SAN FRANCISCO, CA - We are at the height of the holiday season, and fresh departments are transitioning to winter wonderlands as retailers look to optimize seasonal demand. Afresh continues to bring valuable information forth through its Industry Insights blog, and the latest industry vet sharing their expertise is Scott Schuette, former Vice President of Produce and Floral, Fresh Thyme Market. In a recent post, Schuette took a dive into strategies for preparing fresh departments for the winter holidays.

“During key events like Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year’s, fresh perishable product movement can easily double⁠—and even triple,” Schuette said in the post. “Most customers purchase their perishable ingredients a day or two before the holiday event for maximum freshness, making life in retail fresh departments very challenging.”

Some of the tips the retail expert presented in the blog include:

• Plan your merchandising schematic early to ensure placement for key holiday items
• Keep your stores top-of-mind by marketing and merchandising holiday items to customers starting about four weeks before holidays begin
• Leverage cross-merchandising to build incremental sales during the holiday season (like placing cream of mushroom soup with fresh green beans)
• Review your store’s holiday delivery schedules with management and receiving teams to ensure everyone knows when to expect big or important deliveries
• Dive into last year’s historical movement data and this year’s sales trends to help determine how much to order (Afresh helps with this tremendously)
• Create holiday schedules based on prior-year hourly sales history, current-year sales trends, and current labor shortages that need coverage

To read more about Schuette’s advice for planning fresh departments, click here.

Make the most of this holiday season with retail insights here on the pages of ANUK.

Afresh