Archive for August, 2009
Saturday, August 29th, 2009
Rob review:
Are the ice caps melting?
This is the one of the first signs that consumers are starting to feel genuinely more relaxed about their spending habits.
As we feel more affluent, we tend to seek easier ways to full fill are needs.
An 8% change in this direction is not a tidal wave, but it is certainly a ripple of spending enthusiasm. Yippee!
I've tagged this to Marketing because there is a strong lesson in this, some things never change:
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Thursday, August 20th, 2009
Rob's review:
This extract from the Hartman Group, opens the debate about where we are going next. Local is already bigger than organic in the UK and set to grow rapidly over the 5 years whereas organic is going through a static period that needs to have re birth phase. But Artisan and natural still have a very significant place in the market.
So, what next after Organic, Local, Natural and Artisan?
My thoughts are that consumers will split into two camps, sometimes separately and sometimes at the same time.
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Thursday, August 20th, 2009
Rob's Review:
It has been a long time coming, but using the web to help food businesses to improve their supply chain efficiencies is starting to gain in traction.
BigBarn.co.uk have come up with a neat way to make this work. This has great potential, but success is hinged on engagement with the buyers. Most purchasing is bought in the traditional way of wholesalers and distributor, which is for a good reason. Quite simply, it's more efficient.
Food businesses have three top preferences when buying:
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Thursday, August 20th, 2009
Rob review:
This is a huge international study (22 country, 12,000 interviews) into woman and their food shopping habits.
The bottom line is that 88% of food is bought by women, only 5% of these woman are experiencing an ‘extremely happy’ experience.
That's shameful!
MORE OLIVER!
It's not about more food, for sure - 68% of woman think they are above their ideal weight, which further enhances the principal that having an emotional connection with the retailer and the products that are bought, is still the most important attribute when it comes to what to buy.
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Posted in Food Retail | No Comments »
Monday, August 17th, 2009
Rob's summary:
Nothing new about this except that this highlights the challenge of preconceptions - this is how we used to do it so we shall carry on doing the same. Not for this Farmer, they are selling their crops via social media. The key point to realise is that marketing is not about shouting anymore, it is about been found by people that want your products and services.
Shout and nobody listens, find a tribe of loyal consumers and grow by word of mouth.
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Monday, August 17th, 2009
Rob's Summary:
This is a great article. It uses the wonderful Beecher's cheese shop in Seatle's Pike Fish Market (I've been there, is fantastic) to explain a new phenomena in branding and retailing.
I call it P2C.
Producer to Consumer.
Brands for decades have been the poor relation to the retailers, retailers are seen as the gatekeepers to the consumer world. Well it's fight back time, brands are going the whole thing from making it to retailing it.
Why?
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Posted in Food Retail | No Comments »
Monday, August 10th, 2009
As reported in thegrocer.co.uk, Whole Foods Market, the UK subsidiary of US giant has reported a £36m loss for the last fiscal period.
The flagship 80,000 sq flagship store in High Street Kensington has operated at well under capacity since it opened and is still adjusting itself and its formula. Anyone who has ever tried shopping there will have discovered that there’s nowhere really to park, and it was an unusual location!
The FSA’s lambasting of Organic food last week can not have helped prospects.
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Wednesday, August 5th, 2009
Trend watch:
We've been witnessing specialty or pop-up stores popping up all over. Which begs the question, "Can big brands do specialty?" Here's what we've found and who's doing right:
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Wednesday, August 5th, 2009
The dollar just isn't what it used to be. But that doesn't mean you can let your competitors and online "entrepreneurs" debase the value of your company's most priceless assets. When the chips are down, brand owners must shore up the foundation of what connects them most with consumers -- the brand -- and not let it crash and crumble in hopes of future -- and costly -- repair.
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Tuesday, August 4th, 2009
The mobile channel is maturing rapidly, mobile marketing will be the next big push, and it brings the consumer closer to the product. Many brands started their mobile marketing platform in 2008 for brand awareness generation, prospecting and lead generation, acquisition, loyalty management, and customer care, some of them even spent at least one-quarter of their marketing budgets on mobile marketing activities.
There following is a SWOT analysis of mobile marketing for the coming future.
Strengths
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