The core purpose of Acosta Group is to “help connect shoppers with brands that they love, anywhere that they want to buy them, in this omnichannel environment,” said Darian Pickett, chief global client officer for the company, during an interview at the NACS Show in October with The Shelby Report’s Jan Meade.
Understanding today’s shoppers is central to carrying out that mission. Acosta has formed a 40,000-person panel to help it understand what shoppers are feeling and their shopping behavior not just now but in the future, Pickett said. “And we believe, because we sit in an interesting place between retailers and manufacturers, we can help connect the two for the shopper.”
COVID-19 and ensuing inflation have caused shoppers to change their behavior, including where they shop and what they buy. During the pandemic itself, when many restaurants were shut down, there was further blending of foodservice and retail, so Acosta bought foodservice sales agency The Core Group.
“What you can see in our booth is that combination of retail services [and] quick, prepared meal services that shoppers are looking for in an individual store,” he said, adding that today’s convenience store customer is buying some better-for-you products that they weren’t a few years ago.
“We’re going to continue to look at that evolving shopper and figure out how we evolve our capabilities to meet the needs of that shopper.”
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Through a 2022 acquisition, OeP, Acosta built a digital platform “to help connect shoppers both on the physical and digital shelf,” he said.
OeP originated as an agency helping brands sell on Amazon, “but we’ve taken those capabilities and now embedded them in all of our customer planning teams so that we can help plan digitally on how to connect with that shopper.”
Shoppers today can use their devices while in the store to see what competitive price points are and, if the retailer is out of stock, where they can buy it online.
“How then do you connect with that shopper, either pre-purchase, during a purchase or post-purchase, to create a brand message and build brand equity around a product that we’re trying to connect that shopper with? So we’re working with all the digital companies, both to get the product on the digital shelf and off the digital shelf.”
The acquisition of Crossmark this past July added to its services arsenal as well.
“They’ve got a big demo capability that we did not have in Acosta Group,” Pickett said. “That’s a new capability to help us connect shoppers with brands through that assisted selling … in a division they have called Product Connections. Also inside Product Connections, they do a lot of unique work around helping create displays, selling vehicles [to create] that improved shopper experience at that point of sale.”
Pickett was named to his new role as chief global client officer in September.
“What we want to do is help clients and retailers leverage all the distinct capabilities that come with each of these individual brands. Part of my role is to help our clients globally take full advantage of all of the services that we have,” he said.
Asked for his industry predictions, Pickett said he believes there will be continued economic pressure on shoppers, and shoppers are going to “continue to look for a better live shopping experience.
“Digital is going to continue to grow, both on the physical and digital shelf. That’s why the omnichannel solution is there, and I do think the channel definition is going to continue to blur. Foodservice and retail will continue to blur, which is all exciting, because that represents huge opportunities for this industry to think differently, to act differently and drive growth.”
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