Easter eggs have not done great for us. We had an excellent range of eggs from Chocolatier and while they sold okay, we had to drop half of what we purchased to 50% late Thursday to move the stock. This is on the back of Easter card sales being up 20% YOY. Majors nearby were at 50% off and we had no choice if we wanted to get to the close of today with all stock gone. We’re on track to achieve that thankfully. How did eggs do for you?
Based on Cadbury’s category classification, easter eggs are divided into 3 major categories, and 7 subcategories.
1. Early sellers (For me, single consumption)
EG. 39g Caramello or 39g Creme
Implusive products need counter promotion.
2. Sharing (For us)
2.1 Bags (100g to 500g)
2.2 Marshmallow Eggs
2.3 Packaged Eggs
3. Gifting (For them)
3.1 Novelties
3.2 Loose Eggs
3.3 Gift boxes
Jarrdy may have insights on how these categories works in an destination store.
After dropping DL as a supplier we made a decision to have a small range of Easter Eggs (Chocolatier) and focus more on Gifts and Novelties. The move has been great. Up until March 29 our Gift sales are up 95% on last year and Confectionary is down 73%. I know which margins I am enjoying more.
Happy Easter to you and all your readers Mark. I hope it is a safe and profitable one for everybody.
Cheers
Al
Sold out Wednesday, ordered same Darrell Lea as last year, nougat eggs and half Rocklea Road, Liqourice etc eggs, last year had some left after Easter.
Had order of Rocklea Road in last Tuesday and that sold by Thursday arvo (other years left overs)
I even noticed Thursday night Woolies almost sold out of chocoalate. Butcher is almost out of meat.
This year cards not so good.
So unpredictable!
Have extra staff today so we will be pushing plush and lotteries!
Sunny,
We plan our Easter around three categorisations similar to Cadbury. Impulse (which includes most single consumption products), Sharing & Hollow Eggs (bagged and loose eggs) and finally Gifting (everything else).
We don’t actually consider ourselves a destination store for Easter (except for our range of impulse – we carry just about ever line available to us in reasonably large quantities). Most of our Easter chocolate is sold on impulse. Our casket and gifting ranges are limited and we put them out late in the season. We can’t compete with the majors in this area on either price or range so we don’t waste our time trying.
Most of our gifting sales are during the 3 days leading up to Easter Sunday and then last minute sales on the day itself. Our range is suited to that of a convenience store.
Impulse is where it is at for us. We have 8 off-location stands for impulse. Some close the front entrance, some near the newspapers, some on the way to the counter and some at the counter.
The thing I also like about impulse is that you can usually still sell it after Easter if you have any left over.
Woolies had quite a bit left over in our centre and they were discounting hard too. In the absence of darrell lea, I tried Hillier and Choclatier and small to medium plush. Nearly all gone. In hindsight I should have gone harder with novelty and small gift giving ideas. Next year. Not casket eggs I don’t think.
Just an update on the above. As I said we only did a small range of chocolate but am happy to report we virtually sold out and without discounting. I have a Woolies in my centre but have decided not to discount before the event in any season. I like to think that we get used for convenience and am leaving the discounting to the big boys (I can always discount in the week after the event). Saturday saw shoppers that werent concerned with price, they just wanted to get in and get out. We will continue to use this strategy, its working for the moment.
Al
Thanks Jarryd.
Reps from suppliers confirmed that impluse selling well in independent stores than big supermarkets.
Another interesting issue is that big supermarkets nearby didn’t discount the gift boxes until the last week. We do poorly in gift boxes, as we didn’t pre-order any gift boxes. Most of suppliers has well control their stock level, and it is hard to get some when we needed in last month.