Supermarket Branding
Supermarket Branding?Do you think any supermarket company delivers on any sort of branding at all? I have Shaw?s, Stop and Shop, Star Market and a slew of local stores in my neighborhood. I couldn?t tell you how any of them are positioned or what their brand identities are? And I?m a pro??
They have truly commoditized their industry. Only one of them, Stop and Shop has stepped out and differentiated. They opened up PeaPod, an online delivery service. I?ve used PeaPod since they?ve opened. Talk about convenience and time savings. I shop online and they deliver everything to the house the next day. Whoopdeedoo!? They are all great at garnishing statistics on your food shopping choices but they all fail at one thing. Branding. None of them care enough to care enough about the customer. Branding is all about making people feel a certain way. How do you feel at a supermarket? You should feel a certain way in a certain store. But I?m sure like me, you don?t.?
Now comes along Fresh & Easy (a new brand from Tesco).
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Fresh & Easy stores are only a quarter of the size of the traditional
“The combination of Fresh & Easy’s smaller stores, self service tills and ready-to-cook meals has direct appeal among U.S. shoppers whose primary concern is convenience,” says Jennifer Halterman, senior consultant at TNS Retail Forward. “There is demand for this type of concept, and we expect other U.S. retailers to be watching Tesco closely for ideas on how to tap into this buoyant market. Fresh & Easy’s smaller store size gives it an ideal formula to replicate quickly throughout the United States.”?
Let?s look at this realistically. So you are going to be making smaller more CONVENIENT type stores huh. Brilliant! Wait, don?t we already have convenience stores? Ah, yup so what?s convenient about ringing in your own stuff? Last thing I want to do is any kind of work! I tried that at a Home Depot and didn?t like it much. And how about ready to cook meals? Wouldn?t a fast food restaurant suit that bill??
Look, when you try to be everything to everyone you get a bunch of crap. And personally that?s what I think is going to happen here. It may be a hit for a while but long term it?s nothing more than a glorified convenience store.
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I?ll stick with PeaPod, now that?s convenient! And by the way the only company that clearly is differentiating and positioning themselves. The rest of the supermarkets just sell based on location.?Maybe some smart ass supermarket chain will develop a brand identity around location. Like, come see us because we put stores in areas you drive by. We care about you so we?re centrally located. Don?t go to Shaw?s it?s an extra half mile away come to Location-Mart. How?s that?
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December 15th, 2007 at 2:19 pm
Enjoyed you piece on supermarket branding. Safeway is doing some good branding with their “Lifestyle” format stores, especially the new ones the grocer is building. Of course, Whole Foods has retail branding down fairly well in terms of its niche–and beyond it niche in many cases. Trader Joe’s quirky branding style has paid off well for the food retailer. Costco Wholesale’s branding (as both a store for high-end consumers and price-conscious ones) is very successful.
In terms of regional rather than national supermarket operators, Bristal Farms (no owned by Supervalu) in Southern California does retail branding well. Another Supervalu banner, natural foods retailer Sunflower Market also is doing some interesting and quality retail branding. It’s sort of branding itself as a “category killer” in the retail natural foods space. The stores are much smaller than Whole Foods, and Sunflower isn’t attemting to be Whole Foods. Rice Epicurean markets in Texas also is an example of excellent retail branding on the higher-end.
At the lower-end, German grocer Aldi (which also owns Trader Joe’s) is doing some good retail branding with it’s smaller format, price-impact stores in the U.S. In fact, Aldi just announced a major expansion of these stores beginning in 2008.
Regarding Fresh & Easy, we’ve written alot about the venture in our blog. We’ve also written a number of pieces of late about small formats in general and the like. All relate to retail branding. Thought you might be interested in taking a look. The link is: naturalspecialtyfoodsmemo.blogspot.com
Again, enjoyed your piece, and will look forward to reading more from you regularly.
December 15th, 2007 at 10:20 pm
I’m really not familiar with Safeway as we don’t have any in Massachusetts so I’ll take your word on it. Wholefoods has done a masterful job at branding, I’m just not a customer. And once again I don’t have any remotely close to where I live. Add to that I like a nice boiled lobster once in a while and they refuse to sell them because apparently it hurts so I’m off the Christmas card list.
I’ve never ever been to a Trader Joe’s. Costco sells on price and therefore has no true brand identity. Unless selling on bulk is an identity. Not a Costco fan.
With the exception of Whole Foods I’m really not sure any of them have a brand identity and positioning. What are they? Quirky is not an identity. What makes Safeway better and different? Why would I go to Safeway over say Vons (are they still around)?
And the big question is do customers care enough? Or do they just go to the closest most convenient chain? I certainly won’t drive 20-30 miles to shop at a Whole Foods (and I’m not their target market) or Costco.
February 1st, 2008 at 11:24 pm
Costco’s brand means far more than price…Just read the hundreds of Survey’s that say so. Better yet, just ask customers in a Costco store. Costco has been rated by shoppers as numer 1 or 2 in numerous survey’s as the favorite retail store (for food as well) by consumers. They think of price, but also variety and quality. These are 3 great attributes for any retailer. Costco has “major” brand identity…is far more than price.
Safeway owns Vons; has for a couople decades. And Vons is still around.; like about 450 stores worth in Southern California. They also have an upscale divsision called Von’s Pavilion’s…very popular specialty stores’ format. Never heard of them???
Of course Trader Joe’s has brand identity…and positioning. When people think of inique specialty and natural foods, they think of Trader Joe’s. Are you aware its such a successful retailer that people in over a dozen city’s in the U.S. have launched lobbying cmapaigns begging TJ’s to open a store in their town?
Trader Joe’s has positioning…and a brand indentity in the minds’ of consumers most retailers (and other comapnies) would kill for.
Safeway has been super successful with its “Lifestyle” store format…is a few years old. So successful in fact it is in the process of converting all 1,700 of its US stores into the format. Lifestyle format =basic groceries and upscale offerings; more natural and specialty foods, prepared foods, quality to make your lifestyle better. Safeway also has a 1 year private label brand called O’ Organics. In one year it went form zero to $300 million dollars in sales. And that’s selling it in only Safeway stores. Pretty good positioning it has. Safeway is now even selling it in Asia. They will sell it in latin America soon. Should be a billion dollar brand in a couple years.