This year’s Love British Food Fortnight coincides with London 2012- from the 27th July to 12th August and is your chance to shout about everything British in your store.
Hot tips for retailers on how to maximise sales during Love British Food Fortnight and boost your profits!
1. Increase your stock of British food
- Look at your existing stock. Is any of it British? If it is, shout about it- just because you know that the food and drink you stock is British, don’t assume that your customers do!
- Expand the range of regional food that you stock. British Food Fortnight is a good time to launch new products. 84% of new lines of food and drink stocked for British Food Fortnight promotions are continued afterwards.
2. Highlight British Produce
- Use POS material using the British Food Fortnight logo or a Union Jack.
- Rather than just use the term ‘local’, be more specific. If you are unable to specify producers or farms by name then use generic phrases such as ‘All the meat sold comes from within 30 miles of this shop.’
- Create a display of British food so that customers can see the British products available when they walk in.
3. Offer tastings to promote British food
- Run an in-store promotion or tasting. This could be a tasting of new or existing products in your shop and something that could be taken to the street to encourage custom.
- Cross-sell. If you organise a tasting for regional cheeses then match these with different chutneys or cheese biscuits.
- Invite producers into your shop. Retailers report that sales of products offered for tasting double when the producer is in-store.
- Position a board either in your window or outside the store telling customers which
products are being tasted.
4. Use British Food Fortnight as a catalyst for building long-term opportunities
- Start small but think big! A greengrocer in West Yorkshire delivered fruit and veg to schools and gave pupils talks during British Food Fortnight. He has since won a three year contract to supply fruit and veg to 30 schools in the area.
- Launch a healthy lunch box service for school children, regional food hampers for tourists, special occasion hampers for presents or seasonal packed lunches
for office workers to grab on their way to work.
Read more about Love British Food Fortnight.
