Au Bon Pain Supporting National Breast Cancer Foundation is a Good Thing

 

In 2022 50.5% of the U.S. population consist of women. There is no doubt that women are important and Au Bon Pain is extending their brand relevance to support National Breast Cancer Foundation during October.  Steven Johnson Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions® believes extending your brand while doing ‘good things’ is good business and drive new electricity for the brand. 

Au Bon Pain, the grocerant niche bakery brand known for its gourmet offerings of fruit, sandwiches, soup, with convenience, joins the breast cancer fight this October supporting National Breast Cancer Foundation, Inc. (NBCF) in their mission of Helping Women Now at every stage of their breast cancer journey.

“For those of us who knew and worked with Louie (Louis) Kane the founder of Au Bon Pain knew this is the kind of brand promotion that he like and would be proud of for his Grocerant Niche concept, Johnson stated.” 

Throughout the month of October, participating Au Bon Pain locations will sell Pink Out Palmiers, the brand’s signature pastry with a pink drizzle, to bring awareness to the cause and raise funds for early detection, education and support services for women affected by breast cancer. 

“We have the privilege of serving cancer patients and their loved ones at our bakery cafes in hospitals around the country,” says Au Bon Pain President Ericka Garza. “This month we're stepping up to do our part to help those affected by breast cancer nationwide, including our guests and team members.”

According to Breastcancer.org, breast cancer is the most common cancer in American women, except skin cancer. One in eight women will be diagnosed with breast cancer in her lifetime, and NBCF is proud to offer free, innovative programs that other organizations aren’t providing to women facing breast cancer so that no one faces breast cancer alone. 

NBCF is one of the most recognized and respected breast cancer charities in the world. They have received the highest 4-star rating by Charity Navigator, America’s premier charity evaluator, for 16 years. On average, 80% of their expenses are directed to life-saving programs. 

According to Johnson, “Brand relevance is in part driven with innovation in new food products in combination with new avenues of distribution all of which are the platform for the new electricity.” 

Johnson stated “that in my minds-eye the new electricity must be very efficient for the supply and includes such things as fresh foods, smaller footprint, developing brands, fresh flowers, grocerant positioning, fresh food messaging, autonomous delivery, cashier-less retail, plates, glasses, cash-less payments, digital hand-held marketing.

All retailers to survive the next generation of retail must embrace the artificial intelligence revolution while simultaneously embracing fresh food that is portable according to Johnson. 

Looking for success clues of your own? Foodservice Solutions® specializes in outsourced food marketing and business development ideations. We can help you identify, quantify and qualify additional food retail segment opportunities, technology, or a new menu product segment.  Foodservice Solutions® of Tacoma WA is the global leader in the Grocerant niche visit us on our social media sites by clicking one of the following links: Facebook,  LinkedIn, or Twitter

Blurring the line between Franchisor and Franchisee

 

While the world is reopening after the pandemic, the shakeout within the restaurant sector is just beginning, to be uncovered.  Many legacy restaurant brands are asking themselves; where do we go from here. All the while banks are flooded with extra case as consumer savings has skyrocket to all-time highs in large part due to federal stimulus. Now bankers are making the rounds explain to restaurant companies why now is the time to either buy a chain or sell a chain. 

Heeding that advice foodservice franchisee and franchisors are buying, selling, legacy brands.  According to Steven Johnson, Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions® one thing is clear, and that is the bankers are making a lot of money.

Johnson continued, franchisee are becoming franchisors, and now selling franchisee in a competitive world all food retailers are seeking a larger share of stomach, a larger share of food dollars, is anyone really winning?  

Consider that Ampex Brands LLC, a franchisee of 7-Eleven Inc. and Yum! Brands Inc. that has more than 400 convenience stores and restaurants, acquired the Au Bon Pain brand from ABP Corp., a subsidiary of Panera Bread.

Now, Au Bon Pain's 171 locations will join Ampex Brands family, increasing the company's revenue by approximately 10 percent annually. The deal also grants Ampex franchising rights to an additional 131 sites and expands its footprint internationally. (That’s banker talk, not a word about the brand or its customer base according to Johnson.)

In a Battle for Share of Stomach

and Share of Food Dollars

Can you Win

Ampex CEO Tabbassum Mumtaz. "Our QSR brands performed extraordinarily well throughout the pandemic as guests moved to drive-thru. That performance allowed us to diversify and jump on a great opportunity to reposition a legacy brand. The bakery café category will rebound, and Au Bon Pain is well-positioned to grow."

Talk about share of stomach / share of food dollar disequilibrium, post-acquisition, Ampex will assume the role of franchisor for the first time in its 16-year history. Remember that it has been a longtime franchisee of 7-Eleven, Pizza Hut, KFC, Taco Bell and Long John Silver's.

Ampex plans to apply its operating strategy to ramp up Au Bon Pain's existing cafés starting in the brand's key markets in the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic. Once existing cafés are reopened and executing with positive results, Ampex will kick off expansion efforts, starting with corporate-owned locations, according to the company.

Yes, here is a little more, the parent company of Taco Cabana has agreed to sell the 148-unit Tex-Mex chain to the largest franchisee of Jack in the Box and TGI Friday’s for $85 million. In case you did not know, the seller, Fiesta Restaurant Group, said it will use the proceeds from the sale to Yadav Enterprises to pay off $79.2 million in loans and related fees.

In this case the deal, leaves Fiesta with a single brand, Pollo Tropical. The transaction will enable “us to create a more effective, efficient and focused organization, applying appropriate resources to accelerate delivery of the exciting growth potential we have in our Pollo Tropical brand,” Richard Stockinger, Fiesta’s CEO, said in a statement.  Yes, you understood that correctly

For Yadav Enterprises, the deal will add another brand and 142 restaurants to its current holdings of about 400 restaurants. It will also deepen the company’s role as a franchisor; six Taco Cabana units are franchised.

In addition to operating units of Jack in the Box and Friday’s, Yadav is also a franchisee of Denny’s, Corner Bakery and El Pollo Loco. Its restaurants are located across 18 states, with a concentration in Texas and northern California. Does anyone think that they were thinking about brand differentiation or how to build a strong point of differentiation for each brand?  No, I bet most of you thought they simply were looking at you might say dollars not donuts.

Many multi-food concept companies appear to think that each brand is just a widget. In this case in a prepared statement they said, “We are confident he will be an effective steward of the Taco Cabana brand for the long-term.”

Does anyone reading this blog post believe that the buying and selling of C-stores, Chain Restaurants, or Grocery stores is over?  The team at Foodservice Solutions® believes that widgets churn and brands with differentiation grow.

Don’t over reach. Are you ready for some fresh ideations? Do your food marketing ideations look more like yesterday than tomorrow? Interested in learning how Foodservice Solutions® 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 us on our social media sites by clicking the following links: Facebook,  LinkedIn, or Twitter

Why is Panera Just Loafing

Most regular readers of this blog know by now that Panera Bread has begun to experiment selling groceries? Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions® Grocerant Guru®, Steven Johnson stated “the way Panera Bread entered grocerant niche sales was a mistake.”

Back in the day Johnson worked on projects for and with Au Bon Pain and Louis Kane as many regular readers of this blog know.  Most of you also know of the great success Au Bon Pain had, has with catering sales in city centers, there early use of online ordering, and delivery and how they evolve the St. Louis Bread Company into what is now (the spinoff) Panera Bread. In Spanish Panera meaning “granary” or “breadbasket” has now never been more important when thinking of the future of the chain according to Johnson.

Success does leave clues.  Panera Bread without a doubt has left many success clues for other fast casual chains to learn from and many more clues for those simply wanting to learn what it means to consistently do more things right the almost any other restaurant company for the past 25 years.

When Panera Bread joined the growing number of restaurant chains that are leveraging their sourcing capabilities to provide for the basic food needs of their customers by offering groceries. It appears they simply jumped in, took the easy route.  The opportunity for Panera Breaded to become the breadbasket for the local communities was overlooked.

Johnson insist Panera Bread’s goal should be evolve the concepts business model platform into a ‘breadbasket for today’s consumers’, and a solution to the age-old question; What’s for Dinner, integrating both its goal and brand messaging.  

While Panera is selling “baked goods, dairy and produce at its more than 2,000 locations available for takeout — through Panera’s rapid pickup, curbside pickup or drive-thru — as well as delivery.” All can be ordered with Panera’s regular menu items or separately on the chain’s website or app.

The app Panera Grocery purchases are applied to reward points in the chain’s MyPanera loyalty program, and the current offer of $5 off of purchases of $15 or more applies to groceries as well.” Johnson notes “That’s simply a reactive solution, short sighted, and with a mixed branded messaging.”  

When Panera CEO Niren Chaudhary said in a press release announcing the new offerings. “With this new service we can help deliver good food and fresh ingredients from our pantry to yours, helping provide better access to essential items that are increasingly harder to come by.” That was simply reactive messaging, clearly rushed. 

The reason the grocerant niche has been the undercurrent of growth in every sector of retail foodservice for the past 15 years driving customer migration is because the key elements are consumer touchpoints that many legacy retailer have either denied, over-looked, or refused to entertain according to Foodservice Solutions® Grocerant Guru®.  Here lets take a look at what Panera is offering today:

·         Avocados: $1.49 each

·         Tomatoes: $1.49 each

·         Blueberries: $2.99 for 6-ounce container

·         Red Grapes: $5.99 per bag of around 2 pounds

·         Greek Yogurt: $5.99 per tub

·         Kids’ strawberry or mixed berry yogurt tubes: $7.99 for 16

·         Skim or 2% milk: $4.99 per gallon

Success does leave clues.  Panera Bread can and should excel within the grocerant niche.  Johnson stated he is confident that Panera will implement something the ilk of Foodservice Solutions® four steps too success: build, measure, learn, and repeat. Then they can take lessons learned, creating a new platform to drive incremental top line sales and bottom line profits. Or they can call the Grocerant Guru® for insights learned over the past 26 years leading the grocerant niche and more forward with fresh food fast edifying consumer relevant touchpoints.  

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 Foodservice Solutions® of Tacoma, WA has been the global leader in the Grocerant niche. Contact: Steve@FoodserviceSolutions.us or 253-759-7869

Panera Bread Hears You adding Complexity Free Ordering

In five weeks we usher in 2018 and one of the undercurrents of change that will be hear but not seen is the foodservice trend of voice activated ordering according to Steven Johnson, Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions®

I have been using my Google home more and more every week and it seems as if every week there is just one more thing that I find that like and use.  Well now here is one more Google Assistant, which can be on your iPhone, Google Phone, Android devise or Google Home recently announced that Panera Bread was becoming one of the first national concepts to offer the ability to order via voice for delivery and Rapid Pick-Up with the Google Assistant on their mobile devices.

My Panera members in select cities including St. Louis and Silicon Valley at participating locations are eligible to place and pay for their orders using the virtual personal assistant platform. Panera expects the rollout to go national by the end of 2017 so get ready as voice ordering will be big in 2018 according to Johnson.

Here is how it works “Guests can tell Google Assistant, “OK Google, ask Panera for delivery,” or “OK Google, talk to Panera.” The Panera app will then pop up and show users the menu. It will also suggest past items based on history and take the guest through the menu. You can then pay from saved wallet information.”

Why is this so important Ron Shaich, Panera’s founder, chairman, and CEO, in a statement “About 30 percent of total company-wide sales are digital at this point, Since it launched Panera 2.0 in 2014, the chain has grown with Rapid Pick-Up, Fast Lane Kiosks, Catering, and Delivery.’

How must is that?  “With more than 1.3 Million digital orders placed a week at Panera, there is a clear demand for voice-activated ordering methods, and this integration with Google is a step towards an even better guest experience,” according to Shaich.

Blaine Hurst, Panera’s president stated “Voice-activated ordering powered by artificial intelligence is the future. We know the industry is in its infancy….. “While we know we still have a lot to learn, we’re proud to develop, test and refine this capability in partnership with Google. In the long run, the ease and convenience will be meaningful to our guests.  In fact, placing a voice-activated order in many cases is more than 80 percent faster than a traditional app order.”

Leaders lead and when Panera leads expect other to follow according to Johnson.  Other brands the ilk of Wingstop, Domino’s, Pizza Hut have added Voice-activated ordering. 2018 is only five weeks away how are you adding customer relevance to your brand?  Don’t know?  www.FoodserviceSolutions.us or Email the Grocerant Guru® at: Steve@FoodserviceSolutions.us

Meal Kit’s Disrupting or a Family Solution

If success does leave clues the growth of the ‘meal kit’ sector just might be a clue that restaurants and grocery stores sectors want to take a second look at and reflect on the true nature of the growth of the meal kit sector according to Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions® Grocerant Guru®, Steven Johnson.  

Back in the day the team at Foodservice Solutions® identified, quantified, and qualified ‘the 65 inch HDTV Syndrome’ which helped define the foundation creating a platform for one solution we now call the Meal Kit sector.  The simple fact is consumers want to cook, eat, and be home watching their big screen TV’s in order to save time. Kinda like what fast food restaurants did to grocery stores save consumers time.

David Sprinkle, research director for Packaged Facts notes that “the meal kit delivery services space, which has mushroomed to $5 billion in sales”… “Meal kit delivery services are a specialized sector but widely disruptive force in the food industry. This space is the most striking example of the movement toward greater convenience in getting fresh foods to the consumer,…And new approaches to fresh food groceries are consumers are most interested in, and what will determine the winners and losers of the current food industry re-set.”

Today there are is no one single leader within the meal kit sector Blue Apron (at a 17% share), Freshology, Green Chef, HelloFresh, and Home Bistro—the top five players in the market, according to June 2017 consumer survey by packaged-facts.  Three-quarters of U.S. adults have heard of delivery services for fresh food meal kits to cook at home, and a quarter of adults have undertaken at least a free product trial. Advertising by meal kit delivery services providers is by far the top source of information.

Consumers like the solution meal kits provide its just that simple.  Sprinkle continued “Although there is lane-changing (in terms of suppliers) and attrition in use of meat kit delivery services, particularly after free or heavily discounted product trials, almost all (97%) current fresh meal kit delivery services subscribers are using the company they originally signed up with, and nearly that percentage (90%) would recommend fresh meal kit delivery services to their friends.”

The team at Foodservice Solutions® asks are you providing a solution, a service, or a value added attribute to the food you sell?  Are you doing what you have always done or what others in your sector have always done or are you focused on the customer first? 

Are you ready for some fresh ideations? Do your food marketing tactics look more like yesterday that tomorrow?  Visit www.FoodserviceSolutions.us for more information or contact: Steve@FoodserviceSolutions.us Remember success does leave clues and we just may the clue you need to propel your continued success.

Au Bon Pain Meals not Meal Kits Drives Success

Fresh Fast Flavorful are three adjectives that describe Au Bon Pain Café Bakery’s new Bon To Go Boxes but Foodservice Solutions® Grocerant Guru® Steven Johnson thinks Quality, Quick, and Quintessential might better describe Au Bon Pain’s new innovative grocerant niche menu options.

Au Bon Pain’s understands consumer’s attraction to and adoption of Hand Held Food for immediate consumption according to Johnson. Bon To Go boxes complement that growing retail trend well.  Au Bon Pain is filling an unmet need in the marketplace.  Johnson went on to say consumers “want solutions at meal time not cooking, and dishes to do.”

Bon To Go meal options can be mix & matched into a perfect family meal, office gathering, or snack they  combine the quality and taste you expect from Au Bon Pain in a simple grab-and-go package. They are made daily, by hand, so customers can count on them to be fresh every time.

Au Bon Pain’s Corporate Executive Chef Katherine See stated “We all feel like we’re going 100 miles per hour most days and sometimes we just don’t have the time to slow down for a relaxing meal,” ... “We created these nutritious and well-balanced meals for our customers to enjoy on the road, at their desk or even rushing through an airport. Bon To Go boxes are the ultimate fusion of taste, quality and convenience.” So let’s look at some of the options:

1.       Cheese & Fruit—brie, Cheddar cheese, apple, grapes and crackers

2.       Fruit, Egg & Nuts—hardboiled egg, apple, grapes, Cheddar cheese and mixed nuts

3.       Smoked Salmon—smoked salmon, herb cream cheese, cucumber, tomatoes, pickled onions, greens and a sprouted grain roll

4.       Egg, Veggie & Cheese—hardboiled egg, avocado, tomatoes and Cheddar cheese with a sprouted grain roll

5.       Turkey & Swiss—turkey, Swiss cheese, tomatoes, greens and dijonnaise on a fresh roll, with melon bites

6.       Caprese Chicken—chicken, fresh Mozzarella, tomatoes, chickpea salad, greens and balsamic vinaigrette

7.       Southwest Chicken—chicken, black bean salad, Cheddar cheese, tomatoes, greens and a flour tortilla

8.       Hummus, Veggie & Taboule—hummus, cucumber, tomatoes and taboule

9.       Hummus—hummus, cucumbers and pretzel crisps

Au Bon Pain has created a bundle of options to fit today’s consumers.  Most important Bon To Go was created to expand Au Bon Pain’s fresh food options into new non-traditional avenues of fresh food distribution.  The team at Foodservice Solutions® believes Au Bon Pain has found another success clue.

Are you trapped doing what you have always done and doing it the same way?  Interested in learning how www.FoodserviceSolutions.us 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. 

Au Bon Pain Technology Drives Sales

Online ordering at Au Bon Pain is nothing new as regular readers of this blog know.  Au Bon Pain catering sales too Boston area insurance companies and law firms alone for over the last 18 years has exceed $ 6,000,000.00 per year according to our own Grocerant Guru®.

Au Bon is set to utilize technology to put the ‘fast’ in fast-casual, Au Bon Pain announced the launch of ABP Pickup which is a new service for customers to save time and skip the line.

ABP Pickup is available via the new Au Bon Pain mobile app and at aubonpain.com, ‘ABP Pickup allows guests to place their order when they have a few free minutes, select a convenient pick-up time at their preferred Au Bon Pain location, pay ahead, and skip the line when they pick up in café. Once registered, customers can save their orders, easily choosing favorites when it is most convenient, making it perfect for skipping the line during the morning coffee rush hour or grabbing lunch on-the-go between meetings.”

Ray Blanchette, president and CEO, Au Bon Pain stated “With ABP Pickup, guests will have more time to get on with the busy day ahead with a full and happy stomach”…. “We put our time into creating quality, delicious food, but want to give our guests an efficient dining experience. We are proud to introduce this new service to better help our customers, no matter what their schedules may look like.”

ABP Pickup is currently being rolled out in Massachusetts locations and will continue to become available across Au Bon Pain regions between now and May 25, 2017. ABP Pickup is available with the Au Bon Pain mobile app available on the App Store and Google Play.

Foodservice Solutions® specializes in outsourced business development. We can help you identify, quantify and qualify additional food retail segment opportunities or a new menu product segment and brand and menu integration strategy.  Foodservice Solutions® of Tacoma WA is the global leader in the Grocerant niche visit Facebook.com/Steven Johnson, Linkedin.com/in/grocerant/ or twitter.com/grocerant