This week, at its annual conference in Dallas, the Food Marketing Institute (FMI) presented the latest Booz & Co. study on the state of the food retail industry. The results are just what you might expect: a lot like last year, only less interesting.
Four “trends” were outlined, although I don’t know that any of these are really trending; they’re sort of already out there and part of the landscape. read more…
Food retailers don’t like change. That’s not a revelation for anyone who knows this industry. Many of the people in high places running the food industry have been doing it their entire lives. Maybe they started in high school, or it’s a family thing, but they’ve been doing this for many years, and they know how things work.
The flip side of this aversion to change is the attraction to new technology. Over the years I’ve seen lots of new gadgets being tested, from kiosks to fingerprint checkout. Few of these ideas made it to implementation, and of those that did, only a fraction survived longer than a couple of months once the novelty wore off. read more…
The QR code, that technological wonder that marketing folks have been all agog over, is officially dead. Let’s give it a decent burial, and move on. QR codes first appeared on the scene a couple of years ago, and have been touted by marketing folks around the country as the next big thing since then.
The problem is that few marketers understood, or understand, how to use these codes; they were a novelty at best, but one that in practice offered little real value to consumers. It was this lack of value that contributed to the codes’ demise. read more…
There was a fascinating article in the New York Times last week entitled “How Companies Learn Your Secerets” that talks in part about Target and its ability to find out all sorts of things that about its shoppers based on shopping behavior. The example given about sending baby-related coupons to a high-schooler and the tale of her angry father is worthy of urban legend status – and a read of this article.
According to the author, Target, not surprisingly, cut off his access to more information once it got a whiff of what he was digging into, and why. The last thing a major retailer wants is to make the evening news in a negative way, or become a viral topic on Facebook, driving customers away for fear of being stalked or worse, getting sued for invasion of privacy. read more…
Super Bowl XLVI is now in the history books. My first thought is that when they came up with using Roman numerals for the games way back when, no one really expected it to go this far. But that’s a discussion for another day.
Anyway, the bigger news is—of course—the commercials. The Super Bowl has become more famous in recent years for what happens between the plays than what happens on the field. This year was really the first year that social media played a significant role during the game, with many marketers attempting to capture the audience on both screens. read more…
Once again, the holidays are just a memory. Retailers are now taking stock of the recent season, and either counting their money or licking their wounds. Most of the news coverage in December centered on the growth of mobile and online shopping, and how dollars are shifting in that direction.
On the flip side of this movement is the now-viral video of a FedEx driver nonchalantly tossing a large screen television over a fence. As a marketer, I could have a lot of fun with that in a campaign to support brick & mortar retail.
It doesn’t seem like all that many years ago when Amazon.com was touting itself as the “world’s biggest bookstore.” I remember listening to its radio ads in the morning during my commute; who would’ve guessed then that it would come so far as to be a threat to brick and mortar retail, including even the mighty Walmart?
Last week Amazon made more news, and raised the ire of traditional retailers once again, when it offered a 5 percent discount to users of its “Price Check” app. The deal was that you could earn 5 percent on a product (up to $5) if you scanned an item in a store but then bought it from Amazon. Not surprisingly, the backlash has been loud and long. There is a general fear that traditional retailers are becoming little more than showrooms for Amazon. read more…
The United States Postal Service is nothing if not consistent. Earlier this month it posted (pardon the pun) a $5.1 billion (with a b) loss for fiscal 2011, and some estimates show that nearly tripling to over $14 billion for 2012.
The response? A new television spot touting the safety of mail over e-communication. “A refrigerator has never been hacked,” the voice-over begins. Maybe not, but I routinely get mail intended for my neighbors, which leads me to wonder how much of my own mail is misdelivered. Never mind hacking, if email were as unreliable as the postal service we’d all be up in arms. read more…
Mobilizing Mobile—Hard to Believe Many Companies Still Do Not Offer Mobile-Enabled Websites
Yesterday The New York Times ran an article about Google’s push to get businesses to mobilize their websites. “The future is in your hand,” the campaign urges. “Mobilize your site and move your business forward.”
Google sees the need for mobile websites, which makes a lot of sense. What doesn’t make sense is the lack of activity from business. Why don’t businesses—especially their marketing teams—see the need for this? read more…
The U.S. Census Bureau has targeted Oct. 31, 2011, as the day the world’s population will reach 7 billion people. It’s only been 50 years since the population was “just” at 3 billion. Obviously those are estimates, but you get the point—that’s a lot of babies.
When I was a kid, the word “billion” wasn’t something we heard often. A million was a big number, and “trillion” sounded like a made-up word. Today is a different story. We talk about billions and trillions of dollars, both in terms of wealth and debt. The world has yet to see its first trillionaire (measured in U.S. dollars), but it’s only a matter of time. read more…
