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Deliver your message with POP
In-store marketing should do more than sell your products.
February 21, 2007
When Chris Dahlander worked in marketing for Romano's Macaroni Grill, he pulled all the stops. "I did all the danglers, table toppers and things you could possibly do," he said. Now that he owns Snappy Salads, a fast-casual restaurant in Dallas, Dahlander has fine-tuned his approach.
His restaurant features table merchandisers – simple, brown recycled craft paper with a printed letter from Dahlander to guests, personally signed by him. Once a month, he changes the merchandisers to discuss a different part of his story: the biodegradable containers he uses, the charities he supports, the evolving soup selection.
"It's not intended to upsell anybody like the typical dining materials. It's just to put perspective on the restaurant. I try to touch every table, but at the same time I know people have busy lives so I can't tell them a 15-minute story about my life and why I'm doing what I'm doing. Table merchandisers help a lot," he said.
That's the message international sales and marketing expert Bob Phibbs tries to drive home to his fast-casual clients: The role of point-of-purchase materials is to tell a story, not sell the product. "A $1,000, beautiful poster can't do that much heavy lifting," he said. "No matter who prints your materials or how great your graphic artist is, putting the weight of a new promotion on POP's shoulders is an awfully tall order."
That's why Phibbs sees in-store marketing materials as merely a sales tool for employees, who are still the best profit drivers in the restaurant. The axiom dovetails nicely with his second mantra: keep it to a dull roar. Too many posters, table toppers, danglers and stand-ups paralyzes the public into resorting to their standard, unprofitable order, he said.
"Just help me. I'm hungry, that's what I know. So point me in a direction with a story, don't overwhelm me with options," Phibbs said.
With these guidelines as your diving board, make sure the resulting materials also avoid these common mistakes:
·Don't settle for substandard materials.If you're going to be in charge, drive the car rather than take a passenger's seat to the business. That is Phibbs' philosophy. When talking POP, that translates to hiring the best graphic designers for the creative end. Go the extra mile and pay for lamination or UV-coated paper. And make sure it's nearly idiot-proof in its installment process — crooked banners or window decals don't appeal.
· Don't go chintzy on the photography. Phibbs encourages restaurants to hire a top-notch photographer because shots of food items should take up at least 50 percent of the material's space. "That thing should look so yummy that I see it, then the title, then maybe the description," he said.
Don't overlook the power of good lifestyle photography decorations that happen to include your product, either. Bill Schober, editorial director of the In-Store Marketing Institute in Chicago, suggests checking out how Target approaches its brand messages using this artistry with shelf headers yet still maintains its clean store policy.
· Don't place it in the way. POP is an interrupter – it's designed to make the consumer stop in her tracks and consider a new product. But halting is the last thing most fast-casual restaurant executives want happening to their lines.
Schober knows another dirty secret. "If the signs get in the way during rush, the restaurant staff will throw them away at the first opportunity. If the tallest kid on the crew hits his head on a hanging mobile, at some point he will get mad and rip it down," he said.
Good retail marketers typically ban POP within the first 10 feet of the store entrance, because customers need this zone for their eyes to adjust to the different lighting, and the brain to orientate the body's position. "Your mind is 100 places other than, 'Wow! Look at this interesting display,'" Schober said.
Phibbs is a fan of outside window decals, which entice diners to enter. The menu board is prime POP real estate, too. "If you can combine it with your menu so they're always looking up there for something new, how great is that?" he pointed out.
Bathrooms are no-nos when it comes to food-driven messages, Schober warns. Floor decals, however, do earn his thumbs up. Studies show that folks don't carry negative connotations about stepping on an image of a sandwich.
But even following these rules can't empower POP beyond its initial job: to tell a story. Even after nine months of faithfully changing out his table merchandisers, Dahlander still talks to guests who haven't a clue about his corn-based carry-out packaging. "There are a lot of factors with any restaurant. If you don't have great food and great service, then all the in-store marketing in the world is not going to make a difference," he said.
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