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

Pictured above are two very recently introduced value-oriented merchandising plays by Tesco's Fresh & Easy: Its 98-cent value-priced fresh produce packs (at top) and its "Everything under $1 store-within-a-store sections in its stores (above). [Photo Credit: Tesco Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market.

The Wall Street Journal has a story today, "Tesco Tries to Hit a U.S. Curveball," in which it interviews Tesco Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market CEO Tim Mason.

[Note, the Wall Street Journal quotes Tesco in the story as saying Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market's current overall sales-per-square-feet for its 114 stores is $11. If so, that's 21-cents per square-foot below the U.S. supermarket industry average, which is $11.21 per-square-feet in weekly sales, according to the most recently published statistics by the Food Marketing Institute (FMI) we can find here.

Also, Tesco bases its $11 per square-feet average sales number, and has since day one, on using 10,000 square-feet as the average store size. The problem with this is that we aren't aware of any Fresh & Easy stores smaller than 10,000 square-feet. But there some stores with over 10,000 sqaure-feet of selling space, some up to about 13,000 square-feet. This fact gives us a bit of a problem with using 10,000 square-feet as average store size. But we welcome an analysis from Tesco Fresh & Easy of the selling space square-footage of all of its 114 stores that adds up to the 10,000 square foot average store size.]

The focus of the Wall Street Journal's piece is about Tesco Fresh & Easy's attempts to change its positioning to a value-based food retailing model in which it offers lower prices in store and in media promotions like its advertising fliers (more of a high-low model), including deep discounts; is introducing more value-based and priced items across all product categories, including its fairly new Buxted store brand discount fresh meat line; promotes and advertises heavily with a price and value focus -- both using its print media fliers (and more frequent issuing of the ad fliers), selected radios spots and the Internet -- and overall is attempting to now position, market and promote Fresh & Easy as a value-oriented grocery chain.

The thing is, Tesco always claimed Fresh & Easy was a value-based grocer, among other things touting from day one that it offers food and groceries it claims are 10% -to- 20% cheaper in rice everyday than its competitors offerings. For a variety of reasons we've detailed in Fresh & Easy Buzz, shoppers haven't bought it. The main reason consumers haven't bought it is that Fresh & Easy hasn't really been, nor is at present, a value-based grocer.

We've been writing about Tesco Fresh & Easy change in the value direction for a few weeks now, including our recent stories about CEO Tim Mason's comments in the Sunday London Times article.

This move by Tesco's Fresh & Easy to a value-approach, including most of the specifics mentioned by CEO Mason in the Wall Street Journal piece, come in part right out of the pages of Fresh & Easy Buzz, as we've been suggesting beginning as early as 14 months ago that it is the value-based model Tesco needs to adopt, develop and then communicate consistantly to consumers, as the focus of the Fresh & Easy stores. We call value the positioning hub for Fresh & Easy, with all other merchandising aspects of the chain and stores then being the spokes of that hub. [You can read the story here in today's Wall Street Journal.]

We've also suggested, going back to March of 2008, that Tesco should use selective radio advertising as part of an integrated marketing mix and program, which it recently started doing (using radio but not yet integrating its marketing strategy fully), and is mentioned as doing in the Wall Street Journal piece.

We've also been suggesting, beginning about a year ago, and often since, that Tesco's Fresh & Easy needs to distribute it once-every-three-weeks advertising flier more frequently, or distribute supplemental fliers, which it recently has started doing in an aggressive way.

For example, Fresh & Easy has issued at least three supplemental advertising-promotional fliers since issuing its most recent regular once-every-three-week flier, which amounts to a promotional flier being mass mailed about once a week over the last month.

That frequency increased shortly after we published this piece: [Tesco Fresh & Easy's 'New' Advertising Flier: Minimalism Without Thought or Design Does Not A Retail Advertising Communications Piece Make] on January 27, 2009. In the piece we questioned the design (or lack of) of the flier for its too simple black ink on plain white paper look, as well as its crowded layout. Since then all of the Fresh & Easy ad fliers thus far have included color, and have a much improved (work still needs to be done on them though) design layout.

Fresh & Easy also has stepped up the discount pricing (hotter) in the ad fliers, which we've been suggesting it needs to do for many months.

For an example of the grocery chain's deeper discount promotional pricing, read this February 13, 2009 piece [The Valentine's Day (Retail Promotional Price) War of the (Dozen Long-Stemmed) Red Roses: And the Winner Is... Tesco's Fresh & Easy] we wrote about the Valentine's Day-themed flier.

Fresh & Easy also tied-in the red roses promotion in the ad flier with radio ads, something we first suggested the grocer do (integrate selected promotions in the ad fliers with radio spots on a selective basis) a year ago. [See the linked posts under Fresh & Easy Buzz Redux: Tesco's Fresh & Easy & radio advertising below.]

In its most current supplemental ad flier, Fresh & Easy is featuring whole chickens under its fairly new Buxton value-positioned fresh meats category store brand for 69-cents a pound, which is currently among the hottest promotional prices in California, Nevada and Arizona for the whole birds. Read our comparitive analysis of one of Tesco Fresh & Easy's ad fliers in an October 1, 2008 piece here: ['The Promotional Pundit:' Fresh & Easy Buzz Analyzes, Offers Suggestions and Grades Tesco Fresh & Easy's Bi-Weekly Advertising Flier.]

We also wrote the paragraph reprinted below in italics in the October 1 piece:

"We do suggest the grocery chain go from a fortnightly (one flier every two weeks) to a weekly ad flier. It's the norm in U.S. food and grocery retailing. Especially for those chains that aspire to the "big time." It also creates more excitement in the stores -- more in-an out deals, ect." [Historically the Fresh & Easy direct-mail paper fliers have come out every two -to- three weeks. The online versions every three weeks. Our comments about liking the flier design were about the original Fresh & Easy designed flier, before they changed it to the plain white paper version, which as we mentioned above has now been upscaled a bit, adding color, and getting better.]

Below, under the heading "Fresh & Easy Buzz Redux," we list a partial (there are many more stories on the topics in the Fresh & Easy Buzz archives), linked bibliography of stories offering analysis, arguments and suggestions put forward by Fresh & Easy Buzz regarding Tesco's need to move towards the value propostion with its positioning, merchandising, operations and marketing of Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market USA.

Additionally, we include a few links in which we suggested in stories that Tesco's Fresh & Easy should include selective radio advertising in its marketing mix, and needs to offer better promotional price points in its advertising fliers, along with issuing those fliers on a much more frequent basis. Both, along with the overall value proposition, are elements which the grocery chain is now attempting to incorporate into its merchandising, marketing and operations.

>Fresh & Easy Buzz Redux: On the Fresh & Easy value propostion and value-oriented positioning imparitive. A sampling of past stories from Fresh & Easy Buzz:

February 21, 2008: A Look At Fresh & Easy @50 (Stores): An Analysis and Some Suggestions For Going Forward. [Click here to read.]

April 3, 2008: Our 'Fresh & Easy Stores' Lack A Sense of Place' Theory is Growing; Read What We and Others Are Saying Tesco Needs to Do With Fresh & Easy

June 8, 2008: Las Vegas Region Market Report: Signs of Recession in Usually Immune Las Vegas; Why Isn't Tesco's Fresh & Easy Touting its 'Value Proposition'?

June 18, 2008: Tesco's Fresh & Easy and it's 'Value Proposition:' We Asked, They Answered; Discussion, Deconstruction and Fresh & Easy Buzz Analysis

June 8, 2008: Arizona Region Market Report: First Signs of A Weakening Might Be Starting to Show in the 'White-Hot,' 'Super-Competitive' Arizona Market

March 29, 2008: Tesco's Fresh & Easy 'Taking a Pause' From New Store Openings: A Full Review In the Works

August 4, 2008: The Value Proposition: Whole Foods Market's New Focus on 'Value' Demonstrates the Importance of the Value Proposition Currently in U.S. Food Retailing

June 30, 2008: Southern California Region Market Report: The Coming 'Store Wars' in the High Desert Market; Kroger Co.'s Ralphs Lowers Prices, Ups Value Proposition

May 4, 2008: Aldi USA, the Fastest-Growing Small-Format Grocer in the U.S. Promotes Everything But the Kitchen Sink (and Maybe That's Next) In its Weekly Store Ads

November 24, 2008: A Single Bird in the Ad (Even Wrapped in Bacon and Sage) Does Not Make For A Good Thanksgiving Promotion For A Neighborhood Grocer For 'Everybody'

November 20, 2008: Analysis & Commentary: Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market and Tesco's Lowered Expectations

November 12, 2008: Breaking News: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Considering Two Major Changes, One Physical the Other Design Oriented, to Increase Sales in its 100 Stores

November 16, 2008: November 16, 2008: Tesco Fresh & Easy CEO Tim Mason Says He's 'Deliriously Happy' With the Chain's Progress Thus Far; We Prefer Andy Grove's 'Only the Paranoid Survive'

September 4, 2008: News & Analysis: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Launches New Direct Mail Promo Piece Full of $5-Off Discount Coupons; Is it Taking Deep-Discounting Too Far?

October 1, 2008: 'The Promotional Pundit:' Fresh & Easy Buzz Analyzes, Offers Suggestions and Grades Tesco Fresh & Easy's Bi-Weekly Advertising Flyer

November 12, 2008: November 12, 2008: Analysis: Hard Times at Fresh & Easy - Northern California Expansion to Be Postponed or Shelved Do to Economy; But its Only a Symptom Not the Cause

December 15, 2008: Food & Grocery Retailing in the Recession: Wal-Mart CEO Describes Changes in Consumer Behavior-More Cheap Basics, More Cooking at Home; More Leftovers

December 12, 2008: Marketing & Promotions Report: Manufacturers' Coupons Becoming the 'New Black;' Use Among Consumers Soaring; Marketers Distributing More Than Before

January 30, 2009: Breaking Buzz: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Distributes its First Promotional E-Mail Alert Today; Has the Grocer Been Reading Fresh & Easy Buzz This Week?

[Click here for more related stories regarding the value proposition, needed pricing model, ect. for Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market.]

>Fresh & Easy Buzz Redux: Tesco's Fresh & Easy and radio advertising:

Linked below are a few pieces suggesting strongly that Tesco's Fresh & Easy should use selective radio advertising as part of its marketing-media mix, particualrly putting a focus on the value proposion. Note we first offered the selective radio advertising suggestion as part of our analysis of Tesco's Fresh & Easy over one year ago.

February 21, 2008: A Look At Fresh & Easy @50 (Stores): An Analysis and Some Suggestions For Going Forward. [Click here to read.]

April 1, 2008: Supermarket News' Fresh & Easy Cover Story: Industry Analysts and Others Agree With Our Multi-Month Argument That Fresh & Easy Stores Need Local Focus

April 17, 2008: Vegas Baby!: Tesco Announces Ten More Fresh & Easy Grocery Stores For The Las Vegas Metro Region; it's All About 'Critical Mass'

>Fresh & Easy Buzz Redux: On Tesco Fresh & Easy's need to promote deeper price discounts, create value, and issue more frequent advertising fliers and implement other promotional vehicles.

[Click here for a selection of stories/posts from Fresh & Easy Buzz on these related topics.]

Value isn't just discount prices

If you read through the Fresh & Easy Buzz archives, you will notice the concept of the value-proposition informs many of the analysis pieces we've written and published in the Blog, along with informing our merchandising, marketing and operations suggestions for Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market.

It is important to point out, as we always do, that value does not merely mean offering deep- discount prices on items. It is though a key part of the process, and one that is important, particularly right now from a price-impact basis.

Value proposition is a comprehensive strategy

Value is the offering of low, everyday prices as well as promotional prices. But that's just one tactic in the strategic value proposition strategic mix. Good promotional pricing is a tactic, the value proposition is the overall strategy that informs the various tactics, including good promotional pricing and discounting.

Value means creating a grocery chain in which consumers not only perceive that it's a solid place to shop for low-priced food and grocery items but also where they believe can obtain the best overall "value" for their food and grocery shopping dollars.

Among other criteria, achieving value means offering the best price-to-value (quality) formula in the market. For example, cheap chickens only offer value if they are of a certain level of quality -- the price/value ratio. Safeway last week offered Foster Farms brand whole chickens for 77-cents a pound. Fresh & Easy offered its value store brand whole birds at 69-cents a pound last week and this week. Consumers will determine the price-to-value-ratio in that eight cent per-pound difference. The market is wonderful in that regard.

Also, great prices like Fresh & Easy's $9.99 per-dozen bunches of long-stemmed red roses for Valentine's Day last month are only good if a retailer is able to maintain a decent in-stock level on the product. It's OK to run out of the red roses on the holiday. But many if not most Fresh & Easy stores ran out of the $9.99 a dozen red roses pretty much everyday at noon beginning the very first day of the promotion, according to reports we received from a number of store-level employees and customers. (At that price people weren't just going to buy them for Valentine's Day, after all.) Read the comments in the comments section as well here: [The Valentine's Day (Retail Promotional Price) War of the (Dozen Long-Stemmed) Red Roses: And the Winner Is... Tesco's Fresh & Easy.]

A simple solution to this chronic out-of-stock problem would have been to only offer the $9.99 dozen long-stemmed red roses deal on the Friday before, and on Valentine's Day, which was on a Saturday. That also would have added store foot traffic on those two specific days.

Tesco's Fresh & Easy has to be careful not to repeat such mistakes (it was a corporate buying problem) because such chronic out-of-stocks actually take away from the value proposition despite the item pricing being so hot. What value is it to a shopper if they are unable to buy the $9.99 roses even three days before Valentine's Day after two trips to their local Fresh & Easy store in an attempt to do so? The answer: zero value.

There is a need for better coordination and communication between corporate merchandising and the stores at Fresh & Easy -- particularly from headquarters in listening to the store-level employees. For example, we know many store managers were telling headquarters to load up on the $9.99 red rose bunches because sales were going to be massive. But it didn't happen. The result: numerous unhappy shoppers. Value lost.

Towards the value proposition and value-based positioning?

We see Tesco's Fresh & Easy moving closer to the value-based positioning we started suggesting it needed to do a year ago with its "dollar sections" in the stores, value-priced produce and meat packs, beginnings of more frequent item promotions and more advertising fliers and use of other media like radio and the Internet. It's our analysis that each of these introductions has been a positive one for Fresh & Easy. And we like the 98-cent value produce packs and the $1 sections in the stores, for example, from the perspective of building that value postion.

But the grocer needs to do much more. And most important, it needs to create take all of these tactics and combine them in that overall value proposition in its merchandising, marketing and operations, and integrate them -- value as the hub, all else as the spokes.

We are seeing a movement in the right direction though in terms of the increased focus on the value proposition by Tesco Fresh & Easy.

And over the last 3-4 weeks we've seen a difference in the customer counts at a number of Fresh & Easy stores we've monitored over many months, as well as having received reports from regular Fresh & Easy Buzz correspondents in California, Nevada and Arizona that they have in some cases been seeing the same thing in the specific stores they monitor for the Blog.

We will be covering where this beginning goes, as always, in Fresh & Easy Buzz.

Fresh & Easy Buzz Redux: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Changes its Promotional Advertising Flyer to 'Weekly;' Something We've Been Suggesting For About A Year

Pictured at top is Tesco Fresh & Easy's new logo on its advertising flyer designating it as a "weekly" promotional piece. Pictured above are the top three feature items in Fresh & Easy's current (March 11-17, 2009) ,and now weekly, advertising flyer. Click here to view the advertising flyer.

Promotional Merchandising: Fresh & Easy's New Weekly Ad Flyer

Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market has changed the frequency of its promotional advertising flyer from once every three weeks (and sometimes bi-weekly) to weekly, something Fresh & Easy Buzz first suggested about a year ago that the grocery and fresh foods chains needed to do.

Tesco's Fresh & Easy changed to the weekly advertising flyer program starting with its promotional piece last week, which ran from March 4 -to- March 10.

Previous to the change, the grocer issued a new ad flyer every three weeks, and on occassion every two weeks. Sometimes Fresh & Easy would issue one-page supplemental flyer between the three weeks intervals. However, those supplemental flyers were primarily vehicles for the retailer's $5-off and $6-off store coupons.

Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market's second once-a-week advertising flyer is out today. It runs from March 11 -to- March 17, 2009.

[You can view the current March 11 -to- March 17 advertising flyer here.]

Fresh & Easy posts the now weekly promotional piece on its Web site, along with direct mailing a paper advertising flyer to residents in the neighborhoods surrounding its 115 grocery and fresh foods markets in Southern California, Bakersfield, California, Metropolitan Las Vegas, Nevada and Metro Phoenix, Arizona, where the stores are located.

Fresh & Easy Buzz has long suggested Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market go to a weekly advertising flyer for a number of reasons, including:

>It creates "fresh" deals. Three week old item promotions are as stale as three week old bread. Weekly allows for freshness.

>It allows for timely promotions. Once-a-week promotional item advertising flyers allow a food retailer to be timely. For example, the major promotional event for grocers this week is St. Patrick's Day. If Fresh & Easy hadn't changed to the once-a-week ad flyer program, it wouldn't be able to tie-in to St. Paddy's Day this week, which it is, and which virtually every food and grocery retailer in California, Nevada and Arizona is doing this week in their respective weekly advertising circulars or flyers.

>It's competitive. Every major competitor of Tesco's Fresh & Easy distributes a weekly ad flyer or circular. Most are much larger than Fresh & Easy's. Enough said. That's "no brainer" stuff. But it took Fresh & Easy 16 months to figure it out (the first stores opened in November, 2007), and the grocer did so about a full year after we first suggested it. We've been writing about the need for the grocery and fresh foods chain to go to a weekly ad flyeron a regular basis since then.

>It drives shoppers to the stores. Shoppers are used to shopping weekly item promotions in grocers' weekly advertising flyers or circulars. Since Fresh & Easy's ad flyerwas a three week or two week event, the grocer got left out of the weekly advertising circular comparisons done by shoppers. Therefore, Fresh & Easy didn't make it on the "stores to shop for deals at" list many shoppers (and more and more today) make each week when the weekly grocery store ads come out. Going to a weekly ad flyer program helps solve that serious ommission.

There are numerous other merchandising and marketing reasons for using a weekly advertising flyer -- particularly it you want to be a mainstream grocer like Tesco's Fresh & Easy states is its positioning -- rather than a once every two or three week promotional piece, in addition to the reasons we highlighted above.

Below is one of our most recent analysis pieces (January, 2009) about Fresh & Easy's advertising flyer. In it we again called for the grocery chain to go to a once-a-week ad flyer program. [Link: Tesco Fresh & Easy's 'New' Advertising Flyer: Minimalism Without Thought or Design Does Not A Retail Advertising Communications Piece Make]

Below is a piece from back in October, 2008, in which we suggested that, based on our analysis and experience, Fresh & Easy needs to go to a weekly advertising flyer program. [Link: 'The Promotional Pundit:' Fresh & Easy Buzz Analyzes, Offers Suggestions and Grades Tesco Fresh & Easy's Bi-Weekly Advertising Flier.]

Here's what we said in a paragraph in that piece six months ago:

"We do suggest the grocery chain go from an every three weeks or fortnightly (one flier every two weeks) to a weekly ad flier. It's the norm in U.S. food and grocery retailing. Especially for those chains that aspire to the "big time." It also creates more excitement in the stores -- more in-and out deals, ect." [Historically the Fresh & Easy direct-mail paper fliers have come out every two -to- three weeks. The online versions every three weeks. Our comments about liking the flier design were about the original Fresh & Easy designed flier, before they changed it to the plain white paper version, which as we mentioned above has now been upscaled a bit, adding color, and getting better."]

Below are a few more links to past stories in Fresh & Easy Buzz in which we suggested Tesco's Fresh & Easy change to a weekly ad flyer-circular, along with related analysis:

>May 4, 2008: Aldi USA, the Fastest-Growing Small-Format Grocer in the U.S. Promotes Everything But the Kitchen Sink (and Maybe That's Next) In its Weekly Store Ads

>November 24, 2008: A Single Bird in the Ad (Even Wrapped in Bacon and Sage) Does Not Make For A Good Thanksgiving Promotion For A Neighborhood Grocer For 'Everybody'

>October 1, 2008: 'The Promotional Pundit:' Fresh & Easy Buzz Analyzes, Offers Suggestions and Grades Tesco Fresh & Easy's Bi-Weekly Advertising Flyer

>September 4, 2008: News & Analysis: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Launches New Direct Mail Promo Piece Full of $5-Off Discount Coupons; Is it Taking Deep-Discounting Too Far?

January 30, 2009: Breaking Buzz: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Distributes its First Promotional E-Mail Alert Today; Has the Grocer Been Reading Fresh & Easy Buzz This Week?

>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

>June 8, 2008: June 8, 2008: Las Vegas Region Market Report: Signs of Recession in Usually Immune Las Vegas; Why Isn't Tesco's Fresh & Easy Touting its 'Value Proposition'?

>June 18, 2008: June 18, 2008: Tesco's Fresh & Easy and it's 'Value Proposition:' We Asked, They Answered; Discussion, Deconstruction and Fresh & Easy Buzz Analysis

>November 12, 2008: Analysis: Hard Times at Fresh & Easy - Northern California Expansion to Be Postponed or Shelved Do to Economy; But its Only a Symptom Not the Cause

>February 2, 2009: Competitor News: Safeway Stores, Inc. Enters the Store Coupon Derby in Southern CA, Nevada, Arizona; Part of Extending its 'Value Proposition'

>December 22, 2008: Marketing: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Launches E-Mail Promo Alert Program; Something Fresh & Easy Buzz First Suggested it Do Many Months Ago

Store traffic will grow at Fresh & Easy

It's taken Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market way too long to change to a weekly advertising flyer program. Rapid response after all is key in the highly competitive grocery retailing business. Over a year is far from rapid.

But Fresh & Easy has made the change, which shows its willing to listen and course correct -- eventually. That's a positive sign.

And since, as we reported and wrote about in this piece [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.], Fresh & Easy is beginning to adopt some elements of the "value proposition" positioning prescription we started suggesting it needs to focus on about one year ago (and have elaborated on since), going to a weekly advertising flyer program is an essential aspect of that value-based focus and positioning; so the change is therefore not only essential but smart for the grocer.

As we've written frequently in our analysis on the value proposition, one key element of making it work is communication, and frequent merchandising and marketing communications.

A once-a-week promotional advertising flyer is an important tool, among the many in the marketing and communications toolbox, to achieve this comprehensive and frequent communication we talk about regarding the "value proposition" and related goals.

Tesco's Fresh & Easy will soon start seeing some increased store traffic merely by virtue of the fact it has increased the frequency of its advertising flyer to weekly.

Of course, It will take a little time, but the new frequency, combined with offering hotter promotional price points in the now weekly ad pieces, will put more shoes on the floors in the Fresh & Easy stores.

But keep in mind, doing so is only one element of a comprehensive format positioning, merchandising, marketing, retail operations and communications focus and program around the "value proposition."

For example, if Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market is really smart, it will implement the seven retail operations changes listed in this piece [Analysis & Commentary: The Seven Retail Operations Changes Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Needs to Make to Help it Get On the Success Track] which we wrote and published on March 7. [Related links to the March 7 piece: Consumer Use and Retailer Redemption of Manufacturers' Coupons Soaring Says Leading Redemption Company in the U.S.; But Not at Tesco's Fresh & Easy. And: Google & Yahoo - The Tale of the Search Engines: An Analysis of How Tesco's Fresh & Easy is Losing Out By Not Accepting Manufacturers' Grocery Coupons.]

Why? Just as changing and going to a weekly rather than bi-weekly or every three week advertising flyer program is important because it will bring more shoppers into the stores, so to are making the seven retail operations changes equally (or perhaps even more so) important. They are designed to bring more shoppers into the Fresh & Easy stores -- more shoes on the stores' floors'. Even more importantly, they are also designed to bring in shoppers who won't shop the Fresh & Easy stores regardless of how often it runs advertising flyers, or how hot the ad-item price points in the advertising flyers are.

Plus, the "value proposition" is all about the whole, rather than the sum of its parts, as we've been arguing for some time in Fresh & Easy Buzz. The seven retail operations changes are part of that whole.

A Healthy 'Mea Culpa': Tesco Fresh & Easy CEO Tim Mason Says 'We Got it Wrong;' Comments Tend to Agree With Fresh & Easy Buzz Analysis and Arguments

Pictured above is the Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market store on famous Hollywood Boulevard, in Hollywood, California. The Fresh & Easy market is nearby the Kodak Theatre, where the annual star-filled Academy Awards show, also called the Oscars, will take place tomorrow night. The envelope please: It's now about 15 months since the fist batch of Fresh & Easy stores opened. Will Tesco Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market CEO Tim Mason be able to make the small-format, convenience-oriented grocery and fresh foods chain a "star?"

In a brief story to be published in tomorrow's Sunday London Times, Tesco Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market CEO Tim Mason and the Southern California-based grocery and fresh foods chain's chief marketing director, Simon Uwins, tell the Sunday Times' William Kay that the retailer's "extensive" market research in the Western U.S. market regions of California, Nevada and Arizona, research Tesco has been touting as top-flight and comprehensive for over two years, was wrong and mistaken.

"We may have assumed that certain elements of the Fresh & Easy brand would do the work for us and we would not have to go down and dirty on price. That may have been a mistake," Tim Mason, CEO of Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market USA, is quoted as saying in the report.

It not just about getting "down and dirty" on price though, although that's a reality in the current deep economic recession. It's all about creating a comprehensive Fresh & Easy format rather than the current muddled format, placing value at the center of that comprehensive format and then communicating it in a clear and regular way to consumers, as we've been suggesting the grocer needs to do since we started Fresh & Easy Buzz.

We reprint the full Sunday Times' report below (in italics):

Tesco admits: We got it wrong in US
February 22, 2009
The Sunday Times
By William Kay, Los Angeles

THE head of Tesco’s US operation, Fresh & Easy, has said its early market research was mistaken and it may make big changes to the stores.

“We may have assumed that certain elements of the Fresh & Easy brand would do the work for us and we would not have to go down and dirty on price. That may have been a mistake,” said Tim Mason, head of Tesco’s US business.

Ahead of Fresh & Easy’s launch in November 2007, Mason trumpeted the in-depth research that was done to identify a gap in the West Coast grocery market.

Marketing director Simon Uwins said: “We went into people’s houses, talked to them about food and food shopping. We went into their kitchens and poked round pantries.”

Unfortunately, Mason now admits, they did not poke around their garages, where they would have found huge freezer chests bulging with stockpiled meat bought on special offer.

“There’s less loyalty in the American market,” said Mason. “A Brit has to hear it a few times before you accept that people make up their mind where to go each week when they check out the special offers round the kitchen table.

“In a key moment at a focus group, one man told them that he had stopped shopping at Fresh & Easy because they no longer sent him a flier promoting the latest special offers.

“We came out of that meeting and said we had better make sure we hit everyone in the area with fliers.”

Recession has slowed expansion. There are 113 Fresh & Easy outlets and plans to have 200 branches have been put back at least six months. [Here is a link to the story as well.]

Analysis: Tesco Fresh & Easy CEO Tim Mason takes a page right out of Fresh & Easy Buzz

Mr. Mason's comments and quotes should sound rather familiar to regular readers of Fresh & Easy Buzz.

For over a year we've been writing and offering analysis in numerous pieces that Tesco's "extensive" pre-Fresh & Easy launch research was questionable, since the grocer failed to discover so many basic aspects and practices of how food and grocery retailing in America works.

These research failures include such simple basics as how Americans prefer fresh, bulk produce over pre-packaged, to (a major Fresh & Easy Buzz theme) the regional, sub-regional, sub-sub regional and local nature of grocery retailing in the U.S. -- that there are regional markets like the Western U.S., then sub-regional markets within those which have extensive differences, like California, Nevada and Arizona, then additional sub-sub regional markets within those, such as Southern, Central and Northern California, and then even local markets within those sub-sub regional ones, right on down to the neighborhood level. There are niches within the niches. Just ask Safeway Stores, Inc. what it discovered when it finally started taking its neighborhood merchandising-marketing program seriously in the late 1990's.

We've suggested that despite the research being bad, something Mr. Mason has only admitted now, such things happen, but that Tesco's Fresh & Easy should have admitted it long ago and then course corrected. It has started doing a bit of that course correcting of late, including taking our advice in terms of beginning to build a better value proposition. But it is nearly a year too late in doing so, as we've written previously.

Another major theme in all of our writing and analysis has been that's what lacking with Fresh & Easy's merchandising, marketing and operations is the creation of a value proposition and then the communication of that proposition in a clear, concise and repetitive manner. It appears our argument has now found receptive ears.

By value proposition we of course mean discount pricing, both everyday and promotional -- after all from day one Tesco claimed Fresh & Easy was and is about 15% cheaper everyday than its food retailing competitors stores are, which hasn't tuned out to be true based on our research -- but not just discount pricing. Value is much more than that. Value is appealing to consumers on multi-levels, and it must include their pocket books. It's Convincing them your offering provides the best value for the best price.

As we frequently suggest, for Tesco's Fresh & Easy,that value proposition needs to be the hub of its wheel, with all of its other offerings -- prepared foods, natural and specialty foods, specialty wines, ect. -- then being the spokes of that hub and wheel.

Based on our extensive research, which has included talking to numerous past Tesco Fresh & Easy employees, it's, as we've previously reported and discuss in the Blog, our analysis that what Tesco has done to date with Fresh & Easy is essentially assume it could force-feed its model of British food and grocery retailing into the Western U.S. and convince consumers that they would prefer it to what they are used to and like -- food retailing Western USA style, which means appealing to the consumer and focusing locally like a laser beam on the communities and neighborhoods served.

The U.S. is a decentralized (there really is no national chain, Wal-Mart comes the closest to being one), super-competitive, multi-format food retailing market. And unlike the United Kingdom, regional supermarket chains and independents are a key and significant force in U.S. grocery retailing.

In California alone there are numerous multi-billion dollar, privately-held chains that are top market share players in their sub-market regions. These include Stater Bros. (about $4 billion in annual sales) in Southern California's Inland Empire region, Bashas (about 3.4 billion in annual sales) in Arizona, and Raley's (about $3.6 billion in annual sales) and Save Mart (about $6.5 billion annual sales) in regional markets in Northern California.

There are a few others over the billion dollar annual sales mark as well, along with many multi-store independents approaching a billion dollars in annual sales, and even more in the hundreds of millions and high tens of millions in annual sales.

Then there's the really big guys -- Wal-Mart, Costco, Target, Safeway, Kroger Co., Supervalue, (and many more), along with the big niche players -- Trader Joe's (about $5 billion), Whole Foods Market (about $6 billion) (and numerous medium and smaller niche players too) -- and the ethnic grocers (particularly Latino consumer-focused food retailers) in California, Nevada and Arizona).

Did we forget to mention the legions of high-volume single store independent grocers in the U.S.? And California is one of the strongest single-store independent markets in the nation, as one example.

And let's not forget the mega-drug chains like Walgreens, CVS-Long's and Rite-Aid, all of which increasingly are offering and discount promoting more and more food and grocery items. For example, this weeks 12-page advertising circular from Walgreens, the largest U.S. drug store chain (maybe should change the name to Walgreen's drug & grocery) looks more like a supermarket ad circular -- about 60% of the items are groceries, including dairy and deli items -- than a traditional drug chain (or Walgreens') advertising piece.

We aren't sure if this "British food-grocery retailing model "force-feeding" approach by Tesco has been because of pure hubris, which is something former and present company employees have suggested to use is the reason. But whatever the reason, in our analysis its been in many ways "Ted Mack time" (an important American pop culture reference to know) by Fresh & Easy's leaders thus far for Tesco, which is one of the best overall global retailer's in the business.

[If you do a search in the "search box" at the top of Fresh & Easy Buzz -- use words like "value proposition," "localism," "research" -- as well as looking through the Blog archives (even better) -- you will find that Mr. Mason's revelation in the Sunday Times' piece mirrors our analysis, arguments and suggestions rather closely in terms of where Tesco's Fresh & Easy has gone thus far -- and where it needs to go.]

It is said that admitting mistakes is the first step towards correcting them. We hope that's the case for Tesco's Fresh & Easy, especially because the grocer has some of the finest and most dedicated store-level employees in the business.

It's also important to note that unlike Tim Mason, many CEO's will never admit, particularly in print, that they "got it wrong." Instead, they would rather go down with the ship still saying they were right; that the environment was just wrong. For example, look how long it has taken General Motors' CEO Rick Waggoner to admit GM "got it wrong." And the timing was pretty close to the company's asking for billions of dollars in loans from the U.S. government, at that. Therefore we give Mr. Mason credit for having the confidence and wisdom to say what he said.

But the fact that Mr. Mason is admitting the grocer "got it wrong" should also shed some light on just how serious (as in not so positive) Tesco's struggles with Fresh & Easy are. Keep in mind Tesco will soon report its financials, including those at Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market USA.

We have seen some positive signs in recent weeks in terms of changes in Fresh & Easy's merchandising and marketing. Of particular note appears to be the movement, albeit in baby steps, by the grocery chain more towards the value proposition-based model we've long been suggesting it needs to do. On the item side of this equation these developments include the introduction of what Fresh & Easy calls its 98-cent value produce packs. It also includes the addition of more nationally branded grocery products into the stores.

Fresh & Easy also has been sharpening its promotional pricing -- offering better deals -- and improving its in-store merchandising, particularly in the grocery category.

For example, when we visited a number of stores between the 2008 Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays we noticed pre-pack shippers being tastefully used in the stores. Prior to that Fresh & Easy had a "clean floor" policy, in which it didn't allow shippers on the store floor. The shippers we viewed then were all featured national brands, which is a good idea for the grocer because it helps augment the primarily store brand (about 60%) model and focus in the stores. The shippers, many of which contained items with a higher ring but were price-discounted well, also help increase market basket size for the stores.

We also saw an end-cap display we liked. It featured a number of well merchandised fresh & easy store brand grocery items. On the display were stacks of paper Post-It Notes, along with a sign that basically said: "Take a Post-It Note, write-down your favorite fresh & easy brand items and stick it on the display." The display (shelving) was covered with Post-It Notes, with customers' favorite fresh & easy branded items hand written on the slips of paper.

This is the type of creative merchandising the grocery chain needs to nurture and do more of. It's creative and interactive, inviting shoppers to participate in the grocer's business. We suggest Mr. Mason find out who came up with this idea and put them in charge of "creative merchandising" for the entire chain.

But it's our overall analysis at this point in time that Tesco's Fresh & Easy has yet to create this comprehensive value proposition and merchandising and marketing program. We suggest it follow up on its recent value-based offerings and the type of creative and successful (the items on that particular store's Post-It Note display were selling at a brisk pace) merchandising exemplified by the display we described, and build these various elements (the parts) into a value-based overall (the whole) merchandising and marketing program which then must be positioned and communicated well.

Value needs to be the hub of the Tesco Fresh & Easy wheel (format and overall offering) and then all of the other offerings (prepared foods, natural-organic-specialty groceries, wines, ect.) need to be the spokes. The other offerings are important. But they need to fit in with the overall value proposition and support it rather than detract from it in what we've termed as a "model or format muddle" that exists with Fresh & Easy at present.

We will return later for some further analysis on the topic and issue. But that's all for now.

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:

>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

>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: Fresh & Easy Buzz Strategy Session: Trader Joe's and the Key to Enlightenment?

>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

>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: 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

>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'

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

Tesco's Fresh & Easy and it's 'Value Proposition:' We Asked, They Answered; Discussion, Deconstruction and Fresh & Easy Buzz Analysis

In this piece," Las Vegas Region Market Report: Signs of Recession in Usually Immune Las Vegas; Why Isn't Tesco's Fresh & Easy Touting its 'Value Proposition'?," Fresh & Easy Buzz once again asked the question we've often asked in stories in the blog: Why doesn't Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market tout and reinforce it's value proposition, especially in these bad economic times in its respective U.S. market regions, which could be a way to create additional new business in its current 61 small-format, combination basic grocery and fresh foods-oriented, price and value-premised grocery stores?

On Monday (June 16, 2008) Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market essentially offered its first try to answer that question in this press release designed to garner media attention (and thus reach consumers and other stakeholders) with this press release titled: "Fresh & Easy Keeps it Simple and Keeps Prices Low." The release attempts to reinforce Fresh & Easy's value proposition by describing a "new" distribution model the grocery chain has adopted, also touting the environmental benefits that go with doing so.

Here's what the supermarket industry trade publication Progressive Grocer wrote this morning in the opening paragraph of it's brief report on the press release (the rest of the PG report is essentially a reprint of the press release:

"In an ongoing public relations campaign to reinforce its value position, Tesco-owned Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market yesterday said it and its suppliers have streamlined their distribution models to reduce direct store deliveries, which saves money on fuel and allows the retailer to pass these savings on to customers."

Read the entire Progressive Grocer report here.

Here is what the food and grocery industry blog Morningnewsbeat.com had to say about the press release:

"Tesco’s US operation, Fresh & Easy, said yesterday that it is working with its supplies to streamline its distribution model “to reduce direct store deliveries, which saves money on fuel, allowing the company to pass these savings on to customers. This innovative, yet simple, distribution model also helps the environment by reducing the amount of CO2 emissions, fuel consumption, as well as neighborhood traffic congestion and noise that multiple deliveries create … To eliminate extra and unnecessary delivery trips, Fresh & Easy has created a new way of stocking stores with these same products with fewer deliveries by asking the company's suppliers to deliver directly to the company's centralized distribution center.”

Here's Morningnewsbeat.com editor Keven Coupe's comment on the Tesco Fresh & Easy press release:

KC's View: Sounds like the tweaking taking place at Fresh & Easy HQ is more than just brightening up the stores…Of course, cynics will say that this is just another way for the company to slow down its hemorrhaging expenses…

And here is what a Morningnewsbeat.com reader, Bob Reynolds, offered about the press release in an email to Morningnewsbeat.com which was reprinted in the blog:

Bob Reynolds: I know you are tired of Fresh & Easy stuff. However, maybe this is a bit of a different twist.

I was in four LA F&E's last week, I had been in some of the same stores in February.

Some perspectives I have not read from others:

• Out-of-stocks are a very visible problem. And, the out-of-stocks appear to be concentrated in promotional items.

• Because the SKU count is small in these stores, out-of-stocks stick out like a sore thumb. Little or no opportunity for a consumer to do a brand switch.

• Same items were out-of-stock in more than one store, suggesting a distribution problem.

• While I have no objective data, it appeared that there were more national brand items in the store last week than in February. The product selection is still dominated by F&E brand products

• Perishables and ready-to-eat, ready-to-cook products are bland and uninteresting. They don't say "buy me." Color is badly needed in this bland environment.

• Many perishable, code-dated products were at or near code dates. Products dated the Wednesday I was in the stores, were marked 1/2 off.

• All self-checkouts -- One employee at front end to assist customers -- This system eliminates many non-tech-savvy potential customers.

• While I did not do an objective price survey, my impression was "no bargains here."

• All four stores faced nearby competition from conventional name brand supermarkets. So much for the "under-served neighborhood" concept.

• I saw little reason for a consumer to shop F&E rather than its familiar near-by competitors.

• Stores were lightly shopped on the Wednesday, midday that I visited.

• I also visited the Safeway/Vons "The Market" small format store in Long Beach. Store has been open about a month.

This store is right at the beach, 100 yards from the Belmont pier. Looks like a miniaturized version of Safeway's Lifestyle store format with all major perimeter departments. Lots of grab-and-go stuff. Large wine and liquor dept. Good looking deli and bakery. Service meat. Limited selection of dry groceries. Attractive but small produce selection. Good selection of refrigerated non-alcoholic beverages.

Looked like a great beach store but was lightly shopped at Wednesday, 11 AM.

I liked this store a lot. Bought my lunch there.

[Note to Bob Reynolds, much of what you observed has been covered, and is regularly covered in Fresh & Easy Buzz. We hope you find the blog if you haven't yet.]

Read both pieces directly on Morningnewsbeat.com here.

Lastly, the food and grocery industry website Retailwire.com currently has an ongoing discussion about Tesco Fresh & Easy's value proposition in the form of CEO Tim Mason's comments in Sunday's Financial Times piece, which we ran the other day, that the retailer is now combining a high-low promotional strategy along with its EDLP strategies, which forms the basis for Fresh & Easy's merchandising policy as a neighborhood grocery store for all consumers. [You can read a transcript of the Financial Times' interview with Tim Mason here.]

You can view the ongoing discussion at Retailwire.com here. There's also a reader poll which currently shows 44% of those who have thus far responded say price and value (the value proposition) are key to Tesco Fresh & Easy's success, an argument Fresh & Easy Buzz has been making since late last year. Only 2% thus far say the value proposition is unimportant.

The 'Value Proposition:' Fresh & Easy Buzz Analysis

Below (in italics) is the text of Monday's press release issued by Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market:

Fresh & Easy Keeps it Simple and Keeps Prices Low
Streamlining distribution saves fuel, reduces prices and helps the environment

EL SEGUNDO, Calif., June 16 /PRNewswire/ -- Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market and its suppliers have streamlined their distribution models to reduce direct store deliveries, which saves money on fuel, allowing the company to pass these savings on to customers. This innovative, yet simple, distribution model also helps the environment by reducing the amount of CO2 emissions, fuel consumption, as well as neighborhood traffic congestion and noise that multiple deliveries create.

(Photo: http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20080616/AQM550)

A traditional grocery store receives many deliveries a day, including fresh and frozen food, produce and direct store deliveries from numerous suppliers. To eliminate extra and unnecessary delivery trips, Fresh & Easy has created a new way of stocking stores with these same products with fewer deliveries by asking the company's suppliers to deliver directly to the company's centralized distribution center.

"By keeping our distribution model simple Fresh & Easy is able to save fuel and offer honest, everyday low prices on all our products," said CEO Tim Mason. "Reducing fuel consumption is also consistent with our commitment to be a good steward of the environment."

To further conserve fuel, Fresh & Easy has employed state-of-the-art technology in its shipping fleet. Fresh & Easy trailers feature a hybrid refrigeration vector unit which minimizes the amount of diesel used to safely cool and transport store products. The trailers also include automatic refrigeration shut-off when optimum temperature is reached inside the cooling chamber as well as a complete engine shut-off once parked at the stores. Electrical stand-by technology also minimizes the impact on the environment by using no diesel fuel to run refrigeration units on the trailers while parked at the distribution center.

First, regarding the press release itself, as you can tell by reading it, it's targeted (either intentionally or not) to the food and grocery industry trade press, at least based on the way it's written and its intended or unintended target. There isn't much of an angle in the way it's written to excite a consumer or business publication editor to run a story based on the release. We aren't criticizing the release or Tesco's Fresh & Easy because of that, just stating a fact of public relations.

Now, regarding the content of the press release: What Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market is talking about in the first paragraph, the "streamlining of their distribution model," might be new for Fresh & Easy but its old hat in the U.S. food and grocery retailing industry. It's essentially what's called cross-docking, something numerous U.S. supermarket chains ranging from Safeway Stores, Inc. to regional players like Northern California-based Save Mart, Inc. (and numerous other U.S. chains) have been doing with various vendors in various categories for decades.

For example, both Safeway and Save Mart (California-headquartered chains) cross-dock all of their specialty and natural foods category items/orders with their respective distributors. (Safeway self -distributes much of its specialty/natural foods category items but uses a distributor as well.) The distributor sales representative writes the specialty/natural foods category item orders in the stores (in some cases store-level employees write the orders) and then transmits the orders back to the distributor's headquarters via computer modem on the reps hand-held computer.

The distributor then picks and builds the orders and delivers them to the respective retail chain's distribution centers for the respective region the stores are located in. The retailer then bundles the orders with the warehouse direct grocery orders being delivered to the given store and ships all the pallets together. This is called cross-docking.

These two chains do the same thing with other categories besides specialty and natural foods. These are multimillion dollar categories for both chains annually. In return for doing this, the specialty and natural foods distributors, as do other vendors, give the grocery chains a flat rate discount such as 5% off invoice on total purchases. Most of the stores receive at least two, and often three, deliveries per-week in these two categories, which also include ethnic food products like Hispanic-targeted consumer goods and Asian foods.

Fresh & Easy is correct that cross-docking--a vendor shipping to a food retailer's central distribution center and then the retailer bundling various orders and shipping them together to the stores--can save on fuel consumption (although not really for the retailer), carbon emissions and noise in neighborhoods where stores are located due to frequent daily DSD deliveries.

DSD delivery also has an important place in U.S. food and grocery retailing however, especially in the case of highly-perishable and labor-intensive product categories like fresh breads and bake goods, especially those brands which are niche items in the category. These items need near-daily rotation and crediting out (labor intensive) and often are low volume (specialty,artisanal and gourmet breads and baked goods for example). The DSD system has generally proved to work best in these categories from both freshness for the consumer and overall store-level operations perspectives.

There's also the issue of store-level labor. Nearly all of the major supermarket chains in the Western U.S. where Tesco has its Fresh & Easy stores are union shops, which means a full-time store employee with one year's experience makes about $20 hour, compared to the $10 hour Tesco pays Fresh & Easy store clerks. Tesco Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market, like Trader Joe's, Whole Foods Market, Inc. and Wal-Mart, is non-union.

Additionally, these unionized chains offer store employees what is among the best health benefits package in U.S. business (of any kind or level), which the union chain's and the UFCW union agrees adds about $10 hour to the workers' hourly pay. In other words, the fully-burdened hourly wage of these unionized store-level workers is close to $30 hour with the benefit package. Tesco's Fresh & Easy offers store-level workers who work 20 hours or more a week a health insurance package. However, like is the case with nearly every other non-union grocery chain's plans, it isn't as comprehensive or as inexpensive to the worker as the union supermarket's plan is.

As a result of this fact, union supermarket chains, with the UFCW union's blessing (most of the DSD vendors like bread companies also are unionized), like to have some DSD in critical perishable categories (read labor intensive) because it is very expensive to have near $30 an hour clerks doing these tasks. If they did, the cost would have to be reflected in retail prices to consumers, which would make for some serious competitive difficulties for the union chain's, which already is the case because they pay much more than non-union competitors.

These union chains do deliver their store brand(s) fresh bread and related baked goods items directly to their stores, bundling with regular grocery and perishables direct store shipments from the distribution center.

However, many of the fresh bread and related items the stores carry--including specialty, artisanal and ethnic products--come from small, niche vendors, and it makes little sense to have these vendors ship direct to the retailer's distribution centers since the volumes are small and the labor to stock the goods at store-level time consuming based on the sales return they offer the retail chain.

In terms of fresh produce, most U.S. grocery chains supply the majority of produce to their stores directly from their own distribution centers. Therefore, there really isn't much DSD activity at store-level in the category. There is some, which is primarily because many chains are now putting a major emphasis on locally-grown produce to augment their basic offerings. In some cases this local produce is delivered DSD. Although, much of it is cross-docked in the way we've described above.

Lastly, we like the hybrid system Tesco is using for its Fresh & Easy trucking fleets. It's a wise decision. However, it isn't anything new in American food distribution.

For example, distributors like United Natural Foods, Inc. and Tree of Life, Inc., having been using such hybrid dry grocery/refrigerated/frozen truck and trailer units since the 1980's in the U.S. These distributors regularly deliver dry, refrigerated and frozen natural, organic and specialty foods directly to stores and adopted the hybrid system nearly 30 years ago to primarily save having to make multiple trips (a dry grocery run and then a perishables run) to the same store. The secondary benefit was that it saved energy and thus costs. Other U.S. distributors and direct distributing grocery chains do the same thing, and have for decades.

Additionally, for the vast majority of self-distributing American supermarket chains, combining dry grocery and perishable items in the same tractor-trailer just won't work. These stores carry too many skus and do too high of volume to make it feasible.

For example, take a typical, modern 55,000 -to- 60,000 square foot Safeway Lifestyle supermarket, or any grocery retailer's similar version. These stores require multiple weekly deliveries in each of the three categories--dry grocery, frozen, refrigerated--just to keep the stores stocked. Each of the deliveries generally requires the full cube of a standard tractor trailer just to hold the amount of product ordered. In other words, seldom will you see an order arrive at one of these supermarkets in which the trailer isn't full.

Therefore, there is no waste in terms of utilizing the space in the trailer for the product delivery. The chains make sure of that. Further, if the entire trailer isn't used--say in the case of frozen which isn't uncommon--they will make sure it is full, delivering to multiple stores in the same area one after another. It takes generally no more than three stores to cube-out the trailer. There is no delivering half a trailer to a store then going back to the distribution center.

Interestingly, Safeway and other supermarket chains, as well as home delivery-only grocers like FreshDirect on the east coast, use trucks similar to what Fresh & Easy is describing--dry, frozen and refrigerated combined--to deliver Internet-ordered grocery orders to customers homes. Safeway began its home delivery service in California in the early 1990's using such trucks and continues to use them to this day, as do the other U.S. grocers who offer this service.

So the "innovation" is one for Tesco's Fresh & Easy internally, compared to how they were doing things in part in the past, but it's old hat in the U.S. food and grocery distribution industry. It could help Tesco's Fresh & Easy internally to enhance it's value proposition, but as you can see from our analysis above, it offers no competitive advantage since American grocery distribution and retailing has been doing the same for a rather long time in most cases.

We take nothing away from Tesco for making the change, and wanting to communicate it. In fact we congratulate them--especially if it works well and saves money as well as contributes positively overall to the environment.

However, since it isn't a new industry innovation in the U.S., it isn't going to offer Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market any competitive advantages in the main vis-a-vis its competitors, which could result in creating an enhanced value proposition for consumers at retail. That has to be done on a retailer-to-retailer competitive basis elsewhere for Tesco.

Fresh & Easy Brings Back $6-Off Deep-Discount Store Coupon; Latest Version Good For Nearly One Month; New Promo Strategy Didn't Last Long

Grocer Promotions: Discount Store Coupons

Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market has resumed distributing its deep-discount store coupons by direct mail to residential households located in the neighborhoods surrounding its 119 small-format, convenience-oriented combination grocery and fresh foods markets in California (Southern and Bakersfield), southern Nevada and Metropolitan Phoenix, Arizona.

Fresh & Easy mass-mailed a supplemental promotional flier this week (most residents received it on Tuesday, April 28) that contained one of its $6-off total purchases of $30 or more store coupons. The store coupon is good until May 25 -- which makes its duration nearly a month long -- which is unusual even for Fresh & Easy, since most of its recent past coupons were good for about two weeks maximum.

The promotional flier contains some brief advertising copy and photographs of various products, with the $6-off discount store coupon being the centerpiece.

The ad copy says:

We're a neighborhood-sized market that's quick and easy to shop

*Budget prices
*fresh and wholesome foods
*all your favorite brands
*a variety of prepared meals

This is the same ad copy the grocer has used in its direct-mailed, paper store coupon supplemental promotional fliers in the past.

The advertising flier also has pictures of various food and grocery products on it: milk eggs, Bertolli brand Pasta Dinners, chicken, bell peppers, avocados, strawberries, Corona Beer, Trix brand Cereal and fresh flowers.

The supplemental promotional flier was mass-mailed in addition to and separate from Fresh & Easy's regular weekly advertising flier, which it direct-mails to residences each week.

Bringing back the direct-mailed store coupons

As we previously reported, Tesco's Fresh & Easy stopped distributing its deep-discount store coupons via direct snail mail in February of this year. Prior to that the grocery chain distributed the fliers often and regularly using similar paper fliers, along with posting the store coupons often at the same time on its Web site.

In fact, since February, with the exception of issuing a couple online store coupons good for just a few days at a time, Fresh & Easy hasn't distributed the discount store coupons at all over the last three months.

Instead, beginning in early March, the grocer changed the frequency of its mass-mailed paper and Web site-based advertising flier from a frequency of once-every-three-weeks to one-a-week, like all of its competitors' in California, Nevada and Arizona offer. [See our March 11, 2009 story here: Fresh & Easy Buzz Redux: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Changes its Promotional Advertising Flyer to 'Weekly;' Something We've Been Suggesting For About A Year.]

Tesco's Fresh & Easy also has offered more items at better promotional prices since going to the weekly advertising flier duration in early March than it did prior to that.

However, since the grocery chain stopped issuing its store coupons on a regular basis in February of this year -- in the past it issued them nearly every couple of weeks -- it's received numerous comments and complaints for customers via its corporate Blog and on its Twitter.com feed. Many customers have said they want the store coupons on a regular basis like in the past.

Over the last couple months there's been communication from customers wanting the coupons and the Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market marketing people who run the Blog and Twitter site, both of which we monitor regularly. Fresh & Easy's marketing folks responded a couple times to the customers by issuing online store coupons good for three -to- four days, and then announcing the availability of the coupons, with a link, on its Twitter.com feed and on the company marketing Blog.

It appears Tesco's Fresh & Easy has now decided not to do away with the store coupons completely, particularly distributing them via the supplemental direct mailed paper fliers, as the grocery chain's senior management hoped it could.

We don't expect Fresh & Easy to issue the store coupons at the same frequency that it did from November 2007, when the first stores opened, until January, 2009, though. That frequency was so frequent that shoppers became so used to the deep-discount coupons that many wouldn't shop at the stores without one. Of course, we could be wrong.

Additionally, up until the end of 2008 Fresh & Easy distributed the coupons liberally in its stores. It was the norm to give each shopper one or more of the $5-off (purchases of $20 or more) and later $6-off (purchases of $30 or more) store coupons regardless of the dollar amount of grocery purchases they made in the stores. We received three of the coupons a few times after buying about $15 -to- $20 worth of items, for example.

Tesco's Fresh & Easy started cutting back the number of coupons it gave out in the stores in the fall of 2008, much to the chagrin of customers. By the end of last year most of the stores were no longer handing out the coupons, although we've seen a few stores that still have them on occasion to give out to shoppers.

Once Fresh & Easy stopped the store-level distribution of the coupons, shoppers increasingly were asking for them via direct mail and online. In January of this year the grocery chain distributed the discount store coupons via direct-mailed fliers at least twice in the month. But beginning in February it stopped doing so, likely in anticipation of the launch of its weekly advertising circular featuring hotter than in the past promotional prices, a few weeks later in early March.

Fresh & Easy store coupons: Now what?

It will be interesting to see how Tesco's Fresh & Easy handles the store coupon situation now. The new $6-off store coupon is going to once again wet the appetites of the store coupon-hungry Fresh & Easy customers. It should also draw some new shoppers into the stores.

The problem is those same core Fresh & Easy shoppers, the ones who have become used to the coupons, will be looking for another deep-discount store coupon soon after this one expires on May 25. The" coupon crack is back," is what one happy Fresh & Easy coupon-shopper said to us in an e-mail.

Store coupons as promotional vehicles

And the fact that the current store coupon is good for such a long period of time -- expires on May 25 -- seems to indicate a need for the grocery chain to stimulate sales.

Normally in the retail grocery business, as we've written about before, such deep-discount store coupons are good for maybe three to four days -- and one week at the most, when they are used at all -- which is very infrequently and by few retailers.

Early this year, supermarket chains Safeway, Sacramento-based Raley's and Whole Foods Market all issued store coupons. But those respective grocers' discount store coupons were good only for three days in duration. [February 2, 2009: Competitor News: Safeway Stores, Inc. Enters the Store Coupon Derby in Southern CA, Nevada, Arizona; Part of Extending its 'Value Proposition'.]

The reason for this is that the store coupons are used as a promotional device. As such, they are primarily designed to stimulate sales over a short period of time, such as from Friday -to- Sunday, which are the prime grocery shopping days for consumers, and thus the most competitive for food retailers.

The danger in issuing deep-discount store coupons to often and with too long of a per coupon shelf life -- like a two or three week expiration date -- is that shoppers come to think of such coupons as a regular part of a grocer's way of doing business and pricing structure; that the only time groceries are reasonably priced in its stores are when the retailer issues these store coupons, even if that's not the case, as it is at Fresh & Easy, which has good everyday prices.

But perception is reality when it comes to consumers. Think about that "coupon crack" comment the reader-Fresh & Easy coupon-shopper made. And by issuing the coupons so frequently, Tesco's Fresh & Easy has actually created this perception via its marketing.

Store coupons and grocer margins

As we've said before, most grocers also set the minimum purchase amount of such coupons much higher than $30. For example, when Safeway and Raley's issued their respective three day duration store coupons early this year, the minimum purchase amount for both chains was $50. Safeway offered a store coupon good for $10-off purchases of $50 or more (a 10% savings). Raley's offered two versions -- one good for $10-off $50 (10%-off) or more and a second coupon with a value of $25-off purchases of $100 or more (25%).

The logic and practice in the industry is that the higher the minimum purchase, the higher the percentage off you can go. Within reason of course.

For example, Raley's $25-off $100 coupon offered a savings of 25%-off, 5% more than the $6-off $30 Fresh & Easy coupon does. But Raley's minimum purchase to use the coupon is $70 higher than the $30 Fresh & Easy $6-off store coupon minimum.

This is important because another key purpose of deep-discount store coupons is to increase the market basket size (total customer dollar purchase during the shopping trip) of what a shopper purchases. Giving 5% more on a minimum that's $70 more than the Fresh & Easy coupon's $30 minimum purchase pencils out OK for a grocer, particularly when the coupon is only good for three or four days. A 5% difference on a sale of $70 more is workable, as long as the exposure isn't for multiple weeks.

The percent discount on store coupons comes out of the retailer's margins. That is unless of course the grocery chain comes up with a store coupon promotion like Safeway Stores' is now conducting, which is funded mostly using promotional funds contributed by its suppliers. [Read our April 28, 2009 story here: Competitor News: Safeway Leverages Supplier Promo Monies to Fund 'Living Well Feeling Great' $10 Store Coupon On $30 Purchase Promotional Program.]

Safeway hasn't issued any additional direct discount store coupons since the first of this year. Instead it created the promotion described above, which it's been running for a number of weeks now. It end in early May.

Retailer-issued store coupons and margin erosion

Now that Tesco's Fresh & Easy is running a weekly instead of every-three-weeks advertising flier, along with offering hotter promotional price points on the advertised items in the flier, it risks eroding margins considerably if it does this and issues the deep-discount store coupons on any regular basis at the same time, particularly for three week-plus durations like the present $6-off store coupon is for. That's why we would find it very strange from an experiential and analytical standpoint if the grocery chain goes back to its old frequency -- basically all the time -- of issuing the store coupons.

However, the fact that the current $6-off purchases of $30 or more Fresh & Easy discount store coupon runs for nearly a month (doesn't expire until May 25) leaves us wondering. That's a long period of time for a grocery chain to have such a coupon out there in the market from a margin erosion standpoint, especially in conjunction with weekly item discount promotions.

But we suspect the three-plus week shelf life of the coupon is going to please the many Fresh & Easy shoppers who told the grocer it wanted the deep-discount store coupons back, and that without the store coupons they weren't shopping as frequently (or at all) at or purchasing as much in the Fresh & Easy stores.

The main problem with such coupons is that they put too much of an emphasis on price discount over other forms of merchandising and marketing. And since Fresh & Easy has already trained shoppers to rely on these coupons, even though the everyday prices in the stores are good, it runs the risk of further creating a shopper class that perceives the stores as only offering good prices when the deep-discount store coupons are distributed.

We thought Fresh & Easy figured this fact out when it stopped the regular practice of issuing the store coupons in February and switched to a more item-focused promotional scheme with the weekly ad (launched on March 4) and hotter promotional price points.

But clearly that hasn't worked thus far from a store sales volume standpoint. If it had there would be no need to issue a $6-off coupon good for nearly a month. Good for three -to-four days, fine. That's a promotion. But good for nearly a full month? That's a sales salve, even in a recession.

Retailer-issued deep-discount store coupons like Fresh & Easy's can play havock with a grocery chain's gross margins when used frequently because the discount amount comes out of the retailer's margins, as we've said. Tesco PLC didn't report the full-year gross margin for Fresh & Easy when it reported its sales and profits on April 21. Instead it put n/a (not available) in the gross margin column in its published section for Fresh & Easy. [For the details see: Tesco PLC Reports Record Sales and Profits; But Takes £142 Million ($208.05 Million U.S.) Loss For Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market USA.]

Customers happy campers though

But we know the Fresh & Easy shoppers will be happy. After all, they rightly need not concern themselves with things like margin and break-even. [Read - April 21, 2009: Tesco PLC Reports Record Sales and Profits; But Takes £142 Million ($208.05 Million U.S.) Loss For Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market USA.]

Their goal and a grocery shopper's job-one is to get the best deal he or she can on groceries. And with the $6-off purchases of $30 or more discount store coupons, combined with the everyday prices and advertised promotional prices at the Fresh & Easy stores, that works out to a very affordable deal on food and groceries -- for shoppers that is.

Related stories and posts:

>January 27, 2009: Tesco Fresh & Easy's 'New' Advertising Flyer: Minimalism Without Thought or Design Does Not A Retail Advertising Communications Piece Make

>September 4, 2008: News & Analysis: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Launches New Direct Mail Promo Piece Full of $5-Off Discount Coupons; Is it Taking Deep-Discounting Too Far?

.March 7, 2009: March 7, 2009: Analysis & Commentary: The Seven Retail Operations Changes Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Needs to Make to Help it Get On the Success Track
>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.

September 26, 2008: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Experiments With A $1-Off Online Discount Coupon; But its Paper Coupons Offer More Than Twice the Value

>Monday, February 2, 2009: Competitor News: Safeway Stores, Inc. Enters the Store Coupon Derby in Southern CA, Nevada, Arizona; Part of Extending its 'Value Proposition'

>Tuesday, February 3, 2009: Competitor News: 'Grocer-Gone-Wild:' Arizona's Fry's and its 'Bring it On' 'Take All Competitors' (Including Tesco's Fresh & Easy) Store Coupon Move

>January 30, 2008: Breaking Buzz: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Distributes its First Promotional E-Mail Alert Today; Has the Grocer Been Reading Fresh & Easy Buzz This Week?

>December 22, 2008: Marketing: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Launches E-Mail Promo Alert Program; Something Fresh & Easy Buzz First Suggested it Do Many Months Ago

>April 5, 2009: Food & Grocery Retailing in the 21rst Century: New Study Says Younger Consumers Getting Hip to Online Coupons; Particularly Mobile Couponing

>March 19, 2009: Ground Control to Shopper: Point-of-Purchase-Based Mobile Couponing the Next Hot Ticket; Kroger Co. Leading the Food Retailing Pack.

>March 9, 2009: Consumer Use and Retailer Redemption of Manufacturers' Coupons Soaring Says Leading Redemption Company in the U.S.; But Not at Tesco's Fresh & Easy

>March 7, 2009: Google & Yahoo - The Tale of the Search Engines: An Analysis of How Tesco's Fresh & Easy is Losing Out By Not Accepting Manufacturers' Grocery Coupons

>February 12, 2009: Consumer Use of Manufacturers' 'Cents Off' Coupons Continues to Grow: The Latest American Rage: Home Coupon-Clipping and Coupon-Trading Parties

>April 10, 2009: Got Milk? Getting it For Shoppers is Much Less Expensive Now Than it Was A Year Ago in California, Nevada and Arizona; Tomorrow it's Even Free

>December 6, 2008: Use of Manufacturers' Coupons Soaring Among U.S. Consumers; Coupon Delivery Systems Going High-Tech; But Fresh & Easy Stores Don't Accept the Coupons

>December 12, 2008: Marketing & Promotions Report: Manufacturers' Coupons Becoming the 'New Black;' Use Among Consumers Soaring; Marketers Distributing More Than Before

>August 24, 2008: Sunday Supplement: 'America's Cheapest Family' Helping to Spur Increased Use of Manufacturers' Coupons At the Grocery Store; Accept At Fresh & Easy

>April 28, 2009: Competitor News: Safeway Leverages Supplier Promo Monies to Fund 'Living Well Feeling Great' $10 Store Coupon On $30 Purchase Promotional Program

>April 12, 2009: Online Grocery Coupon Use Soaring; Coupons.com Reports Whopping 192% Increase ($57 Million) in Value of Coupons Printed in March 2009 Over March 2008

>March 11, 2009: Fresh & Easy Buzz Redux: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Changes its Promotional Advertising Flyer to 'Weekly;' Something We've Been Suggesting For About A Year

>October 1, 2008: 'The Promotional Pundit:' Fresh & Easy Buzz Analyzes, Offers Suggestions and Grades Tesco Fresh & Easy's Bi-Weekly Advertising Flyer

March 11, 2009: A Fresh Freebie: Tesco Fresh & Easy Offering Online Coupon Good For Free Reusable Canvas Shopping Tote Bag

>June 18, 2008: Tesco's Fresh & Easy and it's 'Value Proposition:' We Asked, They Answered; Discussion, Deconstruction and Fresh & Easy Buzz Analysis

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