Technology is Powering Food Retail Growth

Ok, remember when we wrote the blog about the new Dominos delivery car with an oven.  While many of you wrote and said it was just an expensive expense for franchisee. Steven Johnson our global Grocerant Guru® insisted that the technology combined with digital marketing messaging was differentiation that would elevate Dominos. Since 2015 Domino’s sales, stock, and customers relevance has gone no-where but up. 

So what other technology will we be seeing making its way into restaurants 2017?  Well for one Costco is utilizing pizza-making-robots already in many outlets.   In 2017 we will see an increase in consumer’s attitudes and acceptance of technology including kiosk ordering at fast food outlets including McDonalds.

There will be more Drive-Thru only restaurants, chatbots that allow online users to make reservations, Amazon’s Alex will allow you to order food from Wingstop and 7-Eleven will have more drones that can deliver frozen Slurpee to your doorstep.

Supermarkets struggling to gain customer frequency will embrace digital technology and social media as a means to connect and communicate with their shoppers in an effort to keep pace with the restaurant sector. Currently 37% of shoppers use their mobile devices in store for comparing prices, searching for product

On-line and e-commerce shopping is a growing channel for grocery and studies project sales to be around $24 billion in 2017.  They only way for legacy grocery retailers to retain urban dwellers who are the largest on-line shopper segment, “time-starved”, and more likely prefer restaurants to legacy grocery store pantry food.  Hand held mobile phones are rapidly becoming the platform of choice for shopping on-line for home food delivery, prepared meal components according to aggregate information from Grocerant ScoreCards.

Technology continues to drive customer relevance in food discovery, price, purchase, and retailer profits according to Foodservice Solutions® Grocerant Guru® Steven Johnson.  Invite Foodservice Solutions® to complete a Grocerant Program Assessment, Grocerant ScoreCard, or for product positioning or placement assistance, or call our Grocerant Guru®.  Since 1991 www.FoodserviceSolutions.us  of Tacoma, WA has been the global leader in the Grocerant niche. Contact: Steve@FoodserviceSolutions.us or 253-759-7869