Showing posts sorted by relevance for query Wine. Sort by date Show all posts
Showing posts sorted by relevance for query Wine. Sort by date Show all posts

Thursday, March 26, 2009

In Vino Veritas: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Kicking-Off 20 Percent-Off Six Bottles Or More Wine Promotion This Week; Promotion Runs Until April 25


Promotional Merchandising: Wine Category

Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market is kicking off a three week deep-discount wine promotion in its stores in California (Southern and Bakersfield), southern Nevada and Metropolitan Phoenix, Arizona, in which it's doubling the 10% discount it offers shoppers on purchases of six or more bottles of wine to 20% off.

The 20%-off six bottles or more promotion, which started this week, runs until April 21, 2009, according to Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market.

Fresh & Easy started offering 10%-off purchases of six or more bottles of wine in November, 2008, following retailers with stores in California, Nevada and Arizona like Safeway Stores, Raley's, Trader Joe's, Cost-Plus World Market, Target, Beverages & More and others that have been offering 10% -to- 15%-off purchases of six or more bottles of wine for quite some time.

The 20%-off promotion ups the ante in the highly competitive retail wine markets where Fresh & Easy operates its 116 combination grocery and fresh foods markets.

BevMo's five cent wine promotion

But Tesco's Fresh & Easy isn't the only wine retailer promoting aggressively at present. Wine, sprits and beer beverage category killer retailer Beverages & More (BevMo), which has numerous stores in California, Nevada and Arizona, is currently in the midst of its annual "buy one bottle of wine at the regular price get a second bottle of equal value for 5-cents" spring wine promotion.

BevMo conducts this annual promotion in all of its stores, which feature wine, spirits, beers, snacks, specialty-gourmet foods and more, each year starting right before spring and on into the spring season months. It's a very popular promotion and results in a huge volume of wine sales for the retailer. [You can learn more about the BevMo 5-cent wine sale here.] [Related reading: Southern California Market Report: Beverages & More to Join Trader Joe's and Fresh & Easy to Form Manhattan Beach Food and Beverage Retailing Triangle.]

Mix & match at Fresh & Easy

Shoppers can mix and match the six or more bottles of wine -- different varieties, different price-points -- and receive 20% off the total during the Fresh & Easy 20% wine promotion between now and April 25.

Yet another value-based move

The wine promotion is another example of how Tesco's Fresh & Easy is moving closer to the value proposition positioning Fresh & Easy Buzz suggested for the grocery and fresh foods chain about one year ago. [Read more here: March 26, 2009: News, Analysis & Commentary: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Continues Moving Closer to the 'Value Propostion' Positioning; This Time in Prepared Foods Category.] [And here: March 2, 2009: Fresh & Easy Buzz Redux: Much of the Value Proposition-Based Analysis and Suggestions We've Been Offering Now Being Adopted By Tesco's Fresh & Easy.]

Wine category efforts at Fresh & Easy

In October and November of 2008 we reported exclusively on efforts then in progress at Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market to conduct a complete wine category review and SKU rationalization [this story on October 28, 2008: Category Management Report: Fresh & Easy Conducting Wine Category Review and SKU Rationalization; We Offer Some Analysis] and on the grocery chain's new program designed to increase wine category sales through new promotional efforts in its stores in this [November 11, 2008 piece: Wine Category Report: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Kicks Off New Merchandising and Promotional Efforts Designed to Grow Wine Category Sales.]

The 20%-off discount promotion is a direct result of those wine category activities led by Fresh & Easy's wine category manager Karen Fletcher, who came to Fresh & Easy from Tesco in the United Kingdom.

Additional wine category developments are following, including the introduction of a number of new proprietary brand wine varieties by Tesco's Fresh & Easy, with an emphasis on value-priced varieties.

The 'Big Kuhuna'

Fresh & Easy sells a value-based proprietary wine from Australia called the Big Kuhuna for $1.99 a bottle in California and $2.99 in Nevada and Arizona. The wine is similar to Trader Joe's famous "Two Buck Chuck" value wine. Trader Joe's "Two Buck Chuck" is a California wine.

Under the 20%-off six bottles or more promotion, a shopper can get six bottles of Big Kuhuna for under $10. That's a good buy in these recessionary times.

Promotional product in-stock key

As a result, we suspect Fresh & Easy will see some high volume sales in the next three weeks on the Big Kuhuna wines, along with a number of other varieties.

We do hope that unlike was the case when it promoted a dozen red roses for $9.99 for Valentines Day in February, 2009 (a hot price), when it ran out of the roses every day in most of its stores and was out of stock days before Valentines' Day in many of the stores, that the grocer has prepared itself with plenty of wine inventory, particularly the two varieties of Big Kuhuna, so that shoppers aren't let down by out-of-stocks when they go to their neighborhood Fresh & Easy market to cash in on the good value deal being offered in the 20%-off promotion until April 25. [Click on the comments link and read the comments in this piece: The Valentine's Day (Retail Promotional Price) War of the (Dozen Long-Stemmed) Red Roses: And the Winner Is... Tesco's Fresh & Easy.]

If the retailer has plenty of wine inventory (particularly Big Kuhuna), thereby pleasing shoppers rather than alienating them, the promotion will be a positive one in that it should move some significant wine volume, generate new customer trial, and introduce new shoppers to the store's wine departments and selections. If all works, that's a triple-win.

There's no reason after all to let Beverages & More get all the wine action this month and next month in California, Nevada and Arizona with its 5-cent wine sale.

Below is a linked selection of past wine category pieces from Fresh & Easy Buzz:













[Reader Note: You can follow Fresh & Easy Buzz around on Twitter.com at www.twitter.com/freshneasybuzz.]
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Wednesday, April 30, 2008

Raising Arizona and Getting Local in the Neighborhood: State's First 100% Locally-Produced Wine Offers Win-Win for Tesco's Fresh & Easy Arizona Stores

Maynard James Keenan (sitting with hand on the wine bottle) and Eric Glomski (long hair and standing) conduct an in-store bottle-signing event last week in a Sportsman's Wine & Spirits store for their new, 100% Arizona-produced Tazi white wine. (Photo: Scott Jungman/Yuma Sun.)

Today's issue of the Yuma Sun, a daily newspaper in Arizona, reports on the first 100% Arizona-produced wine, which has been created by a pair of winemaker partners who are trying to gain distribution in the state's supermarkets and wine and spirits stores.

The 100% Arizona-made wine, a white wine blend named Tazi, which is a combination of Chardonnay, Sauvignon Blanc, Riesling and Malvasia Bianca, is being marketed by Eric Glomski and Maynard James Kennan, the winemaker partners in Arizona's Stronghold Vineyard, which is located near Wilcox, Ariizona in Chochise County.

There are about 24 wineries in Arizona, but Stronghold Vineyard is the first and currently only winery to create 100% made-in-Arizona wine with its Tazi white wine blend.

Tazi, which the partners just started pitching to retailers a couple weeks ago, is currently being sold in three supermarkets and two wine stores owned by Arizona-based supermarket chain Bashas, two Whole Foods Market natural foods supermarkets and a number of independent wine shops.

More Bashas'-owned stores (both the Basha's banner and its upscale A.J's Fine Foods banner) are looking to carry the local wine as well. The two wine superstores currently seling Tazi are part of the Sportsman's Wine and Spirits chain, which is owned by Basha's.

Read the article from today's Yuma Sun about Tazi, the first 100%-made in Arizona wine here.

Partners Glomski and Keenan are introducing the local, 100% Arizona-produced wine in retail stores personally, conducting bottle-signings and other in-store special events.

The Fresh & Easy angle

We called Stronghold Vineyards to find out if Tesco's Fresh & Easy grocery stores in Arizona were carrying the locally-produced Tazi wine. A spokesperson told us the grocer was not currently selling the local wine brand.

It would be a smart and savvy move for Fresh & Easy Neighborhood market to call Arizona winemakers and marketers Glomski and Kennan and order five or six cases of Tazi, 100% Arizona-produced wine for each of the 17 Fresh & Easy grocery stores currently open in Arizona, along with booking the partners for bottle-signing promotional events in the stores.

Why?

First, as we reported on April 25, a major element of the marketing-oriented public relations campaign Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market is currently developing with its new PR firm invloves a major campaign designed to position and publicize the grocer's Fresh & Easy store brand fresh foods and grocery products, along with the stores' proprietary and overall wine selection. The grocer's goal: make the foods and wines known and famous.

Second, as we've suggested and argued on Fresh & Easy Buzz for some months, Tesco's Fresh & Easy stores need to do a far better job of localizing the stores' product mixes to the regions, communities and neighborhoods where the stores are located. American consumers love local products--and Fresh & Easy isn't marketing and merchandising to that important aspect of U.S. shopper behavior.

Selling the local wine (Tazi) a win-win

By stocking and promoting the 100% Arizona-made Tazi wine in its Arizona stores, Fresh & Easy would be achieving two things: raising its wine retailing profile in Arizona by becoming the state's current number one retailer of the local wine brand, and enhancing it's store's local product mix.

The reason it would be Arizona's number one retailer of the local wine brand, is because currently only five Bashas'-owned stores, two Whole Foods Market natural foods supermarkets and a number of single-store independent wine shops are selling the wine, which the partners' just started to distribute a couple weeks ago.

Since Fresh & Easy has about 17 stores operating in Arizona, if it sells the Arizona-produced wine in all those stores, it would immediatly become the de facto number one retailer of the locally-produced Tazi white wine in the state.

While adding one item, the local wine brand, to the store does not a local marketing mix make, it's a key move because Tazi is the first 100% Arizona-made wine. First in such cases are good things.

As a result, Fresh & Easy can generate lots of media attention by selling and promoting the local wine in all its Arizona stores, especially by having the winemaking partners do bottle- signing events in each store.

As a result, some good positioning for Fresh & Easy's wine offerings in its Arizona stores will occur from all the publicity generated by merchandising the wine (and touting it well) and having the winemakers in-store conducting the bottle signing events. This of course goes to the strategic marketing-oriented PR campaign goal we described above. It also generates much needed general awareness for the stores.

More win-win in the neighborhood

Here are a few win-win results of bringing in and promoting the local Tazi wine in-store and through the media:

>Enhances credibility as a supporter of local agriculture
>Creates excitement in the stores around a local theme
>Generates lots of press with a positive angle, ie: localization
>Supports local entreprenuers, which helps put the "neighborhood" in Neighborhood Market
>Helps towards goal of positioning store wine selections
>Demonstrates desire to support local businesses
>Earns increased local consumer goodwill

We didn't list it above, but since we hear the local Tazi wine is selling very well in the stores its currently in--especially during the in-store bottle signing events with the partners--Fresh & Easy also is likely to obtain the added benefit of increased wine sales from bringing in the 100% Arizona-made wine.

People love products produced in the place where they live; that's one reason local foods' buying is such as fast-growing trend in the U.S. and elsewhere. It feeds into one's sense-of-place emotionally, as well as having practical economic implications: the more local products you buy the more you support your local economy.

Were we in-charge of marketing and merchandising for Tesco's Fresh & Easy, we would call the makers of Tazi white wine tomorrow and have them reserve 5 or 6 cases of their locally-produced wine per-Fresh & Easy store for delivery as soon as possible. We also would condition that sale on having them agree to do one in-store bottle-signing event per-store as a way to introduce the new 100% Arizona-produced wine in the stores.

Of course, each of those in-store events would be publicized to the local print and broadcast media, as well as touted in the grocer's retail advertising circular in advance. Local food and wine writers would be invited to the in-store events, as would other selects members of the local media.

The great thing about bringing the local wine into the stores and promoting it in-store and via the media, is that its a good thing for all of the stakeholders involved...a win-win. Doing so helps Fresh & Easy, the fledgling winemaker partners who's long-term goal it is to build an Arizona wine industry, and the state's agricultural industry.

It also generates lots of local consumer goodwill--and probably many new, first time shoppers to the Arizona Fresh & Easy stores. Such win-wins aren't usually so easy--and logical--to find.
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Monday, November 10, 2008

Competitive Retailer Wine Category Report: First Person Singular - 'How I Sold 37 Bottles of Wine in 45 Minutes at Trader Joe's'

The Trader Joe's store in New York City's Palladium building in Manhattan has two entrances on the same street. The entrance pictured above, which leads directly into the store's wine department, is designated as Trader Joe's Wine Shop. The other entrace, which is just a few feet down the way and leads into the store's main grocery section, has traditional Trader Joe's grocery market signage. The Manhattan Trader Joe's, which opened in 2006, offers wine delivery to homes and businesses. The Manhattan store also is the first, and one of just a few, Trader Joe's markets that offer home wine delivery.

From the Fresh & Easy Buzz Editor's Desk: Specialty grocer Trader Joe's, which currently operates about 312 stores located throughout the United States, has become one of the premier wine retailers of any format in the country.

The grocer's $1.99 a bottle ($2.99 in some states) Charles Shaw proprietary-blend California wines, called "Two Buck Chuck" for short, took the U.S. wine consuming public and the wine industry by storm when they were introduced in the stores over a decade ago.

The Charles Shaw wines are produced for Trader Joe's by Ceres, California-based Bronco Wine Company.

The wines took the wine industry by storm again in 2007 when Trader Joe's Charles Shaw Chardonnay, which sells for $1.99 a bottle in California where the grocery chain is headquartered, won the grand prize medal in the prestigious California State Fair Wine Competition, beating out wines that retail for ten times the price for the Double- Gold Medal.

Tesco's Fresh & Easy followed Trader Joe's lead in the $1.99 a bottle ($1.99 in California, $2.99 in Nevada and Arizona) wine segment. It sells an Australian proprietary-blended wine, "Big Kahuna" brand, for the same prices in its Fresh & Easy grocery markets in Southern California, Nevada and Arizona.

Trader Joe's stores sell lots of other brands and varieties of wines besides "Two Buck Chuck," which comes in numerous varieties. And the stores sell lots of wine in general.

Trader Joe's sells this high volume of wine in its stores by merely putting it on the shelf (self service), pricing it right and regularly featuring various varieties in off-shelf displays with colorful signage.

Of course, the grocer is able to do this because it has built a strong brand as a retailer that offers quality wines at discount prices over a multi-year period of time. The retailer also puts lots of effort into the wine category.

But it appears with the help of a wine and food specialist, Mike Samii, conducting a professional experiment, a Trader Joe's grocery market in San Diego, California sold even more wine, in a very short period of time, than the chain's already strong reputation for wine sales would otherwise even permit. In fact, we think it might be a world record of bottles of wine sold in a single store in a 45 minute period of time.

You can read the first-person account by chef and wine specialist Mike Samii about how he sold 37 bottles of wine in 45 minutes at a San Diego Trader Joe's store by just walking and talking to shoppers in the store. It's published below.

We think Mike Samii's experiment suggests having store employees who have wine knowledge helps increase wine sales. It's also a strong argument for those supermarkets that employee wine experts or wine stewards in-store. And in Mike Samii's case, he might want to hire himself out to wine retailers at a day rate.

Mike Samii's first person piece:

How I sold 37 bottles of wine in 45 minutes at Trader Joe's
By Mike Samii
Special to Fresh & Easy Buzz

My name is Mike Samii, and I am a Cordon Blue Chef. I have an extensive background in gastronomy and wine.

I shop at Trader Joe's regularly, and I always see people going up and down the aisles looking for a bottle of wine and not knowing what wine to take home. Frankly with the many choices, available, and not knowing what’s what, it is not always easy to choose the right wine.

So I decided to do an experiment one day. One Saturday this last summer, I walked in to one of the Trader Joe's stores in San Diego, California with a clipboard in my hand, pretending that I am writing down a list of wines I like to get for an event. I walked up to every customer that came to the wine section and started looking at the wines for a minute or two, and told them, without introduction, about how good certain wines were in the section and how they tasted.

And, except for a few of the customers, most of them looked at me like I was a god sent. Almost, everyone of them grabbed a bottle or two of the wines I suggested, and thanked me for it. One guy even took 9 bottles of wine and filled up his hand basket. Keeping track of how many bottles people took, my tally read 37 after 45 minutes. I was so gratified to be able to make a difference in some people’s lives by making them a little easier

[Fresh & Easy Buzz Editor's Note: Mike Samii is a Washington state-based chef, wine expert and consultant. For more information about Mike Samii you can go to: www.tastefullyamerican.com , or call him at 425-299-5819.]

Resources:

Related posts from Fresh & Easy Buzz:

Trader Joe's:

>July 22, 2008: Obituary: Innovative Trader Joe's Head Wine Buyer and Popularizer of Value Wines Robert Berning; 73

>March 4, 2008: In Vino Veritas: Fresh & Easy Store Brand Wines Win Two Silvers and Lots of Bronze Medals; Trader Joe's 'Two-Buck Chuck' Chardonnay Wins a Double-Gold

>July 9, 2008: In Vino Veritas: Fresh & Easy Announces 63 Wine Awards to Date; Will Face Off Again Against Wine Award Winning 'Big Kahuna' Trader Joe's at State Fair

>September 22, 2008: Monday, September 22, 2008: Fresh & Easy Buzz Strategy Session: Trader Joe's and the Key to Enlightenment?

>November 6, 2008: Serendipitous Marketing & Cooking With the Trader: Trader Joe's Hits A Marketing Home Run Without Doing A Thing

Tesco's Fresh & Easy:

>November 11, 2008: Wine Category Report: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Kicks Off New Merchandising and Promotional Efforts Designed to Grow Wine Category Sales

>October 27, 2008: Category Management Report: Fresh & Easy Conducting Wine Category Review and SKU Rationalization; We Offer Some Analysis

>October 27, 2008: Southern California Market Report: Beverages & More to Join Trader Joe's and Fresh & Easy to Form Manhattan Beach Food and Beverage Retailing Triangle

>March 22, 2008: In Vino Veritas: No Whining About This 'Parker-Point' Rating for a Fresh & Easy Proprietary Spanish Wine

>April 25, 2008: April 25, 2008: Tesco's Fresh & Easy to Launch A Marketing-Oriented, Brand-Building Consumer Public Relations Campaign For its Store Brand Products and its Wines

>April 30, 2009: April 30, 2008: Raising Arizona and Getting Local in the Neighborhood: State's First 100% Locally-Produced Wine Offers Win-Win for Tesco's Fresh & Easy Arizona Stores

>July 14, 2008: Breaking News & Analysis: CA Assemblyman Introduces 'Tesco Fresh & Easy Law' to Ban Stores With Self-Checkout-Only From Selling Alcoholic Beverages
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Monday, October 27, 2008

Category Management Report: Fresh & Easy Conducting Wine Category Review and SKU Rationalization; We Offer Some Analysis


Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market has been conducting a category review and sku rationalization in its wine, craft beers and liquor category, Fresh & Easy Buzz has learned from sources involved in the process. The focus is primarily on wines, which is a key product category for the Fresh & Easy stores.

All of the current 96 Fresh & Easy stores, except two in Southern California we are aware of (Hollywood and Van Nuys), sell wine and craft beers. A number of the combination grocery and fresh foods markets sell hard liquor along with wine and beer. Not all of the units offer the spirits for sale however. The Hollywood and Van Nuys stores don't have permits to sell alcoholic beverages of any kind.

The wine category sku rationalization process is being led by category manager Karen Fletcher, who came to Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market USA from Tesco in the United Kingdom as part of the start-up team. Ms. Fletcher is a native of Britain.

The category review also comes not to long after Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market went through a series of changes in its grocery merchandising department, which found former director of grocery Charlotte Maxwell, also a British national, leaving Fresh & Easy corporate headquarters and her position to return to Tesco in the UK to accept a director position at corporate headquarters there, as we've thus far been the only publication to report.

Ms. Maxwell was replaced as Fresh & Easy's corporate director of grocery merchandising by Sean McCurley, who previously was director of fresh foods. That position was equal to Ms. Maxwell's in terms of the company structure. Mr. McCurley also is a British citizen.

As part of the wine category review and sku rationalization, Fresh & Easy is looking at reducing the overall number of skus the stores carry in the category, focusing on fewer items and maximizing total sales per item count, according to our sources. Some slow moving wine skus have already been discontinued.

There also has been some merchandising-related discussion as part of the category review involving flipping the wine and beer aisles towards the store's freezer case sections from their current locations, although our sources said they aren't sure of the current status of this previous discussion.

When Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market USA was first organized, the wine and beer department was under the grocery department, which is normally the case with food retailing companies. However, sometime later category manager Karen Fletcher requested her category be placed in the fresh department and that she report to Sean McCurley, who ran fresh at the time, rather then Ms. Maxwell, who then was in charge of grocery.

Fresh & Easy's senior corporate directors approved of the change. Following Ms. Maxwell's departure back to Tesco in the UK and Sean McCurley assuming her grocery director position, the wine, beer and spirits category was moved back over to grocery with Ms. Fletcher's blessing, according to our sources.

Wine primarily, but also beer and spirits, is a major focus for Fresh & Easy, as it is internationally for Tesco. Karen Fletcher was brought over to the U.S. to build the category as an integral part of the Fresh & Easy merchandising mix. Part of that strategy includes having numerous proprietary, specialty-blended wines produced for the grocery chain, including numerous wines from Australia. Tesco is among the leading retail buyers of Australian wines in the world.

Wine category analysis

The wine category hasn't yet been all that Tesco has expected it to be at the Fresh & Easy stores. Our analysis is this has to do with a number of factors, most notably the fact California wines, which Fresh & Easy stores are short on compared to its competitors, are much more popular than foreign wines in California, Nevada and Arizona, where the current 96 Fresh & Easy grocery and fresh foods markets are located.

Even more so, it has to do with the highly competitive nature of wine, beer and spirits retailing in each of these markets. Not only are major supermarkets like Safeway Stores, Inc. major wine retailers in the Western U.S., for example, but there are category killer retailers like Beverages & More and Cost-Plus World Market, along with Trader Joe's and many others (including scores of independents), that have been selling wine in these markets very successfully for decades. These retails know the market, the customer base, and the wine producers almost as much as they know their own family members in many cases.

As a result, Fresh & Easy has far more competition in its Western U.S. markets than say Tesco has in its home market of the UK when it comes to wine retailing.

The wine category product mix at Fresh & Easy also lacks proper regionalization, sub-regionalization and localization. Perhaps this has been recognized and is one of the reasons for the category review and sku rationalization?

Like it has done with its entire product mix, Tesco basically has tried to merchandise its Fresh & Easy stores in many ways like they are British small-format stores (read Tesco Express) in the UK, merely transplanted to the Western U.S. This has resulted in lots of failures, lost sales and missed opportunities.

Additionally, when it comes to the wine category, there arguably isn't a category that it's more important to regionalize, sub-regionalize and localize. Wines that do extremely well in Northern California, for example, often sell poorly in Southern California. The same regional differences hold true in Nevada and Arizona. Wine brands in the U.S. are regional and even sub-regional. What sells well in San Francisco often isn't what sells well just 80 and 90 miles away in the Central Valley cities of Stockton or Modesto, for example.

Further, since Fresh & Easy has so many proprietary brands, wine brands consumers have never heard of, they have had to hope shoppers might merely like the price or how the bottle looks and give them a try. That's a tough way to sell wine, especially in California.

A number of the proprietary Fresh & Easy wines have done well though, particularly its $1.99 a bottle ($2.99 in Nevada and Arizona) Big Kahuna brand, which is a clone of Trader Joe's famous and super-successful "Two Buck Chuck" value-priced wine brand and line. Big Kahuna is an Australian wine. TJ's "Two Buck Chuck," which last year won the top award in the California State Fair Wine Competition, is a California wine. It's produced by Ceres, California-based Bronco Winery.

In terms of the wine category review and sku rationalization, Fresh & Easy needs to add more California wines, sub-regionalize and localize its wine brand and item selection and merchandising program if it wants to be a successful wine retailer in its respective markets, in our analysis.

This is especially true in California, which is a bigger wine sales market than Nevada and Arizona combined are. (Southern California alone and Northern California alone are both respectively even bigger than both states combined. Since California is the major U.S. wine-producing state, as well as one of the top wine regions in the world, consumers are much more familiar with wines then elsewhere in the U.S. The state also has the highest per capita wine consumption in the U.S.

It also follows that the state has the most competitive and generally the best wine retailers in the country.

California wine consumers are big on sub-regional differences. For example, consumers in Southern California want lots of wines from the Santa Barbara region (a major local wine producing region) want lots of wines in stores from that region, along with from elsewhere in California, the U.S. and the world.

In Northern California (which is the main wine-producing region in the state) consumers expect to see lots of Napa and Sonoma-produced wines on store shelves, along with wines from the coastal region and the Central Valley and Foothill regions. Farther up north it's important to add far Northern California and even some Oregon and Washington State-produced wines.

In fact, in the Central Valley, a good wine retailer also merchandises as many wines from that home region and the nearby Sierra Nevada foothill region than he or she does from Napa and Sonoma.

And in coastal Northern California (the Monterey-Big Sur wine region), good wine retailers there will put a major focus on wines from that wine-producing area.

It's all about localization -- and California is full of local, micro wine regions.

Having a basic selection of proprietary, branded wines is fine for Fresh & Easy. However, as long as that is the major focus in the stores it won't be a top wine retailer in its respective markets. There are too many good wine retailers doing the right things for that to happen.

However, if as part of this category review the retailer focuses on the three things we outlined earlier, it has a far better chance of improving its current wine category sales and eventually joining the ranks of the top wine retailers in the markets it has its stores in.

When it comes to wine merchandising and retailing in the Western USA, especially in California, everything is local, despite the fact imports have an important place in the overall category product mix.
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Friday, June 17, 2011

The Wisdom of the Crowd: Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market's Wines Won 39 Medals in the L.A. International Wine Competition; Will it Motivate Your Purchase?


Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market's marketing and public relations people announced via a press release today that the 175-store fresh food and grocery chain has won 39 medals at the 72nd annual Los Angeles International Wine & Spirits Competition for a variety of its proprietary brand wines.

The annual wine and spirits competition is part of the Los Angeles County Fair, which takes place September 3-October 2 this year. An olive oil tasting and judging is also conducted in conjunction with the annual wine competition.

The wine competition judging took place in May. The competition's officials announced the winners June 7.

Among the wines Fresh & Easy won medals for (18 out of the 39 medals) were its new line of proprietary or private brand California wines, which we wrote about in this March 8, 2011 story: Tesco's Fresh & Easy ♥'s California With 27 New Varieties of Proprietary Brand Wines From the Golden State. The new California wines were introduced in the stores in March.

You can see which Fresh & Easy wine brands and varieties won medals here, along with viewing all of the award-winning wine brands and varieties from others. The competition also has a Facebook page here.

El Segundo, California-based Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market is one of just a few food and grocery retailers that enter its private or proprietary brand wines in this and other competitions.

The pioneering grocer in doing so is another Southern California-based chain - Trader Joe's - which has been entering its various private brand wines in the Los Angeles and other competitions, often winning first place in on or more varietal categories, for many years.

It's important to note, however, that not many U.S. grocery and mass merchandise chains offer a moderate-to-extensive assortment of private brand wines (many have a value brand though), although that's beginning to change. As such, there's not much in the way of proprietary brand wine for the majority of grocers to enter in these competitions at present, even if they wanted to.


Tesco-owned Fresh & Easy followed Trader Joe's lead in entering various wine competitions, starting in 2007, and has to date won 275 medals overall.

Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market also promotes wine regularly in its 175 stores in California, Nevada and Arizona and attempts to use the category, particularly its private brand wines, as a leader in terms of hoping it is a lure to bring shoppers into its stores.

We've written extensively about the wine category at Tesco's Fresh & Easy (and other grocers), including its participation in various wine competitions, along with merchandising, marketing and promotional aspects.

[You can read our stories by clicking on the following links: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , .]

As we noted earlier, the majority of U.S. food retailers don't offer much in the way of private brand wines.

Trader Joe's and Fresh & Easy have the most extensive proprietary wine programs we're aware of among U.S. grocers and mass merchandise chains, although as noted numerous big chains like Costco, Walmart and even regional grocers like Save Mart Supermarkets in California offer a value-based (think Trader Joe's Two Buck Chuck) proprietary brand wine. Fresh & Easy's value brand is called the .

Fresh  Easy's parent, United Kingdom-based Tesco, has long had a proprietary brand wine program in operation and offers numerous own brand varieties in its stores in the UK particularly, but also at its stores elsewhere in Europe and in Asia.

What interests us about these wine competitions as they pertain to grocers like Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market, Trader Joe's and others, is if winning medals at the events has any influence on shopper purchases of the winning wines in the stores.

This question is important because the primary reason wine-makers and marketers enter their wines in competitions is to sell more of it. Secondarily is the prestige of winning - or what some folks (not us of course)  might even call the "snob appeal factor."

The Wisdom of the Crowd: Reader Questions

Since Fresh & Easy Buzz has some of the smartest and most-inquisitive readers on the planet, we thought we would put the question to you.

So here's the question: Does a wine brand/variety winning a medal (Gold, Silver, Bronze and the like) at a well-known wine competition influence your decision to purchase it?

Further, will you be motivated to try and buy any of the 39 Fresh & Easy proprietary brand wines - there will be signs on the wines at the shelf in the stores designating them as "medal winners" and you can see the various wines from Fresh & Easy that won here - because a given wine won a medal at the Los Angeles International Wine Competition?

Share your response and opinion with your fellow readers using  the "comments" link below. Just click it and tell us what you think.
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Friday, March 27, 2009

In Vino Veritas: Tesco's Fresh & Easy to Introduce 25 New Wines as Part Of Wine Category Makeover We First Reported On in October, 2008


Wine Category Merchandising

Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market will introduce 25 new wine SKUS in its stores over the next three months, 15 of which will be proprietary wines exclusive to Fresh & Easy, according to wine category manager Karen Fletcher.

The 25 new wines will be a mix of domestic and imported varieties, Ms. Fletcher says, and will range in price from a low of $1.99 a bottle -to- $40 a bottle.

"Fresh & Easy's new selection of wines will be perfect for summer drinking and includes traditional favorites such as a California Cabernet from Sonoma. Unique imports will also be added to the company's range including a Malbec from Argentina, sparkling wines from Italy and a Tempranillo-Shiraz and Ribera del Duero from Spain," Fresh & Easy corporate wine category manager Fletcher says.

"We're always hunting for new wines so our customers have something new to enjoy. We have some great picks coming from California, Washington, Argentina, Spain and Australia. "Now that we're offering all of our wine at 20 percent off 6 (bottles), which is our best deal yet, it's a great opportunity for our customers to try something new, or to buy their favorite wines at a great price."

Tesco Fresh & Easy's Fletcher is referring in the quote to the retailer's just-launched 20%-off purchases of six bottles of wine or more promotion, which we reported on and wrote about in this piece yesterday: In Vino Veritas: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Kicking-Off 20 Percent-Off Six Bottles Or More Wine Promotion This Week; Promotion Runs Until April 25.

In October of 2008 Fresh & Easy Buzz reported exclusively about the wine category review led by category manager Fletcher taking place at Fresh & Easy corporate headquarters in El Segundo, California. [That story: Category Management Report: Fresh & Easy Conducting Wine Category Review and SKU Rationalization; We Offer Some Analysis.]

Additionally, in this November 11, 2008 piece [Wine Category Report: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Kicks Off New Merchandising and Promotional Efforts Designed to Grow Wine Category Sales.] we wrote about Fresh & Easy's plans to grow its wine category sales.

The introduction of the 25 new wines over the next three months, along with the 20%-off deep-discount promotion launched this week and running until April 25, are a direct result of the wine category evaluation we wrote about in October of last year and the merchandising and promotional plans we reported on in November, 2008.

Own brands

Proprietary brands and wines are a major part of Tesco Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market's wine category merchandising strategy.

The strategy comes directly from United Kingdom-based Tesco, which is one of the top retailer's of wine globally. Tesco creates and merchandises numerous varieties of proprietary wines in its stores in the United Kingdom, where its that nation's leading food and grocery retailer, and elsewhere throughout the world where it has stores.

Tesco also is the number one retail buyer of Australian wines, and as a result is able to get excellent bargains on Australian-made wine to use in its various proprietary wines. For example, the Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market proprietary value brand, Big Kuhuna, which it sells for $1.99 a bottle in California and for $2.99 in Nevada and Arizona, is an Australian wine. There are two varieties of Big Kahuna, a white and a red.

Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market wine category manager Karen Fletcher is familiar with this system since she came to Tesco's Fresh & Easy from Tesco in the United Kingdom.

Master of Wine

Tesco's Fresh & Easy also uses a Master of Wine, who works with Ms. Fletcher and the wine category buyers to create the proprietary wines for the stores.

According to the Masters of Wine Institute, there currently are only 274 Masters of Wine, located in 23 countries. The designation requires rigorous testing in order to earn it. [You can learn more about the Masters of Wine designation here.]

New wines: pricing

Tesco's Fresh & Easy isn't saying what percentage of the 25 new wines to be introduced over the next three months are in what price ranges; just that the retail price-points will range from $1.99 -to- $40. However, according to a source, we're told that the majority of the 25 new wines will be in the value-price range, which generally means under about $12 a bottle.

Right now wines selling for under $10 a bottle make up the vast majority of the volume being sold, with wines priced at about $6.99 and below comprising the highest percentage of the under $10 segment.

In other words, with wine as with most all else at present, value is ruling among shoppers.

SKU rationalization

Tesco's Fresh & Easy also doesn't say if it's discontinuing any wine SKU to make room for the 25 new varieties. We can report that the retailer is eliminating some slower moving wines as part of its category evaluation and the introduction of the new SKUS. Out with some old, in with some new -- that's what a category evaluation and SKU rationalization is all about.

As part of its strategic objective to increase wine category sales, look for additional new category developments and promotions in the coming months, in addition to the introduction of the 25 new wines over the next three months, and the 20%-off promotion which lasts until April 25.

Below is a linked selection of a few wine category pieces from Fresh & Easy Buzz:














[Reader Note: You can follow Fresh & Easy Buzz around on Twitter.com at www.twitter.com/freshneasybuzz.]
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Tuesday, March 4, 2008

In Vino Veritas: Fresh & Easy Store Brand Wines Win Two Silvers and Lots of Bronze Medals; Trader Joe's 'Two-Buck Chuck' Chardonnay Wins a Double-Gold


Seven of Tesco Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market's Fresh & Easy store brand wines recently have been awarded medals at the San Francisco Chronicle and California State Fair Wine Competitions.

The San Francisco Chronicle Wine Competition is the largest judging of U.S-produced wines in the nation. Entered wines are judged by a panel of wine experts from all sectors of the industry--wine writers, buyers, vintners and others--over a period of days according to international wine judging rules.

The California State Fair Wine Competition is arguably the most prestigious wine competition in the United States, and is recognized internationally among members of the global wine industry. It's held as part of the California State Fair in Sacramento each year. It's judges are among the most experienced and prestigious wine experts in the world.

The recently-concluded 2008 San Francisco Chronicle Wine Competition judged 4,235 wines entered by 1,500 wineries from throughout the U.S.

Five Fresh & Easy brand wines won a bronze medal in the competition in their respective categories. Those wines are: Fresh & Easy Hilltown Cabernet Sauvignon ($6.99 bottle), Fresh & Easy Napa Family Vineyards Merlot ($10.99 bottle), Fresh & Easy Hilltown Merlot ($6.99 bottle), Fresh & Easy Hilltown Chardonnay ($6.99 bottle), and Fresh & Easy Hilltown Sauvignon Blanc ($6.99 bottle).

Additionally, a sixth store brand--Fresh & Easy Family Vineyards Cabernet Sauvignon ($10.99 bottle) won a Silver medal in the San Francisco Chronicle competition.

Over at the California State Fair judging, where over 3,000 wines from 600 different wineries competed, Fresh & Easy store brands scored well with one of its wines. That wine, Fresh & Easy Northwood Cabernet Sauvignon earned a Silver Medal in the prestigious wine competition. Further, the wine received 92 points out of a possible 100. The Northwood Cab was one of six wines in the Silver award category to receive the highest score a Silver medal-winning wine can obtain in the judging.

The Fresh & Easy brand Northwood Cabernet Sauvignon sells for only $3.99 bottle in the grocer's Southern California stores, and $4.49 bottle in its Arizona and Nevada grocery markets.

The Fresh & Easy brand wine won in the 2007 California State Fair Wine Competition, which was held last summer. The event is held every year beginning in late July and ending on September 3. The 2008 competition runs from late July to September third this year.

Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market hired Philip Reeman, who is one of only 265 wine experts in the world to have earned the title Master of Wine, to create its Fresh & Easy store brand wines.

Fresh & Easy also has taken a page from Trader Joe's wine merchandising innovation (it's incredibly-selling Charles Shaw brand $1.99 bottle of wine called "Two-Buck Chuck") and is selling its own version called "The Big Kahuna (TBK)." TBK is from Australia and comes in two varieties: Chardonnay and Cabernet Sauvignon-Shiraz. TBK sells for $1.99 in the Southern California Fresh & Easy stores and for $2.99 in the Arizona and Nevada grocery markets.

Trader Joe's "Two-Buck Chuck (TBC)" comes in seven varieties: Charles Shaw brand Chardonnay, Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Sauvignon Blanc, Shiraz, Valdiue (like a Beaujolais Nouveau) and in a limited addition Pinot Grigio.

Charles Shaw brand is a California wine though, produced exclusively for Trader Joe's by Ceres, California-based Bronco Winery, using wine grapes from California's Central Valley and Napa-Sonoma regions. The Charles Shaw "Two-Buck Chuck" brand is sold only at Trader Joe's grocery stores.

The Tesco Fresh & Easy wine folks will need to kick "The Big Kahuna" up a few notches though if they expect to compete with Trader Joe's "Two-Buck Chuck."

TJ's $1.99 bottle of wine surprised the wine world at this very same 2007 California State Fair Wine Competition by winning a prestigious "Double-Gold" medal for its "Two-Buck Chuck" Chardonnay, beating out wines which cost as much as twenty-times it's $1.99 retail price. The Double Gold Medal means the wine was judged to be the best Chardonnay out of all Chardonnay variety wines entered in the competition, regardless of price. [Read more about the "Two-Buck Chuck" win here at the very bottom of the linked page.]

Trader Joe's has set the bar high for Fresh & Easy's same-priced "The Big Kuhuna" wine. We suggest both Trader Joe's and Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market enter its respective $1.99 premium-value wines, "TBC" and "TBK," in this year's 2008 California State Fair Wine Competition, which is only about five months away.

The two small-format grocers--one owned by the United Kingdom's Tesco (F&E), the other by Germany's Aldi supermarkets (TJ's) can then have an old fashion 'smackdown' in the premium-quality/value priced wine segment. May the best wine...or grocery chain...win.
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Tuesday, November 4, 2008

'Syrah Palin Organic:' An Election Season Wine Both Democrats and Republicans Can Find A Use For On Election Day USA 2008


U.S. Election Day 2008 Special Report: Election Day

On election day, a certain brand of Chilean organic wine imported into the U.S. by Berkeley, California wine importer and distributor North Berkeley Imports , is getting an unusual amount of attention in parts of America.

It's not all positive attention though. In fact, consumers' attitudes and opinions about the organic Chilean wine, named Syrah Palin (pictured on display at top, left), seem to be more about whether or not they support the Republican Presidential ticket of John McCain and Sarah Palin or the Democratic ticket of Barack Obama and Joe Biden rather than whether or not they like the taste of the wine.

Yes, the "Syrah" (Sarah) variety wine, spelled Palin (pronounced "Pay- Leen) just like the Republican Vice Presidential candidate's last name, has a political season ring to it. And in Berkeley, arguably the most liberal city in America, it is raising a few eyebrows.

According to the wine importer and distributor's Web site, the vintner's (Palin wines) and wine's name "describes a ball that was used in an ancient game played by the Mapuche, a group of people indigenous to central Chile, where the vintner is based. It has nothing to do about Alaska, governors, moose hunting, $150,000 wardrobes or other attributes involving Senator John McCain's Vice Presidential running mate, Sarah Palin.

However, wine drinkers in Berkeley, the San Francisco Bay Area and other parts of the country where the organic wine is being distributed by the importer, are obviously connecting the Syrah Palin wine to the Governor of Alaska, who wants to be the next Vice President of the United States. Some consumers are getting a chuckle out of the resemblance, others are not as happy about the namesake wine.

For example, Chris Cavelli, the co-owner of San Francisco's Yield Wine Bar, which is offering Syrah Palin organic wine for sale by the glass, says "they (customers) just are basically saying, 'Oh, I don't want to drink that. That's too close.' It reminds them too much of Sarah Pain," he says.

Cavelli adds that prior to Governor Palin getting the Republican Vice Presidential nomination, Syrah Palin wine was selling briskly at the wine bar. "I actually think the whole thing is pretty funny," he says. Cavelli said he plans to keep it on the wine list at Yield Wine Bar.

The political nod away from Syrah Palin wine at the San Francisco wine bar isn't surprising though. No Republican in modern history has won the majority of the vote from San Franciscans. San Francisco voters tend to vote in about an 80% majority for the Democratic Party candidate for President in every election. And its the Green party that gets the majority of that remaining 20% rather than the Republican candidate.

But in other parts of the Bay Area and elsewhere, importer David Hinkle, owner of North Berkeley Imports, says there's been an "uptick in sales of the Syrah Palin organic wine since the Governor of Alaska was nominated as John McCain's Vice Presidential running mate.

Hinkle avoids any political connection to the wine. Since he imported it from Chile long before Sarah Palin was nominated, such a thought was the farthest thing from his mind.

"The wines (Palin brand) are outstanding," he says. "Very rich, full-bodied. There's nothing political about the wine in any way."Well, at least intentionally.

Of course, we suspect a few San Francisco Bay Area Democrats are buying the Syrah Palin wine anyway. Perhaps as a keepsake. Or maybe they are planning to break the bottle against a John McCain-Sarah Palin campaign sign celebration style if Barack Obama and Joe Biden wine the Presidency today.

On the other hand, Berkeley wine importer Hinkle might want to call Sarah Palin and pitch his Syrah Palin as the wine of choice for the Presidential victory parties tonight in the event the McCain-Palin ticket wins. We also could see big in-store displays on November 5, the day after the election, if McCain-Palin wins.

But if they lose, well...'Que Sera Sera' (pronounced Saraaah) [Whatever will be will be], as Doris Day sang in the famous song of the same name.
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Monday, November 10, 2008

Wine Category Report: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Kicks Off New Merchandising and Promotional Efforts Designed to Grow Wine Category Sales


In this October 27, 2008 story,"Category Management Report: Fresh & Easy Conducting Wine Category Review and SKU Rationalization; We Offer Some Analysis," in Fresh & Easy Buzz we reported exclusively that Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market has been and is in the process of conducting a wine category review and sku rationalization, along with planning to further increase it efforts to promote the wine departments and wines in its stores.

The grocery and fresh foods chain started that increased wine category promotional efforts today, just two weeks after we wrote and published our piece.

Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market introduced five new wine blends priced under $9 a bottle, today, along with offering a new promotional discount of 10% off on six or more bottles of mix and matched wines, except for the Arbor Mist brand and those wines it already sells by the case.

As part of the new promotion, the grocery and fresh foods chain also introduced for sale today a canvas wine bottle tote bag for $1.99 each, which we wrote Fresh & Easy would be introducing in this story on October 17. The new, reusable fresh & easy canvas wine bag holds up to seven bottles of wine, according to the retailer. Additionally, the canvas wine tote can double as a reusable grocery bag by turning the wine bottle compartments inside out.

Below are the names and per-bottle prices of the five new varieties of wines Fresh & Easy is introducing today:

>Corvina-Merlot Cantina di Merlara -- $8.99
>Ca' Miani Garganega-Pinot Grigio -- $4.99
>La Parra Loca Tempranillo-Shiraz -- $6.99
>Lancewood Cabernet Sauvignon -- $8.99
>Roslyn Family Vineyards Cabernet Sauvignon -- $6.99

A major merchandising focus of the new wines is to keep them under $10 a bottle.

We've been told by our sources that as part of its wine category review process and sku rationalization, Fresh & Easy arrived at the conclusion offering wines under $10 a bottle is a good price-point range for its stores.

The wine category is very important to Tesco corporately. The global retailer (third-largest internationally) is one of the top wine importers and sellers in the world. Wine sales at the U.S. Fresh & Easy stores haven't met the retailer's expectations to date. Therefore, the category review, sku rationalization and increased promotion are all part of its plans and hopes to juice up wine sales in its California, Nevada and Arizona stores.

Second wine category promotional effort

Fresh & Easy also launched a second promotional effort today as a way to gain further attention to its stores' wine departments and proprietary wine selection.

This effort is a public relations one though.

The grocery and fresh foods chain today distributed a press release touting sales of sparkling wines more than doubled at its 97 Fresh & Easy stores in Southern California, Nevada and Arizona for Election Day, 2008, which was Tuesday, November 4.

As we wrote about in this piece on November 3, Fresh & Easy launched an election day promotion in its stores that featured food items and beverages, including sparkling wines.

Fresh & Easy stores carry 11 different bottles of sparkling wines, including five that are proprietary varieties, according to a company spokesperson. Seven of the 11 sparkling wines retail for under $10.

The best selling sparkling wine in the stores for Election Day was the Fresh & Easy Montcadi Cava which retails for under $7.00, according to Simon Uwins, Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market's director of marketing.

What Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market didn't mention in its press release today regarding the election day doubling of sparkling wine sales was what its pre-election day average sales of sparkling wine is. In other words, what was the average number of bottles sold each day in all the stores before election day, compared to sales on election day? That would have been an interesting figure to include in today's press release in our analysis and opinion. But then we are numbers wonks when it comes to such things.

For example, lets speculate the average sales per day for all of the Fresh & Easy stores combined is one bottle of sparkling wine. In that case, that would mean the stores sold on average two bottles of wine on election day, for a doubling of sales. That's not much in terms of a total dollar sales increase, although it still is a 50% increase, which is nothing to sneeze about even though it wouldn't amount to much of a gross sales increase.

On the other hand, lets speculate on average each store sells five -- or even 10 -- bottles of sparkling wine per day. Then a doubling, to 10 or 20 bottles on election day, would amount to some nice additional gross sales numbers.

Alas, that information isn't available.

And of course, we must merely take the retailer's word that the sparkling wine sales actually doubled on election day over pre-election day sales of the bubbly. We give them the benefit of the doubt and believe them of course. But it would be interesting to know the numbers behind the doubling, for the reasons we describe above, anyway. It would just add some realism -- and additional news weight -- to the doubling factor.

But it is interesting sales of sparkling wine increased at all since Americans aren't known to celebrate Presidential elections with sparkling wine or champagne, or really to celebrate elections much at all in general. Therefore, from a macro political participation sense we see this as a very good sign.

Perhaps with all the attention the historic campaign, and now historic election, of Barack Obama generated, we will see a new era of participation and celebration by American voters in the political process. That would be something well worth tipping a glass of sparkling wine to in celebration for sure.

And good for Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market, which is owned and operated by the British retail chain Tesco, for launching and conducting an election day promotion. We didn't see very many U.S.-based and owned grocery chains hold election day promotions for example. It's not the Superbowl we suppose, an event every chain seems to promote heavily.

And searching for further Tesco Fresh & Easy synergy with election day, were it not for the defeat of the British centuries ago by men who were primarily a bunch of former British nationals who became Americans, America not only wouldn't have elections at all today, there wouldn't be a United States of America, let alone blue states (Democrat) and red states (Republican).

Additionally, were it not for the two countries forgiving and forgetting, and becoming close friends and allies, Tesco wouldn't have been able to come to America with its small-format Fresh & Easy grocery and fresh foods chain.

Therefore, we see a certain synergy, beyond merely trying to sell more food and wine, behind the Tesco Fresh & Easy election day promotion.

Meanwhile, it should be interesting to see what further efforts Fresh & Easy does to follow-up on its multiple efforts today to gain increased attention for and to build sales in its wine category. Wine category sales are extremely competitive in California, Nevada and Arizona, where the grocer has its stores, after all.

Fresh & Easy Buzz will be the first to report these efforts, like we have been with the other Tesco Fresh & Easy wine category developments. And of course, like in elections, it is up to you, our readers, to decide.
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Wednesday, July 9, 2008

In Vino Veritas: Fresh & Easy Announces 63 Wine Awards to Date; Will Face Off Again Against Wine Award Winning 'Big Kahuna' Trader Joe's at State Fair


Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market announced today its specialty-blended wines have won 63 awards in various wine competitions over the last six months.

Simon Uwins, Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market USA marketing director, said over half of the retailer's 65 varieties of proprietary blended wines have won awards in the competitions the grocer has entered its wines in.

"Most award winning wines are priced under $10, including two which retail for only $1.99 in California and $2.99 in Arizona and Nevada." Uwins said.

You can read a selected list of the Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market proprietary blended wines that have won wine competition awards in this press release issued by the grocery chain today.

Using wines to help build the Fresh & Easy retail brand

Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market is entering its special-blend wines in as many wine competitions as it can as a way to create an image of offering quality wines at reasonable prices for its small-format, combination basic grocery and fresh foods grocery markets. The idea is to create fame and a consumer following around the proprietary-blended, value-priced wines as one element of the many, as a way to draw customers into the stores and keep them there.

This is very much the model Trader Joe's has used to build its reputation as a grocer which offers quality wines at reasonable prices.

For example, as we reported in this March 4 piece, "In Vino Veritas: Fresh & Easy Store Brand Wines Win Two Silvers and Lots of Bronze Medals; Trader Joe's 'Two-Buck Chuck' Chardonnay Wins a Double-Gold," both Trader Joe's and Tesco's Fresh & Easy entered a number of their respective proprietary-blended wines in the last California State Fair Wine Competition, considered by most to be the most prestigious wine judging competition in the U.S., and one of the top such events in the international world of wine.

Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market won two Silver Medals and numerous Bronze Medals for a number of its specially-blended wines at the judging, which was a strong showing, particularly since it was the retailer's first time participating in the competition with its wines.

However, Trader Joe's took first place, winning a Double-Gold Medal, in the Chardonnay varietal category, with its $1.99 per-bottle Charles Shaw Chardonnay, more commonly called "Two Buck Chuck."

Winning doesn't get any bigger in a California State Fair Wine Competition category than getting a Double-Gold Medal, which means in this case Trader Joe's "Two Buck Chuck" Chardonnay beat out other Chardonnay brands costing as much as 20-times more than the grocery chain's discount priced Charles Shaw proprietary wine.

F&E, TJ's will face off in California State Fair wine competition

This year's version of the prestigious California State Fair Wine Competition begins later this month. The tastings and judging last until early September. The winners are then announced sometime after that.

Both Trader Joe's and Fresh & Easy are entering wines in the State Fair competition this year. It should be interesting to see how both retailers do in the competition. Both did well last year, despite going up against some very premium wineries, along with some very expensive bottles of wine in various categories.

"Fresh & Easy works directly with a Master of Wine to develop most of the company's 65 specially selected wines. Masters of Wine are highly regarded throughout the industry as extensively trained wine experts, and there are only 251 in the world," according to Mr. Uwins.

You can learn more about the Master of Wine designation here.

Tesco knows wine

United Kingdom-based Tesco PLC, parent company of Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market USA, is one of the top global wine retailers, known for its innovation and its creation of proprietary store brand wines using various brand names.

Tesco was one of the first retailers to popularize Australian wines, for example, including the now popular Shiraz varietal from that country. In fact, Tesco Fresh & Easy's "The Big Kuhuna" value wine (it's $1.99 a bottle in California and $2.99 in Nevada and Arizona) is Australian wine. By contrast, Trader Joe's same-priced Charles Shaw value wines are California wines.

A wine even Robert Parker likes

Perhaps Fresh & Easy's most critically acclaimed proprietary-blended wine to date is its Reflexion Reserva Rioja (often just called Rioja), from Spain. It's a 2003 vintage from the Bodegas Palacio region. Fresh & Easy grocery stores sell the wine for $9.99 a bottle.

The wine received 10 "Parker Points" from wine guru Robert Parker on his Parker scale. A perfect "Parker Point" score is 100. Parker, who's arguably the most influential wine judge and writer in the world, doesn't give out 90's easily. That the $10 bottle of Fresh & Easy's Spanish Rioja received a 90 from the parsimonious Parker is an achievement.

End Game: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market and Wine: Recent Stories From Fresh & Easy Buzz:




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Friday, July 15, 2011

Tesco Launches Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market-Developed 'The Big Kahuna' Brand Wine in United Kingdom, South Korea Stores

"The Big Kahuna" on the shelf at a Fresh & Easy store in California.
Private Brand Showcase

El Segundo, California-based Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market's "The Big Kahuna" proprietary or private brand wine has been launched in Tesco-owned stores in the United Kingdom and South Korea, along with being offered for sale by the case on the UK-based retailer's Tesco.com website.

Tesco-owned Fresh & Easy introduced "The Big Kahuna" as its in-house value-priced wine brand over three years ago, following a path blazed most successfully in the U.S. by Trader Joe's with its super-popular $1.99 per bottle Charles Shaw brand wine, more commonly referred to as "Two-Buck Chuck," the huge success of which has spawned similar priced value brand copy-cat versions from nearly every major food and grocery retailer in the country.

The Australian-produced "The Big Kahuna" comes in two varieties: Cabernet Shiraz (at top) and Chardonnay.

Fresh & Easy sells the wine in its stores in California (127 units) for $1.99 (750-ml bottle), and for 2.99 per bottle in its Nevada (21 units) and Arizona (28 units) grocery markets.

The wine is being offered at a higher price-point in the UK than at Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market in the U.S.

For example, Tesco is offering Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market-developed "The Big Kahuna" wine brand for a considerably higher price on its Tesco.com website in the UK. The current price per case is £22.80 (£3.80 per bottle), which is about $37.18 per case, or $6.19 per bottle, based on today's British pound to U.S. dollar conversion rate. The per-bottle retail in the stores it's currently in is a bit higher.

Tesco has a long history of offering Australian wines in its stores in the UK and in Asia, particularly South Korea. In fact, the British retailer is the largest customer of wine produced in Australia, largely based on the numerous Tesco proprietary or private brand wines produced for the retailer in the country.

It's a logical and smart move for Tesco to offer Fresh & Easy's "The Big Kahuna" brand wine in its UK and South Korea stores as well as online via Tesco.com. Doing so expands the number of points-of-distribution - and thus increases total sales - for the brand, which in turn should allow Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market to obtain a lower cost of goods for "The Big Kahuna" from its Australian producer.

A lower cost of goods means a better gross margin on the wine for Fresh & Easy, which is important because at $1.99 and $2.99 per bottle retails, along with the shipping costs from Australia, there isn't much gross margin in "The Big Kuhuna," or any other wine with similar overseas origin and the same points.

But even a few pennies cost savings per bottle can add up to nice little profit boost on the wine for Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market because the value-priced "The Big Kahuna" is a high volume brand for the grocer.

Additionally, since the Australian producer of "The Big Kahuna" also produces additional proprietary wine brands for Tesco, it makes good top and bottom line sense to us to maximize the brand opportunities across all its chains globally for UK-based Tesco whenever it makes sense.

"The Big Kahuna" is the second private brand developed at El Segundo, California-based Fresh & Easy that Tesco is distributing in its stores in the UK, where it's the leading retailer of food and groceries.

The first brand, which we broke the news about in these two stories - June 26, 2011: Tesco Bringing Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market's 'goodness for kids' Brand to the UK - With a 'Tesco' Twist; and June 27, 2011: Tesco Introduces First Items in Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market-Developed 'Tesco goodness for kids' Brand in United Kingdom Stores - is "Tesco Goodness for kids", which is based on the "fresh&easy goodness for kids" brand developed in Southern California.

The Australian-produced wine brand with the Hawaiian name, "The Big Kahuna," is the first Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market-developed private brand product to be sold in Tesco's stores in Asia we're aware of, in this case the country being South Korea.

Interestingly, we suggested in this March 8, 2011 piece - March 8, 2011: Tesco's Fresh & Easy ♥'s California With 27 New Varieties of Proprietary Brand Wines From the Golden State - that Tesco should take a few or all of Fresh & Easy's then new proprietary brands of California wines to the United Kingdom and South Korea.

Perhaps a few of those brands of wine produced in California will be the next ? Stay tuned.

Related Stores

Read more about wine at these links: , , , , , , , ,  ,

Additionally, you can read past stories in our Private Brand Showcase feature here.
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