baggie’s owner Shaun Domoney, 37.

He also appeals to gymgoers in the fitness-forward neighbourhood by playing up the nutritional benefits of biltong. “We really want to drive home the fact that biltong is a clean, high-protein snack. I mean, when you look at the options, particularly in Singapore, there’s not a great deal of healthy, accessible, on-the-go snacks.” 

Unlike, say, bread rolls – which are made with sugar, cream and other unhealthy fats – biltong is keto-friendly and almost devoid of sugar or any added salt, he points out. “Although it does taste salty, the salt factor is only around 3 per cent.” 

To create better exposure for the store’s products and build up a more committed base of regulars, his team organises monthly barbecues in front of the shop, selling boerewors, a type of South African sausage. “We’re probably doing 100 boerewors rolls on Saturdays, and we’ve got a good mix of people coming. They hang around, have a drink and chat with other guests,” he says. 

How niche is too niche?

Not all products have the power to draw a crowd, though. Domoney describes his sales as “98 per cent biltong”. The other South African products, like Ina Paarman’s sauces and Mrs Ball’s chutney, are “just an add-on”, as he puts it. 

“When I took over the business in 2025, I decided to really focus on biltong because in the whole of South-east Asia, we’re the only ones producing biltong at this scale. We have strong ambitions to grow in the region,” he says.  

At Anna’s Gourmet, Singaporean customers tend to be more wary of things stored in jars – such as ljutenica, a Balkan roasted red pepper and tomato vegetable spread – which they find less familiar.

Conversely, common items like Thai bread spreads and jams prove less popular at Thai Supermarket.

Director Loh Yuen Seng, 62, says: “Demand for these items is generally lower as customers have many similar options available from local supermarkets, making it a less distinctive category for us.”

He says the business’ bestseller is its fresh produce, such as holy basil and green papaya – essential components of authentic Thai dishes.

“Our focus remains on carrying products that offer something uniquely Thai, while continuing to review our product mix based on customer demand and shopping preferences,” he adds.

For others, the point is to remain as niche as possible. Once a year, a large container of Danish goods is shipped to Singapore and stored at the Danish Seamen’s Church in Pender Road. These Scandinavian items are sold at the church’s shop – but only to members. 

As a registered society, its primary goal is not to turn a profit, but to meet the needs of its members.

Church chairman Oliver Andersen, 50, says: “For many Danes living abroad, these foods provide a strong sense of home and connection to their heritage.”

These products consist mainly of candy, pantry staples and frozen goods that are otherwise difficult to obtain in Singapore, and which can last for around a year. Popular items include remoulade (a traditional condiment), aebleskiver (pancake balls) and Matador Mix (a type of candy popular in Denmark). 

A logistical conundrum

On the whole, Jaeger estimates that she sells around 95 per cent of her food. “I’m very cautious about the products I bring in because I want to avoid waste. I feel bad when we have to throw away food.” 

That means no fresh fruit or vegetables from places like Azerbaijan, which do not last long in Singapore’s hot and humid climate. Products – certain soft drinks, candies and alcohol, for example – whose prices skyrocketed due to the war in Iran were discontinued as well.

She is also limited to goods from countries that have established trade routes to Asia, or at least to Hamburg, where a supplier consolidates shipments from across the continent and sends them over to Singapore. 

Duric, too, has found that running a business like this has its fair share of logistical headaches. First comes the struggle of finding the right suppliers and convincing them to sell the product to Lebenslust.

“Normally, these suppliers engage with larger companies, but we explain our business model, tell them that we’re a niche player and new to the market, but growing. We don’t really have any competition in the United Arab Emirates and the only other German supermarket in Singapore is in Bukit Timah,” he says. 

And even if the pitch works, he has learnt not to expect any extra support, in terms of marketing or otherwise. “Suppliers might be like: ‘Okay, you can have it, but it’s your job to do everything else.’ But that’s the life of a small business, I guess.” 

Once his list of goods is firmed up, he has to figure out exactly how many he can sell at any given time. Footfall can be especially uneven during holiday periods. “Some days, I’m trying not to have too much on the shelves because food has an expiration date. If I have too much food while people are travelling, it might hurt my business margins,” he says.

Online or offline?

To better manage costs, some businesses like LeMed, a retailer specialising in Mediterranean produce, eschew bricks-and-mortar stores, relying wholly on the internet. 

“Operating online gives us greater flexibility, allows us to offer a wider product range and helps us keep costs more manageable,” says John Milli, 32, who manages LeMed’s website and social media accounts, sources products and oversees day-to-day sales. 

He adds that some of the company’s biggest challenges include rising logistics and import costs, as well as supply chain fluctuations. Sales have also declined by around 30 per cent from their peak during the Covid-19 pandemic. 

Milli is, however, optimistic about the growing curiosity of local customers. “Consumers today are much more adventurous and informed about food compared with a few years ago. Social media, travel and exposure to international cuisine have played a major role in shaping food preferences.”

It is this curiosity that makes running a physical store viable for grocers like Anna’s Gourmet and Lebenslust. It helps, too, that the stores are located in cosmopolitan, affluent neighbourhoods.

According to Jaeger, it was challenging to position her products in Little India. Holland Village, on the other hand, generates considerably more interest.

Duric has similarly observed a steady stream of walk-ins at Lebenslust. “Joo Chiat is very dependent on foot traffic. A lot of locals go on strolls through the neighbourhood and take their dogs out.”

Likewise, half of Domoney’s business at Baggie’s comes from foot traffic. “That’s the beauty of Singaporeans,” he says. “They are very open to food.”