As we enter the second week of August, we are still receiving pretty good advertising support from the New England retailers, with 12 retailers on ad this week. FOB’s are going up some, but we still have Food Bazaar, Stew Leonards and Western Beef at $1.99/lb. Quality at this end continues to be good, with bright, firm fruit and green stems.
After years of trying to get BJ’s to try a secondary display outside the refrigerated area, they have finally gotten upper management approval to create non refrigerated displays and the initial results are phenomenal. They are reporting sales are up 26.3% in dollars and 158% in units. They have been concerned that non refrigerated displays would lead to increased shrink and it looks like they are finding that the cherries do not sit out long enough for that to be a problem.
We are in the process of gathering up all the paperwork for the display contests. In the stores I visited across most of the banners that I cover, I found large, significant displays primarily at the entrance to the store. I believe that large displays are as responsible for good sales as are good quality and creative pricing. I recommend we look at continuing the display/sales contests support in coming seasons targeting the specific weeks where we need the most movement.