Dive Brief:
- Graze.com, an online snack subscription service, is making its U.S. grocery store debut, Food Business News reported.
- The e-tailer will introduce its branded products to 3,500 retail stores nationwide, including Walgreens, Hannaford, Big Y and Shop Rite, over the next two weeks.
- Graze CEO Anthony Fletcher told Food Business News that the company made the same transition in the U.K. last year, and that multi-channel effort has been "a big hit" he hopes Graze will experience in the U.S.
Dive Insight:
Out of the hundreds of products Graze has developed since its U.S. debut in 2013, the company has selected 17 packaged snacks to make the transition from site to shelf. Most of these products are considered better-for-you and in the free-form category. Healthy snacks already resonate with the vast majority of in-store consumers, so Graze's expansion from online to brick-and-mortar retail makes sense.
Graze has focused much of its decision-making, as many other manufacturers have, around big data. Collecting data first from its online sales and then from its U.K. brick-and-mortar venture allowed Graze to carefully curate the products, retail partners and distribution strategies that would best fit the U.S. market. Collecting and analyzing big data is becoming crucial for producing unique insights and targeted strategies that can help newcomers like Graze stand out on in major retailer stores.
Development endeavors like this always risk failure as the logistics, relationships and investments needed to pull off an in-store retail expansion can be challenging for a company that has primarily operated online. Still, Graze's product line of accessible and on-trend snacks and successful expansion in the U.K. should benefit this new venture.