General Session
December 8, 2010
Kantar Retail defines the insights needed to create a winning strategy for 2011 and beyond:
- The risk of the supplier community as a whole losing thought leadership and mind share with shoppers is higher than at any time we have ever seen. In tomorrow’s retail environment, there is great danger in seeking safety—vendors that are slow to change, accept risks, or make Big Bets may be left behind.
- Your company is geared towards a growth rate that the market place won't support. With stubborn unemployment and consumer confidence slowly sinking, it's harder to do business today than it was two years ago.
- Over-focus on traditional growth customers risks irrelevance with other, more productive customers whose businesses vary from the supposed norm. For retailers, replacing less efficient businesses as a way to grow may have run its course…for suppliers, that means concentrated volume growth is now difficult to achieve in one sales call.
- In a world of disparate opportunity, expressing a cohesive narrative that defines your brand will be a challenge—and a necessity.
The insights Kantar Retail delivers will help you craft a strategy that is not merely the sum of your tactics.
Keynote — The Agile Supplier: Moving To A Dynamic Retail Strategy
John Rand, Senior Vice President
Just like in classic physics, classic retail strategy demonstrates that a profitable business will tend to travel in a straight line…and resist any change of direction as long as it remains profitable. Yet the Great Recession was a wake-up call for those who will heed it—as a winning strategy going forward will require a more agile and flexible approach to the marketplace, the customer, and the shopper.
- Understand how tomorrow’s retail environment will require more than the traditional approach geared to large customers with concentrated volume
- Learn how to benchmark your progress at preserving supplier brand equity—even when your customer’s brand creation may be aimed at pre-empting your own
- Focus on the need to communicate with a more diverse shopper—using a stronger narrative that expresses the real value of your products, all supported by more relevant insights
Mapping Mass: Walmart Post-Impact and Target Post-Recession
Leon Nicholas,
Senior Vice President
The past couple of years have brought momentous changes to Mass, with shifting strategies and the effects of the recession altering supplier and shopper dynamics alike. For Target, the downturn challenged the heart of its discretionary-driven brand promise, compelling it to shift its emphasis to value-focused messaging and consumables. At the same time, Walmart unleashed Project Impact, radically altering its go-to-market approach just as the recession drove millions of new shoppers to the price leader.
- With Project Impact now in retreat and the economy out of its trough, where will these two retail giants go from here?
- What lessons have the past two years taught, and to what extent will they return to their “DNA?”
Leon Nicholas addresses these questions and points suppliers to the dynamic landscape that has now emerged.
Beyond the Comfort Zone: The Growing Importance and Challenges of Selling Club
Brendan Langan,
Director of Retail Insights
The warehouse club channel (Costco, Sam’s, BJ’s) has consistently been one of the fastest growing, rewarding—yet at the same time challenging—collection of "Alternative" customers as any in retail…despite having one of the most stable, straight-forward business models. As growth with large conventional customers slows, identifying and gaining share of the market will require a deeper understanding and comfort level with managing non-conventional customers and the questions they push our companies to ask.
- Gain insight into the growing importance of working with the “stubbornly non-conventional” club channel and discuss implications for vendor partners with “stubbornly conventional” business models.
- Evaluate the channel and its key players by aligning your customer strategies and mapping them against key opportunities and challenges.
Success in the Diverse Value Discount Channel
David Marcotte,
Senior Vice President
2010 continues to be the “Year of the Discounter,” as all the major players not only continue to grow sales, but also comps and profits. By focusing on their own definitions of best practice and expansion beyond the lower tiers of shoppers, each has been able to find a way to success. And that growth is being accomplished via a range of very diverse strategies and tactics…which can befuddle vendors trying for a single approach to the channel.
- Explore the limited commonalities that can be leveraged across this channel
- Identify how the ownership of each company radically changes its approach to business and growth
- Consider the possibility of penetrating the closed strategy of Dollar Tree and Aldi
- Contemplate what success looks like without your full portfolio
Rocks, Ripples, and Whirlpools: The Fluid Dynamics of Traditional Channels
John Rand,
Senior Vice President
There are a handful of retailers in grocery—and drug—who have weathered the recession more or less intact, using a mix of evolving value propositions, innovative shopper offerings, and aggressive marketing. There are even more customers in some stage of change or flux, trying to find stability as shopping behaviors make pricing and forecasting more difficult. And in both channels, there are retailers at risk—those whose performance has been sub-par and whose very survival may depend on finding a way to make their stores compelling. Grocery and Drug offer risk and reward to the agile supplier who can act effectively amid complexity—and at the same time, both channels are essentially competing for the same trip and the same shopper, making a coordinated strategy a business necessity.
- Identify the “rocks” of success in grocery and drug and find out why their success can’t be easily copied
- Define which retailers are at risk and what suppliers should do to help them…while still protecting themselves
- Understand how drug store retailers can steal food trips—and learn how grocery retailers can become relevant in health and beauty
Making the Most of a Slow Recovery: Identifying Shopper Opportunities
Mary Brett Whitfield,
Senior Vice President
The economy is not recovering quickly and neither are consumers,
as the post-recession era has (so far) been plagued by slow job growth—thereby constraining retail spending growth. Those hit hardest by the recession—specifically Baby Boomers—have made the most changes, and their new shopping patterns largely will be maintained indefinitely. In contrast, Gen Y consumers have been least affected for the long-term … but because many in this shopper cohort are still forming shopping patterns, they are less likely to “bounce back” than to “move forward,” having adopted new approaches to shopping and new priorities for spending. In this environment, it is imperative to make the most of moderate growth by investigating macro opportunities based on evolving shopper needs and leverage points—and identifying values- and interest-oriented niche opportunities.
Mary Brett Whitfield outlines how retailers will need to think differently about building and cultivating relationships with the highest-opportunity shoppers.
Clearing The Path To Purchase:
Ensuring Brand Relevance In A Complicated World
Bryan Gildenberg,
Chief Knowledge Officer
As traditional channels continue to morph and the United States’ largest retailer seeks to regain its voice, growth and relevance are going to come from more complex, less well-understood places. In this presentation, Bryan brings together the core themes of the General Session with an eye on what’s next for organizations seeking to position themselves to capitalize on the upside and avoid being swept away by downside risk. In particular, we look at the shopper-centricity, new capabilities, and organizational alignment required to understand consumer decisions and engagement in a multi-format, multi-channel world. Consider this the “workout regimen” required to gain and maintain the agility required to win