DWYER WILLIAMS, EXECUTIVE VICE PRESIDENT DAIRY MANAGEMENT INC.
Understanding the trends shaping the food and beverage category – and the possibilities for dairy – is a key aspect of our checkoff strategy. One trend that understandably has our attention is the continued growth of e-commerce sales that topped $2 trillion worldwide in 2017, according to eMarketer, and that represents a significant shift in the way consumers are buying their groceries.
What’s especially noteworthy is that the Food Marketing Institute and Nielsen project that 20 percent of all groceries will be purchased online by 2025. While new territory, this presents a great opportunity for the checkoff to explore new strategies and partners that will help assure dairy has its rightful place in the “e-grocery” world.
The good news is that data from MyWebGrocer showed that 93 percent of online grocery purchases include dairy products. However, we must do more to understand our potential and the ongoing e-commerce opportunity for dairy, especially given its appeal to a younger segment of the population where we see declining milk consumption.
In 2018, we began to identify leading e-grocery companies that we could partner with and could bring their resources and expertise to the table to pilot a focused dairy effort that would help us meet farmers’ goals of driving sales and trust in our products and the people who produce them.
The right partner
We found the right fit in Peapod. Not only did Peapod pioneer online grocery marketing, it fulfilled another critical component that we look for in our strategic partnerships: the company’s values and work ethic align perfectly with those of our dairy farmers. Peapod was founded by brothers in 1989, but it is now a wholly-owned subsidiary of Ahold Delhaize.
Peapod is the country’s leading online grocer with more than 40 million orders delivered in 24 metro markets across New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Illinois, Wisconsin, Indiana, Pennsylvania, Maryland, the District of Columbia and Virginia.
Dairy sales have been steady on Peapod since its inception. But, in sitting down with Peapod’s team, we both saw an opportunity to share a better story on their platform about you, the dairy farmer, and your hard work and commitment to animal care and environmental stewardship.
Peapod knows that their customers – many of whom are far removed from a working dairy farm – want to understand where their food comes from and the people behind the products they purchase. They know it’s often the story that sells the product and they were confident that your story would resonate with their customers, who are far removed from a working dairy farm.
