Foodservice Marketing

Congratulations to Advance Food Company on their purchase of Quik-to-Fix from Smithfield Foods! Read the rationale for the Acquisition in the Enid News.

Admire the creativity behind Advance Food Company’s latest press release: Within a day it had earned a mention in Pizza Marketing Quarterly. If you are submitting your releases online, PR Web, WorldAnnounce, and Pressbox are all excellent submission sites.

This article tracks the trend toward better food in heathcare and quotes Foodservice Rewards member Scottish Rite Hospital for Children in Dallas.

BCM (Best Customer Marketing) is largely misunderstood, yet separates marketing winners from losers. Learn how to use this important principle to your advantage.

This Harvard Business Review of loyalty programs is worth a read as it effectively illustrates how Behavioral Economics impacts program participants.

“Trade shows will always be a focal point, but the strongest marketers in the industry – such as Tyson, McIlhenny, Kikkoman and FoodService Rewards – are in front of restaurant operators daily with a variety of messages aimed at different segments of the market. The opportunity to quickly change their promotions to deal with trends or new competitor products is vital” according to Jack Fordi of the National Restaurant Association SmartBrief (circulation: 51,000 vs. our 62,000). Read the whole article in B2B magazine.

Here are 16 ways to improve eMail open rates. We’re also inserting reward codes into direct mail to boost open rates.

Foodservice Rewards will benefit from the buzz of My Coke Rewards, a multi-year consumer loyalty program using reward codes entered online. Here’s an excellent video describing the original reward code promotion run by Pepsi.

Updated 7/24/06 – looks like Coke is having implementation issues. This sometimes happens in programs that rely on advertisers to supply the “prizes” as promotional consideration. It’s akin to the upset frequent-flier programs generate when they restrict the number of available award seats. Foodservice Rewards, by contrast, faces no such issues as the rewards are all sourced & replenished directly by BI.

During a recent flight to St. Louis for Bunge’s account review, Northwest turned the plane around en route owing to a mechanical problem. A week after the delayed flight I received a letter from their Director of Customer Care apologizing and depositing 2,500 bonus miles into my Silver WorldPerks account. Here’s the clever thing: John Neupauer, who was flying with me but has no elite status received the same letter – and only 1,000 points.

Two important lessons here:

1) Communicate with your best customers when behavior changes – they stop entering codes, for instance
2) Communicate differently based on customer value – number of codes entered or number of different products purchased

Soon we’ll begin focusing on customer behavioral triggers and how to use them to grow your business more profitably. Stay tuned.