Hand Held Food for Immediate Consumption Still Drives C-Store Sales

 

Don’t get me the wrong idea convenience stores are fast evolving into a viable new generational platform by selling fresh food fast that can be mix matched, and bundled into a customized family meal.  How are they doing that?  According to Steven Johnson, Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions®. “they are selling hand held food for immediate consumption and empowering consumer to add milk, eggs, bread, cereal too an online order that will be delivered within a half hour.

Take Kum & Go as an example they have added items to its fresh food menu the new items include grab-and-go breakfast burritos with four premium meat options, as well as made-to-order breakfast bowls featuring a choice of breakfast potato or wilted spinach base. Previous favorites of the new concept, including stackers and grain bowls, remain on the menu.

Kum & Go’s Jac Moskalik, vice president of food innovation, stated, “Our food pilot launched last fall continues to grow as we offer our customers crave-able food options when and where they need them. The fascinating part of the pilot was evaluating how our customers responded to the new food offering and building out additional assortment based on shopping habits and trends for continued success. We have certainly challenged the perceived ‘norm’ of convenience store food and are excited for what the future holds,”.

Technology matters in 2022, so, in addition to relaunching its new food menu, Kum & Go introduced web ordering as a method for customers to order food and merchandise via the Kum & Go website. Web orders can be picked up in store or delivered curbside (and fuel side), with a minimum fulfillment time of 10 minutes using the “ASAP” option or scheduled for a future pickup time.

Kum & Go’s Ryan Lindsley, vice president of marketing and digital strategy, stated, “Web ordering is yet another way Kum & Go is extending beyond our four walls and bringing our ‘crave-able’ fresh food and wide variety of products to our customers. This will be a great way to recruit new customers to try our new offerings and encourage participation in our &Rewards loyalty program, mobile fuel pay and mobile ordering in our &Rewards app,”.

Kum & Go continues to roll out its refreshed brand and new food program across its footprint, focused on implementation in Des Moines, Iowa this year. Web ordering capabilities are planned to be implemented across its entire footprint later this year.

In case you did not know, established in Hampton, Iowa in 1959, Kum & Go is a fourth-generation, family-owned convenience store chain. Kum & Go plans to hire over 5,000 associates across all locations this year, adding 176 food positions as it expands its brand and food program in the Des Moines market.

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

Kum & Go a Social Media Success

 

If success does leave clues one thing is very clear, that is Kum & Go has picked up enough success clues to elevate it brand messaging to new levels according to Steven Johnson, Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions®.

So, get this, a social media prank is turning into a real meal deal at Kum & Go LC convenience stores after achieving viral popularity. Earlier this month, Springfield, Mo., resident, author and motivational speaker Kyle Scheele placed a life-size cardboard cutout of himself advertising the non-existent "Kyle Scheele Meal" inside a local Kum & Go store to see how long it would be before employees noticed and removed it, the story was reported USA Today.

Scheele’s video of the prank received millions of views on TikTok and inspired a real namesake meal that will benefit a charitable cause, Scheele announced in a follow-up video. That could have only happened if the marketing team at Kum & Go understood brand messaging, customer relevance, and was prepared (trained) to elevate incremental attention into positive brand messaging.  The Kum & Go staff was prepared, able, and did a great job leveraging all the right tools in their marketing toolbox to drive brand awareness. Congratulations.

Now get this, the real "Kyle Scheele Meal" will be available at all Kum & Go stores for $5 each. It includes once 12-ounce Red Bull and a pizza sandwich, or "just two pieces of pizza smashed face to face," Scheele said.

Once again it gets even better, as Kum & Go will reportedly donate $2 from every meal purchased from now until Thanksgiving, up to $10,000, to No Kid Hungry, a national campaign run by Share Our Strength, a nonprofit organization working to solve problems of hunger and poverty in the United States and around the world.

No that’s not all, Red Bull will match the donation total, according to Scheele, who thanked his followers for the "incredible groundswell of ridiculous, insane support" that made the charitable initiative happen.

"In one week we took this from a crazy idea to a real thing that's really going to help real people," Scheele said. Is your team ready to drive brand awareness at a drop of the hat? 

Are you ready for some fresh ideations? Do your food marketing ideas look more like yesterday than tomorrow? Interested in learning how our Grocerant Guru® 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 one of the following links: Facebook,  LinkedIn, or Twitter

Grocerant Niche Fresh Food Retailers Must Integrate Social Media

 

In a world where fresh food fast, needs too meet-up with consumers ever evolving pace of life, social media is an avenue of branded messaging success clue that simply can’t be over looked according to Steven Johnson, Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions®.

Recently Ariel Rubin, director of communications Kum & Go LC, shared 10 tips for fellow fresh food retailers looking to truly expand their social media conversation.  According to Johnson, Rubin’s 10 tips will help all fresh food retailers expand valued brand messaging in an inviting, interactive and participatory fashion.  Let’s look at his 10 tips:

1.       Use influencers to build long-term partnerships. Influencer collaboration can work if it is a well-matched influencer to your brand. You also must consider the platform being used.

2.       Consider celebrity engagement, especially celebrities near your brand. “We send our swag to famous people strategically — those who we like and who like us. We send T-shirts; they tweet about it or use our name in a podcast. They are a friend of the brand. It’s all free and it builds goodwill.”

3.       Make the merch work. Kum & Go’s philosophy is “make cool merch, win cool customers.” Giveaways inspire social media conversations and build loyalty. Kum & Go recently gave away a needlepoint with the inscription: “Tis better to have kum and gone than never to kum and go at all.”

4.       Test new and emerging platforms like TikTok. To capture and connect with 16- to 22 year-olds, Kum & Go hired a 19-year-old Gen Z specialist to manage platforms like TikTok.

5.       Tweet to the next level. Kum & Go uses humor and storytelling on Twitter to win over both new associates and new customers.

6.       Go offline. It’s not all about online conversations. Kum & Go brings the same “digital hype and energy” to its store openings, with 100 fanny packs typically given out by 7 a.m. Kids camp out for the openings.

7.       Stand for something. “We use our social platform and privilege to amplify marginalized voices, be loud allies, and support causes that matter to us,” said Rubin. “When we have something important to say, we find a fun way to say it. People really engage with this stuff.” Recently, Kum & Go posted: “we don’t mind if you want to laugh at our name. we get it. kum. but one thing we won’t tolerate on our platform is rape apologist language. any slut-shaming, sexism, or misogyny in the comments is going to get you blocked. love, kum & go.”

8.       Engage in a deeper way. Kum & Go believes that if you help people get through something important to them, they will become a fan for life. And so, the retailer believes in deepening its relationship with its audience. According to Rubin, “not only are we communicating with our audience, we are also listening, incorporating their ideas into fun campaigns and giveaways.”

9.       Promote chainwide and local happenings. Kum & Go utilizes social media to promote its business as it evolves offerings and operations, such as curbside delivery or gas-pumping service.

10.   Make mistakes. This is the only way you’re going to find out what’s working and what isn’t. Try things. They won’t always work, but this is how you find your voice and ultimately build your audience. “You have to be willing to screw up. Trust your social media people. Let them make mistakes. The failures are just as informative as the wins — maybe even more so.”

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