When selecting new equipment, such as ovens, it’s critical to make sure it is flexible enough for a smooth transition as a convenience store moves from one daypart to another.
This advice came from Lee Hawkinson (pictured right), head of facility reliability and concept design at Laval, Quebec-based Circle K, speaking on Innovating Your Foodservice With Equipment and Packaging at the NACS Show in Las Vegas last week.
“The data shows the snacking daypart is growing and growing, especially with more folks on the go, and the younger generations are looking for that snack,” Hawkinson said at the session, which was moderated by Dave Hinton (pictured left), president of Flexeserve Inc., Southlake, Texas. “You have to get it out quickly and you have to have equipment that can change with those different types of products.”
Also, retailers don’t know now what products they will develop in the future, “So don’t put yourselves in a position where you have to buy another piece of equipment to support a new product you’re developing,” he said, adding that it’s important to have flexible packaging to tie in with the operation.
‘Labeling must be clear and concise and meet regulations out there.’
Andrew Spink (pictured center), research and development chef at Jacksonville, Florida-based Gate Petroleum, added that food preparation has to be easy for employees to accomplish, so it’s important to have the right equipment to do the work.
Spink added: “You can’t rely on them to saute something.”
While equipment selection and other aspects to running a c-store are important, business begins outside the store, Spink said.
“The cleanliness of the pumps, shrubbery, it all ties together with customers—that’s one thing they see,” he said. “Lighting, cleanliness, making sure that first moment someone walks in they say, ‘Wow, we want to come back.’
“We have an open-concept-type store where you can walk one end to other and see everything you’re looking for right down to the open-air case,” Spink continued. “That’s really eye appealing. Everyone eats with their eyes.”
Maintaining cleanliness and safety with food also is a key aspect, Hawkinson said.
“You can’t have a foodservice program without safety,” he said. “Food is not food unless it’s safe. Food safety is not a competitive advantage. You cannot be successful in food unless you’re successful in food safety.”
Other Highlights
During a remodel revolving around shifting to made to order from grab and go, Spink said they had to consider the flow of the kitchen, packaging and equipment.
“Everything has to be working at same time,” he said. “We’re going to have more of a hybrid model: The customer can order, but there’s also food in a holding area.”
When considering packaging for grab-and-go items, Hawkinson said, “First, have culinary expertise available to use, whether that’s internal or via your supplier network. Take in that product development knowledge.”
‘If that case is not full or if you’re out of something, you can lose them for a while.’
From the packaging side, “Think how you want to merchandise, how that drives the packaging selection, so you can merchandise it easily,” he continued. “Does it have your branding on it? Labeling must be clear and concise and meet regulations out there.”
Tap into the knowledge of partners and others when it comes to packaging solutions, Spink added.
“I can make food, but how are we going to hold it? What can we hold a burrito in? Ask, and you’ll find there are 10,000 things you can hold a burrito in. They’ll usually lead you to where you need to be—and then it’s testing—in my kitchen [we’ll spend] months checking holding times.”
Store Design
When it comes to how customers perceive freshness of a store’s grab-and-go items—and enhancing this perception—Spink said that during a renovation, he thought about how the kitchen and store looked, “And in our case, I took a whole wall down” in a move to an open-concept kitchen that allows a better flow. This allows the customer to look into the kitchen and “see everything that we’re doing. I believe that is crucial for the customer to see that. We hand-crack eggs, we make fresh bacon. We’re constantly cooking. We bake cookies. Everything.
“The smell coming out into the store—I believe customers love to see that,” Spink continued. “We get people sometimes just staring at us. That builds the relationship. We’re not trying to hide anything They feel it’s fresh and not sitting there for hours.”
‘Grab and go shouldn’t be an excuse for lower quality.’
Hawkinson played up the importance of cleanliness as part of the customer journey.
“In the parking lot, we put design principals into place,” he said. “That journey should not be overcluttered but clean. Customers should see food when they enter store; it should be highly visible. There’s nothing that says bakery needs to be near the coffee.
“A well-lit store sends a freshness message to the customer,” he added.
Hinton added,” Try to get staff to welcome customers when they enter the store.”
Hawkinson said to have right product out at right time at right daypart. “We want to make customers’ lives easier every day at every daypart,” he said.
Spink added, “Their attention is very short. If that case is not full or if you’re out of something, you can lose them for a while.”
Food Development
When developing a new food item, you have to think about what you have on hand,” Spink said. “You can’t keep adding. Maybe you can add one extra ingredient.”
Spink added that retailer must remember that they might like the recipe, but does the customer?
“We hire people off the street who like to cook,” he said. “We don’t hire chefs. Try not to get to the complex stuff—and you don’t have to be complex to make good food. Some of our best-selling stuff is simple; it’s just a few ingredients.”
‘The cleanliness of the pumps, shrubbery, it all ties together with customers—that’s one thing they see.’
Hawkinson added, “We try to keep it simple for our store associates—a minimal amount of assembly, but some we do assemble in store when the volume drives it.”
Freezer and fridge storage is precious, Hawkinson said.
“You can’t expand just because there’s a new product you want to bring in,” he said. “If you bring in one, you have to get rid of one.”
Grab and Go
When a product is for grab and go, it must be as solid as any other foodservice offering, said Hinton, who added that consumers have a high expectation of grab and go.
“It may have had a connotation in the past of being a certain quality,” he said.
Spink said grab and go had a “bad rap 10 years ago or more, but places like Wawa, Buc-ee’s are helping change attitudes, but you have to build that trust,” he said. “If you serve something that you don’t think is good but you’re like, ‘The customers will eat it,’ well you might just not be in business.”
Hinton added, “Grab and go shouldn’t be an excuse for lower quality.”
Hawkinson replied: “You’re absolutely right. Maybe 10 years ago the quality wasn’t as good, but the product innovation that our suppliers have brought in over the past number of years, and the equipment innovations that our equipment suppliers have developed, really has driven improved quality across the board, and, of course, packaging is a part of that—and you see the convenience-store share of the stomach, if you will, growing, and that is one of the drivers as customers come in and try your product.
“They’re in a hurry, you’ve got a beautiful store,” he continued. “It’s clean and it’s easy to select your product, and they’re maybe a little bit surprised of the quality because it was much better than they expect, perhaps, coming into a convenience store. That’s what’s gonna bring ’em back.”
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