Kerry Foods, the company behind brands Mattessons, Cheestrings, Richmond, Wall’s and LowLow, is using its presence as a headline sponsor of National Convenience Show 2015 to launch a chilled food convenience campaign which it hopes will add £1.5bn of extra sales to retailers’ cash registers by 2018.
The ‘Building a Nation of Chilled Experts’ campaign is targeted at all convenience retailers – whatever their current level of chilled retailing expertise – and aims to take them on a chilled retailing journey that could turn the number one food category in convenience into a £6bn proposition within three years.
“Chilled food is already at the heart of the success story in the fast-growing convenience retailing sector, but we firmly believe that this category can work even harder for retailers if they can continue to improve their chilled offering and inspire customers,” explained Clare Bocking, Convenience Sales Director at Kerry Foods.
“Our own research shows that there is already likely to be £719m of organic growth in chilled convenience sales by 2018, but that retailers could add a further £1.5bn of sales by implementing a number of simple measures to make their chilled food offering even more enticing for customers.”
As part of the campaign, Kerry Foods has produced a 36-page guide that aims to help retailers make even more out of their chilled fixtures.
The guide challenges retailers to identify their current ability in chilled food retailing and then use a series of tips and tricks to reach one of three levels of chilled sales excellence.
‘Get Chilled Fit’ is aimed at retailers with limited space (eg: a one bay chiller), and offers a step by step guide on how to give customers the right range, display and pricing structure to build sales from the chiller, as well as tips on how to manage waste.
‘Build The Basket’ is for retailers who already have two or more bays of chilled food, but who want to learn more about how to tap into their shoppers’ missions – and persuade them to spend more across the rest of the store.
Finally, ‘Destination Chilled’ aims to equip the nation’s best in class convenience retailers with the skills to reach the ultimate level in chilled food retailing, promoting the management and development of cross-category display and offering promotions throughout the day to cover different occasions, as well as zoning stores by mission to spread the chilled offering throughout the store.
To produce its guide, Kerry Foods worked closely with leading retailers in order to gather best practice already out there in the field, and to better understand what information, support and advice that retailers need.
They include Ramesh Shingadia, who owns a 2,600 sq ft Londis store, and has already attained the status of Destination Chilled following a major refurbishment.
“We all have to start somewhere on our chilled journey, but it is a category that offers retailers great rewards if they can get it right,” explained Shingadia. “Through Building a Nation of Chilled Experts, the team at Kerry Foods is once again leading the way in helping retailers to make the most out of the number one category in convenience retailing.
“I would urge any retailer with an interest in growing their chilled offering to get involved with this programme.”
Bocking added: “By working closely with retailers like Ramesh at each and every stage of the chilled retailing journey, we can guarantee that our advice is relevant and practical across the whole of the convenience retail trade. We look forward to working closely with many more retailers following the exciting launch of Building a Nation of Chilled Experts at National Convenience Show 2015, and to continuing to build the chilled food opportunity throughout the UK.”
