January 11, 2008
Tesco Encourages Convenient Dieting
By Bernice Hurst, Managing Director, Fine Food Network
In an effort to encourage customers to spend their dieting dollars (or to lose bodily and monetary pounds as may be more relevant in the UK) on Tesco products, the supermarket has linked up with website ediets.com in a New Year’s promotion.
According to The Times, “Britain’s biggest supermarket chain has splashed out £2.5m on an overhaul of its Healthy Living range and the introduction of a new brand, Light Choices, aimed at dieters” – apparently its biggest investment in healthy eating products for more than two decades, Tesco is supporting its new lines with an updated health website and “a new online Healthy Living tracker that gives targeted, detailed advice on diet to shoppers.”
According to the website, “Light Choices is a great new addition to the Tesco food range for dieters who don’t want to compromise on choice or taste. All products meet strict criteria for sugar, saturates, salt and calories and either less than three percent fat or half the fat of a comparable product.”
Customers wanting to determine which diet is best for them, link through to ediets and complete a profile which takes them to a choice of ten featured meal plans and eleven healthy living plans.
Deciding to choose one of the plans, at a cost of £2.99 per week, entitles shoppers to a personalized weekly meal plan and shopping list, weigh-in, access to nutritionists, motivational team and other dieters.
Carolyn Bradley, commercial director responsible for the project, explained that today’s consumers equate healthy eating with preventing disease by positively choosing foods such as broccoli or oily fish rich in omega 3 acids. The Healthy Living range will therefore focus on balanced meals and will contain many natural foods. The new Light Choices range will be targeted more at those just wanting to lose weight and will include lighter versions of favorite foods to allow managed indulgence.
Tesco has also decided to introduce a 30-minute, four-in-one health-check service at some of its stores’ pharmacies. The tests will look at weight management, blood pressure and cholesterol as well as diabetes screening.
Discussion questions: Do you think supermarkets in the U.S. should be much more heavily involved in encouraging shoppers to think more about what they buy and eat? Are there opportunities for retailers in the U.S. to create a point of difference with a program similar in nature to what Tesco is doing with ediets? Do programs such as this create loyal customers?
[Author’s comment] At about the same time Tesco launched its healthy living and diet programs, journalist Martin Hickman was writing about an investigation by television program Dispatches that reveals confusion and frequent inaccuracies on the labels of ready meals, convenience and processed foods. Researchers also claim that some products promoted as premium and healthy often contain more of the dreaded fat, salt and sugar than economy ranges. As Mr. Hickman put it, “Dispatches found that own-brand ready meals in supermarkets with names such as ‘Healthy Living’ or ‘Be Good to Yourself’ were sometimes less healthy than cheaper, economy versions. In addition, some branded products promoted as healthy had more salt or sugar than junk food.”
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I think supermarkets should be focusing on selling products, not encouraging shoppers to change the way they eat. If a store sees this as a method for differentiation or otherwise increasing sales, that’s great. But they should not be doing it from some altruistic ideal–that’s not the business they are in.
They need to worry about pushback too–convincing a shopper to try a diet regimen that ends up not working can hurt the store (and how many diets actually work?).
Great marketing move. They have identified a hot button with consumers and are turning it into a marketing advantage.
Another great example of this is all of the companies who are now vying to be green. Same idea, and look how well it is working.
Encouraging healthy living is a smart choice for all parties involved but if the retailer wants to make a buck, then he/she needs to ‘drive’ the customer to make those choices. Even as simple a thing as putting up POP in the store would make a difference.
Because I love anything that has a plasma screen in it, I have to give major kudos to the organic guy down the street from me. He has plasma screens in high traffic areas that display new products and information for healthy living and he did it all by himself in PowerPoint. It looks incredible and you can actually see little crowds forming to watch the slides.
Customers are hungry for information and can make impulse decisions based on available information so really it is up to the retailer to take advantage of that.
Interesting. This might be one area where TESCO is not fully ahead of the curve.
1. In a recent GFK study of the American consumer, supermarkets came out second behind nutritional GURUS when asked “who is most trustworthy to recommend Health and Wellness products to the general consumer?” Manufacturers and Government were WAY down the list. So, done correctly, this can be a powerful loyalty building tool for the retailer.
2. It sounds like and looks like a relatively easy program to manage which is good for the consumer. If they can get advice and tracking tools with an easy to print product list to take to THEIR store they will stay interested.
3. A couple of Gotchas based on our experience:
TESCO is offering a set of products limited to their PL brands. While PL accounts for much more of the business in the UK, helping consumers with all of their choices offers a much more convenient and loyalty inducing program.
The web interface is a great tool, but even in the UK the use of the web isn’t ubiquitous. There needs to be an easy to understand program at-the-shelf to both serve customers who aren’t using the net, and to reinforce the web program at store.
Final note with regard to the label details. My experience is that most manufacturers are not trying to mislead, but that there are four or five very serious sources of product data issues in design and quality, that need to be overcome to serve the purposes to which it is now being put. That “trust” which the consumer has bestowed on their grocer can turn into a very different emotion when it is betrayed by data which doesn’t support the ratings or program.
I have to agree that stores should be focused on selling. I can see offering literature about things like where food comes from, prep and storage, basic caloric info about things on the peripheral aisles (produce/meat/bulk foods), and even recipes with complete nutrition info as part of differentiating themselves and marketing. I draw the line at teaming up with a diet site to promote info on diets for healthy eating for many reasons.
A shopper who needs to get started with information and a diet plan should seek the advice of a medical professional, not a website. A website endorsement from a store which people could view as a trusted source, might lead some shoppers down the wrong path.
And while I am all for people eating healthy, it’s not appropriate information for a store to give out–it’s really gimmicky. I also think it opens the store up for some liability issues they might not want to sustain.
Tesco is a progressive retailer capable of staying ahead of the curve and their reputation for innovation benefits from their practices. But many other food retailers do not seem prepared to be professors of Food Health 101. Nonetheless, every food retailer should promote good, healthy eating in their own fashion and seek whatever opportunities lay therein.
But are food retailers today expected to do too much beyond serving their customer efficiently and courteously with what they want, when they it, in a fresh condition and in clean stores, and at a fair price? Or should more be expected? Since we tend to criticize many food retailers regularly in this venue for not doing their basic multi-duties job well enough, do we really believe in their capacity to expand their service horizons? Some great retailers can–and they do.
Any USA grocer can call Weight Watchers and test an alliance program. Weight Watchers often have meetings at various workplaces, so I’m sure they’d be happy to test an alliance with a grocer. And the #1 most popular signup time for Weight Watchers is January. Furthermore, they have an online membership program, not just a meeting program. So the grocer doesn’t have to design the weight loss program from scratch.
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I think supermarkets should be focusing on selling products, not encouraging shoppers to change the way they eat. If a store sees this as a method for differentiation or otherwise increasing sales, that’s great. But they should not be doing it from some altruistic ideal–that’s not the business they are in.
They need to worry about pushback too–convincing a shopper to try a diet regimen that ends up not working can hurt the store (and how many diets actually work?).
Great marketing move. They have identified a hot button with consumers and are turning it into a marketing advantage.
Another great example of this is all of the companies who are now vying to be green. Same idea, and look how well it is working.
Encouraging healthy living is a smart choice for all parties involved but if the retailer wants to make a buck, then he/she needs to ‘drive’ the customer to make those choices. Even as simple a thing as putting up POP in the store would make a difference.
Because I love anything that has a plasma screen in it, I have to give major kudos to the organic guy down the street from me. He has plasma screens in high traffic areas that display new products and information for healthy living and he did it all by himself in PowerPoint. It looks incredible and you can actually see little crowds forming to watch the slides.
Customers are hungry for information and can make impulse decisions based on available information so really it is up to the retailer to take advantage of that.
Interesting. This might be one area where TESCO is not fully ahead of the curve.
1. In a recent GFK study of the American consumer, supermarkets came out second behind nutritional GURUS when asked “who is most trustworthy to recommend Health and Wellness products to the general consumer?” Manufacturers and Government were WAY down the list. So, done correctly, this can be a powerful loyalty building tool for the retailer.
2. It sounds like and looks like a relatively easy program to manage which is good for the consumer. If they can get advice and tracking tools with an easy to print product list to take to THEIR store they will stay interested.
3. A couple of Gotchas based on our experience:
TESCO is offering a set of products limited to their PL brands. While PL accounts for much more of the business in the UK, helping consumers with all of their choices offers a much more convenient and loyalty inducing program.
The web interface is a great tool, but even in the UK the use of the web isn’t ubiquitous. There needs to be an easy to understand program at-the-shelf to both serve customers who aren’t using the net, and to reinforce the web program at store.
Final note with regard to the label details. My experience is that most manufacturers are not trying to mislead, but that there are four or five very serious sources of product data issues in design and quality, that need to be overcome to serve the purposes to which it is now being put. That “trust” which the consumer has bestowed on their grocer can turn into a very different emotion when it is betrayed by data which doesn’t support the ratings or program.
I have to agree that stores should be focused on selling. I can see offering literature about things like where food comes from, prep and storage, basic caloric info about things on the peripheral aisles (produce/meat/bulk foods), and even recipes with complete nutrition info as part of differentiating themselves and marketing. I draw the line at teaming up with a diet site to promote info on diets for healthy eating for many reasons.
A shopper who needs to get started with information and a diet plan should seek the advice of a medical professional, not a website. A website endorsement from a store which people could view as a trusted source, might lead some shoppers down the wrong path.
And while I am all for people eating healthy, it’s not appropriate information for a store to give out–it’s really gimmicky. I also think it opens the store up for some liability issues they might not want to sustain.
Tesco is a progressive retailer capable of staying ahead of the curve and their reputation for innovation benefits from their practices. But many other food retailers do not seem prepared to be professors of Food Health 101. Nonetheless, every food retailer should promote good, healthy eating in their own fashion and seek whatever opportunities lay therein.
But are food retailers today expected to do too much beyond serving their customer efficiently and courteously with what they want, when they it, in a fresh condition and in clean stores, and at a fair price? Or should more be expected? Since we tend to criticize many food retailers regularly in this venue for not doing their basic multi-duties job well enough, do we really believe in their capacity to expand their service horizons? Some great retailers can–and they do.
Any USA grocer can call Weight Watchers and test an alliance program. Weight Watchers often have meetings at various workplaces, so I’m sure they’d be happy to test an alliance with a grocer. And the #1 most popular signup time for Weight Watchers is January. Furthermore, they have an online membership program, not just a meeting program. So the grocer doesn’t have to design the weight loss program from scratch.