Food Lion Meets Customer Needs with New Hispanic POS Elements

Food Lion, a large retailer operating more than 1,300 supermarkets from Pennsylvania to Florida, was looking for materials that could communicate with their Spanish-speaking customers without alienating their English-speaking counterparts. Luckily, they discovered the beef-checkoff funded Hispanic POS elements. Food Lion used the new elements to effectively deliver their messages without losing anything in translation.

The company used the complete package of available elements, including the bilingual Hispanic Dictionary, cut charts, rail strips and posters. The package of elements was rolled out at five pilot stores in the Raleigh-Durham, NC, area at the end of June to coincide with departmental resets. Food Lion chose to use all of the elements because "they look great and work together to communicate important information to ourSpanish-speaking customers" according to Brandon Moorefield, part of Food Lion's Meat and Seafood Merchandising department. All meat associates were trained on how to best use the elements in order to capture the potential benefits of the program.

After the initial installation of the elements, a comprehensive marketing campaign was implemented in all five pilot locations to include weekly promotions throughout the store. Hispanic radio stations Que Pasa and La Ley broadcasted weekly from the stores weekly, and DJs promoted the campaign through radio spots during their regular programs. New ad flyers were created for the pilot stores along with a bi-weekly, double-page layout in a local edition of Que Pasa magazine, a weekly newspaper-formatted Hispanic publication that features community events as well as local and national news and topics that are of interest to the Hispanic community. Messaging focused on price, quality, variety and convenience.

Many market associates have found the bilingual posters and the booklets very useful when communicating with customers, allowing Food Lion associates to provide stellar customer service to both English and Spanish-speaking customers. In addition, the company has received positive comments on the variety of beef cuts they are carrying. They have also seen significant lift in total department sales and an even greater lift in beef sales.

Moorefield says that working with the beef checkoff during the test and implementation of the Hispanic POS elements has helped "build a relationship and partnership that has strengthened throughout the process." While the implementation is still in test phases, Food Lion believes that the messaging is meaningful and appeals to their English and Spanish-speaking customers.

For more information on the Hispanic Retail Pilot Program, click here.

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