Denny’s Three C’s for Success

Well, the one thing we know already is that digital data and consumer discontent were not the three C’s of success for Denny’s.  However many times after your company experiences consumer discontent they step up in the minds-eye of the consumers refocusing, retooling, and refreshing and that is exactly what Denny’s has done according to the team at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions®.

Today’s consumer specifically Gen Z is tech-savvy to a fault in the minds-eye of those of us over a certain age.  Being socially connected through devices, restaurant operators are more likely to get their messages seen through digital platforms thus requiring restaurants to refocus and fresh while repositioning their marketing messaging and that has proven harder than it sounds.

A Pew Research Center survey found “ consumers ages 13 to 17, about a quarter of respondents said they were online all the time, and sent and received 67 texts a day, excluding other messaging channels like Snapchat and Facebook Messenger.”

With that data in mind the marketing team at Denny’s went to work.  They probe, explored, and investigated consumer trends within foodservice.  The platform forming the three C’s are convenience, choice and customization,”  which are eerily similar to the foundation that is driving the success of the fast growing grocerant niche and will work well for the 1,750-unit Denny’s chain according to the Grocerant Guru®.

A Denny’s spokesperson stated “We call it the ‘Three C’s.’ They haven’t known a world without the ability to get things how they want it, when they want it, the way they want it.” To communicate that Denny’s fits the “Three C’s,” Denny’s communicating with Gen Z and Millennials through social media including Tumblr, Twitter and Instagram.

“The expectations from a technology standpoint are high. Today’s and tomorrow’s customers grew up in a world when technology was just there. They didn’t evolve into it; it’s just an expectation.  Denny’s understands that customer is dynamic not static and they are becoming dynamic as well.

Denny’s goal is to be customer centric.  They aim is to expand the dialog with the consumer at all relevant points of interaction so the Denny’s brand has relevance and is interactive and participatory according to the team at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions®.  Here is an example that Denny’s provided “What we try to do in the digital and social space is to extend the diner booth — and the conversations that happen in the diner booth — to play directly into that Generation Z mentality”.  The team at Denny’s gets it!

Are you trapped doing what you have always done and doing it the same way?  Interested in learning how Foodservice Solutions® FIVE P’s of Food Marketing can edify your retail food brand while creating a platform for consumer convenient meal participation, differentiation and individualization?  Email us at: Steve@FoodserviceSolutions.us or visit:  www.FoodserviceSolutions.us for more information.

Digital Grocery List Freaking Out Legacy Grocery Stores

Category managers at legacy grocery retailers are flipping out over the rapid customer adoption of the new digital App Flip  Flipp.com.  To say that it is creating a heightened level of consternation in the C-suites of legacy grocery stores may just be an understatement according to Foodservice Solutions® Grocerant Guru®.

One thing is clear AmazonFresh is the digital leader in grocery list delivery today.  Compared to AmazonFresh all other food retailers are just beginning to roll out digital platforms many with third party companies, some with click and collect at the store other offer delivery.  None match the service, quality, and speed of service offered by AmazonFresh. Thus there is cause for concern about Flipp as customer adoption leaves them one step back once again.

Now there is a new Hand Held Digital Marketing App called Flipp that is causing even greater concern for legacy grocery store category managers than AmazonFresh is coast to coast.  What Flip does is exploit the weakness at the core category management that is Price, Placement, and Transparency (or lack of transparency in the case of the consumer).

Consumer adoption of Flipp is simple, consumers they save both time and money. Flipp makes shopping easy they scan advertised sales at over two hundred retailers finding the consumer the best price the product they place on their grocery list.  Thus the era of the ‘lost leader’ might be dimming.

Let’s look at some facts on why this is happening now.  Based on data from 1,000 shoppers who have bought groceries in the last 24 hours, plus data from shopper journey studies collected over the past six years:

1.       47% of Digital Natives look for product recommendations and suggestions before buying (vs. 31% of older . generations)

2.       57% love to be the first to know about new products (vs. 42% of older generations)

3.       64% like to browse aisles to discover new products (vs. 55% of older generations)

The case for grocerant food merchant’s vs corporate category managers is beginning to take root. Old category models are beginning to be discarded. Hand Held Digital marketing elevates the need for transparency and grocerant niche fresh prepared food merchants. 

Invite Foodservice Solutions® to complete a grocerant program assessment, Grocerant ScoreCard.  For brand, or product placement assistance our Grocerant Guru® has the skill-set you are looking for.  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

Arby's Price Points Continue to Drive Top Line Sales

Foodservice Solutions® Grocerant Guru® knew when Arby’s introduced Sliders, a lineup of mini sandwiches featuring five of the same high-quality proteins offered on the core menu: roast beef, chicken, corned beef, ham, and jalapeño roast beef that they would be a hit.  Our Grocerant Guru® knew it then and continues to believe that price is a key driver in every sector of retail foodservice today.

Growth is back on the menu at Arby’s as they opened 28 new restaurants and remodeled 155 others system-wide in the first three quarters of 2016 and more are on the way. Paul Brown, chief executive officer of Arby’s Restaurant Group Inc. stated: “Sliders have helped us provide value to our guests that is focused, not just on price, but on a wide variety of high quality proteins,” “We expect …he Sliders platform paired with high quality, premium core menu items, and innovative LTOs to remain a significant component of our menu strategy going forward.”

The simple fact is Arby’s sales and unit volume achievements were backed by the continued success of its Sliders platform. Since being introduced during Q3 2015, Arby’s has sold more than 160 million Sliders through the end of Q3 2016.

Brown continued “The record average unit volume among our system-wide restaurants is a testament to the collective efforts we’ve made along with our franchisees to continue to strengthen the Arby’s brand,” …Our multi-year trend of continued transaction growth is also a sign of the underlying strength of the Arby’s brand as we continue to attract new guests to our restaurants.”

Success does leave clues and today price continues to drive frequency, customer adoption, and top line sales and bottom line profits. Visit: www.GrocerantGuru.com or Email: Steve@FoodserviceSolutions.us for information on how you can edify sales at your operation. 

Restaurant Customer Count Conundrum

With 6,677 Grocerant ScoreCards completed and under his belt Foodservice Solutions® Grocerant Guru® Steven Johnson understands the key drivers of consumer concept adoption and concept abandonment.  Johnson stated “a set of universal success commonalities and recurring findings driving consumers buying pattern changes has emerged that any retail foodservice operator can leverage to their advantage.

Nation’s Restaurant News continues to report that restaurant sector customer count declines within the restaurant sector continue to indicate the undercurrents of customer migration have not ebbed.  It is at the intersection of the consumer, technology and retail food sales where we find the grocerant niche creating and expanding points of quality food distribution driving customer adoption.  Restaurants that are not evolving are dying.  It’s just that simple.  Just look at this list of restaurant bankruptcies.

Restaurateurs need to be particularly mindful of developments within grocerant niche for they are driving the change within the price, value, service equilibrium in retail foodservice. Consumers are resetting the Price, Value, and Service Equilibrium.

Here is Foodservice Solutions® formula:

(Mobile Access + Digital Payment +Delivery) X (Price + Food Quality + Speed) = Value

 Incremental Value:

Constantly Changing Menu (Seasonally / Sustainability with Creditability).

Restaurateurs must be mindful that consumers today are time-starved  and that consumers are seeking  with Ready-2-Eat or Heat-N-Eat fresh prepared food components that are perceived “better for you”, and portioned for one or two. Consumers are seeking companies that help them create Convenient Family Meal Participation, Differentiation, Individualization / Family Customization.  Are you doing that?  

Grocerant fresh prepared Ready-2-Eat and Heat-N-Eat food in non-traditional outlets poses an ever increasing threat to restaurant growth.  We can help you reclaim your customers. Contact Steven Johnson, Grocerant Guru® at Steve@FoodserviceSolutions.us or Call 253-759-7869

For international corporate presentations, educational forums, or keynotes contact: Steven Johnson Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions®.  His extensive experience as a multi-unit restaurant operator, consultant, brand / product positioning expert and public speaking will leave success clues for all. Facebook.com/Steven Johnson, Linkedin.com/in/grocerant or twitter.com/grocerant

At Jack In The Box the Best Customers Deliver

Where do you sell you food?  How have you cultivated your strongest brand attributes?  Does your brand promise deliver a strong emotional quotient?  Are you delivering on you brand promise for your best customers? Jack In The Box is doing just that according to Foodservice Solutions® Grocerant Guru® Steven Johnson.

If your answer is No then it’s time to reach out to Foodservice Solutions® team and lean how to drive incremental top line sales and bottom line profits. Jack In The Box has cultivated customer differentiation that does not mean different; it means familiar yet it requires simultaneously being optimally distinct.

Here is an example Jack In The Box is trying a different approach to delivery in the San Francisco Bay Area, teaming up with a third party (Door Dash) to provide the service until 3 a.m. Jack In The Box has a  features a separate late-night menu, called Jack’s Munchie Meals that cater to this specific targeted segment.  However late night customers in the Bay Area will be able to order off the chain’s entire menu.

In an Omni-channel retail world new platforms of which both Time (of day and saving time) and Delivery are platforms are important to customers.

Delivery via DoorDash will begin at the start of the chain’s regular hours. While late-night delivery offers will be touted in a new ad campaign running that highlight the new expanded times though the fall, according to Jack in the Box.

Our team believes that differentiation does not mean different it means familiar yet it requires simultaneously being optimally distinct.  Our team believes that late-night delivery will garner incremental customers while driving up the average check recapturing market share lost to new non-traditional retailers the ilk of grocery stores and c-stores.  

Are your top line sales up? Are you garnering new customers driving up customer counts?  If not contact or visit www.FoodserviceSolutions.us Email: Steve@FoodserviceSolutions.us Outside Eyes can help deliver top line sales and bottom line profits for your company. 253-759-7869 Since 1991 Foodservice Solutions® has been the leader in the Grocerant Niche.

Is Chili’s a Casual-Dining Casualty

Don’t throw in the towel on Chili’s just yet while Chili's company-owned same-store sales declined 1.4 percent and even more important traffic at Chili’s company-owned locations fell 4.1 percent in the most recent quarter. Chili’s is not Ruby Tuesday’s according to Foodservice Solutions® Grocerant Guru®.

Wyman Roberts, Brinker president and CEO, in a prepared statement “We remain optimistic about our growth plans despite a choppy first quarter, and are seeing traction with stronger comparable-restaurant sales for Chili's in October,” “In the first quarter, the casual-dining category was more challenging than we anticipated” Our own Grocerant Guru® said “that statement is simple bogus bloviating; you can forget about fast casual sector and simply focus on the evolving retail foodservice customer”.

Here is why Chili’s is not Ruby Tuesday’s, Roberts went on to explain that Chili’s is “rolling out multiple growth platforms — craft beer taps, happy hour, To Go, Plenti points for My Chili's Rewards loyalty program”. Today foodservice / restaurant consumers are not one one-dimensional; they are dynamic on static the mix and match meal components from multiple legacy food sectors into a perfect family meal according to Foodservice Solutions® Steven Johnson.

Foodservice Solutions® team believes that Chili’s understands that in an Omni-Channel retail world brands must be Omni-present to capture and satisfy customer’s demands for branded flavors, experiences, and sales. 

Our team believes that differentiation does not mean different it means familiar yet it requires simultaneously being optimally distinct.  Our team believes that Chili’s can break the mindset of casual-dining recapturing market share lost to new non-traditional retailers simply by becoming optimally distinct. 

Are your top line sales up? Are you garnering new customers driving up customer counts?  If not contact or visit www.FoodserviceSolutions.us Email: Steve@FoodserviceSolutions.us Outside Eyes can help deliver top line sales and bottom line profits for your company. 253-759-7869 Since 1991 Foodservice Solutions® has been the leader in the Grocerant Niche. 

Cinnabon’s Emotional Quotient Success

There are few companies that leverage their emotional quotient as well as Cinnabon to drive top line sales and bottom line profits.  Cinnabon continues to drive growth marketing with aroma and flavor.  The universal commonalities of commonalities of flavor and aroma are connected too consumers creating an emotional bond according to Foodservice Solutions® Grocerant Guru® Steven Johnson.

The famously alluring and decadent aroma and flavor of a Cinnabon cinnamon roll comes from Makara cinnamon sourced from Indonesia, according to Kristen Hartman, senior vice-president of marketing for the Snacks Group at parent company Focus Brands. It’s that uniquely sourced cinnamon that elevates Cinnabon’s brand with consumers and from other competitors according to our won Grocerant Guru®

Now Cinnabon is about to extend its brand once again this time in grocery stores that will now be able to offer marble pound cake with cinnamon swirl, a cream cheese frosting filled streusel muffin, a cinnamon chip cookie, and a Caramel Pecanbon cookie.

Hartman stated  “Our group is responsible for this extension into the marketplace, so we’ve got a team of chefs in our R.&D. group, and they work with the manufacturer to make sure we really capture the essence of the Cinnabon brand and get all of the flavor profiles right… “Cinnabon is a brand that deconstructs well, and the reason it deconstructs well is from an ingredient standpoint, it has ingredients that really apply to a lot of different product formats, so the cinnamon and the cream cheese frosting, but then it also deconstructs well in that people have an emotional connection to the brand, so when they see those core elements in other forms and formats, it’s the kind of thing they naturally gravitate to.”

Hartman continued “The thing that we know about Cinnabon is people absolutely love the brand, but they tell us all the time that they want more access. We have a good number of locations in the United States, but in the grand scheme of things people don’t have the access to the brand that they want, so we decided to develop a line that extends from our core that gives people a little taste of Cinnabon and to do it in a way that allows them to get it in convenience stores or travel plazas.”

 “Consumers right now love indulgent beverages, so when they think about Cinnabon they think that sounds like a delicious indulgent beverage, and the flavors pair really well with coffees, with shakes,” Ms. Hartman said. “We have a Cinnabon flavored shake in Sheetz. So the flavors pair really well with beverages, and it’s also that indulgence people are looking for.”

Where do you sell you food?  How have you cultivated your strongest brand attributes?  Does your brand promise deliver a strong emotional quotient?  No then it’s time to reach out to Foodservice Solutions® team and lean how to drive incremental top line sales and bottom line profits.

Invite Foodservice Solutions® to complete a grocerant program assessment, Grocerant ScoreCard.  For brand, or product placement assistance our Grocerant Guru® has the skill-set you are looking for.  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

Starbucks Empowers Success

Success does leave clues and the very first clue of successful foodservice retail is talk with the employees that are the closest to your customers. Starbucks just happens to do that better than just about any other foodservice company according to Foodservice Solutions® Grocerant Guru®.  

Here is a perfect example of what I mean just beginning last weekend and ending this weekend Starbucks baristas are invited to feature their own creations in stores. At more than 7,500 U.S. Starbucks locations will have and will feature Barista Originals:” fall beverage recipes developed exclusively by baristas. The beverages will highlight classic ingredients found in Starbucks stores and showcase drink varieties including lattes, Frappuccino blended beverages, hot and iced teas and cold-brewed coffee drinks.”

Sarah Spencer, Starbucks marketing manager  stated “At the beginning of the season, we saw a lot of excitement around fall flavors, especially after we introduced Starbucks Almondmilk,”…We wanted to tap into our baristas’ beverage artistry by giving them the opportunity to create new fall-inspired drink recipes to share with customers in their stores.”

Then Spencer and her team asked Starbucks baristas to submit their favorite fall beverage customization ideas through social media. The team discovered and tested 20 of the drink recipes and selected five of their favorites. For two weekends, baristas are invited to feature these beverages in their stores or use them as inspiration to create their own drinks.”

This promotion is perfect because the focus is both consumer interactive and participatory and each are keys to retail success.   Yes, Starbucks understands marketing, empowerment and customers.

Spencer continued “While we were taste testing, we saw a few ideas for the same recipes,”. “That let us know that our baristas are creating their own flavor trends. We wanted to empower them to share their ideas with customers.”

Steven Johnson is Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based www.FoodserviceSolutions.us , with extensive experience as a multi-unit operator, consultant and brand/product positioning expert. Since 1991 Foodservice Solutions® of Tacoma, WA has been the global leader in the Grocerant niche for more on Steven Johnson and Foodservice Solutions® visit http://www.linkedin.com/in/grocerant  or twitter.com/grocerant 

Grocerant Meal Components Growing Digitally Globally

Restaurants, C-Stores, Furniture Stores, Liquor Stores, and Grocery Stores are all expanding into the grocerant niche filled with Ready-2-Eat and Heat-N-Eat fresh prepared food.  The grocerant niche continues to fuel innovation within the retail foodservice sector around the world as regular readers of this blog know from Sweden, Malaysia, Australia, Germany , United States to name but a few.

According to a new study, “Feeding the Global Consumer,” from AlixPartners, a global business-advisory firm meals and meal components that  are targeted, sold or delivered for “On-the-go”, Dining, Delivery,  leveraging new Technology are “another trend shining through in the survey is consumers’ growing interest, around the world, in dining while “on the go.”

Here are some of the facts:

1.       23 percent of those surveyed said they plan to increase their frequency of carryout meals over the coming 12 months,

2.       52 percent of the Chinese saying that,

3.       39 percent of the Brazilians,

4.       26 percent of the Germans

5.       The U.S., possibly the most saturated place in the world for drive thru’s and in-car multitasking, came in at 15 percent.

6.       Even more telling was that respondents internationally said that on average they expect that basically one of every four meals (23 percent) of any kind they eat in the coming 12 months to be either carryout from a restaurant or some other form of a “mobile meal,” such as food from convenience stores or grocery stores.

When the study turned to technology the results were just as interesting.  Here is what they found when asked to identify the top-three most-important technologies a restaurant today can have:

1.        53 percent of respondents globally chose online ordering, the No. 1 vote-getter of the options offered.

2.       Digital menus (49 percent) were second and digital loyalty programs

3.       (48 percent) third, with mobile payments

4.       (44 percent) and mobile meal-ordering

5.       (42 percent) rounding out the top five.

6.       Among US respondents, the leader was digital loyalty programs, at 56 percent, followed by online ordering (53 percent) and digital menus (52 percent).  

Building meal component sales today requires the understanding that it take an integrated, branded, customer meal building focus that begin online.  When the AlixPartners study asked how effective online discount services are at influencing their dining-out decisions, 20 percent said such services are “extremely” influential and 49 percent said “somewhat” influential. In addition, an average of 52 percent said they plan to look for more discounts in the year ahead; and notably, those in the two largest economies in the survey, the U.S .and China, came in at well above that average, at 62 percent and 71 percent, respectively. Enough said. If your footprint Digital?  Digital Meals mean fresh food sales.

Invite Foodservice Solutions® to complete a grocerant program assessment, Grocerant ScoreCard.  For brand, or product placement assistance our Grocerant Guru® has the skill-set you are looking for.  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