Supermarket Perimeter - April 2019 - 45

butchers
7 in 10 shoppers are
interested in their
store offering a
produce butcher, with
18% very interested.
Source: FMI

he says. "It wasn't until further down the road that we
figured out that we have been doing some variations of
this long before others were and not getting the credit
for it."
Gelson's produce butchers will cut, slice, dice, noodle,
spiral - basically whatever the customer asks them to
do, Savidan says.
"Our customers love it," he says. "They like the fact
that they can customize items to their needs, especially
on items that are time-consuming. We also get a lot of
great comments about cutting fruit that's at its maximum flavor, which customers love."
Not just anyone, Savidan says, can be a produce
butcher at Gelson's. "Our produce butchers know about
quality and superior customer service," he says. "They
go out of their way to find the best eating seasonal items
that have customers coming back for more."

BY ANDY NELSON

Pioneers
In the U.S., the first self-styled produce butchers started
showing up circa 2010 at New York-based food emporium Eataly, which has since expanded to other cities.
Nearly a decade later, they're still going strong. Eataly's
butchers (the chain's official name for them is "vegetable
butchers") are not only the originals but an exception to
the general rule: namely, they clean and cut produce for
free. And they're more than happy to answer any questions customers might have about prep or cooking.
"I'm just like a bartender," Jennifer Rubell, the original "head butcher" at Eataly told today.com. "But the
advice customers seek from me is about what to do with
vegetables, and to introduce them to unfamiliar ones like
cardoons and celery root."
Rubell has an interesting take on the job of a produce
butcher. With the average produce department featuring
hundreds if not thousands of SKUs, it can be intimidating
to figure out what to buy for a particular purpose; and,
once it's purchased, to figure out the best form in which
to eat or cook it.
With that in mind, Eataly's produce butchers "help
make the world of vegetables less intimidating,"
Rubell says.
Another early leader in the produce butcher movement was Austin, Texas-based Whole Foods Market.
Whole Foods' announcement that is was adding produce

4 REASONS TO ADD A BUTCHER TO YOUR FRESH PRODUCE DEPARTMENT
1. CONVENIENCE. In our
time-starved age, shoppers are
looking for the fastest, easiest
ways to make healthy meals
and snacks.

2. EDUCATION. Butchers can
teach consumers how to prep
difficult or exotic fruits and
vegetables. Many even tell
them (or actually show them)
how to cook with them.

3. THEATER. Shoppers are

pulled in to the interactive
experience of telling their
produce butcher what they
want, then watching, listening
and often smelling and tasting
as they go to work.

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4. ADDING VALUE. Many consumers are happy to pay up to
$6.99 a pound for a butcher's
services.

APRIL 2019 - 45

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Supermarket Perimeter - April 2019

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