LAS VEGAS — Convenience-store retailers looking to add pop to their dispensed beverage programs need to focus on driving excitement and engagement and improving the experience.
David Hall (second from right), vice president of global foodservice at Circle K, said that earlier this year, the convenience-store chain of Laval, Quebec-based Alimentation Couche-Tard Inc. partnered with Pepsi on a Mtn Dew Purple Thunder flavor exclusive to its Polar Pop fountain drinks.
Hall spoke at the NACS Show in Las Vegas on Oct. 3 during a session called “Gulp! Reinvigorating Dispensed Beverages,” moderated by Chris Rapanick (far left), director of business development at NACS, Alexandria, Va.
Circle K asked, “What can we do to re-engage our customers coming out of pandemic?” Hall said. The launch, for dispensed beverages and bottles and cans, included billboards and in-store displays. The flavor, a combination of blackberry and plum, “was something new and different,” he said.
Circle K also is boosting engagement with its Sip & Save beverage subscription loyalty program, where customers get one beverage daily for $5.99 per month. “Sip & Save creates value and loyalty,” he said.
“Create the experience where we want to shop,” he said, adding that beverage dispensers all should be operational with no “out of order” signs. “Be clean, sharp, fresh, engaging. Be a place people would like to come and bring their families.”
- Alimentation Couche-Tard is No. 2 on CSP’s 2022 Top 202 list of biggest U.S. convenience-store chains by store count.
With people having an average attention span 2.8 to 8 seconds today, along with fierce competition, “You really have to capture them the way they’re used to—on the screen,” said Jose Salinas (far right), director of retail accounts at Marmon Foodservice Technologies, Carol Stream, Ill., who also spoke during the session.
The c-store world must adjust to the digital world and “get screens on display units that can work with the customer,” Salinas said, adding that 30% of restaurant customers find digital menus influential in their buying decisions, and 74% said an effective menu display is their top priority in the ordering process.
Engagement is critical. “Communicate, inform and inspire them to give them permission to make the purchase,” he said, adding the need to upgrade marketing for a digital world, “because that’s what our customers are used to; be able to easily switch out the message.”
He added that 60% of stores without signage or digital equipment plan on investing in next two years.
There is a 3% to 19% sales lift seen in c-store equipment with digital screens, which give customers choices and the opportunity to interact, he said. “Once you get someone touching and interacting with a screen, they get more creative.
“Maximize the impulse purchase,” he added.
Maverik Inc., Salt Lake City, is seeing soda shops “popping up on every corner,” Ryan Ratcliffe (second from left), category manager for dispensed beverages, said during the session.
- Maverik is No. 22 on CSP’s 2022 Top 202 list of biggest U.S. convenience-store chains by store count.
“It’s spreading outside Utah,” he said. “Customers love them because they can choose their drink, and soda shops put fun names to these drinks. You add syrups, creams, slush, ice cream—and people pay a premium for this, like at coffeeshops. People will line up and wait up to 30 minutes—and pay $4 for a Coke with a little Dr Pepper in it.”
“These used to be my customers, and they’ve gravitated away,” Ratcliffe added.
To combat this, Maverik has created and publicized its own soda-shop menu—for beverages about a third of the price. “We added syrups and creamers to our counters, and customers make the beverage the way they want it,” he said.
“The marketing team did a great job publicizing,” he said, adding the marketing is “big on social media.”