In a partnership that is expected to deliver more than $1.5 million in annual shrink savings, Stillwater, Minnesota-based Cub Foods has implemented Upshop’s Expiration Date Management product across 55 stores.
Following an initial pilot in the Stillwater store last fall, Cub began deploying it in March, with the rollout completed in less than four weeks.
The program, which offers the potential for greater savings as it expands into center store, has been well received by employees, who appreciate its ease of use and the ability to better manage inventory.
The rollout marks an expansion of the partnership between the two companies, which has been in place for more than a decade for management of labeling/scales, recipes, traceability and inventory.
“Expiration Date Management is another core investment which ensures the freshest offerings across the store, without additional effort for our associates,” said Dan Triplett, VP of sales, merchandising and marketing of Cub.
Upshop’s technology helps employees with efficiency, offering targeted notifications and workflow guidance to ensure that soon-to-expire products are properly rotated and, if necessary, removed from shelves before expiring.
This initiative enables Cub to deliver on its freshness commitment to shoppers, ensuring that customers consistently receive the highest quality products.
“Upshop’s solution goes beyond store enablement, giving our operations and merchandising leadership teams the reporting needed to ensure long-term success and further optimize our inventory assortment,” said Luke Anderson, CIO of Cub.
Shamus Hines, CEO of Upshop, agreed.
“Upshop’s entire platform is designed to make the day-to-day workload easier for store associates, with Expiration Date Management empowering the Cub team to spend less time managing inventory and more time dedicated to serving shoppers,” he said. “We look forward to continuing to work with Cub and other retailers to drive significant cost savings and improve operations.”
Expiration Date Management is being used by grocers, such as Raley’s, Southeastern Grocers, Price Chopper and Lunds and Byerlys. According to Upshop, these grocers have all “benefited from the implementation by reducing on-shelf expired items through automated, easy-to-follow notifications, while receiving real-time expired shrink analytics.”
