Portillo's Triple Drive-Thru Fresh Food Fast

Grocerant niche Ready-2-Eat and Heat-N-Eat fresh prepared and portable food fast has been key to driving customer trail, adoption, and brand migration according to Steven Johnson, Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions®.

Fast-casual chain Portillo’s is kicking things up a notch, with a new, one-of-a-kind location. The company introduced Portillo’s Pick Up. Unlike traditional restaurants, Portillo’s Pick Up will not have an indoor dining room. Instead, the 3,750-square-foot restaurant will feature three drive-thru lanes as well as a pick-up area for orders placed at portillos.com and through the Portillo’s app. The chain will also offer delivery and catering from the new Joliet restaurant.

Portillo’s CEO Michael Osanloo, stated, “This new restaurant is unlike anything Portillo’s has ever done…. “We’re bringing the inside out in Joliet. With this new model, guests will get the signature Portillo’s experience with our unrivaled Chicago-street food exclusively via our pickup and delivery channels. We know our guests enjoy the convenience of our drive-thru and delivery, so we’re excited to double down on those efforts.”

Fresh food fast is one of the hallmarks of the Grocerant niche and once open, Portillo’s Speed Team will race to serve guests its signature Chicago-style hot dogs, Italian beef sandwiches, char-broiled burgers, fresh salads and world-famous chocolate cake, all for takeaway. Outside, the restaurant will feature Portillo’s design and flair, complete with a raceway theme.

“Portillo’s is a popular regional eatery that I am proud to welcome to Joliet,” says Joliet Mayor Bob O’Dekirk. “This new restaurant concept combined with the popularity of Portillo’s is a promising addition to the North Ridge Plaza shopping center. This is another outstanding development for Joliet and its residents.”

To help launch the new restaurant, Portillo’s designed a limited-edition t-shirt for this location. Guests are invited to sign up for Portillo’s Birthday Club to receive one of these shirts on opening day, while supplies last. Fans who sign up also receive a slice of Portillo’s homemade chocolate cake on their birthday. 

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 us on our social media sites by clicking one of the following links: Facebook,  LinkedIn, or Twitter 

Red Robin resets the Price Value Service Equilibrium to Drive Sales

Removing price as an obstacle to drive sales is the new electricity for Red Robin a fine fast, fine burger, or sit down restaurant according to Steven Johnson, Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions®.  

In a new marketing campaign called #BurgerMath Red Robin is leveraging Price to garner incremental customer visits and trial. .Red Robin CEO Denny Post stated “The goal is to make it stone-cold easy for our guests to say ‘Yes’ everyday to visiting Red Robin, and to unlock greater frequency and share going forward.” ..“This is only the first of many messages to come contrasting our everyday value with others,”

While unemployment is a record low levels Red Robin is leveraging its brand invitation with new electricity looking to garner those consumers who are ready to move up from fast food to fine casual according to Johnson. 

What is your brands new electricity? 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.” Red Robin CEO Denny Post understands that.

Johnson stated “that in my minds-eye the new electricity must be very efficient for the supply and includes such things as fresh foods, urban clothing, grocerant positioning, price,  branded relevant messaging, autonomous delivery, cashier-less retail, cash-less payments, digital hand held marketing. This program has all of that.

Foodservice retailers to survive the next generation of retail must embrace the artificial intelligence revolution while simultaneously embracing fresh food that is portable, fresh, with differentiation that is familiar not different.  That will require brands to embrace new fresh food partnerships more now than ever before according to Johnson.

Grocerant positioning works as Red Robin’s off-premise sales rose by 40% year over year during the quarter, revealed CFO Guy Constant. Delivery, takeout and catering now account for 9.4% of overall sales, added Post.

However, the typical off-premise check tends to be a little lower than what patrons would spend for a comparable dine-in order because it’s not likely to include a beverage, said Constant. Off-premise customers “do add on a little more, but the nonalcoholic beverage incident does make it a little bit lower than what you see in dine-in,” he said.

So just what is your New Electricity? Success does leave clues www.FoodserviceSolutions.us  is the global leader in grocerant niche business development.  We can help you identify, quantify and qualify additional food retail segment opportunities.  Has your company had a Grocerant ScoreCard completed a Grocerant Program Assessment, or new Grocerant niche product Ideation?  Want one?  Call 253-759-7869 Email: Steve@FoodserviceSolutions.us

Innovation Grocerants offer Different Choices and Consumer Like the new Options

What brings customers into you location with the desire to buy more and more?  Innovation; simply put doing whatever you do better, faster, and doing it with Braggability, as Braggability inspires word of mouth advertising, empowers personal endorsements, setting the stage for an ongoing dialogue according to our Grocerant Guru®. 

While Millennials are seeking food discovery, others are simply tired of the same old same old. Foodservice retail customer migration has been most difficult for legacy foodservice chains lacking differentiation.   Foodservice Solutions® Grocerant Guru® Steven Johnson says “Differentiation does not mean different rather it means familiar with a twist and today that twist must be clearly defined and noticeable.” I ask does your foodservice retail outlet have “Braggability’? Grocerants niche Ready-2-Eat and Heat-N-Eat food is different, much has ‘Braggability”.

When you think about it very little has changes since Henry Ford’s 1922 autobiography “My Life and Work” he famously remarked, “Any customer can have a car painted any color that he wants so long as it is black.” In this statement, Ford the pioneer of the assembly line was stating that mass producing the same product in large numbers was the secret to keeping prices low.

All things being equal, people like to have things that are custom made just for them or allow for customization and personalization. Foodservice Solutions® Grocerant Guru® continually reminds us that the consumer is dynamic not static. That helps explain the evolving retail demand for a food platform that includes convenient meal participation, differentiation and individualization that platform has become the Grocerant niche.  

Consumers like ‘eating-out while eating-in’ (eating-at-home) according to our Grocerant Guru®., means take-out food has become the food of choice, and meal component bundling is how most foodservice retailers can garner the attention of new customers. Mix and Match meal component bundling is the best way which retailers can differentiate themselves, from other retail outlets while garnering new customers with an increased frequency of purchasing

Back in the day that is to say prior to 2005 no one would have thought that the future of food was not a chain restaurant.  Streets were lined with Look-a-Like Menu-a-Like steakhouses, fern bars and grills, Quick Service Restaurants and food courts in every mall and city in the United States.

Not any longer today the Grocerant Niche fresh prepared food has caught on fire. Once considered uniquely American the grocerant niche is booming in Europe, Asia, Australia, and Africa of late.  Universal commonalities of time saving, lack of cooking skill-set, meal component bundling have taken root.  Many of us at Foodservice Solutions® have been helping drive success in the Grocerant niche since 1991. 

Grocerant Ready-2-Eat and Heat-N-Eat fresh food is about discovery, simplicity, and transparency fresh food fast without the labels of ingredients that no one wants to pronounce let alone understand. New unique venues and menus are two of the biggest drives companies the ilk of Pinkies Liquor stores, Wawa is much more than a C-store, Hello-Fresh is a global Meal Kit success story driving new trends. Each has ‘braggability, they are different, notable driving non-traditional meals outlets and occasions to social consumption acceptance.

These new non-traditional food retailer’s of which many serve great food in unusual surroundings, each offer a side of ‘braggability’ while creating a social buzz that is becoming a roar.  More and more that ‘braggability’ is in the form of Ready-2-Eat and Heat-N-Eat fresh prepared food. The retail foodservice and restaurant business is famously Look-a-Like Menu-a-Like outlet design alike platform. Simply put that has become boring for consumers.  What do you give your customers to talk about? Boast about?

So think about it. Does your retail foodservice outlet have ‘braggability’? How do you package your food? How do you package a meal?  Is the meal you offer today the same as it was ten years ago? If so them maybe your restaurant is running more like yesterday that today.  Create ‘braggability’ it’s simple it will make you noticed by new customers and notable by your current customers.

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 and braggability?  Email us at: Steve@FoodserviceSolutions.us or visit:  www.FoodserviceSolutions.us for more information.

Faster Fresh Legal Seafood

Consumers are dynamic not static and chain restaurants need to be as dynamic as consumers according to Steven Johnson, Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions® Boston-based casual-dining seafood chain Legal Sea Foods is evolving with its customers with dynamic relevance.

In an effort to offer fresher, faster, seafood Legal Seafood is opening a 850-square-foot space in the Quincy Market Building.  It will feature six signature bowls, customizable bowls and a “liquid bowl,” which is Legal’s signature clam chowder.

Empowering customer choice customers can select a base of brown rice, jasmine rice, mixed field greens, zucchini “noodles”, or lo mein noodles. Then they can top it with hoisin glazed salmon, marinated organic shrimp, tuna poke, salmon poke, spicy tuna, soy-ginger chicken or kung pao tofu. The seafood proteins are $5 and the others are $3. Customers can also get the bowls without protein for $7.95.

With that price point consumers get up to three toppings, the ilk of roasted cauliflower and shallots, grilledlemon kale, seaweed salad, edamame, rainbow carrots or shaved Romano cheese. Additionally they have a choice of one crunchy toppings: spiced seeds and nuts, wasabi peas, sunflower seeds, nori furikake or sesame seeds. Finally they have a choice of dressing: sesame ginger, cider Dijon, orange chipotle, olive oil and vinegar, tahini, or poke sauce.

The signature bowls are $13.95 except for the Chicky Chicky Bang Bang, which is $11.95 and features soy-ginger chicken over jasmine rice with grilled lemon kale, spicy roasted sweet potatoes, charred broccoli, sunflower seeds and orange-chipotle dressing. The other bowls are:

Tunanimous Choice: Sesame ginger tuna poke, jasmine rice, seaweed salad, charred broccoli, kimchi, radishes, nori furikake and poke sauce

Salmon Poke-Manna From Heaven: Sesame ginger salmon poke, brown rice, avocado, marinated tomatoes & cucumbers, rainbow carrots, scallions, spiced seeds and nuts, and poke sauce

Noodle it Over Shrimp: Marinated shrimp, lo mein noodles, marinated mushrooms, rainbow carrots, spicy roasted sweet potatoes, cucumbers, scallions, basil, cilantro, mint and tahini

Pick Your Hoisin: Hoisin-glazed salmon, grilled lemon kale, charred broccoli, zucchini noodles, sunflower seeds, sesame seeds, red pepper flakes, avocado and cider Dijon dressing

Tuna Spiced Nice: Spicy tuna, sushi rice, avocado, edamame, cucumber, wasabi peas, tobiko and tamari

Legal Fish Bowl also offers three house-made drinks for $2.50 each: lemonade; organic green tea with mint, basil and elderflower syrup; and Haymaker’s Punch with raw honey, apple cider vinegar and ginger. How are you improving service, reducing cost, and selling fresh food faster? 

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 have the clue you need to propel your continued success

Packaging Drives Grocerant Fresh Prepared Food Sales

Foodservice Solutions® Grocerant Guru®, Steven Johnson contends that advances in packaging have driven incremental fresh food sales.  In fact demand for single-use disposable foodservice products in the United States is forecast to approach $226 billion in 2021. Johnson asks is your food portable?

Time starved consumers in search of grocerant niche Ready-2-Eat and Heat-N-Eat fresh prepared meals, and meal components that can be bundled in a mix and match way as to create a personalized and customized family meal are driving demand according to Johnson. 

Eating-Out while Eating-In has become the norm for many as regular readers of this blog know.  Consumers are looking for speed and convenience in meal preparation according to Johnson. With the availability of new Apps for online ordering and delivery services its clear that this trend is just about to elevate itself to new highs.

Retailers serving grocerant niche Ready-2-Eat and Heat-N-Eat fresh prepared meals and meal components for takeout or delivery can create differentiation with branded unique packaging according to Johnson.

While customer migration is away from grocery store to new non-traditional fresh food locations it  is a shift away from shopping to fill the pantry for shopping for fresh food for immediate consumption and all food retailers are in a battle for a greater “share of stomach” according to our Grocerant Guru®.

Recenlty McDonald’s announced that it is moving to sustainable packaging. Consumers want their eating choices to reflect their values, and establishments want to meet their corporate sustainability objectives. As compostable, recyclable, and post-consumer products become more price competitive, they are quickly becoming an economical alternative to the traditional single-use foodservice product materials.

Retailers have more choice in packaging today everything from Bio-based, renewable, and biodegradable materials derived from sugarcane (bagasse), corn (polylactic acid or PLA) and recycled newsprint (molded pulp) offer suitable alternatives to traditional cups, clamshells, dinnerware, and cutlery. Does you packaging have a ‘halo’ of better-for-you?

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

Costco’s Drives Foodservice Sales with Integrated Marketing

When considering What’s for Dinner; consumers at a minimum of 87 million times a year they are thinking Costco according to Steven Johnson, Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions®.  That my friends is destination dinning. 

As regular readers of this blog know Costco sell the hell of the $4.99 rotisserie chicken.  Costco recently reported that is sells an estimated 157,000 rotisserie chicken search  day, on average, for a total of 87 million sold last year—up from roughly 60 million in 2013.

While consumers can choose from a huge variety of online recipes that incorporate Costco rotisserie chicken into soups, pastas, and other dishes the fact is Costco marketing team published recipes for its rotisserie chicken ‘leftovers’ and even sells salads utilizing it’s ‘pulled’ rotisserie chicken. 

As we have pointed out in the past Costco’s Ready-2-Eat and Heat-N-Eat fresh prepared food that includes pizza and oversized $1.50 hot dogs that come with a free drink to name a few of the items as a standalone business it reports sales of over $2 billion a year in sales.  If that unit was a stand-alone business it would be profitable. Remember that does not include the 87 million rotisserie chickens they sell a year.  Simply put as we have said in the past Costco is destination dinning. Are your customers thinking about you when it dinner time? 

Quality, consistency and price matter and Costco understands how to integrate that messaging so consumers get it.  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

Mark 2018 as the Year of the Proliferation of the Grocerant Niche

The line between restaurants and food retailers is growing ever thinner. The fight for America's food dollars continues to intensify as consumers find fresh prepared Ready-2-Eat food options at a wide and growing array of outlets across almost every channel including convenience stores, chain drug stores, restaurants, grocery stores, club stores, vending and even more non-food traditional fresh food retailers like dollar stores.

While manufacturers, retailers, and restaurants worry about choice overload, consumers have embraced their new choices and show no signs of returning to the old ways. This fight is taking place in what is called the grocerant niche.

The restaurant industry is not known for trying to be the fastest to market with an ideation, food, or tech advance.  Restaurants are slowly understanding that the consumer never takes a step backwards from technology or fresh prepared food quality, speed of service, prepared food meal component options according to Steven Johnson, Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions®.  

In the United States, the larger the chain in almost all cases the more slowly they are to adopt something than a smaller chain or independent restaurants will. Chain restaurants goal is simple to feed one meal at a time in the restaurant while protecting and edifying the brand according to Johnson.

Historically chain restaurant leaders have denied the credibility of start-up competitors as non-relevant. The pizza sector is a great example; evolving from family dining independents to a national chain of "Red Roof" Italian, then to delivery-only outlets and now take-N-bake is garnering market share in the pizza sector.

Trends in the Food Industry Point to an Increase in Non-Traditional Meal Occasions

At the intersection of the consumer, freshly prepared food, and technology we find that consumer eating behavior is evolving and is now beyond the control of traditional food marketers.

Evolving culture and lifestyle, demographics along with the new uncertain economy are all putting pressure on the American food consumer: Demands of work, economic shrinkage, demands of raising a family, commuting, social interaction, kid's after-school activities, all contribute to a food marketplace where convenience vies with price over legacy brands.

Recent Advances in Food Packaging and New Points of Non-Traditional Food Distribution Have Empowered Consumer Choice

Americans are embracing these choices even as legacy marketers cringe. Who's after restaurant food dollars? Simply put everyone including retailers from Tommy Bahama, Macys, and Ikea.

Why should you care if Walgreens is selling fresh prepared Ready-2-Eat and Made-2-Order sandwiches? Why should you care if Amazon-Whole Foods, Trader Joe's, Safeway and Wegmans are selling Ready-2-Eat and or Heat-N-Eat fresh prepared pizza? Why should you care if Coinstar is selling Seattle Best Coffee at 1,000 locations around the United States for $1.00?

You should care because they are selling it, and you are not! The fastest growing sector of retail foodservice for the past four years has been the Convenience store sector. The C-store sector's growth in large part has been driven by freshly prepared food. Non-traditional avenues of distribution are growing, gobbling market share while establishing new patterns of consumption, price points, and customer loyalty.

The Shopper Is in Control Spurring New Retail Food Formats

Trader Joe's and Amazon -Whole Foods have created Ready-2-Eat and Heat-N-Eat fresh prepared food items with qualitative differentiation as an entity with an identity that has helped propel them into Ready-2-Eat fresh prepared food leadership.

Recent research shows that both Trader Joe's and Amazon-Whole Foods are each known for high quality (restaurant quality) Ready-2-Eat and Heat-N-Eat foods with distinctive offerings. More important each is leading with innovative products and package size that create value and have positioned each chain as a food shopping destination for meal components customized and personalized for immediate consumption or mix and matched for a meal time at home. In short, they are stealing your customers.

Walgreens fresh prepared food is restaurant quality and priced less than Panera Bread or Corner Bakery CAFE.

Both Panera Bread and Corner Bakery CAFE thrive in urban locations. Walgreens is now growing price, quality, and speed of service advantages over legacy retailers. Legacy restaurant chains must reconsider the speed at which they evolve and adapt or non-traditional outlets will capture profits margins as well.

Traditional views of meals and mealtime can pretty much be discarded. Legacy retailers waiting for the "next big thing" to copy simply might be out of luck this time. Legacy food retailers may not like to be first movers very much but it may prove that waiting too long will not work this time.

Product, Packaging, Placement, Portability, and Price

The retail food world is evolving at an ever increasing pace filled with innovation in food, portion size, points of distribution, and quality fresh prepared meal solutions. The price, value, service equilibrium is resetting in retail foodservice. In order to edify the brand and reinforce consumer relevance restaurateurs must leverage Foodservice Solutions® Five P's of food marketing.

Many legacy food retailers continue to practice brand protectionism, stifle the brand while diminishing consumer relevance. The consumer is dynamic, not static. Brands must be dynamic, evolving with the consumer. Four years of watching other retail sectors thrive should be long enough. Success in the restaurant world is no longer simply about what happens within your 4 walls.

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.