The real business cost of promotions is being chronically underreported in grocery retail. We’ve seen sales uplifts from promotions fall 18 percent in the past five years and today estimate that a third of promotions are actually destroying value for the retailer. Yet food promotions are still being rolled out week after week.
This is why we’re keen to share with you the findings from our work with companies that are leading the way in changing their promotional activities – and in many cases significantly reducing their reliance on promotional campaigns.
In this report we describe how these companies decide what products to promote, how they measure success, and under what circumstances they will move away from promotions altogether, all with the goal of creating a sustained business advantage for themselves and their suppliers.