I recently had a conversation with a well-known grocery brand manager - not a client of ours I should point out - who said he was “happy” to achieve 15% compliance for his point-of-sale material in a major supermarket. I was pretty stunned by this over 80% of the signage he had paid to produce was not being deployed. And he was pleased with an improvement on what had gone before.

This balance of power between retailers and manufacturers has long been a hot topic of debate in grocery. When it comes to PoS, shop owners and brands don’t always understand the benefit of the PoS they have, so they don’t ensure their display and promotions appear as agreed. In fact, it often feels as though the brands are producing the assets because they are contractually obliged to and the supermarkets get way more than they can cope with in terms of resources to deploy.

Lord Leverhulme famously said half his advertising worked, he just didn’t know which half. With PoS, the discrepancy is even more pronounced. So what can be done about this?

One of the often overlooked aspects of field marketing is compliance. With field teams in store every day or week, brands get to see the overall deployment of PoS very quickly across an estate and can easily feed back on whether material is or isn’t being displayed.

Although no official recourse is available if a brand owner has a grievance, they could take a detailed audit of non-compliance to a retailer buyer and consider withholding payment, but an in-store team is there to facilitate a strong working relationship to prevent that point being reached.

In-store experts ensure correct processes are followed to support the retailer in constructing and deploying displays. This, in turn, maintains the visibility of PoS material so retailers, brand and consumers all benefit.

Now, I would say that, wouldn’t I? But look at those brands that have consistent, relevant and prominent offers on display - I am convinced that behind them will be a field team regularly checking for compliance during their in-store visits. There should be no need to be pleased about 15% compliance any longer.

Cathy Evans is MD of Tactical Solutions

Topics