Americans are constantly weighing convenient food options that are either indulgent or healthier. As a result, more convenience stores are ensuring they have both types to choose from.
By Howard Riell, Associate Editor
The average American eats six convenience foods daily, according to industry statistics. With a number that significant, and more consumers relying on c-stores for many of those foods, it makes sense that retailers should stay apprised of the latest food trends.
Of course, one of those trends is consumers’ growing propensity for healthier food options. In fact, striking the right balance between decadent, comfort fare, convenient foods and nutritious items can prove tricky, taxing resources and often eroding the success of a retailer’s food program.
Many retailers still rely on roller grills as the staple for foodservice programs, but even a wider variety of healthier grilling options offer customers more nutritious convenience food options.
“Finding that balance is very difficult, I’ll be honest,” said Ed Pollock, the owner of the Grasslands Markets in Douglas, Wyo. Pollock was surprised to find that the balance that suited his customers—many of whom are blue-collar workers—included healthier choices.
“These guys are very happy with our healthier food, but then there are also guys coming in who are loading up on the milkshakes and those fun and tasty things, too,” Pollock said. His strategy for striking that balance is simple—size. “You’ve just got to have a big enough store where you can have all the products.”
MIXING IT UP
Research indicates that more patrons are forgoing ice cream bars, opting for frozen yogurt, fruit cups and other healthy snacks, for example, but c-stores should also closely follow purchasing trends in their stores, while engaging customers to determine what to include on the menu, and what to leave off.
“It’s an interesting challenge for most convenience stores,” said Michael Lawshe, president of Paragon Solutions, a retail consulting firm based in Fort Worth, Texas. “Oftentimes their food programs are based on their competency—good, bad or indifferent. If they can execute a roller grill program, then that’s what they do. A lot of people think they can, but it’s more complicated than they realize when they get into it.”
So what healthier options sell well in a c-store that are also easy to manage and are cost efficient?
“I think your grab-and-go offerings in open deli cases are your easiest way to start looking at some of those things,” Lawshe said. Healthy wraps and high-fiber bread products are gaining in popularity. Salad is another item that is too often underrated by c-stores to ensure a quality offering.
“Consumers absolutely will buy salads, if they’re good,” Lawshe concluded. “All you have to do, again, is look around. I travel a lot. When you go to the airport you see great salads with Wolfgang Puck’s name on them in a clamshell, presented well. But, if you go into a convenience store you see salads that are half the size, with wilted lettuce. It’s not a good offering; you’re not going to buy it. There is a ton of grab-and-go items that really can work. There is nothing like a little bit of fruit and vegetables to accent it, as well.”
Of course not every patron is looking for a salad. Back to the roller grill, offering lower-calorie proteins, such as all-beef hot dogs and chicken taquitos, can add some variety for health-conscious customers.
Another potential wrinkle that c-stores face are federal guidelines for food items that can be purchased with SNAP (the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program) benefits. Meant for low-income residents, participants each month are given a plastic card called an EBT (electronic benefits transfer) card, which works like a debit card.
Pilot programs have been rolled out in the last few years to determine if incentives provided to SNAP recipients at the point-of-sale increase the purchase of fruits, vegetables or other healthful foods.
“President Obama’s got great intentions for healthy food programs, but I have (clients) who have been forced to put certain food products in their stores only to watch them go to waste and be thrown away,” Lawshe said.
The lesson?
“You can’t force the market,” Lawshe said. “You have to really analyze the market and determine what the market wants. You can influence it, but you can’t force it.”
Pollock, a developer who decided to open a c-store because he found a prime location, said the diversity of offerings works in his location because of the broad overall spectrum of his customers.
“I wouldn’t have a recommendation for someone in a specific environment,” Pollock said. “But I knew the deli food would work just because it’s made fresh, it’s made healthy, and it’s all the things that people like.”
Pollock is planning on opening a handful of other locations with a similar theme of diversity.
AGAINST THE GRAIN
Andy Revella, the owner and chief creative officer of the Cookery and Food Institute in Dallas, and its sister company, Vision 360 Design, worked closely with Pollock to design and construct the 3,800-square-foot store. Revella said Grassland, which opened last August, is bucking conventional wisdom about what foods c-store customers want.
“This place is up in the oil fields, and it’s a lot of men—heavy-duty, rugged, outdoor working men,” he said. “If you had listened to the old-school people you would have heard, ‘They just want double cheeseburgers and all the typical things.’ Well, guess what? We’re serving people fresh fruit cups, and we cut actual fresh fruit. We’re selling between 70-90 granola parfaits each day.”
Grasslands also offers a deli where customers can create self-made sandwiches, pick from hot and cold grab-and-go cases, or enjoy a fresh-baked pizza.
Revella suggested that the way for c-store operators to find that all-important balance is to let go of previous assumptions and look at their customers’ changing demographics and desires.
“What they have to stop doing is looking at the past,” Revella said. “For 50 years, baby boomers decided what we had to do and we kept on doing it, driven by price. Today, it’s not the operator who has changed; it’s the customer who has changed.”
While consumers still want convenience, of course, they also insist on an increasingly diverse and healthful menu, Revella said.
“They want lighter items like fruit and parfaits, wrap sandwiches, salads sold out of the case,” he said. “The c-store retailer has to stop looking in the rear view mirror because guess what: the customer is completely different.”
Grasslands plans to install a Greek yogurt dispensing machine to add even more diversity for customers.
“It will allow customers to actually build their own Greek yogurt parfaits instead of just the ones that we make.” Also in the works, he continued, is the addition of a variety of lighter meats and cheeses and wrap offerings.
“That’s because these guys want it,” Revella said. “Even the sandwiches we make for our grab-and-go case feature fresh oven-baked turkey. It’s not the heavy stuff. We carve all the meats and cheese right there in front of them. It’s also fresh; they love the idea that everything is fresh-made. That’s the thing we hear most when the guys come in and we ask them. And by the way—we’re seven cents per gallon more for gas. They come to us despite that to get the food.”
Revella said c-stores must change with the times in order to reflect customers’ changing preferences.
GOING THE RIGHT DIRECTION
Knowing what customers want, and how much of it, is a question that a lot of c-store operators tend to approach from the wrong direction, Lawshe said.
“What you want to do is look at the other fast feeders,” Lawshe concluded. “We need to stop looking at ourselves just as convenience stores. We need to look at what products and services they are offering; how successful they are.”