In light of rising childhood obesity rates and the general confidence in supermarket sales, Disney, the world’s top licensor, is steadily making the push to realign its brand with a healthier image, targeting kids with fruits and vegetables instead. The savvy marketing move appears to be working too, as sales of the Disney Garden line were up 70 percent in 2008, a trend that can at least partially be attributed to consumer attitudes about the products. At the end of the day, a kid clamoring for an apple emblazoned with the cherubic faces of characters from The Suite Life of [...]

With grocery stores in general seeing an uptick in business as people eat out less during the downturn, it was only a matter of time before someone decided to take advantage of the increased foot traffic. Until May 3rd, Teatro Vivo is bringing their brand of non-elitist theater to the produce section, the deli counter and every aisle in between at the Forest Hills location of UK supermarket Sainsbury’s with an adaptation of Shakespeare’s Sonnet 91. Though we can’t predict how this will impact sales at the store, it certainly creates a unique shopping experience and provides one more reason [...]

Trader Joe’s is a small supermarket chain that has developed a winning formula for its growing number of stores by offering an inventory of innovative products – most are store brands –  for reasonable prices in a quirky shopping environment that keeps its customers coming back. Despite the underlying corporate aspect that drives the business, each store manages to pass itself off as unique in some way, giving people the feeling that they’re being welcomed into their own distinctive neighborhood store. Based on our own experiences at their first NYC location on 14th Street, one need only look to the [...]