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Consumer Buzz :: Meghan Boyer
Published:4/1/2008
Ads from the Cart
What if a shopping cart did more than simply ferry shoppers’ goods? Microsoft Corp. and software-maker MediaCart Holdings Inc. had the same question. The two companies have been working on a grocery-cart-mounted digital console that helps shoppers find products, scans their items and accepts payment. The carts also use radio frequency identification (RFID) to sense where a cart is in the store and send specific advertisements or coupons to shoppers at certain points.
The companies intend to test the carts in the second half of 2008 at ShopRite supermarkets on the East Coast. Customers with ShopRite loyalty cards will be able to log into a website at home, enter their grocery lists and later retrieve them at in-store cart consoles by swiping their loyalty cards. As a person shops, he or she scans the items before placing them in the cart, and the console gives a running price tally and removes items from the shopper’s list.
It’s All In the Bag
Retailers used to be mainly concerned about their products in the store and not how customers brought them home. Now that focus is shifting. More retailers, from Saks Fifth Avenue and Macy’s to Abercrombie & Fitch and Lord & Taylor, are revamping their shopping bags in response to a customer trend. In fact, they are investing millions of dollars in features like plastic-coated paper and heavy fabric cord handles, reports the New York Times.
All the fuss is because consumers have shifted their behavior. Instead of throwing out shopping bags when they get home, customers are using the sturdy ones as disposable carry-alls to bring laundry to the cleaners, food to a picnic or lunch to work—which amounts to free advertising for retailers.
E-Commerce On the Rise
Instead of visiting retailers in person, more consumers shopped with their fingers this past holiday season, as online sales grew in numerous retail sectors, according to Coremetrics, a provider of digital marketing products. The company recorded performance data between the Monday before Thanksgiving and the Friday before Christmas from more than 300 participating brands and compared it with 2006 results.
“As evident from these results, online shopping is growing, and we’re seeing specific sectors make significant strides in capturing and retaining customers,” said Joe Davis, CEO of Coremetrics.
Here are some of the key findings:
•Department store e-commerce sites saw the highest growth, with a 35% sales increase.
•Intimate apparel and health & beauty sites saw 27% and 26% increases in sales, respectively.
•Sports apparel sites gained 14% in sales versus 2006 results.
•Home sites finished the year with 13% year-over-year growth during the holiday season.
•Office supply and electronic sites as well as general apparel sites saw sales increases of 10%.
Where Did I Park My Husband?
As the stereotype goes, women will shop until their men drop. But bored and tired men trailing behind their ladies can cut shopping trips short, which is what retailers don’t want. To keep the men happy and the women shopping, some retailers have installed husband lounges, reported Forbes.
Bloomingdales, Kohl’s, Macy’s and more (including some of your fellow garden centers like Hillermann Nursery & Florist in Washington, Missouri and Pesche’s Flowers in Des Plaines, Illinois) are adding seating areas tailored to men’s interest. Some serve beverages, provide magazines and have televisions showing news or sports. While it’s hard to pinpoint how much the lounges increase spending, the stores that have them keep seeing their sales go up, stated Forbes.
Chat Room Boom
With more consumers turning to the Internet to get news, communicate with friends and even shop, some retailers are providing online spaces for their customers to talk with professionals, learn about products and discuss problems, according to the Clarion Ledger. Retail chat rooms can be more cost effective than a call center and serve many of the same purposes, which is why roughly 27% of online retailers offer live chat, the Ledger reported.
But the success of a merchant’s chat room depends largely on its customer base. Younger consumers, who have grown up with the Internet and chat rooms, largely feel at ease with the medium, while older consumers may feel more comfortable talking about problems or products with a person.
Paper or … Paper?
As more cities and states move to reduce or even eliminate plastic shopping bags, some retailers are making the move from plastic to paper and reusable bags on their own. In late January, Whole Foods announced it will stop offering disposable plastic grocery bags in 270 stores in the United States, Canada and United Kingdom by April 22, 2008—Earth Day.
The change amounts to 100 million plastic bags not entering the environment between April 22 and the end of 2008, according to the company.
Starting at the end of April, Whole Foods shoppers can choose from free recycled-paper bags, 99 cent reusable bags made with 80% recycled plastic bottles, and canvas bags that range from $6.99 to $35. The company also will encourage customers to bring their own shopping bags by discounting 5 cents to 10 cents from their bills.
Dude, Where’s My Pizza?
When customers order a product, they like to know where it is as it moves toward their homes, which is why both UPS and FedEx offer tracking features that allow customers to see where their packages are in transit. Now, those customers accustomed to tracking their UPS and FedEx packages online can track their pizza orders as well.
Domino’s launched its Pizza Tracker Web feature in January at 3,400 locations and plans to have it available for all stores by late June, reports USA Today. With Pizza Tracker, customers can go online and follow the progress of the order, which Domino’s guarantees as accurate to within 40 seconds.
In addition to the names of the workers who took the order and are delivering it, a Domino’s customer can learn when the pizza is in the oven, when the workers place it in its box and when it leaves the store. The only thing a customers can’t track is how far away the delivery person is from their homes.
Score a Shopping Touchdown!
Retailers know consumers reach for their wallets in anticipation of Christmas, Halloween and Valentine’s Day, but now there’s another day to add to the consumer-spending list: Super Bowl Sunday. Total spending for the February 3, 2008 Super Bowl was expected to reach $9.5 billion, according to the Retail Advertising and Marketing Association’s 2008 Super Bowl Consumer Intentions and Actions Survey.
While Super Bowl spending can’t rival the $474.5 billion the National Retail Federation predicted that consumers would spend during the 2007 holiday season, it can add sales in the post-holiday season, one that’s traditionally slow for retailers.
Here are additional survey findings retailers can use to score big with consumers before the big game:
•Roughly 158 million people intended to watch the Super Bowl this year.
•Consumers planned to purchase 3.9 million televisions for Super Bowl Sunday, up more than 50% from 2.5 million in 2007.
•Consumers planned to spend an average of $59.90 on Super Bowl-related merchandise, up from $56.04 last year.
•Consumers ages 18 to 24 years old are twice as likely as other groups to say Super Bowl advertisements encourage them to purchase products from the advertisers.
Marketing On a Budget
Independent retailers can’t compete with big boxes when it comes to price or advertising, but they can compete with ingenuity. A shoestring budget and a few great ideas can create an effective marketing plan that brings customers in and boosts sales.
Here are a few marketing tips from Fortune Small Business:
•Define your store’s niche, whether it’s an exclusive line of products or a designer label.
•Keep a thorough customer database for targeted marketing campaigns.
•E-newsletters are the most cost-effective method of reaching a lot of consumers at once.
•Customer newsletters should be more than product specials; they should contain trends and other useful information.
•Get involved in community events and area charities through donations and sponsorships.
•Hold in-store events to capture new customers (and their information for your database).
•Create noncompetitive alliances with area businesses, such as health clubs and restaurants, and work on trading customers.
Meghan Boyer is a freelance writer based in Chicago, Illinois. She can be reached at meghan_boyer@yahoo.com.
Learning from Horticulture Magazine
We spoke to Meghan Lynch, editor, Horticulture magazine, about consumer gardening trends and how they can help you learn more about your customers.
What’s the biggest trend you’re seeing with your readers?
Our readers are trying to incorporate some organic methods into their garden care. They’re concerned about invasive plants and they’re seeking information on native plants. At the same time, there’s a greater awareness of the facts that “invasive” one place doesn’t mean invasive everywhere, and that native plants outside their native range can be troublesome, too. I think both the organic approach and the interest in native plants and their home habitats reflect a desire to work with nature, not struggle.
How do you come up with story ideas?
Most of our stories evolve out of ideas pitched by writers across the country, many who write for us frequently (though we’re always open to new voices.) We choose stories that we believe will help our audience create their best garden—for example, a story on a personal garden should show how a design challenge was solved or some particularly creative combinations; a feature on a genus should include some dependable species as well as some less common ones. Our readers are looking for something different to make their gardens stand out.
What are you seeing currently with consumers when it comes to gardening?
Our readers seem to be gardening more. They do it themselves. It probably has to do with who our readers are—they are avid, enthusiastic, mostly experienced gardeners. They love to garden, so they make time for it and wouldn’t want to give the “job” away.
What’s your goal as a consumer gardening magazine?
Horticulture’s goal is to provide our readers with in-depth, accurate, interesting information on every aspect of the gardening life. We show them excellent garden plants, explain their needs, and suggest how to use them in the garden. We cover tools and materials with the goal of making our readers’ work in their gardens more effective and comfortable. Our readers tend to be fairly experienced, so we don’t devote a lot of space to the basics. Consumer magazines in general also serve as entertainment and make readers feel part of a community. To that end, in each issue we supply our readers with a feature-length look at a real garden, an interview with a notable member of the green industry or the gardening culture, and personal essays and opinion pieces to which readers may relate.
What are the most common questions or topics you’re hearing from your readers?
Our readers are asking about invasive plants and alternatives to them; organic methods; and they always want to hear about great combinations. As for plants, we received good responses to recent stories on African daisies, hydrangeas, native woodland ephemerals, winterberry holly, native clematis and monkshoods.