The Grocerant niche finds Peet’s Coffee Customized Success

Built on a foundation customization, personalization, and mix & match bunding the grocerant niche continues to drive top-line sales and bottom-line profits in every sector of retail foodservice today according to Steven Johnson, Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions®.

In an effort to elevate brand awareness in the growing coffee sector, Peet’s Coffee is making its roasted-to-order coffees available for personalized digital gifting with the gift experience management platform GiftNow, a Synchrony solution.

Get this, Peet’s Coffee has created a highly customizable coffee experience on www.peets.com  that allows coffee lovers to choose their preferred blend and grind type before the coffee is roasted. With GiftNow,

So, Peet’s enables customers to digitally gift personalized experiences to friends and loved ones, who will then receive a unique unboxing experience and have the opportunity to modify their gift to their taste and preferences and update delivery information before their gift ships. Peet’s customers can use GiftNow for special occasions, holidays and “just because” celebrations. 

Pari Raccah, general manager for GiftNow at Synchrony, stated, “Brands of the future must deliver customized and differentiated experiences that directly map to consumers’ needs in the moment,”... “Leading merchants like Peet’s are seeing the value of a holistic, integrated gifting solution as a way to build loyalty and serve customers in new ways. GiftNow provides Peet’s the chance to reach more customers by simplifying the gifting process and delivering the gift of fresh roasted coffee in a more meaningful and personalized way.” 

Justin Brennan, vice president digital marketing and e-commerce, Peet’s Coffee, went on to say, “Creating an unparalleled customer experience has always been Peet’s mission,” …. “We’re excited about the ability to gift the perfect coffee for each palette and hope that giving our customers the ability to personalize the Peet’s Coffee gifting experience will make their holiday shopping easier and more fun. And ensure that everyone unwraps a gift they’ll love.” 

Consumers looking for gifts can choose a coffee or gift item from peets.com and select the GiftNow button for digital gift wrapping and the option to include a personalized greeting or video. The gift notification will be sent to the recipient by email, text, FB messenger or can be printed out to be delivered in-person. The recipient will then be notified with a personal digital unboxing experience and recipients can exchange or modify their gifts before they are roasted or shipped, including customizing the grind or changing the pre-selected blend to deliver the best gifting experience possible. Coffee gifts will be shipped within 24 hours of roasting, or shoppers can choose from tea, coffee gear or other Peet’s gifts to make the holidays brighter. GiftNow orders can be digitally delivered instantly – ideal for last-minute gifters – or scheduled for a later time.

It’s not planned to be a one-time event, as Peet’s looking a customer ahead, expects a popular seasonal gift will be the annual fan-favorite Holiday Blend. The Holiday Blend, also available in decaf and K-Cup pods, is an ode to the festive season and is crafted from Peet’s most spectacular beans.

The ‘halo’ of better for you a staple within successful grocerant niche players, this is the gift that gives back. For every pound of Peet’s Holiday Blend purchased at a coffee bar or online Peet’s will donate $1 (up to $40,000) to La Cocina, a San Francisco based non-profit committed to increasing inclusivity in the food industry and to solving inequity in business ownership for BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, People of Color) and immigrant food entrepreneurs. 

Step up and give it a try.  GiftNow is available on purchases of $10 or more on Peets.com. A full selection of gifts can be found at peets.com/gifts. Now let us know what you think.

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 

Technology Driven Briggo Solves the Restaurant Labor Shortage

What’s next for Briggo?  Where will they open the first robotic coffee drive-thru?  Up early on your way to work and in a hurry?  Briggo just might be the next ‘restaurant’ coffee competitor filling your cup with fresh brewed coffee according to Steven Johnson, Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions®.

Briggo is rapidly expanding beyond their current footprint in Austin, Houston, and Dallas/Fort Worth creating a platform for fresh fast coffee that might be hard to compete against according to Johnson.  Briggo is once again expanding the Grocerant niche filled with Ready-2-Drink fresh prepared coffee.  Currenlty, Briggo is ideal for high-traffic locations such as airports and corporate HQs where quality and convenience are in high demand.

When Briggo, announced the opening of their second robotic Coffee Haus location at the Austin-Bergstrom International Airport (ABIA). The team at Foodservice Solutions® asked what is next?  The simple answer is a drive-thru?  How will you compete with that?  Will your service be as fast? Will your coffee be as consistently made? 

Did you know that Briggo, way placed on Fast Company’s list of the World’s Most Innovative Companies, successfully activating the Airport Experience Conference in Las Vegas, and once again becoming a viral hit for SXSW Festival visitors both in Austin’s Airport and at Austin’s Convention Center. Furthermore, Briggo will be a featured customer demo at the annual Dell Technologies World later this month in Las Vegas.

Leveraging digital technology ordering ahead from the Briggo mobile app or on the Coffee Haus touchscreens, customers become their own barista by customizing their favorite coffee and tea drinks once again elevating grocerant niche personalization and customization. Using the precision and efficiency of Briggo’s robotic technology, the drinks are crafted within minutes from Briggo’s custom whole-bean blend, fresh dairy and gourmet syrups. So once again we ask, are you looking a customer ahead? Does your coffee house look more like yesterday than tomorrow?

Are you ready for some fresh ideations? Do your food marketing ideations look more like yesterday than tomorrow? 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.

Kombucha is Hot

Customer relevance is important to maintain.  It does not matter what industry you are in consumers are dynamic not static and when the customer evolves retailers must as well according to Steven Johnson, Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions®.

Let’s face it Kombucha is the hot beverage and when Peet’s Coffee announced that bought a majority stake in kombucha maker Revive Kombucha, with promises to bring the company’s drinks to more grocers and its own coffee shops everyone knew that Peet’s Coffee was keeping pace with consumers.

Revive Kombucha offers bottled and on-tap kombucha and has more than doubled in size over the past year. Peet’s said that its financing will enable the brand to grow its operations and increase its distribution through the coffee company’s network.

Peet’s operates well over 200 coffee shops, mostly out West, and has a considerable retail business inside grocers and its e-commerce platform. The company said that it expects to expand Revive’s market into those channels.

Eric Lauterbach, president of Peet’s consumer division, stated “Kombucha is a natural adjacency to ready-to-drink coffee and our consumers tend to love both,”… “Adapting our growth strategy to extend access and trial of superior beverage choices across channels in new and convenient locations is key.”

The deal continues a trend in which coffee chains are looking to expand into tea and other beverage products. Starbucks, for instance, closed its Teavana shops to focus instead on expanding that brand at grocers and other retail locations as well as its own coffee shops.

So, we ask how are you expanding your brand with relevance?  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

JAB Holdings Focusing on Hand Held Food for Immediate Consumption

The undercurrents of consumer migration from traditional avenues of fresh food distribution to new non-traditional avenues of fresh food distribution have been well documented by Steven Johnson Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions®

One company JAB Holding Co continued its food-industry buying spree this week this time targeting a leader in the grocerant niche chain restaurant Pret A Manger that excels with hand held food for immediate consumption and has outstanding growth prospects according to Johnson.

Jab Holding Co is the same company that bought Panera Bread to JAB in 2017 another company that excels with hand held food for immediate consumption, catering, and delivery.  The food category similarities place Jab Holding Co within the top tier of the growing grocerant niche retailers.

Pret-A-Manger was, founded in London in 1986, it currently has 530 locations worldwide, including 381 in the United Kingdom.  It has 92 restaurants scattered within the northeastern United States including Boston, Chicago, New York, Philadelphia and Washington. The company had fiscal 2017 sales of $1.17 billion and according to Johnson is positioned for growth.

JAB grocerant niche has become clear to all retail players as they also have controlling interest in global coffee manufacturer Jacobs Douwe Egberts; Peet’s Coffee & Tea; Caribou Coffee Co.; Einstein Noah Restaurant Group, Inc., and Espresso House, the largest branded coffee shop chain in Scandinavia.

The Grocerant niche is filled with Ready-2-Eat and Heat-N-Eat fresh prepared food for immediate consumption most of with is hand held and Jab Holding Co team has a record of innovation, consolidation, and marketing skill set to not only drive growth but incremental top line sales and bottom line profits.

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