Retailers are Making the Investment in Health & Wellness
Consumers care about health and wellness, but do retailers? Actually, they do. According to this SmartBrief article, a recent FMI report found that food retailers are investing in health and wellness more than ever before.
In-store dietitians, product sampling, healthy recipes, and good-for-you products are just a few of the steps food retailers are taking to further their investment in health and wellness. So why are they doing it? Where food retailers’ health and wellness efforts used to be merely transactionally-focused, they’re now more strategic. According to the report, 72% of retailers are investing in health and wellness to grow their own store brand and 61% are doing it to help them keep up with the health and wellness efforts of their competition. Other retailers indicated doing so in hopes of increasing their customer loyalty.
“Eighty-one percent of the food retailers in this survey (up from 70% in 2014) currently view supermarket health and wellness programs as a significant business growth opportunity for the entire industry in the years ahead.”
If food retailers are taking a more strategic view of health and wellness, it’s imperative that food brands think about it strategically as well. After all, brands are the real marketing experts.
How can brands do it? We’ll touch on that soon.