From January to October 2026, Freddy Hirsch's Google Ads returned 10.29x and produced 1,131 online sales, well above the 6x target. Almost all of it came from one Performance Max Shopping campaign, which returned 14.1x. Syte runs Google Ads, SEO and email newsletters for Freddy Hirsch Group, a South African supplier of spices, food ingredients and butchery equipment . The account works because it's built around the product feed, with search used only where it pays.
| Client | Freddy Hirsch Group (PTY) LTD |
| Vertical | Food ingredients, spices and butchery equipment, online store |
| Market | South Africa, national |
| Channels | Google Performance Max Shopping, search, Demand Gen remarketing |
| Period | 1 January – 31 October 2026 |
| Google Ads | 10.29x ROAS · 1,131 conversions |
| Main campaign | Performance Max Shopping, 14.1x · 93% of conversions |
| Target | 6x ROAS |
The challenge
Freddy Hirsch sells to a specialist market: butchers, food producers and serious home cooks buying spice blends, casings and equipment. Their buyers are mainly butchers, food producers and serious home cooks. Those buyers search for specific products, often by name, and they compare suppliers on price and range. The business set a 6x return as the bar for Google Ads, which is high for a store with this many products. Paying for broad searches that bring the wrong visitors would sink that number quickly.
Approach
We let the product feed do most of the work:
- Performance Max Shopping as the core. It carries about two-thirds of the budget and produced 1,050 of the account's 1,131 conversions in 2026, at 14.1x.
- Search only for specific product groups. A spice search campaign returned 3.8x on 62 conversions. A butchery equipment search campaign returned 1.37x on 17 conversions. Equipment is a bigger, slower purchase, so it converts less often.
- Remarketing tested and measured. A Demand Gen remarketing campaign using the feed has returned very little so far (0.04x) and is under review.
- Keywords cut when they don't sell. We regularly remove search terms that cost money without bringing in sales.
Channels used
- Google Performance Max Shopping: most sales, from the full product feed.
- Google search (spices and butchery equipment): high-intent product searches.
- Google Demand Gen remarketing: brings back past visitors with feed-based ads.
- SEO and email newsletters: Not covered on this page; no dated Report BOT metrics for those channels in the period.
What we changed
- The Google account is built around a Performance Max Shopping campaign on the full product feed. Exact build date is not in our dated change log.
- 2 November 2026: paused four phrase-match search keywords that had spent without producing a sale.
Results (platform-reported)
| Measure | Jan – Oct 2026 | Comparison period | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Google ROAS | 10.29x | 11.43x | −10% |
| Google conversions | 1,131 | 1,139 | about level |
| Click-through rate | 4.50% | 4.16% | +0.3 points |
| Conversion rate | 2.25% | 2.64% | −0.4 points |
| Cost per conversion | n/a | n/a | +8% |
| Google spend | n/a | n/a | +7% |
Freddy Hirsch has held a return above 10x across two long periods. In 2026 the account made about the same number of sales as the previous ten months, at a return 70% above the 6x target. More people clicked the ads, at 4.5% of impressions, but a slightly smaller share of them bought. Month by month, the return ran from 9.75x in June to 14.02x in August.
Methodology. Figures are platform-reported (Google Ads) for 1 January to 31 October 2026 unless stated. They're compared with 3 March to 31 December 2025, the previous period of the same length.
What's next
The return has eased since August, to 8.99x in September and 7.57x in October. It's still above target, but it's heading the wrong way, and each sale is costing a bit more. Our focus is on the search campaigns and remarketing: cutting search terms that don't sell (four were paused on 2 November) and deciding whether Demand Gen earns its place. The Performance Max Shopping campaign keeps most of the budget.
FAQ
Does Google Ads work for food ingredient and spice suppliers?
It can work very well. Freddy Hirsch's Google Ads returned 10.29x from January to October 2026, with 1,131 online sales, against a 6x target.
Is Performance Max good for a specialist food supplier with a big catalogue?
For Freddy Hirsch it is the core of the account. Its Performance Max Shopping campaign returned 14.1x in 2026 and produced 1,050 of 1,131 conversions.
Should a food supplier run search campaigns alongside Shopping?
Yes, for specific product groups. Freddy Hirsch's spice search campaign returned 3.8x in 2026. Butchery equipment search returned 1.37x, because equipment is a bigger, slower purchase.
What ROAS target is realistic for an ingredients supplier on Google?
Freddy Hirsch works to 6x and has beaten it, at 10.29x for January to October 2026 and 11.43x in the previous ten months. Targets depend on margins, so set yours from your own numbers.
Does remarketing work for food ingredient stores?
Not always. Freddy Hirsch's Demand Gen remarketing campaign returned 0.04x in 2026, so we're reviewing whether it earns its budget.
Related
- Google Ads service: /services/google-ads
- SEO service: /seo
- E-commerce case studies: Gym Gear (/case-studies/gym-gear), The Bed Shop (/case-studies/the-bed-shop)
- Contact: /contact
