Stores Magazine - October 2007 - (Page 22) fullprice/markdown Where’s the Beef from? IF YOU’RE THINKING Safeway or Stop & Shop, you’re probably not L FULCE an organic food enthusiast. Still, for RI P those who are concerned about the source of their meat, Wholesome Harvest has a solution. Shoppers who buy organic meat from Wholesome Harvest will find a Farmer ID number on every package. By visiting the Wholesome Harvest website, shoppers can key in the ID number and read about the American farm family that raised the source cattle. Wholesome Harvest founding farmer and CEO Wende Elliott modeled the company’s traceability system on those found in Asia and Europe, and hers is believed to be the first company in the U.S. to offer consumers end-to-end traceability on every package. Elliott believes that traceability builds a bridge between farmer and consumer, creating trust and reassurance that the animals were raised on small farms in the United States, rather than foreign or industrial factory farms. She started the grassroots project to help small organic farmers reach metropolitan markets and to advance the domestic fair trade movement. & RETAIL HITS MISSES Mom, Meet E-Me L FULCE RI P SEARS ADDED avatars to a new website created for ’tweens and invited online back-to-schoolers to dress them up in their favorite Sears offerings. The site, www.Sears.com/e-me, invited young shoppers to create a personalized virtual representation of themselves – an “E-Me” – then select shoes and clothes to dress their avatars. Once they were done, shoppers saved their outfitted avatars and other selections in a virtual closet. The idea behind E-Me was to make back-to-school shopping more fun for ’tweens, while at the same time boosting clothing sales among parents. It also made it easier for parents to buy what their kids wanted to wear: Parents who brought a printout of the avatar and the closet into a Sears store received a 10 percent discount on the items in the closet. This approach represents the latest extension of Sears’ online interactive services, which already includes the My Virtual Kitchen and My Virtual Laundry Room design functions. The Power of Smell KFC RECENTLY unRK- leashed the aroma of MA WN fried chicken in some ofO D Making House Calls A PROGRAM being run by The Shirt Box of Farmington Hills, Mich., raises the bar for customer service. The company literally brings the store to some of its best and most sought-after shoppers. The shop’s owners regularly visit the headquarters of local businesses bearing racks of the latest fashions. Shirt Box representatives have learned the sizes and style preferences of their most loyal shoppers: Now, when they arrive on site, they not only have the newest offerings – they’re also toting product in the most requested sizes and colors. This year marks the 25th anniversary for The Shirt Box which, not surprisingly, has emerged as the store of choice for men’s fashions in the local market. 22 STORES / OCTOBER 2007 L FULCE RI P fices in Washington, D.C., Chicago and Dallas in an attempt to lure office workers to its restaurants. Louisville, Ky.-based KFC used a “scent-focused” pilot program to highlight the launch of its new $2.99 Deals meal, which includes a chicken breast, drumstick or thigh, two Crispy Strips, a side of mashed potatoes and gravy or macaroni and cheese and a biscuit. A plated meal was placed on the mail carts that pass out inter-office mail, overnight packages and bills during prelunch drops. (Word has it that mailroom staffers were fed first.) Sniffing out whether or not office employees enjoyed this olfactory assault requires some detective work, but as marketing ploys go, it seems more foul than fair. WWW.STORES.ORG http://www.Sears.com/e-me, http://WWW.STORES.ORG
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