MARKET WATCH
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New VP of Business Development for AFS Technologies  

Kurt Kaiser has joined AFS Technologies as Vice President of Business Development for the Trade Promotion Management (TPM) solution group. AFS is global provider of software solutions for consumer goods companies.

Kaiser joins AFS from Nielsen where he served in consulting, product management, and business development roles related to price & promotion analytics, revenue management, trade promotion optimization (TPO), and TPM. Kaiser brings 21 years of sales and trade spend-focused experience having also worked in consumer goods account management, sales operations, trade marketing, and technology.

“We view our people as one of our key differentiators, our product managers and developers are world-class experts, designing purpose-built solutions to meet and exceed the demands of companies moving at the speed of business,” said Joe Bellini, CEO. “Our select services teams give AFS customer partners the ability to have systems implemented and integrated with minimal disruption and maximum benefit. Adding Kurt Kaiser to our team expands our great talent base and gives our customer partners a further advantage over our competition.”


ProLogic Loyalty Platform Now Available on DUMAC POS System

The loyalty solution from ProLogic Retail Services is now available for grocers using DUMAC Business Systems’ RORCv6 POS. ProLogic is the largest provider of loyalty marketing solutions to independent grocers.

ProLogic’s technology enables grocers to understand the dynamics of their shoppers, organizing shoppers into key segments including top shoppers, new shoppers, high-potential shoppers and lapsed shoppers. With this information, ProLogic works with retailers to create targeted personalized offers to influence the behavior of individual shoppers and groups of shoppers.

DUMAC has been serving the grocery market for more than 40 years. DUMAC solutions are installed and serviced at more than 1,000 independently-owned supermarkets across the United States.

Ross Ely, President and CEO of ProLogic Retail Services, said, "Independent grocers have been asking us to integrate with DUMAC’s RORCv6 POS system and we now have the ability to meet this demand."

Phil McCarthy, Partner and Vice President at DUMAC Business Systems, said, “Independents face unique challenges and opportunities, so they want solutions developed with their needs in mind.  DUMAC and ProLogic share a rich history of working with independent grocers.”


GS1 US Gives Excellence Awards

GS1 US recognized six companies with GS1 US Excellence Awards for their achievements in implementing GS1 Standards to transform business processes and drive innovation. The awards were given out during a ceremony at the GS1 Connect conference June 20, 2017 at the Cosmopolitan in Las Vegas, Nevada.

The recipients of the awards were:

  • GS1 US Innovation Award: Coca-Cola North America and REI CO-OP
  • GS1 US Operational Excellence Award: Dot Foods and Target
  • GS1 US Small/Mid-Sized Business Excellence Award: Tegu and Upper Lakes Foods

The Small/Mid-Sized Business Excellence Award highlights GS1 Standards implementation stories from small and mid-sized companies, and how standards helped drive their businesses forward.

The Roger Milliken Career Achievement Award was posthumously awarded to Ken Traub, a technology visionary who made significant contributions to the development of the world’s most widely used supply chain standards.


Campbell Adds Visual to Update Skill for Echo Show

Campbell Soup has updated its Campbell’s Kitchen Skill for Amazon’s Echo to leverage Echo Show’s visual capabilities. It is one of the first brands to offer a visually-enabled skill on Amazon’s new Echo Show touchscreen device.

Step-by-step audio/visual recipe instructions are now available for owners of the Echo Show who download the updated skill from Amazon and say “Alexa, open Campbell’s Kitchen.”

The skill offers simple navigation of touchscreen-enabled content for more than 3,000 Campbell recipes. This includes the ability to search by recipes’ main ingredients, prep method, cuisine type, and skill level.


Walmart.com Top Online Grocer for Fresh Food, Jet.com for Packaged

Walmart.com is the most preferred online retailer for buying fresh foods, while Jet.com is most preferred for packaged groceries, according to a new report from Field Agent, a market research firm based in Fayetteville, Ark
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The report compares four major ecommerce retailers - Amazon.com, Walmart.com, Target.com and Jet.com. It shows that one-quarter (25 percent) of Walmart.com shoppers purchase fresh foods from the site, compared with 10 percent, 8 percent and 5 percent at Target.com, Jet.com and Amazon.com, respectively.

“Walmart.com provides more options to buy not only electronics … but groceries as well, and they give me the option to … pick it up from the store, free,” a survey respondent said.





















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