The consumer demands retail strategies to look into new ways to draw customers into their store. But wait, isn’t retail dying? Doesn’t everyone order their stuff online now? While we’re seeing closures from apparel retailers and large brands such as Macy’s, J.C. Penney, and Sears, it’s not necessarily because retail has lost its edge. As you may have guessed it’s because of the Amazon effect. So, is it dying? Maybe. Shifting? Most definitely.
E-commerce has become a channel that has made shopping easy and convenient. You order some clothes, a couple of HBA products, and some snacks. Two days later it’s on your doorstep without having to take time out of your schedule.
However, it’s shifting because there are still things that brick-and-mortar stores can offer. Smaller, nimbler brands are set for expansion while the more prominent names are closing their doors. Dollar General, for example, is planning to open an additional 1,000 locations across the States.
Among other things, Dollar General is going smaller at 6,000 square feet and bringing in fresh produce. The focus of their new plan is to hone in on technology and capitalize on the e-commerce shift, despite trailing behind the retail industry trends for quite some time.
For example, Amazon rolled out its Amazon Fresh in Washington several years ago. Today they’re expanding to metropolitan cities to offer grocery delivery in the same vein you can order other goods via Amazon. It may be giving retailers a run for their money, but should brick-and-mortar retailers be sweating?
Retail Shift Towards Engagement
Retailers are compensated for keeping their ear to the ground and understand what their consumers want. The question is why? Retail experience. What did Best Buy do differently than hhgregg? Engagement. You can sit on that chair you’ve looked at online to get a feel. You can play that newly released console game from a month ago. You can demo the product and get a feel for it.
Welcome to a branded food CPG opportunity. Partner up with the retailer to offer new experiences for consumers. With a healthy market plan, you can assure your retail partner the traffic that will support turn on shelves and ultimately benefit both parties. Point-of-purchase is a great way to foster experience or engagement with shoppers in-store. You can sample products, cooking demos, or have coupon dispensers to drive trial.
Shoppers have broken away from the “primary shopper” profile. Now, people in the household are shopping for themselves. Families have shifted habits where others help out and perform shopping duties. That means going to various stores to satisfy their shopping lists. With this shift, shoppers are perusing stores that offer experience over function.
Knowing that experience is becoming the draw for grocery shoppers, how can you bring differentiate retail from e-commerce?
Differentiating the Experience
A panel of Generation Z (often abbreviated Gen Z) consumers have expressed that “ordering fresh grocery food from Amazon did not appeal to [them].” On the other hand, these consumers were confident in ordering meals via UberEats. Gen Z’s perceived thought is that food delivered through UberEats was fresher than groceries ordered through AmazonFresh. They don’t like the idea of their food being handled and processed. Further, they can’t honestly examine the quality of their food like they can when they’re at the store.
While it’s a small sample size, it’d be wise to explore different tactics. Gen Z is still young, but they echo habits and attitudes from the Millennial generation. Retailers should continue addressing these elements: price, taste, and convenience. But track with convenience. When was the last time you dreaded going to the store because of the long lines? Or whether they’d have your product fully stocked? Stores today are looking at the growing era of technology. How can they make your experience more comfortable, convenient, and memorable?
Millennials Driving Growth of Online Food Sales
We’ve all dreamed it, but Millennials are doing it: sitting on the couch and not only putting together their grocery list but submitting their order for pickup of delivery. Have you discussed with your retail buyer and partner how your brand is positioned to support online sales? This could be a tremendous marketing opportunity. Can you create shipper-friendly package sizes (hint: drop the dead space)? Can you partner with a compatible brand to create recipe-ready shippable packages? Retailers look for thier partners for innovation.
To identify and isolate areas for improvement in shopper marketing program strategies and tactics to further your CPG brand growth against set KPIs:
Maximize the economic performance of your CPG brand shopper marketing investment
Increase velocity at retail and consumer brand affinity
This shopper marketing audit will detail and contrast your CPG brand shopper marketing and messaging versus that of industry standard competitive practices and will include, but not limited to:
Target market reach, integrated retail marketing support, promotional continuity & awareness, offers and incentives, and tactical execution timing
Go-to-market launch strategies, timing, and tactical execution
Deliverables
Marketing Communication Audit Report
The deliverable will be a white paper with NewPoint Marketing findings and recommendations related to marketing activities in one retail partnership or DMA/market as defined by the client.
Brant brings 20+ years of experience to NewPoint as chief brand communicator and marketing-plan contributor.
Brant’s specialty is bringing an outside, investigative perspective that can feel alternately “rigorous” or “exasperating” depending on your point of view. Yet, he never fails to uncover a business’s unique selling proposition—one which can serve as a brand foundation for marketing that is compelling, creative and “sticky.”
Throughout his career, Brant’s applied his skill set to a broad range of business applications along the food supply-and-service chain. His services have provided vital clarity for all types of operations, from the more conventional food and food equipment manufacturers to the adjacent enterprises that partner with them, such as the Purdue University College of Agriculture.
Stephanie Bossung
Food industry marketing expertise—from retail to food-service and food-service equipment— is a natural outcome of having deep knowledge in every facet of a business’ operation. With 10 years in branding and business development, preceded by 15 years in mass media and promotions, Stephanie is an FMI Emerge mentor, holds an executive-level expertise in sales, marketing, media, and production management.
This exceptionally diverse skill set adds value for NewPoint clients by providing a full complement of perspectives on food-industry brand management endeavors.
Wired for a hawkish attention to detail while also maintaining a high-resolution view of the big picture, Stephanie is uniquely able to provide astute branding direction and simultaneously apply the business principles necessary to squeeze more bang out of every marketing buck.
Patrick Nycz
A member of the Forbes Agency Council and quoted in the New York Times, USA Today and Adweek, Patrick Nycz is the author of Moving Your Brand Up the Food Chain: Marketing Strategies to Grow Local and Regional Food Brands. He is an FMI Emerge mentor, an American Advertising Federation’s Silver Medal Award winner, and the Founding President of NewPoint Marketing, a full-service food industry marketing firm focused on food industry brands On a mission to grow.
Patrick’s vision for NewPoint emerged from his team’s success using this proven model for food industry clients and is fueled by NewPoint-funded food buyers and food manufacturers research around tracking consumer, industry, and ongoing food trends.
Kristy Blair
Since starting her 20-year career in commercial graphic design at one of the foremost catalog retailers in the world, Kristy’s visual branding skills have organically narrowed into the food-industry niche.
In that time, she’s directed graphic identities for snack food and restaurant startups, print materials for multiple agricultural seed companies, display graphics and merchandiser signage for major food-equipment manufacturers and everything in between.
Today, as one of the key brand architects for NewPoint clients, she continues to lead our visual research & development team, always working to find the innovative median between the best practices worth honoring and the accepted rules worth breaking.