Discount grocery chain Aldi USA is headed to Southern California in a big way -- and soon.
The hard-discount grocer, which is headquartered in Germany and has its U.S. corporate office in Illinois, will set up shop in Southern California in the coming months, with plans to open its first stores in the region in nine months to a year, Fresh & Easy Buzz has learned.
Aldi plans to open about 100 stores on the west coast during its first two years (starting in 2013) of operation, according to our sources who are familiar with the grocery chain's plans.
Aldi also has longer-term plans in the west, following those first stores in Southern California, to eventually open its small-format (about 10,000 square-foot) grocery markets throughout California and in other nearby western states, including Nevada, Arizona and others, according to our sources.
Aldi USA currently plans to build and open a distribution center in Riverside County, California, where Tesco has its 850,000 square-foot facility for its 190-plus-store Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market chain, to serve its stores in Southern California and elsewhere on the west coast. Construction of the distribution facility is set to begin soon, according to our sources.
As part of its plans to open its first stores in Southern California in nine months to one year, Aldi USA is currently looking for a buying director and buying manager, both of which will be based in the region.
Aldi representatives are interviewing candidates for the positions tomorrow and Wednesday in Southern California. Once hired, the buying managers will move to Chicago for an eight month training period, where they will be trained at Aldi's corporate office and in its stores in the region. They, along with numerous other regional employees, will then be based in Aldi's west coast offices in Southern California.
The buyer manager candidates being interviewed this week have been selected for Aldi by an executive search firm, Reaction Search International.
In addition to the key buying/merchandising positions, Aldi USA will soon be hiring for other positions for Southern California and the west coast, ranging from other corporate headquarters functions to the planned distribution center in Riverside, and for the stores.
The arrival of Aldi in Southern California will be a major game-changer in the region, as has been the case in each market the discount grocer has entered in the U.S., which includes the Midwest, South, Mid-Atlantic, eastern and Southwest (Texas) regions in the U.S. Aldi currently has about 1,300 stores in the U.S.
Aldi, which is privately-held and keeps such developments very close to the vest, has not announced its upcoming plans for Southern California and the west coast, not is it confirming our report. But our information comes from multiple sources, all in positions to know the details reported on in this piece.
More to come...
Showing posts with label Fresh and Easy Southern California. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Fresh and Easy Southern California. Show all posts
Monday, June 4, 2012
Saturday, March 3, 2012
'Eight Isn't Enough': Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market to Open Ninth 'Express' Store Soon in Palos Verdes Estates, California
Companion Story - March 3, 2012: 'Eight Isn't Enough' - New Fresh & Easy Express Store Planned for Bell, California
Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market is now hiring employees for what will be its ninth Fresh & Easy Express mini-market, at 2201 Palos Verdes Drive West in the Southern California city of Palos Verdes Estates.
The store at Palos Verdes Drive West and Yarmouth Road in Palos Verdes Estates is scheduled to open next month, according to information we have. Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market hasn't announced the store's opening date.
The 3,000 square-foot (selling space) Fresh & Easy Express store - there are currently seven 'Express' format units open and operating, all in Southern California, with an eighth store in Los Angeles' San Pedro neighborhood set to open soon (see here) - is going into the former family-owned Lunada Bay Market grocery store, which closed in August 2011.
All but a small portion of the Lunada Bay Market, pictured above shortly before it closed in August 2011, will house the ninth Fresh & Easy Express grocery market. [Photo credit: Elizabeth Stanley.] Pictured below is the inside of the Fresh & Easy Express store at La Cienega Boulevard and 18th Street, Los Angeles, which was the first of the 'Express' store to open, on November 2, 2011. [Photo credit: Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market.]
Fresh & Easy will use about 4,500 square feet of the space for the 'Express' market. About 3,000 square feet of that space will be the 'Express' store's selling space. The remaining space will be used for the bakery and back room. The remaining space is being offered for lease by a commercial real estate firm.
The Fresh & Easy Express mini-market will be Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market's first store in Palos Verdes Estates, which is in Los Angeles County.
Green light for Fresh & Easy Express
Tesco's Fresh & Easy has publicly said its plans with Fresh & Easy Express was to open eight stores as a test, then decide to go forward with additional units based on the performance of the existing eight stores.
However, the grocer is clearly going forward with additional 'Express' units before store number eight opens. The Rancho Palos Verdes store has been in the works for sometime. So has the store in Bell, California.
Additional Fresh & Easy Express stores are set to be opened this year. There are also more units in the planning stages.
The story about the Bell, California location linked at top offers details about why Tesco and its Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market chain are going forward with the micro small-format 'Express' stores, which offer about 2,700 SKUs, including groceries, produce, meats, fresh-prepared foods and non-foods, and small in-store bakeries, in 3,000 square-feet of selling space.
Los Angeles County: Fresh & Easy Express' ground zero
On December 10, 2010, we reported in this story - Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market CEO Tim Mason Says 70 New Stores Possible in Los Angeles Area - that Tim Mason, the CEO of Fresh & Easy and Tesco's deputy CEO and chief marketing officer since March 2011, said Fresh & Easy Neighborhood market could open up to 70 stores in Los Angeles over the next couple years.
Last year Mason repeated this potential strategy in a July 12, 2011 presentation to the Town Hall Los Angeles civic organization, noting the 70 new store potential in the L.A. region. [Suggested reading - July 12, 2011: Tesco in America: A Few Things Tesco Deputy CEO-Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market CEO Tim Mason Might (and Probably Should) Say in His Speech at Town Hall Los Angeles Today.]
Four of the seven Fresh & Easy Express stores opened since November 2011 are in Los Angeles County. Additionally, so is the eighth unit, which is set to open soon at Sixth and Gaffey Streets in Los Angeles' San Pedro district. Further, the cities of Palos Verdes Estates and Bell are also both in Los Angeles County, making seven of the 10 initial 'Express' stores Los Angeles County-located.
The grocery chain also has new standard-format (10,000 square-foot) Fresh & Easy stores opening in Los Angeles County this year, including those listed here.
Bottom line: Los Angeles County is ground zero for Tesco's Fresh & Easy Express format, which is something we said it would be over a year ago.
Look for many more of the mini-markets, along with some regular format Fresh & Easy stores, to pop up in Los Angeles County this year and beyond, assuming Tesco can come close to breaking even with Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market by the end of this fiscal year, which started at the end of February 2012 and runs until the end of February 2013, as CEO Philip Clarke says it will.
Related Stories
[Readers: You can read past stories and analysis focusing on Fresh & Easy Express, beginning with our January 2011 report in which we broke the news Tesco's Fresh & Easy would launch the smaller stores, at this link - Fresh and Easy Express.]
Reader Resources
>Click here for a list of the Fresh & Easy Express store locations.
>Click here to view a list of upcoming Fresh & Easy store openings.
>Click here if you're interested in learning more about the city of Palos Verdes Estates.
Tuesday, February 28, 2012
First Two My Fit Foods' Stores Open in California; Santa Monica Unit Coming Soon
Texas-based fresh-prepared foods retailer My Fit Foods has opened its first two stores in California, at 1005 Pacific Coast Highway in Hermosa Beach and 2543-G Pacific Coast Highway in Torrance.
The Hermosa Beach store (pictured at top) opened Monday, February 27. The unit in Torrance, located right next to a Trader Joe's grocery market (three photos below), opened today.
Grand opening events for both stores were held today.
My Fit Foods originally planned to open both Southern California stores Friday, February 24 but delayed the openings until this week.
As we've previously reported, My Fit Foods plans to open additional stores in California this year and beyond.
The next store set to open is at Wilshire and Barrington (11701 Wilshire Boulevard #7) in Santa Monica, as noted in the brochure pictured above, which was available today at the Hermosa Beach store. That store is slated to open in a couple months.
The stores offer fresh, pre-packaged refrigerated meals, side-dishes, snacks and deserts in buildings ranging from about 1,100-to-1,800 square-feet.
In Southern California, the fresh-prepared food iterms, like the pre-packaged Tenderloin Roasted Vegetable Dinner below, are made in a kitchen inside the My Fit Foods store in Hermosa Beach, which is larger than the unit in Torrance.
The fresh-prepared foods are transported from the Hermosa Beach unit to the Torrance store in the van pictured below. The Torrance store doesn't have a kitchen.
Related Stories
February 19, 2012: California Launch: My Fit Foods Opening Hermosa Beach, Torrance Healthy Fresh-Prepared Food Stores February 24
February 17, 2011: Texas-Based Healthy Fresh Foods' Retailer My Fit Foods Opening First California Store in Hermosa Beach
January 10, 2012: Welcome to the (Eclectic) Neighborhood: Second of Seven Fresh & Easy Express Stores Opens Tomorrow in Hermosa Beach, California
December 20, 2012: Hermosa Beach, California Fresh & Easy Express Taking Shape For January 11, 2012 Opening
December 13, 2011: Welcome to the (Eclectic) Neighborhood: Hermosa Beach, California Fresh & Easy Express Set to Open Jan. 11, 2012
Sunday, February 19, 2012
California Launch: My Fit Foods Opening Hermosa Beach, Torrance Healthy Fresh-Prepared Food Stores February 24
Houston, Texas-based healthy fresh-prepared foods' retailer My Fit Foods plans to open its first two stores in California in the Southern California cities of Hermosa Beach (1005 Pacific Coast Highway) and Torrance (2543-G Pacific Coast Highway) Friday, February 24, according to a fresh posting on its new website, which the retailer went live with Friday, as we noted in this story - February 17, 2012: Texas-Based Healthy Fresh Foods' Retailer My Fit Foods Opening First California Store in Hermosa Beach.
The Hermosa Beach and Torrance My Fit Foods' stores are the first two of what the fresh-prepared foods' retailer says will be numerous retail outlets in the Golden State.
The Hermosa Beach store (pictured at top, above and below) is about a quarter-mile away from the Fresh & Easy Express market on the Pacific Coast Highway, which was opened by Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market on January 11, 2012.
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| [Photo credit: Fresh & Easy Buzz, 02/19/2012.] |
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| [Photo credit: Fresh & Easy Buzz, 02/19/2012.] |
As we reported yesterday, My Fit Foods is also expanding from its Texas home base into Arizona, Nevada, Utah, Idaho and Oklahoma, in addition to California.
My Fit Foods, which currently has about 44 stores, offers a variety of healthy fresh-prepared meals, side dishes, breakfast foods and snacks for takeout.
The foods are prepared in the company's corporate kitchens - and in some cases in-store - then packaged for sale in the stores.
The fresh-made foods, 95% of which the company says are gluten-free, are prepared using lean protein, are low in carbohydrates, and contain heart healthy fats. There are currently about 60 items on the menu, with more being added regularly.
The primary focus of the fresh-prepared food shops is takeout. However, the My Fit Foods' store's also have an area where customers can eat-in at a counter and a few tables with chairs. The store's have microwave ovens to heat the prepared meals.
In addition to the fresh-prepared foods, The retailer offers a line of vitamins and nutritional supplements under the My Fit Foods' brand, which is sells in the stores. The vitamins and supplements are part of the overall healthy foods/healthy eating/healthy lifestyle niche the company is focused on.
Besides the standard storefront retailing of the fresh-prepared foods, My Fit Foods also offers shoppers various customized healthy meal plans which they can sign up for, letting the company do the meal planning and food preparation for them. Among those plans is what My Fit Foods' calls its "21-Day Challenge," a three-week, five-meal-a-day program it says will start consumers on the road to healthier eating and better nutrition.
[Editor's Note: Stay tuned for an upcoming post featuring a pictorial look at and inside the My Fit Foods' store in Torrance, California.]
Related Stories
February 17, 2011: Texas-Based Healthy Fresh Foods' Retailer My Fit Foods Opening First California Store in Hermosa Beach
January 10, 2012: Welcome to the (Eclectic) Neighborhood: Second of Seven Fresh & Easy Express Stores Opens Tomorrow in Hermosa Beach, California
December 20, 2012: Hermosa Beach, California Fresh & Easy Express Taking Shape For January 11, 2012 Opening
December 13, 2011: Welcome to the (Eclectic) Neighborhood: Hermosa Beach, California Fresh & Easy Express Set to Open Jan. 11, 2012
Also see this link, fresh prepared foods merchandising, for additional related stories.
Friday, February 17, 2012
Texas-Based Healthy Fresh Foods' Retailer My Fit Foods Opening First California Store in Hermosa Beach
Houston, Texas-based healthy fresh-prepared foods' retailer My Fit Foods plans to open its first store in California at 1005 Pacific Coast Highway in the coastal Southern California city of Hermosa Beach and a second unit at 2543-G Pacific Coast Highway in Torrance, with more stores to come, Fresh & Easy Buzz has learned.
The Hermosa Beach store (pictured at top), which is currently being renovated, is about a quarter-mile away from the Fresh & Easy Express market on the Pacific Coast Highway, which was opened by Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market on January 11, 2012.
Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market puts a major merchandising emphasis on ready-to-eat and ready-to-heat fresh-prepared foods in both its standard format (10,000 square-foot) grocery markets and in its smaller (3,000 square-foot) Fresh & Easy Express stores, five of which have been opened to date, all in Southern California.
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| A view from the Pacific Coast Highway of the My Fit Foods store. |
A Fresh & Easy Buzz correspondent has been monitoring the progress of the planned My Fit Foods store at 1025 Pacific Coast Highway since early January 2012. Three weeks ago the sign depicted in the photograph at top wasn't on the building's facade, for example.
No date has yet been set for the store's opening, according to our sources. But a sign on the building says it's "opening soon." The building's renovation has been steadily progressing over the last few weeks and looks to be nearly completed.
My Fit Foods hasn't publicly announced the planned location or the store's opening date.
My Fit Foods, which describes itself as a healthy, fresh, pre-packaged takeout meal company and retailer, is currently hiring "front of the house" employees (store clerks) for both its first store in Hermosa Beach and the second unit in Torrance. Starting pay is $10 hour. The retailer also hires what it calls nutritional consultants for each store.
Texas-based My Fit Foods offers a variety of healthy fresh-prepared meals, side dishes, breakfast foods and snacks for takeout.
The foods are prepared in the company's corporate kitchens - and in some cases in-store - then packaged for sale in the stores.
The fresh-made foods, 95% of which the company says are gluten-free, are prepared using lean protein, are low in carbohydrates, and contain heart healthy fats. There are currently about 60 items on the menu, with more being added regularly.
In addition to the fresh-prepared foods, The retailer offers a line of vitamins and nutritional supplements under the My Fit Foods' brand, which is sells in the stores. The vitamins and supplements are part of the overall healthy foods/healthy eating/healthy lifestyle niche the company is focused on.
Besides the standard storefront retailing of the fresh-prepared foods, My Fit Foods also offers shoppers various customized healthy meal plans which they can sign up for, letting the company do the meal planning and food preparation for them. Among those plans is what My Fit Foods' calls its "21-Day Challenge," a three-week, five-meal-a-day program it says will start consumers on the road to healthier eating and better nutrition.
Shoppers can also order the fresh-prepared meals and other foods online, for pickup at the stores.
My Fit Foods recently launched what it calls a corporate wellness division, through which it's offering to provide healthy eating and nutritional benefits to companies, using its fresh-prepared food products as the centerpiece of the program.
The fresh-prepared foods retailer - it currently has about 34-stores in four cities in Texas and recently opened its first store in Arizona (in Scottsdale) and has plans to launch into Nevada, Utah, Idaho and Oklahoma in addition to California - operates on a mixed corporate-owned/franchise model. The majority of the stores are owned by independent operators. The company provides the culinary/product development and the prepared foods, along with merchandising, marketing and other services under the joint-venture arrangement.
In addition to the franchised standalone stores, My Fit Foods is also pursuing the supermarket channel as a source of distribution for its fresh-prepared foods - but not in the traditional on-the-shelf manner.
Instead, the fresh-prepared foods' retailer has a deal with Texas-based supermarket chain H-E-B to put "My Fit Foods" healthy meal kiosks in selected stores. At present H-E-B is testing the kiosks in about eight supermarkets in Texas.
The supermarket kiosk concept is something My Fit Foods is interested in expanding into California, Nevada, Arizona and elsewhere where it plans to launch, signing up a chain in each region to test with like it's doing with H-E-B in Texas.
The fresh-prepared foods retailer's focus at present in the Golden State is Southern California. But its also interesting in opening stores in Northern California.
In Nevada the initial market region focus is metro Las Vegas. In Arizona it's the Phoenix metropolitan region.
Tesco's Fresh & Easy has its 182 stores in California (138 units), Arizona (24 units) and Nevada (20 units).
Houston-based My Fit Foods was founded in 2006 by certified nutritionist-entrepreneur Mario Mendias, who also spent 19-years' working as a personal trainer before starting the company.
In 2007 Mendias partnered with restaurant industry veteran Anthony Milton, and the two partners and majority-owners launched My Fit Foods as a fresh-prepared foods' retail chain, focused on healthy eating and nutrition.
In describing the start of My Fit Foods Mendias says: "No matter how much I preached to the clients I trained every week that 80% of your results, in regards to your health and fitness goals, are derived from what you are eating, what I found wasn't that they were not listening to me. It was simply that most people just didn’t have the time, knowledge or support to stay consistent with a clean and healthy diet. So, it was simple to me, I decided to do all the healthy cooking for them, and My Fit Foods was born out of my tiny apartment kitchen on Memorial drive in Houston, Texas."
Founder Mendias says his plans are to grow the fresh-prepared foods chain throughout the western U.S., after having what he says is a good reception in Texas.
My Fit Foods is fairly aggressive from a promotional standpoint in Texas. For example, the fresh-prepared foods retailer uses its Facebook page regularly, promoting the stores, its fresh-prepared foods, and holding contests and other promotional activities aimed at customers and potential new customers alike.
Additionally, My Fit Foods, which has as its motto, "Eat Fit. Live Fit, just went live today with a redesigned website.
There's no shortage of retailers of various formats offering prepared foods for takeout in Southern California, including those offering healthy options - grocers, mass-merchandisers, club stores, convenience stores, food kiosks, restaurants, food trucks and others.
The franchise model My Fit Foods works on though could help it in competing in the food mecca that is Southern California because under such a system the independent owner-operators share in the financial investment, bearing most of the upfront costs, while the company earns an income stream from providing the concept, culinary development, food, merchandising and marketing to the franchise owners.
But the independent owner-operators' success (or failure) is My Fit Foods' success (or failure) as well, so its a symbiotic relationship, both operationally and financially.
My Fit Foods' ready-to-eat and ready-to-heat takeout foods appear to be popular in the four cities in Texas where it has its stores - Houston, Dallas, Austin and San Antonio - based on conversations we've had with customers of some of those stores.
Much of the success of the stores also depends on how strong of a relationship the owner-operators build with customers and potential customers, something independents can be good at when they have their own money on the line. Key to that is also the quality of support they get from the corporate folks.
My Fit Foods wants to open numerous stores throughout Southern California, as well as move into Northern California, using the model it's been following in Texas since 2007, which is to focus on cities and neighborhoods that best fit the healthy, upscale takeout foods' customer demographic and lifestyle.
The company is also in a major growth phase, which is why its expanding into California, Nevada, Arizona, Utah and Oklahoma, according to founder Mendias.
Related Stories
January 10, 2012: Welcome to the (Eclectic) Neighborhood: Second of Seven Fresh & Easy Express Stores Opens Tomorrow in Hermosa Beach, California
December 20, 2012: Hermosa Beach, California Fresh & Easy Express Taking Shape For January 11, 2012 Opening
December 13, 2011: Welcome to the (Eclectic) Neighborhood: Hermosa Beach, California Fresh & Easy Express Set to Open Jan. 11, 2012
Also see this link, fresh prepared foods merchandising, for additional related stories.
Wednesday, February 8, 2012
Ellen DeGeneres 'Goes Bananas' At A Fresh & Easy Store in Burbank
On Sunday, February 5 we reported (see the story and photos below on the blog or here) on the new "Scan As You Shop" hand-held customer scanning system Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market is testing at its store at Olive and Verdugo in Burbank, California.
Our reporting included a visit to the grocery market last week.
But today the Burbank Fresh & Easy store had a much more famous visitor - at least by proxy.
Television talk show host Ellen DeGeneres sent her writer, Amy Rhodes, to the Burbank Fresh & Easy market, where she posed as the produce manager, for the "Hidden Camera Pranks" segment of the show.
Hidden cameras were placed throughout the store, and the writer, who Ellen sends out on various adventures, was equipped with a hidden earpiece in her ear, which allowed the comedian and talk show maven to interact with customers by instructing her - like trying to convince customers to purchase bananas, for example - through the earpiece, as you'll see in the video of the segment at top.
By the way, that's one of the "Scan As You Shop" units the customer in the produce department is holding and using at the start of the video segment.
Sunday, February 5, 2012
Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Testing 'Scan As You Shop' Mobile Self-Checkout System at Burbank Store
Breaking Buzz & Analysis
El Segundo, California-based Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market is following the lead of parent company Tesco and testing a version of the United Kingdom-based retailer's mobile self-scanning system at its store at Olive and Verdugo in Burbank, California.
The "Scan As You Shop" mobile self-scanning system being tested at the Burbank Fresh & Easy store is similar to those used by a few U.S. grocery chain's, like Stop & Shop on the east coast (in about 350 of its 375 stores) and Belgium-based Delhaize Group's Bloom chain - which it said last month it's eliminating for lack of performance; converting 42 of the existing 49 Bloom stores to the Food Lion banner and closing the remaining seven units.
In addition to Tesco, Waitrose and Morrisons are two other supermarket chains in the United Kingdom that offer mobile hand-held scanners in some of their stores.
Fresh & Easy's system, from Motorola, features a hand-held scanner device (see above and below) which customers carry with them as they shop the store. Shoppers then scan the product codes on the items they purchase as they shop.
Once a customer completes his or her shopping trip, they then go to one of the two specially designated self-service checkout stands in the Burbank Fresh & Easy store for checkout.
Once at checkout, a store employee randomly checks a few of the items (currently six SKUs) the customer has scanned into the hand-held device in order to check for accuracy.
After the random security check is made, the customer then completes the checkout process. Since the purchases are already scanned into the hand-held device, all that's required is for the shopper to tally the items on the device and make payment at the register.
The "Scan As You Shop" system allows shoppers to keep real time track of their purchases as they shop.
It's also compatible with Fresh & Easy's "Friends" loyalty/rewards card.
Tesco-UK tested "Scan As You Shop" for six months, from spring to the fall of 2010, at a store in Rumford, UK. It's expanded the system into some additional stores in the UK since then.
If the test at the Burbank Fresh & Easy store is a success as defined by Tesco, plans are to expand the "Scan As You Shop" system to additional stores, according to our sources.
Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market has not publicly announced it's testing the hand-held mobile self-scanning system at its Burbank store. The test was just recently launched.
According to sources, the grocery chain has hopes the "Scan As You Shop" system will result in customers purchasing more items in the stores (at least at the Burbank test store to start) because shoppers are able to tally their purchases as they shop, resulting in higher average market basket sizes (shoppers buying more per-store-visit than they currently are doing) at the Fresh & Easy stores, which is something the grocery chain needs to achieve, as we've discussed in depth in the blog, but hasn't been able to achieve in a significant enough way to help it break-even financially to date.
This hope that the "Scan As You Shop" system being tested in the Burbank store could lead to higher average market basket purchases was discussed at Fresh & Easy's weekly meeting at its corporate offices in El Segundo, California last Wednesday, in fact.
There's no hard evidence out there though, based on our experience and research, that such mobile self-scanning systems result in encouraging shoppers to purchase more per shopping trip. In fact, there's actually some evidence to suggest the opposite can occur, which is that because shoppers are able to keep a real time tally of their purchases as they shop, it better enables them to hold purchases to a set amount, even putting items back that exceed that desired total spend. Therefore, impulse purchases could be reduced.
Fresh & Easy's senior management, led by CEO Tim Mason, also have as a goal with the "Scan As You Shop" system the speeding up of the checkout process in the Fresh & Easy stores, according to our sources.
This is a bit odd since Mason and Fresh & Easy's spokesperson have been saying since the first Fresh & Easy stores opened in November 2007 that one of the hallmarks of the chain's self-service checkout system is that it allows for faster customer checkout than conventional full-service checkout, which is offered by all of Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market's competitors in California, Nevada and Arizona. Some of those competitors also offer self-service as an option, along with full-service checkout, in some of their stores.
Additionally, as a source with extensive experience working for Tesco's Fresh & Easy points out, the Fresh & Easy stores have only 10,000 square-feet of selling space (there are four 3,000 square-foot "Express" format stores and a handful of 7,000 square-foot stores) and eight grocery aisles, so: "How much time can you really save with 'Scan As You Shop,'" over the current time it takes to checkout in the stores, the source says. " They're (Fresh & Easy) not Costco, with people filling their carts to the brim," he adds.
The source points to another high-tech project, called Agora, that Fresh & Easy spent a considerable amount of effort and money on but hasn't in his analysis (and in ours) provided any tangible benefits to the fledgling Tesco-owned chain.
"I see 'Scan As You Shop' as "another wasteful project, like one called Agora, a triangulation program for users with an IPhone or Android phone, where you download an app for your phone and upload the floor plan of your store, then you can see where you are," he says. "You can also type in, for example, 'rice' and see what's the best path to get to the shelf with rice. But again, F&E only has 8 aisles, how lost can people get?"
He adds: "To do this project (Agora), you'll need 3 detection devices, an app, a specific map of the store and all the SRD (Space Range and Display) plan for the store real time for the consumers. They've piloted this project in the Manhattan Beach store. It seems like a waste of resources to me," the source says by way of comparing the 'Scan As You Shop' effort to it.
"With so much focus on all these special technology projects, I think UK and Tim [CEO Mason] have lost focus on the issue at hand," the experienced Fresh & Easy employee says. "They don't need cool tech to help people - they just need more people and sales. They don't need Agora or 'Scan As You Shop'. They just need someone to fix GO (Group Ordering - written in the UK) so that their just-in-time supply chain doesn't screw up. They need better quality assurance in the fresh dept and for the suppliers," the source says.
Mobile self-scanning systems offer potential benefits for shoppers who choose to use them however, such as having the ability to keep that running tally of what they purchase.
Some systems also include the ability to pay for purchases via smart phone. The test system at Fresh & Easy doesn't offer that feature at present.
But the benefits of the systems for grocers depends on the specific chain and where it's at from a development and financial standpoint.
In terms of time savings, a mobile self-scanning system can perhaps achieve that in a store where checkout is full service, although full-service is often actually much faster than customer self-service. But since the Fresh & Easy stores have self-service checkout only, which means customers unload, scan and bag their purchases at the checkstand anyway, it's hard to see where any meaningful time-savings will be achieved with the "Scan As You Shop" system.
Instead, what occurs is better explained as customer-labor shifting - rather than the customer scanning and bagging at the checkout, they do so while shopping.
It takes essentially the same amount of time to scan and bag while shopping as it does to do it at the checkout though. The only time-savings we can see with the system at Fresh & Easy is if all of the self-checkout lanes in the store have lines, something seldom seen in a Fresh & Easy store, at which point it might be faster using "Scan As You Shop" because the two specially-designated checkout lanes might move faster than the regular self-service lanes, assuming customers are lined up at them waiting to checkout.
It takes essentially the same amount of time to scan and bag while shopping as it does to do it at the checkout though. The only time-savings we can see with the system at Fresh & Easy is if all of the self-checkout lanes in the store have lines, something seldom seen in a Fresh & Easy store, at which point it might be faster using "Scan As You Shop" because the two specially-designated checkout lanes might move faster than the regular self-service lanes, assuming customers are lined up at them waiting to checkout.
Christopher Luna-Vasquez, a customer who used "Scan As You Shop" for the first time today at the Burbank Fresh & Easy store, told Fresh & Easy Buzz he likes the mobile self-scanning system for just that reason - that it allowed him to track his purchases in real time while shopping - and that it was faster for him than using Fresh & Easy's regular self-checkout system.
Whether or not there are enough fans of the "Scan As You Shop" system at the Fresh & Easy store, like Luna-Vasquez, is yet to be seen. But that's what tests are for, as long as they aren't biased tests.
In our analysis, testing the "Scan As You Shop" system at one store is fine. However, on a priority scale of 1-to-10, it doesn't even register in terms of where Fresh & Easy should be focusing it's efforts as a grocery chain, in our analysis.
That job one focus needs to be on the basics of foods and grocery retailing, which we aren't seeing being done in El Segundo, although we do see it being done by workers at store-level, despite a number of limitations placed on them by policies coming out of the home office.
[Photo credits: Christopher Luna-Vasquez and Rafael Luna-Vasquez, special for Fresh & Easy Buzz. Taken February 5, 2011 at Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market, Olive and Verdugo, Burbank, California.]
Tuesday, January 10, 2012
Welcome to the (Eclectic) Neighborhood: Second of Seven Fresh & Easy Express Stores Opens Tomorrow in Hermosa Beach, California
Retail Ethnography - Bright Lights, Eclectic Neighborhood: Welcome to the Neon Fresh & Easy Express
Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market is set to open its second 'Express' format store - 3,000 square-feet of selling space, with an edited and limited assortment of the products it offers in its 10,000 square-foot grocery markets - at Pacific Coast Highway (PCH) and 8th Street in the coastal Southern California city of Hermosa Beach tomorrow morning.
We've been chronicling in words and pictures the creation of the soon-to-open Fresh & Easy Express store in what we've termed the eclectic Hermosa Beach neighborhood since December 13, 2011, when we published this piece - Welcome to the (Eclectic) Neighborhood: Hermosa Beach, California Fresh & Easy Express Set to Open Jan. 11, 2012 - which was the first story in our "Welcome to the (Eclectic) Neighborhood" trilogy.
A week later we updated you on how the Fresh & Easy Express store was 'doing' in the neighborhood, offering Part II of our "Welcome to the (Eclectic) Neighborhood" Hermosa Beach Fresh & Easy Express chronicles in words and pictures in this December 20, 2011 piece: Hermosa Beach, California Fresh & Easy Express Taking Shape For January 11, 2012 Opening.
The Christmas and New Year holidays have now come and gone and the Hermosa Beach Fresh & Easy Express store is set to be welcomed to the neighborhood tomorrow morning at 10 a.m, when the doors to the micro-small-format grocery market are opened.
Tonight a crew of Fresh & Easy employees are in the Fresh & Easy Express store preparing for tomorrow's grand opening.
The new neon sign on the front of the store is burning bright, as are the lights inside the store. The shelves are stocked but getting a touch up and facing, all in preparation for tomorrow's opening.
The Hermosa Beach, California fresh food and grocery market, which we've nicknamed the "Neon Fresh & Easy Express," will be the second 'Express' format store to be opened by the grocer.
The first Fresh & Easy Express market, at La Cienega Boulevard and 18th Street in Los Angeles, opened on November 2, 2011.
Tesco's Fresh & Easy plans to have seven of the small food and grocery markets, all located in Southern California, opened by the end of March 2012.
The next Fresh & Easy Express store set to open is the unit at Victory Boulevard and Buena Vista Street in Burbank, California. The store's opening date is set for one week from tomorrow, Wednesday, January 18. (You can see photographs of the Burbank Fresh & Easy Express store's construction in progress here.)
Tesco is hoping the new, 3,000 square-foot Fresh & Easy Express format stores will play a major role in its efforts to break-even with its Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market chain in America, which is now four-plus years old and continues to lose a significant amount of money for the United Kingdom-based global retailer, which has operations in 14 countries and is the third-largest food, grocery and general merchandise retailer in the world.
The opening of the 'Express' store in Hermosa Beach tomorrow comes on the heels of an announcement Tesco's Fresh & Easy made late Monday (January 9, 2012) that it's closing 12 underperforming Fresh & Easy grocery markets, a story we broke on Sunday (see here) in Fresh & Easy Buzz, and followed up on Monday (see here), with a second story in which we listed the locations of the 12 stores the grocer is closing, along with reporting on the internal announcement about the store closings made to company employees by Tim Mason, CEO of Fresh & Easy and group deputy CEO of Tesco.
Mason made the announcement via an e-mail to selected employees of Fresh & Easy just a short time before we published our report on Monday. Following the publication of our story on Sunday and our follow up piece early Monday afternoon, in which we reported the stores to be closed, Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market made the announcement of the store closures, although initial plans called for it to make the Wednesday.
One of the reasons Tesco CEO Philip Clarke and Mason are working hard to get the first seven Fresh & Easy Express stores opened before the end of March is because they hope the 3,000 square-foot grocery markets will perform well, and therefore help provide a key to breaking even financially with Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market by the end of Tesco's 2012/13 fiscal year, which begins in February of this year and ends in February 2012. This is something Clarke, who took over as CEO of Tesco in March 2011, says will happen.
Tesco will report the results of its 2011/12 fiscal year, which ends in February, in April of this year. Tesco reported a half-fiscal year loss of $112 million for Fresh & Easy earlier this year, on sales of $470 million.
The loss is 23% less than Tesco reported for Fresh & Easy for the same period a year earlier but still remains substantial. As we reported Sunday, the closing of the 12 underperforming Fresh & Easy stores is part of Tesco's strategy to achieve break-even with the chain by the end of the 2012/13 fiscal year.
But tonight, on opening eve, all eyes are on the "Neon Fresh & Easy Express, the soon-to-be-opened store on a busy stretch of the Pacific Coast Highway in the the eclectic neighborhood in Hermosa Beach, California.
And come tomorrow, the new Fresh & Easy Express store with its bright neon sign will join Learned Lumber, Sassy's, The Tendor Box and numerous other retail stores in the eclectic coastal Hermosa Beach, California neighborhood, each one offering what it offers to the eclectic mix of residents who live there.
Welcome to the (eclectic) neighborhood, neon sign and all.
[Related Stories: Read our extensive coverage and analysis of Fresh & Easy Express, including our story that broke the news on the retailer's plans to launch the format, here.]
[Editor's Note: All photographs credit Fresh & Easy Buzz, 01/10/2012.]
Tuesday, December 20, 2011
Hermosa Beach, California Fresh & Easy Express Taking Shape For January 11, 2012 Opening
Retail Ethnography - Welcome to the (Eclectic) Neighborhood
A week ago today we wrote and published this story - December 13, 2011: Welcome to the (Eclectic) Neighborhood: Hermosa Beach, California Fresh & Easy Express Set to Open Jan. 11, 2012 - about the Fresh & Easy Express store Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market is preparing to open in early January 2012.
In the story we reported that El Segundo, California-based Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market plans to open what is calls internally the "F3 store" on January 11, 2012.
The Fresh & Easy Express stores have about 3,000 square-feet of selling space in what is about 4,000 square-feet of interior space, hence the "F3 store" moniker. The standard stores are called F10's because they have 10,000 square-feet of selling space.
The grocery chain hasn't announced the opening date of the Hermosa Beach Fresh & Easy Express store, or the dates of any other stores it plans to open in January 2012.
Since our story came out last Tuesday, Tesco's Fresh & Easy has made considerable progress on the 'Express' store, which is located on Pacific Coast Highway (PCH) and 8th Street in Hermosa Beach.
For example, as you can see in the photograph at top taken Monday, December 19, the exterior of the building, which previously housed a furniture store called Mortise & Tenon, now sports two new signs - the vertical sign directing shoppers to the store's parking lot on 8th Street and the Fresh & Easy signage on the building's facade.
If you take a look at the second photo at top, which is from our December 13 story, you'll see that the two signs weren't on the future Fresh & Easy Express store.
The vertical Fresh & Easy Express sign (see top photo) directing shoppers to the parking lot on 8th Street replaced the old Mortsie & Tenon furniture store sign (see second photo at top).
The Hermosa Beach unit is one of four Fresh & Easy Express stores the grocer plans so far to open in early 2012, all in Southern California.
The other three units are: Los Angeles (Figueroa Street and Jefferson Boulevard); Burbank (Victory Boulevard and Buena Vista); and Laguna Niguel (Crown Valley Parkway and Golden.)
The first Fresh & Easy Express store opened November 2, 2011 in Los Angeles See the November 1 and 2, 2011 stories linked at the end of this piece for details and photographs.
On November 15, 2011 Fresh & Easy Market announced via a press release that it plans to open 20-plus new stores in early 2012.
The Tesco-owned fresh food and grocery chain didn't and hasn't announce the specific locations of the stores, mentioning just the cities the grocery markets will be located in.
However, through our reporting and research we've identified the addresses of the 20-plus stores, which we published in this story on November 15: Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market to Open 20-Plus New Stores in Early 2012 - We Have What's Not in the Press Release.
Tesco's Fresh & Easy will close out 2011 with 184 stores in California (135 stores), Arizona (28 units) and Nevada (21 units.)
Of the 135 grocery markets located in California, 105 units are in Southern California. There are 14 stores, seven units each in metro Bakersfield and metro Fresno, in the mid-to-southern Central Valley, and 16 stores in Northern California.
Tesco has opened 29 new Fresh & Easy stores in calendar year 2011. No new store openings are planned the the remainder of the year.
The Hermosa Beach Fresh & Easy Express store is slated to open in three weeks. Stay tuned.
Related Stories
December 13, 2011: Welcome to the (Eclectic) Neighborhood: Hermosa Beach, California Fresh & Easy Express Set to Open Jan. 11, 2012
November 23, 2011: Tesco and its Fresh & Easy Chain Hoping 'Seven' is the Lucky Number For 'Fresh & Easy Express'
November 2, 2011: Open in Los Angeles: A Look at the First 'Fresh & Easy Express' Store
November 1, 2011: Analysis: Tesco Opens First 'Fresh & Easy Express' Store Tomorrow in Los Angeles ... So What ... ?
July 30, 2011: First 4,000 Sq. Ft. Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market 'Express' Store Set to Open in Los Angeles' San Pedro Community This Year
January 23, 2011: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Looking For Locations For New, Smaller-Format 4,000-to-5,000 Square-Foot Stores
Tuesday, December 13, 2011
Welcome to the (Eclectic) Neighborhood: Hermosa Beach, California Fresh & Easy Express Set to Open Jan. 11, 2012
Retail Ethnography
Welcome to the neighborhood.
Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market plans to open its micro-small-format (3,000 square-feet) Fresh & Easy Express fresh food and grocery store (pictured at top) at Pacific Coast Highway (PCH) and 8th Street on an eclectic commercial block in Hermosa Beach, California on January 11 2012, according to the banner (below) the grocer recently put on the exterior of the vacant building being renovated to house the store.
And an eclectic block it is - particularly the three retail stores that will be neighbors of the Fresh & Easy Express market when it opens in less than a month.
Sharing the block fronting the PCH and across 8th Street are three stores: Sassy's, The Tender Box and Learned Lumber.
The last business, Learned Lumber, is self-explanatory - it's a lumber yard.
But the other two, Sassy's and The Tender Box, are nearly impossible to discern from just the names of the stores.
Venture a guess what type or format of stores they are, without looking a the photos?, of course
Fortunately you don't have to guess, that's what we're here for - to go out in the field and report, and then inform.
Sassy's (at left, above), which is located next to The Tender Box (at right, above) and is a mere baguette's throw from the future Fresh & Easy Express store, is a adult lingerie and costume shop, featuring everything for a night at home (lingerie), a special night out (adult costumes) or a mix of both in the same evening.
If you're thinking The Tender Box might be, say, a tobacco shop, think again. And when trying to guess, think about its proximity next door to Sassy's.
Give up?
Well, and remember we're merely the messenger, The Tender Box specializes in adult entertainment and toys, and we aren't referring to consumer electronics, although some of the inventory for sale in The Tender Box does require batteries to use.
Unique business names seems to be the norm for the block.
For example, the vacant 4,000 or so square-foot building (pictured below) Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market is putting the 'Express' market in previously housed a furniture store named Mortise & Tenon. For those not familiar with the term mortise & tenon, it is a type of joint used in wood working, such as in furniture-making. The store will have about 3,000 square-feet of selling space.
All four of the stores - Fresh & Easy Express, the lumber yard, Sassy's and The Tender Box are on the west side of the PCH. Learned Lumber and Fresh & Easy Express are next to one another on 8th Street, while Sassy's and The Tender Box are next to one another across 8th Street.
And yes, no need to ask - Learned Lumber does sell plenty of "hardwood," and the now gone furniture store - which the Fresh & Easy Express is replacing - also offered various items made out of that particular variety of lumber back in its day on the block.
The eclectic nature of the businesses on the block shared with the soon-to-open Fresh & Easy Express store actually are a pretty good depiction of the Hermosa Beach neighborhood itself, which is, well ... eclectic.
The demographic is mostly young. But there are also a number of older, long-term residents in the area, including a few folks who still call themselves hippies.
It's also fairly bohemian or hipster if you're looking for a lifestyle generalization.
There are also numerous singles and young couples in the neighborhood, which is highly dense and filled with apartment complexes and condominiums.
Our four-plus years of research and reporting on Tesco's Fresh & Easy shows younger people, those about 35 and under, as well as singles, tend to be the demographic that thus far has taken to the Fresh & Easy format the most, from a demographic and lifestyle perspective.
Therefore, the demographic and lifestyle composition of the neighborhood could bode well for the Fresh & Easy Express, which is essentially a smaller - about 3,000 square-feet, as compared to 10,000 square-feet - and edited - about 2,500-2,700 SKUs, as compared to about 5,500 SKUs - version of the 10,000 square-foot standard-version Fresh & Easy stores.
The area isn't an inexpensive place to live however.
Housing costs and rents in Hermosa Beach are a bit less than is the case in nearby Manhattan Beach (where Fresh & Easy has a store), for example.
But Hermosa Beach is only affordable from the perspective of what people living in coastal Southern California consider "affordable" to be. As an example, If you're reading this and renting a two bedroom apartment in metro Phoenix, Arizona (or some place similar), multiply what you're paying by a factor of around three.
What the neighborhood doesn't have much of is foot-traffic. Rather, the traffic in and around the block where the future Fresh & Easy Express store will open at Pacific Coast Highway and 8th Street, on January 8, 2012, is mostly automotive.
The 'Express' market will front the PCH, as you can see in the photo above. But there's also an entrance on 8th Street, where there's a small parking lot, pictured below.
There's no on-street parking to speak of either on 8th Street (a few spaces on one side of the street is all) or on the PCH. Therefore, the small parking lot next to the Fresh & Easy Express store on 8th Street is about it on what is a very auto-traffic heavy block.
These same tight space conditions might also make food and grocery deliveries to the 'Express' store a bit of a challenge. The earlier in the morning the better would probably be a good move.
The Hermosa Beach neighborhood isn't a food desert.
There's a Ralphs' Fresh Fare supermarket, for example, along with a big CVS Pharmacy drug store, which has a large selection of groceries, perishables and frozen foods (and liquor, beer and wine) but no fresh foods like meat or produce, and a 7-Eleven convenience store, all a couple to a few minutes drive from the Fresh & Easy Express location at Pacific Coast Highway and 8th Street.
Additionally, there's a Whole Foods Market store about 10 minutes away by car from Pacific Coast Highway and 8th Street, along with a couple other grocery stores a 10-15 minute drive away.
The Hermosa Beach Fresh & Easy Express set to open January 11 is one of four 'Express' format stores Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market plans to open in early 2012, as we reported and detailed in this story on November 15, 2011: Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market to Open 20-Plus New Stores in Early 2012 - We Have What's Not in the Press Release.
The other three Fresh & Easy Express stores with planned early 2012 openings are in Los Angeles, Burbank and Laguna Niguel. The addresses of those stores are in the story linked above.
Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market opened its first 'Express' store at La Cienega Boulevard and 18th Street in Los Angeles November 2, 2011.It's the only Fresh & Easy Express unit currently open.
In addition to the La Cienega store, we've identified the addresses of six more future Fresh & Easy Express stores - the three noted earlier set for early 2012 openings, plus two more, which we listed in this November 23, 2011 story: Tesco and its Fresh & Easy Chain Hoping 'Seven' is the Lucky Number For 'Fresh & Easy Express.'
There are also photographs of the Burbank Fresh & Easy Express, construction in progress, in the November 23 piece.
Back at Pacific Coast Highway and 8th Street, where the Fresh & Easy Express store will soon open in the former furniture store building, we don't see a whole lot of retail synergy coming to the grocery market from its immediate neighbors - Sassy's, The Tender Box and Learned Lumber - although one can imagine that after spending time shopping in any or all three of the stores one might have worked up a bit of a thirst or hunger.
Conversely, we doubt if the Fresh & Easy Express will bring much new business to Sassy's, The Tendor Box and Learned Lumber, since all three stores tend to be what retail experts call destination stores.
The lumber yard, for example, tends to deal primarily with contractors and local handymen rather than off the street trade, although its probable that after loading a truck with lumbar a contractor might venture over the the Fresh & Easy Express for a bite to eat and a beverage.
And we could be completely wrong about synergies in the case of Sassy's and the Tender Box. Both stores cater to women as well as men, for example - and it is a fact women shop for groceries at a much higher percentage than men do. So perhaps the close proximity of the three stores will lead to a bit of synergy for the two stores plus the Fresh & Easy Express.
But, in a less tongue-in-cheek analysis, based on the demographics of the neighborhood, the potential for the Fresh & Easy Express store doing well in the area is fairly high. For example, the large selection of ready-to-eat and ready-to-heat fresh-prepared foods available in the "Express' format stores should be particularly popular with the young and single residents in the Hermosa Beach neighborhood.
Conversely, the major drawback for the Fresh & Easy Express store at Pacific Coast Highway and 8th Street in Hermosa Beach is the lack of adequate parking. The nearby Ralphs, CVS drug store, 7-Eleven and Whole Foods Market store all have large parking lots, for example. And since the neighborhood is high on auto transit and low on foot-traffic, having adequate parking is a very important variable.
But Fresh & Easy Express is a eclectic little store - its small but stocked with plenty of ready-to-eat and heat foods; has an in-store bakery; offers an assortment of groceries, perishables, frozen foods and non-foods items; sells beer and wine; and serves fresh coffee by the cup - and the commercial strip where it's located on Pacific Coast Highway and 8th Street offers an eclectic mix of retail, to say the least. So perhaps the little grocery store will fit right in, sharing the block with Sassy's, The Tender Box and Learned Lumber, in a Hermosa Beach bohemian kind of way.
[Editor's Note: Photo Credit - Fresh & Easy Buzz. The photographs were taken by a Fresh & Easy Buzz correspondent on 12/07/11. Click on the photos to enlarge.]
Related Stories
November 23, 2011: Tesco and its Fresh & Easy Chain Hoping 'Seven' is the Lucky Number For 'Fresh & Easy Express'
November 2, 2011: Open in Los Angeles: A Look at the First 'Fresh & Easy Express' Store
November 1, 2011: Analysis: Tesco Opens First 'Fresh & Easy Express' Store Tomorrow in Los Angeles ... So What ... ?
July 30, 2011: First 4,000 Sq. Ft. Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market 'Express' Store Set to Open in Los Angeles' San Pedro Community This Year
January 23, 2011: Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Looking For Locations For New, Smaller-Format 4,000-to-5,000 Square-Foot Stores
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