Oh my. I think I'm addicted. Seriously. Every week for the last two months or so, I've bought The Grocer. I can't explain why. It makes no sense. It's a trade magazine for food and drink retailers, I work for a DVD distribution company. I should be reading Media Week, or Broadcast, or something like that. Not this. But if I see a headline like "AS MANY AS 50% OF ASDA'S 5,000 NEW ROLLBACKS OFFER JUST A 1p SAVING" or "WHY APPLE PRICES ARE DOWN 20% YEAR-ON-YEAR", sorry, but I've got to buy that magazine.
The current issue is especially good. They do special pull-out guides once a month I guess (the last one was about hot beverages). In this issue, there's a guide to confectionery. It's got Mr T on the front. Mr T says:
Listen up suckers, did you know:I didn't know any of that, Mr T. Well, possibly the last one.
- MARS is the No.1 manufacturer in sales of 'hunger' lines with 59% value share
- The hunger category is big and growing
- 'Hunger' is the 2nd largest needstate with sales of over £250m
- Multifacings of the best sellers (eg Mars, Snickers, Twix) will deliver more sales than 1 facing of a slower seller
To be honest, I never realised how knowledgable Mr T was when it comes to this sort of thing. You've got to admire the way he has all these figures at his bejwelled fingertips.
The Grocer's Guide To Confectionery contains what is without doubt the clunkiest, clumsiest, most desperate, most awkward linking paragraph I have ever read in my life. Let me set the scene. Talking about Nestlé's advertising proposals for the coming year, journalist David Burrows then seeks a way to link that to the new Mikado product recently launched in the UK by Kraft. This is how he does it:
It's been another impressive year for KitKat with sales up over 30% to £94m. Buyers suggest Nestlé has "got its house in order" with the brand now, having improved the focus. The launch of KitKat Senses, fronted by the Girls Aloud babes, has also given the brand that Something Kinda Oooooh.Christ. I'm not claiming the rubbish I write on this bloody blog is any better, but, you know, I'm doing this for free. Fuck knows why.
Britain's most popular girl brand was, of course, discovered on TV show "Popstars: The Rivals". And now, "their biscuit" could have a rival, of sorts, on the confectionery shelves with Kraft foods having just launched a "unique chocolate biscuit snack specifically designed for on-the-go customers".
The same article also contains sentence which, well, I wouldn't want to suggest it's a deliberate lie, so maybe it's better just to say it demonstrates a slightly absurd overconfidence in the accuracy of their figures:
Nestlé has promised £7m to its Aero brand and treble that for KitKat. In fact, shoppers are unlikely to have a break from advertising for the iconic brand with the series of "Perfect Break" ads set to be seen by 99.9% of the target audience 53 times in 2009.How on earth can it be possible to make a statement with that degree of accuracy?
And then, within this very same article, there's a spectacularly inane comment from Craig Barker, sales director at Ferrero:
Boxed chocolate remains a strong category despite tough economic times. The amount of disposable income may diminish, but key gifting occasions such as birthdays, Christmas, Valentine's and Easter will continue, as will the propensity of the consumer to gift at these key times.Brilliant. He's basically saying "there are still times when people will give chocolates to other people as presents and at these times when people will give chocolates to other people as presents, they will give chocolates as presents". Thanks for that, Craig.
Anyway, despite all this, and even only looking at the confectionery guide, I like learning all the specialist phrases used in industries like this. The "hunger" "needstate". "Multi-facings". "Impulse sub-section". "Pouch format". "Large-block"
Possibly The Grocer doesn't really qualify for this blog. It's a trade magazine, not a trade association, and their website doesn't offer much more than the print version so it's not like I'm concentrating on that either. But, so what? It's my blog. I can write what I want.
2 comments:
"And there's something deeply beautiful about this picture"
Hello James - I like your blog.
Have you seen David Byrne's True Stories film? I think it's about this sort of thing.
Hello
Thank you.
Yes, I love True Stories - haven't seen it in ages though as I've only got it on VHS. My favourite bit is when Byrne is driving along and turns to the camera and says something like "I was going to make a point about the difference between American and European cities, but I've forgotten what it was. I have it written down on a piece of paper at home though!"
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