Foxtrot Market Grocerant Niche Prepared Food Is the Future

 

What’s for dinner? Yes, the age-old question has a new set of answers.  One of them is the questions have evolved around where do we get dinner in stead of simply What’s for Dinner. Let’s look at just some of the reason Foxtrot Market is looking a customer ahead with grocerant niche Ready-2-Eat and Heat-N-Eat fresh prepared food.

 

1. Recent Grocerant ScoreCards found 81.1% of consumers don’t know what’s for dinner at Noon, and 61.1 don’t know what’ s for dinner at 4PM %.
2. Roughly 63.7% of consumers purchase prepared food items from a retail location at least three times a month.
3. 79.6% all dinners have at least 1 grocerant niche Ready-2-Eat and Heat-N-Eat meal component and 66.6% have two meal components.
4. When asked if they wanted to cook dinner from scratch or assemble dinner from fresh meal components 91.3 % of Gen Z chose assemble from Fresh Prepared Meal Components and Millennials 83.4% chose meal components.
5. Seventy-three percent of retail prepared food purchases are taken to go
6. Prepared food purchases are frequently a planned purchase among 61.2% of shoppers, while 40.9% of shoppers said they buy prepared foods on impulse. Dinner has the highest amount of prepared food buys with 81.7% of respondents making purchases for that meal, while lunch comes in at 76.9% and breakfast at 61.4%.
7. 57.8% of consumers would like to add Alcohol to a dinner order

 

IN case you did not know, Foxtrot Market uses a hybrid e-commerce and physical store with potential for a greater foodservice business. When recently hired President and Chief Financial Officer Liz Williams worked a shift at one location, she noted just how much the upscale convenience store chain fulfills customers' food and beverage wants and needs.

President and Chief Financial Officer Liz Williams in a recent interview with Progressive Grocer, "We have a lot of data on who our customers are, but this was an affirmation of how diverse our customer base really is and how we play throughout the day. I got to see everyone come in, from morning coffee and breakfast tacos to prepared salads for lunch to a smoothie in the middle of the day and, later, drinks to take down to the lake," …"It also showed the mix of retail, restaurant and technology — a lot of orders came in for delivery through the app and mobile."

Retooling its look forward Foxtrot's new ambitious expansion path includes the planned opening of 50 stores within the next two years. They are expected to open in the retailer's hometown of Chicago as well as newer markets in the Washington, D.C., area and parts of Texas and Massachusetts.

Remember that in January, Foxtrot announced $100 million in new Series C funding led by D1 Capital Partners. Foxtrot founders Mike La Vitola and Taylor Bloom tapped Williams to take the company to its next level of growth. Formerly the CEO of hair styling salon chain Drybar and CFO at Taco Bell, Williams will leverage her background while overseeing several functions, including operations, finance, strategy, real estate, human resources, supply chain and growth.

Williams continued, "Mike and Taylor have this amazing vision and built a terrific brand. We now need to scale and go to the next level of operational excellence to put consistent operations in place," …. "I have a lot of that experience, certainly from prior roles where I have scaled brands, and I have worked in retail and restaurant businesses to operationalize and put standards, systems and processes in place.”

"I'm excited to bring that together with the development muscle at Foxtrot and working with the team to target which markets we want to go to and thinking about how we do that,"…. "We are putting a lot of the groundwork in place so we operate the same in Austin and Chicago." She continued.

According to Williams, the Foxtrot model works well in neighborhoods with high foot traffic as well as densely operated urban areas.

Williams and her team will also emphasize the expansion of Foxtrot's prepared foods program. Despite the company's start as an e-commerce business, the addition of more physical stores and foodservice offerings reflects a consumer need in an era shaped by the COVID-19 pandemic and, more recently, inflation.

"We have a model that our stores are supported by commissaries that make a lot of our food from scratch. It's a fabulous way to deliver freshly prepared foods at an affordable price and that are really craveable and delicious," she said.

Right on target, according to Johnson, is looking at the current succesful items and the opportunity to provide more meal solutions, Foxtrot is rolling out a new dinner menu within the next month. The company is targeting the dinner occasion with offerings such as grilled chicken breast, roasted salmon, and whitefish dip, which Williams noted hold appeal even as consumers are wary of escalating inflation.

"I think we are at a really nice price point on prepared foods. We are cheaper than some of the casual dining (restaurants) and are offering something that is more freshly prepared than quick service." She noted.

Technology, of course, Foxtrot stores offer a dedicated in-store pickup area for digital orders as well as an in-store café. A grocery section features everyday basics in addition to several items from niche and startup brands, along with Foxtrot's own store brand.

At the present time Foxtrot  operates 21 retail locations in Chicago, Dallas, and Washington, D.C. The retailer offers 30-minute delivery through the Foxtrot app and five-minute pickup in addition to a collection of curated goods and gift boxes available nationwide via its national shipping site.

Invite Foodservice Solutions® to complete a Grocerant ScoreCard, or for product positioning or placement assistance, or call our Grocerant Guru®.  Since 1991 Foodservice Solutions® of Tacoma, WA has been the global leader in the Grocerant niche. Contact: Steve@FoodserviceSolutions.us or 253-759-7869