We throw a spotlight on five ‘adapt & grow’ strategies for food & drink brands as they emerge from lockdown. How are you preparing for your future?
As a sector food & drink has fared pretty well through the recent dramatic changes in the consumer landscape, especially when compared to other spend categories such as events, hospitality, or holidays. In fact, the latest grocery market share figures from Kantar show take-home grocery sales rose by a whopping 16.9% during the 12 weeks to 12 July 2020, the fastest growth rate since 1994, reflecting three months of increased grocery purchasing during lockdown while most other retailers, bars and restaurants were either closed or experiencing significant reductions in trade. That’s a lot of people dining in instead of dining out, trying their hand at new baking and cookery skills, or buying for a bigger household as adult children return to the nest.
This new landscape is an opportunity for brand owners to reshape their business, capitalize on new trends & behaviours, or simply turn the ideas that have been simmering on the back burner roaring in to a reality. Some brands have thrived and wish to push on, others have struggled and need to adapt. Whatever the motivation here we consider five strategies to help food & drink brands adapt & grow.
Grow sales online
Get your brand noticed
Create winning new products
Build a brand fanbase
Effective brand packaging
1. Grow sales online
In early 2020, data compiled from the Office for National Statistics showed retail sales were already tracking at 19%-21% higher year-on-year, before rocketing throughout April and May to 33%, as the impact of Covid-19 took hold. While Mintel, who are trend and research specialists, forecast online grocery retailer is expected to increase in 2020 by 33%, accounting for 16% of all grocery purchases. There is huge potential for growth online, whether you sell direct to consumer or via retailers. So what can you do today to improve your online brand? Growing your own e-commerce business is achievable and accessible but only if you work at it consistently. This is a huge topic but here are our five tips for success:
1. Think Brand First!
2. Build traffic
3. Deliver a great experience
4. Love the numbers!
5. Invest in content….regularly!
To find out more about each of these five tips for online success read our blog post 5 steps for building a brand online
2. Get your brand noticed
We believe brands should always, always start with a crystal-clear view of what makes them distinctive and then communicate that as succinctly, creatively and memorably as possible, whether online or offline. And consistently, time after time across every touch point.
It is hard to be different in a given market, but there is no substitute for being thoroughly distinctive and true to the unique characteristics of you, your brand and your business. We help brands unleash the truths in their business and harness that within a concise, distinctive presentation of what makes them…them. In their packaging, website, organic social media, visual content, promotional partnerships, advertising and more. Brands need to establish their unique ‘tone of voice’, the manner in which they present themselves unlike no one else and do it time after time. We help brands find their voice...distinctively, succinctly and consistently
3. Create winning new products
New product development done well is the lifeblood of growing brands. And new products can come in the form of new pack sizes, new pack formats, new flavours or entirely new ranges. You might even make a case for an entirely new brand, although we would always explore the core first!
The key to creating effective new products is to understand more about what customers want, and the flavours and formats they love the most. In our experience, we have seen many businesses try to create uniquely different products or flavours only to discover the reason why they are not already on the market…. because it might be different but it’s not what people want. Consumers can be more conservative than you expect and often need something familiar to latch on to.
For examples: In the crisp category if you don’t have a cheese & onion variant you are missing out on 15%-20% of the market – so do cheese and onion, but do it your way….”Mature Cheddar & Red Onion” as Kettle® Chips do for example. And in the world of meat, duck is still largely undiscovered relative to beef, lamb or chicken, so it is the familiar recipes related to orange, cherry or hoisin that drive this category.
4. Build a brand fanbase
We believe in building a brand’s own marketing ‘ecosystem’, driving interest in the brand, growing a database, and nurturing those contacts into an active and engaged fanbase. On-pack promotions, social media advertising, website contact forms, and in-store campaigns can all generate invaluable customer contacts which, when combined with e-mail marketing, website content and organic social media feeds, can help create a community of fans and advocates that will support the brand into the future.
We deliver significant revenue to clients through the email marketing programs we run, we see social media followers defend brands from perceived unfair criticism and we help brands keep customers engaged and loyal to their brand in the face of competition from others. You fight hard to win a customer, so it’s right that you work hard to keep them.
5. Effective brand packaging
In food & drink the product packaging is the most significant and valuable communication point for any brand in its battle to achieve stand-out and visibility on the shelf, convey the essence of what makes its offer distinctive and appeal to the very consumers most likely to be attracted to their offer. Not forgetting the essential functional attributes of a brand’s packaging – the environmental credentials, its ability to keep product fresh, protected from damage in transit or tampering and how it can make the customer’s life easier (e.g. easy opening, resealability, portion control, cook instructions, allergens, etc).
New packaging formats can open up whole new opportunities too such as larger packs for bulk buying, smaller packs for lunch boxes or single serves, and assorted varieties for gift packs. Packaging is a communication tool too; it is your brand billboard as well as the single most important engagement with the customer… after your product of course!
As a marketing agency based in Suffolk, we work with many leading food and drink brands as well as some of the most innovative farming and family-owned SME food businesses in the East of England and indeed across the UK. Some of the renowned food brands that we have worked with include Gressingham Duck, Mackie’s Ice Cream, Fairfields Farm Crisps, Sutton Hoo Chicken, Metcalfe’s Popcorn, Paddy & Scotts Coffee, Kettle Crisps, and Stokes Sauces.
If you would like to discuss ideas for your brand, we’d love to hear from you, with no obligation on your part and no expectation on ours. Click here to contact us.