The company introduced its convenience and impulse strategy ‘Better Biscuits, Best Sellers’ initiative in March this year.
It hopes the project will drive total biscuit category growth by up to £88m ($115m) in the next five years.
The strategy is an extension of the company’s multimillion c-store program ‘Better Biscuits, Better Business’ launched in 2014.
The extended initiative from this March has resulted in a 28% sales boost in trials across ambassador and field sales visited stores, said pladis.
Who are pladis?
Turkish conglomerate Yildiz Holding consolidated its United Biscuits, Godiva Chocolatier, Ulker and DeMet’s Candy Company busineses into a $5.2bn global company named pladis in June this year.
Display stands
Part of the trials featured a McVitie’s display stand, the width of a packet of biscuits, which pladis said helped stores grow biscuit category sales 4.8%, equivalent to £700 ($914) more per store annually.
The company now hopes to roll out more than 1,000 stands across stores in the UK.
It will also expand its c-store initiative with NPD and price-marked packs.
NPD
New products include a price-marked £1.50 ($1.96) McVitie’s Chocolate Digestive range and a 89p ($0.77) McVitie’s Biscuit Barrel range.
Pladis said the price-marked offer represented a “more competitive headline price” and said its new case size - containing three free packs (15 packs for the price of 12) - allowed retailers to improve margins.
Its Biscuit Barrel range includes classic biscuits ranges such as Custard Creams, Bourbons and Shorties. These come in 250-300 g packs, a larger size than has previously been available for these lines, said plaidis.
Field sales visits
The company’s program has also seen field sales teams paying visits to 9,000 retailers across the UK every four to eight weeks, offering advice on merchandizing and providing displays.
Pladis said the field sales program had achieved a 20% sales lift for core ranges in independent and club stores.
Its field sales teams will now concentrate on offering support for recent NPD such as McVitie’s Nibbles, Jacob’s Cracker Crisps and the new price-marked packs.