• “I prefer separate gluten-free sections.  I believe there are riches in niches.”
• “There is a functional purpose that a separate space serves…this minimizes any potential cross-contamination, namely, a celiac picking up a gluten product by mistake.”
• “In terms of a retail future for gluten-free…online is one of the areas worth considering, Amazon offers over 10,000 gluten-free products but only 1000 organic products.”

• “I favor just about anything that will bring excitement into the center store.”
• He endorses in-store demos, but offers a word of caution.  “A lot of companies bring in people who have no passion, no excitement, no knowledge.  I would be careful of that and make sure it is done right.”

• “Look at what Applebee’s did…curbside pickup…Couldn’t the grocery industry do that?  Couldn’t we figure that out?  Consumers order by smartphone or call us and we have those four or five thing ready…stay in the car.  The idea is to bring the center store to the customer.
• “Think about it.  Why do you have a pasta aisle with 40 SKUs of pasta at one end and at the other end you have the pasta sauce?  You have to run back and forth.  Think of some things differently.”
• George worked on a project to more effectively merchandise dairy creamers.  His idea was to put the creamers by the coffee and sell the package.  “It almost failed…the store had difficulty keeping the coolers by the coffee stocked. The lesson learned is the convenience of customers is more important than retailer convenience.  The relocation of creamers adjacent to coffee made this combination purchase a natural for the customer.”

• “The challenge for retailers is to think about the checkout or the front of the store as the last opportunity to solve customers’ problems.”
• “They need to focus on not ‘what do I want’ but ‘what do I need.’ That opens up a whole other realm of merchandising at the front of the store.”
• Keeping in mind that customers go to “where the shortest line is” George sees little appeal with the current fad of “candy-free” checkouts that offer only healthy snacks.
• When people are on line they are looking at the conveyor and thinking, ‘Did I get everything that I need?’ It is kind of like the last checkpoint.”
• “As a retailer, think of the thing they might have forgotten that you can merchandise there as an alternative to candy and other traditional front end items. I think that is a great opportunity.”

Awarded at Commencement 2013

Dr. Richard George, Professor of Food Marketing, will receive the Tengelmann Award for Distinguished Teaching and Research. Rich has a distinguished career at Saint Joseph’s extending over 40 years. Known as an accomplished researcher, Rich is recognized for involving his students in his research and bringing the results into the classroom. He also collaborates with colleagues at University College, Cork, Ireland, adding an international dimension to his work. His teaching has been recognized both at the University and in the business community.

• “Demographics are about customers.  The biggest change is that retailers have to start focusing on their front door rather than their back door.”
• “There no longer will be supermarkets that everybody likes a little; there will only be supermarkets that somebody likes a lot.”
• “Supermarkets like to build a market that they everybody comes to, but to do that customers have to compromise.”
• “When you look at the markets that are doing well right now, it’s the specialty markets.”
• “I always say, There’s riches in niches.”

• “The history of the pretzel, of course, stretches through Germany and France. “It’s been around since 6 AD, if  you were in Bavaria, you would get it everywhere.”
• “I am only surprised the pretzel bread trend didn’t happen sooner.   I don’t think it’s a big deal.”
• “The same old pastrami and rye gets boring,” he says. “The salty taste and the texture [of pretzel buns] make it a party in your mouth.”
• “You can be sure that fast food restaurants are already onto what’s next. They’re always one step ahead.”
• “But always careful to maintain a balance.  We like new things, but we like equilibrium. We like tension, but not too much. We’re always throwing a party for our mouth.”

“If I’m a competitor—if I’m Giant or ShopRite, which are the two biggest like them in this (Philadelphia) area—I’m just salivating because these guys are down. They don’t have any resources really to turn it around.”

“Supervalu was a “terrific” wholesaler about 15 years ago. Supervalu was a wholesaler that always wanted to be a retailer, and they went on this whole thing with acquisitions—Albertson’s, Jewel, Acme and all these other markets—and I don’t think they ever had the expertise necessary to run retail centers.”

“Supervalu, and its traditional retail brethren, must do more to differentiate themselves from the pack that occupies “The Big Middle” —stores that are neither discount nor high-end oriented.”

“When you’re driving down the street, what’s going to make you turn into an Acme? What will it be?”

“They say they’re not going to file for bankruptcy, but they’ve been trying to sell these properties for the last few years. I have no confidence at all that they have the ability to turn around.”

The foodservice industry has witnessed dramatic change in the last few years. Since the onset of the recession, the industry has seen a reduction in the number of operator units, increased regulation, higher food and energy costs, and intense competition at all levels. In the face of these changes, many have recognized that improved collaboration between trading partners—especially distributors and manufacturers—is an area ripe for progress and potential reward.

During the past three years, the International Foodservice Distributors Association (IFDA), with assistance from the International Foodservice Manufacturers Association, has pursued concrete steps their members might take to improve collaboration and trust. Led by IFDA Peck Fellow Dr. Richard George of St. Joseph’s University, the project has now released a final report, Collaboration Works! The members-only report details pilot projects with eight distributors and five manufacturers that developed and tested a collaboration model and established metrics to measure progress. Beyond defining the model and metrics, the report includes feedback from pilot project teams that provide insights about commitment requirements and benefits that can be achieved by greater collaboration.

The pilot was built upon 2009 research that worked to define the current state of the distributor/manufacturer relationship. Interviews with industry leaders for that research underscored the fact that the current model continues to erode trust, and that distributors and manufacturers could benefit from a more collaborative model that includes better defined business strategies, shared commitments, enhanced transparency, and data exchange.

“The question before us was how to migrate towards the new paradigm,” said Dr. George, professor of food marketing at the Haub School of Business at St. Joseph’s University, who led the effort. “We concluded that a lack of trust emanates from a lack of understanding, which comes from a lack of real engagement and transparency. To move forward, distributors and manufacturers need to engage in face-to-face planning and a sharing of expectations of what the partnership is going to deliver and who does what for whom. In addition, trading partners need to set measurable goals, based on a scorecard approach to what the partnership is achieving,” said George.

Efforts turned to establishing a collaboration model that is easy to understand and implement. The model includes five components:

• Understanding how your channel partner works,
• Agreeing to share information intensively but selectively,
• Identifying and agreeing to the dimensions of collaboration,
• Developing model metrics, and
• Engaging in a systematic post-mortem of the results and process.

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Metrics used in the collaboration model involved three key areas: sales and profitability growth (7 metrics), supply chain efficiency (12 metrics), and customer centric strategic business management (4 metrics).

Results for participants were encouraging. “Most teams reported increases in new item sales with partners,” said Dr. George, “and growth rates reported by these partners during 2011 were, on average, 10 to 15 percent greater than in 2010 and 10 to 15 percent higher than overall market growth rates in 2011.” While some supply chain efficiency metrics were either not measured or reported, those that were showed positive results. On-time delivery rates on average improved from 90 to 95 percent. Fill rates with partners improved from 95 to 98 percent. Out of stocks with trading partners improved by a range of 15 to 50 percent.

Overall, said Dr. George, it appears that the collaboration pilot project was helpful in improving the relationship between foodservice distributors and manufacturers. It broadened the conversation by identifying and reporting mutually useful metrics and it “deepened the relationship” by increasing mutual understanding of how each party measures progress in the marketplace, said Dr. George.

The report was provided to IFDA membership (member leadership and top procurement executives) in August 2012, and IFMA also shared out the report with their manufacturer members. Additional copies of the report are available to IFDA members by contacting Carolyn West at IFDA at (703) 532-9400.

Courtesy of IDFA Online.