All posts tagged with
grocery marketing
Spring Brings in Rosier Marketing Picture
Category: Food Packaging| Retail/Grocery
15 Apr 2010With Consumer Spending Across Categories Back on the Rise, Ad-Spending Forecasts Are Also Up.
That’s the good news for brand marketers. The bad news is, so far, they’re largely staving off private label by reducing price gaps. That comes from a combination of the brand marketers cutting prices and private labels raising them as they catch up with hikes the branded players took a year or more ago, according to reports by Bernstein and Consumer Edge.
Share losses to private label are hard to regain. On average, brand marketers have gotten back 30% to 40% of the share lost to private label in past recessions. But it could be harder this time, Bernstein analyst Ali Dibadj said, citing his company’s consumer survey showing 77% of consumers who traded down during the recession found the lower-cost products they bought “as good or better” as those they replaced. Those consumers generally said an improvement in their economic circumstances or outlook alone wouldn’t get them to trade back up. “They need either a decrease in price [of the branded products] or a new product or improvement in quality,” Mr. Bernstein said.
But Sean Seitzinger, senior-VP consulting and innovation at SymphonyIRI, said most efforts to win back private-label share through price cuts have failed for package-good players, noting that volume hasn’t significantly been increased despite price cuts. “There are a lot of dollars being thrown [at price] but those dollars are delivering a very poor return on investment,” he said. P&G, Kellogg Co. and Kraft Foods, he said, are among manufacturers holding their own with private label by emphasizing the value of their brands in ways beyond price.
Marketers are more likely to succeed against private label through improved products or marketing better aimed at consumer segments, retailers and localities prone to switching to private label, he said. About 80% of package players in the past year, he said, have assigned executives specifically to combat private label.
To read this article, found in Advertising Age, in its entirety, click here.
Stevens & Tate Marketing Partners With Strack & Van Til Super Market
Category: Anouncements| Retail/Grocery
9 Feb 2010Indiana-based Strack & Van Til Super Market Inc. has hired Stevens & Tate Marketing/Endora Digital Solutions to help the grocer in the marketing of the company’s 14 full-service food stores in Northwest Indiana and Illinois.
Stevens & Tate has a solid record of developing and implementing successful marketing and branding campaigns in the grocery category, including having served Aldi and its stores for more than three decades. Dan Gartlan, president of Stevens & Tate said, “Strack and Van Til is a company with strong family roots and ties to the community, plus a reputation for exceptional customer service. We look forward to helping this company – which shares many of our Midwestern values – grow its business by applying our extensive experience in retail marketing.”
Strack & Van Til operates 30 supermarkets in and around Chicago and northern Indiana. Stores operate under the banners of Strack & Van Til, Town & Country Food Market, and Ultra Foods. The regional grocery chain offers fresh and packaged foods and has delicatessen and bakery divisions in each of its stores. The company is owned by the Chicago-based grocery distributor Central Grocers, which also operates supermarkets under the Berkot’s and Key Market banners.
The Super Bowl Shuffle for Advertisers
Category: Retail/Grocery| Social Media
3 Feb 2010This January, marketing mainstays like FedEx, General Motors and Pepsi announced that they would be opting out of this year’s ad extravaganza, the Super Bowl.
Adverting Age has recently run an article titled Super Bowl Shuffle: Why Marketers Will Shift to ‘Platforms’, which discusses the phenomenon of advertising and the Super Bowl.
The article claims that for those looking to gauge the health of the ad industry, Super Bowl advertising is a bit of red herring. CBS is charging about $2.5 million for 30 seconds of commercial time, and rightfully so. Rarely do you get so many Americans watching one event and actually enjoying the advertising. It is a tremendous opportunity for most brand marketers and it would be foolish to look at this year’s Super Bowl as proof of either the rejuvenation of the 30-second spot or the rejection of it.
There certainly will be advertising winners (and losers) on Super Bowl Sunday but let’s hope that the Monday morning quarterback chatter doesn’t obscure the larger shift at hand for marketers this year. 2010 will be the year of the “platform” for advertisers.
Unlike a website, banner, Facebook application or 30-second spot, a platform is an always-on digital environment that allows brands to run specific or multiple programs. The goal of a platform is to meaningfully engage consumers on multiple levels. For some brands, this means creating an experience with integrated commerce. For others, it means enabling consumers to connect with each other in valuable, unexpected ways.
But for marketers, the real winners this year will be the brands who have built these platforms to engage consumers well after this year’s Super Bowl becomes a distant memory. Here are some examples of the types of platforms that are being created and executed today:
- Community Action Platforms
- Crowdsourcing Platforms
- Commerce Platforms
- Brand Experience Platforms
- Social CRM Platforms
These are just a few examples of the kinds of platform moves brand marketers will make in 2010, but there will certainly be more — especially with the rise in mobile and emerging technologies such as “touch” and augmented reality. To read this article in its entirety, click here.
Stevens & Tate Presents New Webinar: Introduction to Social Media for Grocers
Category: Anouncements| Retail/Grocery| Social Media
12 Jan 2010The term “Social Media” is everywhere lately. But what is it exactly? And how does it affect you? Get the answers, as Stevens & Tate Marketing and Endora Digital Solutions present our latest informational Webinar, “An Intro to Social Media for Grocers”. Geared specifically toward food retailers, this FREE 1-hour Webinar will guide you through all the basics of social media, why it’s relevant to you and your business, talk about specific benefits and challenges, and even show you how to get started.
Participate in this free Webinar and learn all about social networks, micro-blogging, video and photo sharing sites and more. You’ll discover how the right social marketing plan can influence your exiting customers, and even help to bring in new ones. Plus, benefit from discussion with other attendees as well as Q and A with our panel of food and retail brand marketing experts.
Key presenter will be Internet Director Nicole Wagner, whose knowledge of the ever-changing online world has been instrumental in raising awareness on innovative electronic marketing and Web 2.0 developments. Sign up for “An Intro to Social Media” today and start the New Year with some valuable new insight – all from the convenience of your very own workspace.
Date: Tuesday, January 19, 2010
Time: 11:00 AM – 12:00 PM CST
System Requirements:
PC-based attendees:
Required: Windows® 2000, XP Home, XP Pro, 2003 Server, Vista
Macintosh®-based attendees:
Required: Mac OS® X 10.4 (Tiger®) or newer
Space is limited, so reserve your seat now by clicking here.
After registering you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the Webinar.
Calculating the ‘New Normal’
Category: Retail/Grocery
8 Dec 2009In the article Calculating the ‘New Normal’, from the Wall Street Journal, Craig Herkert, CEO of Supervalu, certainly recognizes that he has a tough job ahead of him, and during his brief tenure he has already made some difficult decisions. Hopefully they are the right ones.
To read this article in its entirety, click here.
Change Is In The Air
Category: Retail/Grocery| Stevens & Tate Speaks
8 Dec 2009Depending upon your business category and situation, you may be seeing signs of life in the economy. Don’t be fooled, however, into thinking that the world will eventually return to status quo.
Here are three fundamental shifts we are seeing:
The emergence of younger demographic groups. Baby Boomers (ages 45-63) will not drive the new economy; here are the two key groups you should be targeting:
- Gen X (29-45) customers are entering their peak earning and spending years. Unlike the boomers, they are having children later (if they are having them at all).
- Gen Y (20-29), the Millennial Generation, is the first to be raised in new technology. They are easily impressed and receptive to new tools and shopping techniques, but not necessarily easy to capture. Gen Y is more fragmented, with hundreds of small niches encompassing every variable from geography to lifestyle. Marketers need to determine which of these niches constitute their best prospects and focus directly on them—so do your homework!
Fundamental changes in shopping behaviors. Here are three categories of recession shopping behaviors that will probably ameliorate over time, but never truly go away:
- Deal seeking – doing one’s homework before purchase, obviously aided by technology.
- Limiting – buying less, possibly allowing oneself to run out before re-purchase. Culling “wants” in favor of “needs”. Shopping less often.
- Trading down – avoiding top brand names, choosing models with fewer accessories, shopping value retailers and discount stores.
Communications Upheaval. Most of you know that traditional media is on the down slope, however, many of you are not sure what to do about it. Everyone talks about Social Media, but few know how to execute it, and even fewer have tried it. Be on the look out for the continuing shift!
Gaining The Competitive Advantage
Category: Retail/Grocery
27 Nov 2009While the article Making A Difference: The Competitive Advantage, found in Progressive Grocer is focused on grocers, it really applies to any retail category.
There are two parts to this equation:
- You cannot be all things to all people; if you try you’ll become so generic that you won’t stand for anything to anybody.
- As the article points out, if you are only known for convenience, pretty soon you’ll only get the fill-in trips, while the big orders will move elsewhere. And long term, this is unsustainable.
To read the article in its entirety, click here.
Marketing Experts Discuss New Media Strategies At IFRA/GMA 2009 Annual Conference
Category: Anouncements| Retail/Grocery
3 Nov 2009Internet advertising experts and media consultants from Comcast, CBA, Tribune Media Group (TMG), Endora Digital Solutions, Daily Herald and Google™ came together at the Illinois Food Retailers Association/ Grocery Merchandising Association (IFRA/GMA) 2009 Annual Conference to discuss new media strategies.
The panel discussion, titled “Reaching Consumers in the New Century: The Internet and New Media,” advised independent grocers of trends in the consumer use of traditional media, and presented new, affordable and measurable ways of using the Internet and digital media to reach their customers.
Stevens & Tate Marketing President Dan Gartlan, who served as moderator, said, “The marketing landscape is changing rapidly. The tried-and-true media that food retailers have relied on in the past is under siege. Currently, effective consumer marketing requires an added strategy for Internet media, search and social.”
Gartlan provided an overview of trends in traditional media marketing, focusing on newspapers and television. Each panel member then made a brief presentation relating to his area of expertise, followed by audience questions.
The panel discussion format with questions from the audience was chosen by Gartlan to provide immediate and useful answers to specific marketing questions from IFRA members. “It’s important to send people back to their workplace with actionable information they can use immediately, after they’ve invested their time attending a conference,” said Gartlan.
Toward that end, Gartlan’s team also provided a complimentary website evaluation to each retailer who requested the service during the registration process. Recipients of the evaluations are welcome to contact Stevens & Tate to execute recommended changes, but are under no obligation to do so.
The IFRA/GMA 2010 Annual Conference is scheduled for Sept. 28-29, 2010.
IFRA is a non-profit trade association dedicated to the profitability and growth of locally owned and owner-operated retail food stores located in Illinois and the suppliers that service them. The association provides essential and timely information about general industry topics and legislative issues that affect this sector of the food retailing industry. For more information visit www.ilfood.org or call 800-624-6712.
Check out more photos from this event on the Stevens & Tate Flickr Photostream.
Fresh Ideas for Grocery Marketing
Category: Retail/Grocery
26 Oct 2009The Internet is giving grocery store marketers the opportunity to promote themselves innovatively. No longer are grocers limited to in-store flyer and newspaper ads; now they can reach customers through brand and local store sites, e-mail marketing, mobile marketing, and banner campaigns.
Through these innovative digital marketing and advertising initiatives, grocers are able to extend their reach to a larger consumer base and interact with their customers on a whole different level.
This article from ClickZ discusses how grocers were able to use interactive media to find successes in their marketing campaigns.
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