Harris Teeter has been in the online space since 2001. At the beginning, it was one store that offered the services.

“It really started gaining some momentum probably about 10 years ago,” Crainer said.

When the E-Biz department was formed in 2013, about 40 Harris Teeter stores were using online services. That number is now 227, with eight more being added.

“Just about every store that can physically do it will have pickup, and if they don’t have the space to do pickup, they’ll at least have delivery,” Crainer said.

As a wholly-owned subsidiary of The Kroger Co., Harris Teeter is in the final stages of integrating with Kroger’s systems. The process has been under way for several months.

“At the end of the day, it’s going to be a better system. It will allow us to roll into our fulfillment centers, which is the big play going forward,” he said. “This is all going to be delivery out of those units, so you have to tie your inventories…around the fulfillment centers to make all that work.”

By integrating with Kroger’s systems, Harris Teeter will be able to extend its footprint. Crainer said some of the areas the grocer will be entering do not have brick-and-mortar stores. He cited as an example Kroger’s Fulfillment Center in Groveland, Florida.

“They did that without stores…build your brand without having the expensive brick and mortar,” he said. “I think this is going to give us the opportunity to grow into the North and also down South and more East Coast.”

While Harris Teeter started out as a grocer in the Carolinas, it now has stores in Virginia, Delaware, Maryland and Washington, D.C., as well as in Florida and Georgia.

Customers will continue to shop online through Harris Teeter’s website or new app, which will be integrated into Kroger’s structure, according to John Robinson, director of customer marketing. He said the new system will allow Harris Teeter to “be much more creative, to move much quicker.”

The new app will offer a “seamless experience,” allowing customers to be on their laptops, their iPads or their mobile phones, “and make it as easy as possible to do that,” said Crainer, who added that he believes they will love it.

More than 50 percent of Harris Teeter’s customers prefer to use their phones for online shopping, rather than a laptop, Crainer said. The app allows ease of use for customers.

The new app will have a different look but all the attributes of the former, “just rolling into the seamless platform…you’ll be able to store your list, you’ll be able to scan items in your pantry,” Crainer said.

In another benefit of tying into Kroger’s back-end systems, Robinson said it will allow integration with Instacart, which will “really make it a lot more convenient and flexible for our customers who are interested in delivery.”

In the past, customers had to go to a partner site to order for delivery. Through the new system, customers will be able to use coupons, which was not the case in the past.

“This new system is going to allow us to accept coupons immediately, which is going to be a real win for the customer.”

VIC program

The marketing department also includes Harris Teeter’s Very Important Customer loyalty program. Through this program, Harris Teeter gains insight into customer needs, which helps the company make better decisions and create a more personalized connection with shoppers.

Robinson said the program engages in unique ways with both online shoppers and in-store customers. Among the benefits of the VIC program are weekly discounts, a fuel points program, personalized e-mail communication, access to digital coupons and sweepstakes.

These programs work in tandem to “engage with customers, to encourage them to use the VIC card so the cycle can continue.”

“When shoppers use their VIC card, we are able to better understand what they are looking for when they shop at Harris Teeter. We use that information to offer them more value and enhance their shopping experience, creating long-term customer loyalty,” Robinson said.

The grocer’s Together In Education program, which is a loyalty program benefiting local schools, is also tied to the VIC cards.

“It allows schools to work with us to incentivize their customers to shop with us and use their VIC cards,” Robinson explained. “When they do that – and they’re linked to a school and buy Harris Teeter products – then we donate money directly to the school.”

The products involved include all of Harris Teeter’s private offerings.

Shoppers can link up to five schools to their cards online or in store with numbers that correspond to the respective schools, according to Robinson.

“Local schools sign up and are given a four-digit code. They keep that code forever…we have over 5,000 participating schools,” he explained. “We work together to encourage parents and alumni, grandparents – just anybody that’s interested in the community – to link their VIC card to that four-digit school number.”

While schools maintain the same codes, VIC rewards members are able to change their school beneficiaries.

“We build around the traditional school year, August through May, then we clear it out,” Robinson said. “Customers start fresh every year, so just as their kids are moving from preschool to elementary or middle to high, or if they move neighborhoods.”

Since its inception in 1998, the Together In Education program has donated more than $32.4 million to schools within the company’s market areas.

The post E-Biz Department Leading The Way At Harris Teeter appeared first on Shelby Report.

Harris, from Charlotte, and Teeter, from Mooresville, met through the North Carolina Food Dealers Association, according to Danna Robinson, director of corporate affairs for Harris Teeter. 

Harris owned and operated Harris Super Markets; Teeter owned and operated Teeter Super Markets. In 1958, the two grocers came together to purchase a warehouse to leverage buying power for their companies.

They merged the companies on Feb. 1, 1960, with Harris as president and Teeter as EVP. The new company became the largest independent grocery organization in the Carolinas. 

At the time of the merger, there were 15 stores. Within three years, that number had grown to 25 and a new, larger warehouse with office facilities opened.

In 1969, the Harris and Teeter families sold the company to Ruddick Corp., a diversified holding company, according to Robinson.

They initially had approached the company to help facilitate the sale of Harris Teeter, but Ruddick leadership decided to acquire it. At that time, Harris Teeter was operating 17 stores. 

While under Ruddick Corp., Harris Teeter made several acquisitions. It purchased Charlotte-based Hunter Dairy in 1980, and Greensboro-based Food World in 1984. Food World had 52 stores in North Carolina and Virginia at the time. This brought the total number of stores to 122 in four states – North Carolina, Tennessee, South Carolina and Virginia, according to Robinson.

The company continued closing unprofitable locations and acquiring others, including 52 Big Star stores. In 1993, Harris Teeter purchased five Bruno’s supermarket locations in South Carolina.

In the years since, the company “continued to grow organically, building new stores and ­entering new markets,” Robinson said. 

In spite of its success, as it approached its 50th anniversary, an economic downturn occurred which adversely affected the grocery industry. Even during this challenging time, the company continued to expand while remaining committed to its core values of high-quality products, excellent customer service and clean, modern stores.

In 2013, Harris Teeter Supermarkets and The Kroger Co. announced a merger agreement. About six months later, the deal was finalized. It is now a wholly-owned subsidiary of The Kroger Co.

Throughout the transaction, both companies were transparent in their intentions, Robinson said.

Leaders of both companies – Rodney McMullen, current Kroger CEO, and Fred Morganthall, former Harris Teeter president and COO, outlined the benefits of the deal in a letter to Harris Teeter associates: “[Kroger has] long admired many things about Harris Teeter and hopes to apply these practices across our company.”

Robinson said Kroger continues to empower Harris Teeter to run the business the way its customers expect while leveraging the size and strength of the Kroger enterprise.

“Harris Teeter continues to have one story and one vision across our company,” she said. 

In March 2018, it acquired 10 Farm Fresh stores, including three in-store pharmacies and three fuel centers. The company’s first fuel center purchase resulted in an agreement with Piggly Wiggly in 2013, according to Robinson. 

Today, Harris Teeter operates 258 stores and 70 fuel centers in seven states and the District of Columbia. The company also owns grocery, frozen food and perishable distribution centers in Greensboro and Indian Trail, North Carolina.

Tammy DeBoer is the current president. Previously the company’s SVP of merchandising, operations and marketing, she succeeded Rod Antolock as president on Feb. 1, 2022.

The post Harris Teeter Continues To Build On History Of Success appeared first on Shelby Report.

From its founding 62 years ago, the company has grown to become a premier regional grocery store brand in the Southeast. It boasts 258 stores and 70 fuel centers and two distribution centers in seven states. 

The company has been on a path of expansion since 1997. Previous President Fred Morganthall II oversaw that growth as Harris Teeter moved into Georgia, Florida and Tennessee and later spearheaded growth into Virginia, Delaware, Maryland and Washington, D.C. 

Craig McKenzie, SVP of operations, is a 40-year Harris Teeter veteran. 

“The grocery business is extremely competitive,” McKenzie said. “Our Harris Teeter Team, which is made up of our store associates, our corporate associates and our warehouse associates press us to be better. In the end, the push ultimately pushes Harris Teeter into the future.”

The present-day Harris Teeter is headquartered in Matthews, North Carolina and employs approximately 35,000 associates. 

The company continues to focus on expansions – adding stores, new innovation in merchandising, own brands and in-store offerings. 

Butchers Market

The meat department, known as the Butchers Market, includes its own beef products under the Rancher Beef, Harris Teeter Reserve Angus Beef and Harris Teeter Naturals Beef brands. 

According to a publication written and distributed by the company, titled “Harris Teeter Legacy – 50 Years,” this practice began as products were cut to order or sold under service case glass.

“Our butchers purchased sides of beef and proceeded to cut the beef in-store directly off the rail; customers did not have the wide variety of options to buy that which they are accustomed to purchasing today,” the publication reads.

In 2006, the grocer launched its Harris Teeter Fresh Market Expert program, which provides its stores with a certified butcher who offers custom cuts, recipes and knowledge about the products, according to the publication. 

The meat program has been hailed by national beef and poultry associations, including recognitions in 2008 and 2010 during the Cattle Industry Annual Convention and the 2009 Beef Industry Visionary Awards. And in 2010, it became part of the USDA program, Certified Very Tender beef. 

Harris Teeter remains among a small group of retailers nationwide to take part in the program, which highlights strict protocols for steak cuts and requires that beef must be aged at least 21 days. 

The beef and poultry grab the limelight in the cases, but Harris Teeter takes care to keep current on trends and meet customers where they are. Formerly placed behind center-store freezer doors, plant-based meat alternatives have risen in popularity and the grocer does not shy from sharing its meat cases with the newcomers.

“When we talk to our customers, they are looking for variety and the best cuts of meat,” said Shawn Cram, VP of fresh merchandising.

“To meet these needs, we focus on premiumization, we have Wagyu, Prime, Natural, Angus and Ranchers. And if you go into one of our stores and you are not sure which cut of meat you want, we have full-service meat cases with experienced butchers who can custom cut your selection.”

Fishermans Market

Harris Teeter’s Fishermans Market is another staple of its fresh merchandising. The market has advocated a buy-local philosophy, according to Cram. 

All Harris Teeter locations offer a local fresh catch program. Much like its Butchers Market, the Fishermans Market keeps pace with customer trends and demand. 

“Value added” seafood has become prevalent, made in store by Harris Teeter associates with fresh ingredients. These items include salmon stuffed with crab meat and premade seafood items such as marinated Mahi Mahi and crab cakes.

Chief Financial Officer Scott Nations noted that this – along with the other prepared foods in front of the meat counters – provide customers with extensive options. 

“The feedback we get from our customers is that they appreciate variety,” he said. “The freshness and variety of the product offering, as well as the cleanliness of the store, all of that together excites our customers when they shop in our stores. They know that rather than going out for a meal, they can come to Harris Teeter and either pick up all the ingredients to prepare a meal at home or purchase a high-quality prepared offering.” 

Nations added that Harris Teeter customers enjoy a personal connection with associates and value the opinions they provide for meal options and product information.

“They want to know that that high-end steak in the meat case can be cut to their specifications. That’s across the board. Regardless of what they are buying, they’re going to have a great experience from our associates who care.”

Pairing that meat with a reasonable side is easy thanks to Harris Teeter’s Farmers Market. Back in 1936, when co-founder W.T. Harris, a farm boy from Georgia, opened his first Harris Super Market, he prided himself on providing the freshest, highest quality produce to customers, according to the company’s publication. 

Farmers Market

Much like the previous two markets, customers can find associates in the Farmers Market who are trained and educated on its offerings. Since 2003, Harris Teeter has been training them through its Green Thumb Experts program, which requires associates to complete a rigorous certification program.

They are, according to the company’s publication, “experts in their fields who are able to answer any questions a shopper may ask, including how to best store or prepare a particular item in the Farmers Market.”

While Harris Teeter has a long history of successful vendor partnerships, Green Thumb Experts associates inspect every produce item several times before it is allowed onto the floor. This is a last line of defense for the Farmers Market, as quality assurance checks take place at the distribution center. If an item has blemishes or flaws, it will not be sold.

While not all produce is sourced from local farms, Harris Teeter encourages support of local produce in its communities. Regional store teams have great autonomy on where they source their products, and stores that share a market area sometimes won’t receive the same produce from the same farms.

Most recently, Harris Teeter has developed fresh merchandising programs that have been introduced in the Farmers Market. The program uses mobile merchandising displays that showcase the grocer’s in-store made fresh products, including fruit bowls, veggies bowls and seven-layer dips. 

The program has had remarkable success and there are plans to add these display cases to additional Harris Teeter locations, according to Cram.

As a bonus to the Farmers Market, some Harris Teeter locations feature an adjoining juice bar.

Fresh Food Market

The last – but certainly not least – of Harris Teeter’s in-store branded departments is its Fresh Food Market, which is much more than a deli or bakery. 

The market includes standard deli meat counters, with ready-to-eat options, but also a variety of prepared foods. Chef-made prepared meals include an entree and side, ready to serve along with a variety of à la carte options.

At the company’s super flagship stores, Harris Teeter offers a variety of bars that offer rotating meal options for breakfast, lunch and dinner. 

Customers also will find a salad and olive bar; in-house pizza station, where customers can watch the pizza being made; a Murray’s cheese monger station with a variety of cheeses from around the globe; and a prepared meal event station at select stores. 

Harris Teeter also offers an extensive fresh bakery selection, including dessert items and signature cakes.

The Fresh Food Market has a strong partnership with Boar’s Head that dates back 11 years. Since that time, associates working the deli counter have been required to take part in the Boar’s Head Premium Deli Professional Workshop. Much like Harris Teeter’s own programs, they gain knowledge on the products and learn customer service traits specific to the Boar’s Head company, according to the publication. 

The grocer estimates it sells about 4 million made-to-order subs a year at its deli counters, while it averages one million cakes sold in that same span.

The bakery has a wide assortment of specialty dessert items, cakes, cookies and – depending on the area – cultural-inspired desserts. The bakers bake over two dozen kinds of artisanal breads per day. Ranging from baguettes to ciabatta, they make up a third of bakery sales. 

And just like the other markets within its stores, Harris Teeter has pre-packaged and in-store made bakery items.

“What really sets all that apart from everything else is the way that people can come in and get absolutely everything they could need or want,” said Matt Martin, VP of marketing. “It’s about meeting the customers where they are, and we aim to do that in every part of our store. 

“There is intention behind every decision. We get the customers’ and associates’ feedback. We can see, we can measure what is working and what isn’t. We are dedicated to a wide variety of quality fresh products and exceptional customer service.”

In order to create the prepackaged products for all of the departments, Harris Teeter devised its own chef program. It was put together in the 1990s by certified chef Gianfranco DiCarlo, an Italian cuisine expert.

Our Brands

Another area of emphasis for the company is private brands. While it has evolved over the years, the aspect that has not changed is quality. Much of Harris Teeter’s brands are supplied by the same national suppliers of the name brand. 

“The quality of our own brands is equivalent to the national brand or better,” said Chuck Munn, VP of non-perishable merchandising. “We have a tremendous Own Brands program here at Harris Teeter for every customer, including entry level own brands to a more premium level product.”

The Harris Teeter private label can be found under many names – Simple Truth and Simple Truth Organic, H.T. Traders, Harris Teeter brand and Private Selection. 

No matter which of the private label brands customers choose, there is a money-back guarantee if they’re not satisfied. 

As of 2014, Harris Teeter is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Kroger. The merger with Kroger created synergy between the two companies that allowed Harris Teeter to enhance and expand its Own Brand selections, including adding Kroger’s Simple Truth and Simple Truth Organic brand.

Simple Truth is a natural and organic food product that is free from artificial preservatives, GMO’s and free from 101 artificial ingredients.

Officials said the transition made sense for Harris Teeter as the Simple Truth brands continue to resonate with shoppers. As of 2021, Harris Teeter stocked more than 700 Simple Truth items, with that expected to top 1,000 in early 2023.

For more information, visit harristeeter.com.

To read the full Retailer of the Year section on Harris Teeter by The Shelby Report, click here.

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In addition, President Tammy DeBoer was awarded Female Executive of the Year and past president Rod Antolock was inducted into the Food Industry Hall of Fame.

“We are honored to be named Retailer of the Year – Southeast by The Shelby Report,” said Danna Robinson, director of corporate affairs for Harris Teeter. “We strive every day to enrich the lives of our associates and our customers, and to be recognized as a company and have our key executives recognized for their individual efforts means everything to us.

“Harris Teeter is extremely proud of Tammy and Rod, who are both deserving of these honors. As for our Retailer of the Year award, all thanks and congratulations go to our valued associates – they are the reason our customers love their Harris Teeter.”

Join us in the pages that follow to learn more about the retailer and its history.

To read the individual stories within, click the links below:

To read more about the retailer’s fresh offerings, click here.

To learn about its history of success, click here.

For more information about its e-biz department, click here.

To read about our Female Executive of the Year Tammy DeBoer, click here.

To learn about our Food Industry Hall of Fame inductee and Harris Teeter Past President Rod Antolock, click here.

The post Harris Teeter Named Southeast Retailer Of The Year appeared first on Shelby Report.

Kress began his grocery career at age 18 in 1984, working as a part-time cashier. Over the ensuing 38 years, he has served in a number of progressively responsible and cross-functional leadership roles at Giant Food and its parent company, Ahold Delhaize.

After serving in several store management roles, Kress transitioned into human resources and held leadership positions in training, staffing, management, development, organizational development and labor relations.

In 2003, he was named VP of human resources and labor relations for Giant Food. He stayed in that role until 2011, when he was named SVP of human resources and labor relations for then parent company Ahold USA.

Two years later, Kress returned to Giant Food as SVP of retail operations and assumed responsibility for all store operations and asset protection for Giant Food’s 164 stores throughout its market area of Delaware, Maryland, Virginia and Washington D.C.

In 2019, Kress began serving as the interim president when the then president went to lead Stop & Shop, another Ahold-Delhaize brand. Kress was named president in May 2020.

He and his wife of eight years, Heather, have three children each who range in age from 17 to 32 years old and one grandchild who is 2.

Along with his duties at Giant Food, Kress is an active member of his community. He currently serves on the boards for the Johns Hopkins Pediatric Oncology Advisory Council, the Capital Area Food Bank, the USO National Capital District and the Ahold-Delhaize USA Family Foundation.

But Kress rarely talks about himself. For example, when interviewed for his Hall of Fame induction, he immediately touted the company and the great work its associates are doing.

“Being awarded Retailer of the Year – or even me, Ira Kress, in the Hall of Fame – is not what we’re in business to do. It’s not why I lead this organization [as president],” he said. “For me, I think we do deserve recognition as a brand. It’s for what our associates do every single day. They literally are the ones who are living, breathing and delivering upon our brand promise and our commitment to our customers. And then the managers and leaders in this organization – not Ira Kress – are the ones delivering what our commitment is to our associates.”

While noting that his years in the grocery industry are not “a long career, just a long time,” he said there are two core reasons why he has stayed: “I love the company. I love Giant.”

He likened his feelings for Giant Food to playing with an all-star athlete. “When you’ve been working with the No. 1 player, it’s hard to suggest you’re ever going to make the decision to say, ‘I think I want to go play for the No. 2 player.’”

He also appreciates how the food retail business has changed over time, saying he “never got bored.”

The second core value that kept Kress around was the company’s ability to adapt and stay relevant, something he finds exciting.

“I’ve never viewed myself as having worked for one organization for 37 years,” he said. “I’ve probably worked for four or five truly different businesses over that period of time. Yes, the name may say Giant or Ahold, but for all intents and purposes there was always something new.”

As he was taking over executive responsibilities as president during the COVID-19 pandemic, many things were happening and changing. Adaptability was Kress’ key term when it came to his leadership and how the company and its associates led their communities through the worst of COVID.

“It’s what made us successful, not just throughout the pandemic but frankly throughout the last 86 years,” he said. “I wouldn’t say there’s even been a host of policy changes. I think the impact on people is what’s changed.

“How our associates and our customers view the world has changed, competition has changed, the economy has changed and we’re seeing that impact a lot of those things today. The resiliency that our associates and our customers have shown in navigating through just an extraordinarily uncertain period of time – a scary period of time – has been simply astounding.”

Kress explained that seeing how the communities that Giant Food inhabits change, accept and adapt to the evolving world that surrounded the pandemic was heartwarming.

“I knew we had great people. I would have never imagined this is how our associates are going to react to it,” he said. “I would have never guessed they would have reacted the way they did, which is with tremendous enthusiasm and passion and commitment to Giant Food.

“They were doing what they do for the company to a degree, but a larger purpose was what they were doing for their community; what they were doing for their neighbor; what they were doing for their customers. For me, just seeing that and seeing it continue for a very long period of time – given the uncertainties and the unknowns and the risks, all of the things that they went through – it was very heartwarming.”

Kress believes Giant Food’s virtue lies within its authenticity and autonomy. Franchise owners make a majority of the in-store decisions. That’s a trait that helps connect more with their local community. No two stores are exactly the same. And that personalization helps them connect with their communities. To Kress, that’s simply “our brand.”

“The reality is every single one of our current 164 stores is a community store. It’s not a Giant Food brand store. And they are all unique based on the associates and start there,” he explained. “We hire associates from within the communities that they’re serving. The managers are embedded in the communities in which they’re serving, whether they live in that community or not.

“And it runs with everything from the Boys and Girl Scouts to bake sales to softball and baseball games. They’re embedded in the community…the customers are classically shopping within the community that they live in. It’s their friends and neighbors and family.”

Along with bringing in members of the local community, Giant Food looks to stock store shelves with brands and products that are meaningful to the community. The company considers the demographics of the communities and their lifestyles.

“We’ve got an extraordinarily diverse community base and not just diverse in race and gender, but diverse in life experiences and interests,” Kress said. “Our customers, regardless of their race or gender, experience life through food…that helps us embed ourselves in the community.”

That community impact goes well beyond the stores. Giant Food has four core charitable pillars that include local food insecurity and access, military support, pediatric cancer research and social equality. Beyond the company, the communities organize their own food charitable events.

“Frankly, it’s something that I didn’t build,” Kress said. “It’s been built by the associates in this business…it’s our associates rallying behind the church down the street, with a synagogue down the road or the school that is struggling. That’s not something that we put out and say, ‘Do this.’ They do it because they’re a part of that community.”

Kress saw the change that emotions were making in the workplace and throughout Giant Food’s communities when he took over as president.

On the store side, he saw that sense of community being challenged. Everyone wore masks and shoppers couldn’t see each other’s faces and Plexiglass separated them from associates. On the corporate level, he saw some people retire due to health and safety concerns, while others worked away from the office.

“I could never put my finger on what people think now or this is how they feel now. It’s different person to person…I think how people think about home life and quality of life is different now. Working in the office is different,” he said. “Human emotions, they span huge aspects of our lives. And that’s what we saw was the people change. Beyond that, there’s not so much a difference in the way we operate our business today. We had to lean in on core qualities and traits of the business and the brand. One of those was trust with our customers in our associates. We had it going in and built it throughout.”

Kress has based his leadership on open communication. As his tenure as president immediately began with putting out fire after fire, he found that being open and honest with his leadership team, associates and customers was the best option. He still believes that keeping communities informed is the best possible way to maintain trust.

“We were really up front and out front in our communication,” Kress said. “That being with our associates and our customers. We were grounded in the decisions that we made. We were very overt in telling customers and associates where that grounding was coming from.

“There were a lot of thoughts and opinions from customers, from associates, from my leadership team. We decided very early on what our priorities were. Our priority was the safety of our associates and the safety of our customers.

“It was interesting to watch [municipalities] take what we did as a precautionary measure and then make it mandatory…we looked to do what was beyond mandatory and we kept our customers and our associates informed.”

Kress said interaction with people is his favorite part of leading Giant Food as president.

“I have been known to say, ‘We sell pork and beans for a living.’ It’s not because I love selling pork and beans, I love the ability to interact with and lead people. We are a consumer business. We literally see the impact of what we do every single day.

“We’re all consumers of this business. So for me, one of the things I love about this industry is we’re all in it. All my friends and all my neighbors and all my family – everybody I know – is a customer of this business…that’s the most wonderful thing about it.

“And the most difficult thing about it is I’ve never been at a neighborhood party or event or a family gathering where someone doesn’t have insight and input for me on what we should do better or different – from the products we carry to where we stock them to what height they are on the aisles. Because we’re all a part of this business and we’re all a part of a community. I love it.”

To view the complete Hall of Fame/Retailer of the Year section, presented by The Shelby Report, click here.

The post Popular President Says Brand Deserves Recognition, Not Him appeared first on Shelby Report.

With about 1,600 staff members throughout the company, Zvaleny had to write the playbook after the COVID-19 pandemic hit.

With so many unknowns, the pharmacy operations team sought multiple sources of information. Each state or district within Giant’s operational scope – Delaware, Maryland, Virginia and the District of Columbia – had its own mandates and policies. None gave a clear indication of how vaccine guidelines were supposed to be administered or coordinated. And that was just the beginning of the challenges.

“You had to figure out how to do everything, how to make everything work. So being a pharmacy – a community pharmacy, retail pharmacy – we had to play by certain rules, but there were no guidelines on how to play by the rules,” Zvaleny said.

In his nearly 25-year career, Zvaleny had no point of reference on organizing emergency use of vaccines for 152 pharmacies. As Giant Food was the first pharmacy to offer the vaccine to consumers, even external help from other retailers was limited. Beyond ever-changing federal policies, vaccine priorities, storage methods, there was the issue of pharmacies simply receiving the vaccine when promised.

“The demand was just skyrocketing, as you can imagine…it’s a brand-new vaccine that has never been done before. So that is a lot of training,” Zvaleny explained. “We had to develop all the training. We had certain storage requirements. We had to have certain temperature-monitoring devices, certain transport containers, a scheduler. All these things you have to build that aren’t built yet. They didn’t exist…we didn’t know when we were going to receive it. The date kept changing.”

Despite the uncertainties, Zvaleny said the reason for Giant Food’s success was the inability to say “no.”

“When you look back at the trajectory we took and the reason we’re so successful is I never said no to anything,” he said. “Actually, I asked for more. If they don’t want it or whoever doesn’t want it, I’ll take the supply.”

Giant Food’s vaccine campaign began in D.C., which was a bit smoother than some of the other markets the company serves. D.C. had its own vaccine scheduler. Through that federal third party, it was easier to coordinate the correct people who were getting the vaccine at a time when supplies were limited and were available only to essential personnel like healthcare workers.

After D.C., the company’s home state of Maryland was next. Gov. Larry Hogan wanted Giant Food to help pilot the vaccine distribution. Beginning with 22 stores, it was one of the first pharmacies to vaccinate in the state. The problem, as first realized in D.C., was there were only so many doses available.

“We had 4,500 doses of vaccines in 22 stores and there were several million people who wanted it,” Zvaleny said.

As vaccines became available for more people, Zvaleny and his team worked with the Federal Retail Pharmacy Partnership and the respective states to bring in more vaccines for not only the store’s pharmacies but also external clinics the company held.

“We were working on high throughout clinics with [Maryland], working directly with the governor’s office, working different entities…we built immunization teams. We had 50 pharmacists and techs all the days and nights give [vaccines]. We built central separate teams to do all the billing and the paperwork.”

Throughout 2021, Giant held more than 1,500 external clinics in Maryland. They were held in schools, nursing homes, skilled nursing facilities, juvenile centers, detention centers and homeless shelters. The teams even went to individuals with developmental disabilities.

“We went everywhere…we went outside of our footprint – significantly outside of the footprint – to keep driving that and get those vaccinations there,” Zvaleny said.

Giant Food’s efforts through the pandemic were recognized by Vice President Kamala Harris, who visited a store in the D.C. area to see the operation in motion and address the importance of getting immunized. Delaware and Virginia were the last of Giant’s market states to ask for the company’s help to coordinate vaccines. To date, Giant Food has distributed more than 1.1 million vaccines – and it all started with the word “no.”

To view the complete Retailer of the Year section, presented by The Shelby Report, click here.

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Gregg Dorazio’s half-decade at Giant Food began as a marketing position. When he was named e-commerce lead in 2019, there was a base for him to expand the grocer’s online portfolio before the COVID-19 pandemic came on the radar.

“It’s been an evolution. We’ve had a presence – or at least Ahold Delhaize has had a presence – in the market for about 20 years now,” he said. “That early presence has informed a lot of what we do today. It gave us a base to kind of build from.

“But the reason we consolidated things back in 2019 was to literally bring that Peapod business into Giant food, rebrand and relaunch it with delivery. Also, we were starting to scale pickup and adding third-party vendors like Instacart at the same time.”

Dorazio went on to note that these were the “three legs of Giant’s stool” – the three services beyond conventional grocery shopping that would prepare the company for the demand of e-commerce that came with the pandemic. But it mostly began with the integration of Peapod.

Peapod, now known as Peapod Digital Labs, began in Chicago as a next-day delivery service. Today, it allows companies such as Giant to fulfill the growing demand for e-commerce. According to Dorazio, satisfying customers is the “need for speed.”

“You see customers come in and say, ‘Can I have it the same day? Can I have it in two hours? Can I have it in one hour?’ So now you have other models that have popped up,” he explained. “And alongside Giant Delivers, which was the previous Peapod business, you have Instacart, it’s a third-party marketplace. I liken that to a personal shopper. “You are hiring that gig worker to go into the store for you. You can share your list, you can text back and forth, and they bring it to your house.”

Giant Delivers is a free delivery service with a minimum of $30 orders that boasts speeds as fast as four hours, Dorazio said. He and his team have seen traffic surge over the past three years.

Giant Food offers three online portals – mobile, mobile app and desktop. The convenience of the choices is enticing many customers that were already shopping with the company. The challenge now, according to Dorazio, is growing that marketplace into broader age ranges. Those who use the e-commerce opportunities enjoy the convenience of a handheld digital shopping list, coupons, weekly ads, Giant Flexible Rewards and personalized shopping lists. But how does the company get more customers to try it?

“It’s not a huge training opportunity. It’s more just an awareness build that [the app] is going to save you time,” he said. “This is going to save you the most money by coming through us and you’re using all those resources. They see the benefit.

“Once you get going – and once they get to their third, fourth or fifth orders – that’s where the savings really start to multiply. That’s where customers see the benefit.”

Dyani Hanrahan, VP of marketing and community relations, said Giant Food’s personalized online experience will draw people not only to its e-commerce offerings but also in-store experiences. She added that every associate throughout the company is trying to enhance the e-commerce experience. “We’ve got this new customer behavior, that’s very complex, that we always have to think about now,” she said. “We need to think about whether [the customer] is online only or brick-and-mortar only or are you a little bit of both? How does that personalized experience layer into that? That’s another great challenge for us.

“You do have to think in the moment of the customer and their journey. It’s not just about slapping the website on every piece of collateral. Everybody on our team has to think about it like that, ‘How do I contribute to the e-commerce option?’ It’s about their behavior and how we can provide solutions for those complex problems.”

Giant Food offers a myriad of solutions. Every market it serves has some form of e-commerce offerings, according to Ira Kress, president. Whether customers are hoping to have their products ready for pickup, delivered to their homes or searching for the most relevant coupons, the company has something to offer everyone. “We are uniquely positioned when it comes to e-commerce,” Kress said. “I say that because we offer effectively every channel that a customer has an interest in. We have our in-store pickup business across 98 percent of our stores. Effectively every market in which we serve we have in-store pickup customers go online, order a full assortment at store level, pay the same as in-store prices and have that order available for pickup within four hours.”

To further expand its e-commerce, Giant Food wants to make the services faster. The company has a fulfillment center in Hanover, Maryland. It acts as the dual center for store inventory deliveries, as well as e-commerce, and works to meet customer demand for same-day delivery.

After taking over the Maryland facility in 2019, Joe Urban, VP of supply chain operations, has seen its capacity double, to the point where another center is required. A new facility is set to open soon in Manassas, Virginia. That will help expand the company’s e-commerce and delivery capabilities, but also do so in a streamlined manner.

“Our primary focus is not only to meet the demand of home delivery, but it’s really the speed upon delivery as well,” Urban explained. “We really want to move about 70 percent same-day service out of those facilities. Again, it’s just speed of delivery. “Those orders are coming, and we want to make sure we’re able to turn those orders quickly. And by doing that in Manassas, we’ll be able to expand our zip codes and expand our market presence as well.”

With the Manassas center, Giant Food will be able to cover more than 100 percent of its market area. “By opening our Manassas facility, we’ll have 100 percent market cover-age even outside of our market area where we don’t have a brick-and-mortar presence,” Kress said. “We’ll have the ability to deliver – particularly on the East Coast, as an example – farther south, in Virginia. But more importantly, the speed to service grows exponentially. We can effectively have a 50 to 60 percent same-day model with the new fulfillment center.”

Giant Food also has a “cross-dock” facility in Milford, Delaware, that allows it to serve the primarily older population in that area. Through it, the company can move truck trailers to the facility, where products are then loaded onto Giant Delivery vans. The total time for product to be delivered to a customer’s house after being unloaded is about two hours, according to Urban.

On average, Giant has at least 100 delivery vans – including two electric ones – on the road at any given time. But that isn’t the only avenue for delivery. According to Kress, Giant was one of the first companies to market with a third-party delivery service – in this case, Instacart. Delivery through Instacart is available across Giant’s entire market, which further illustrates its commitment to same-day delivery.

“Customers choose to use whatever is most convenient for them,” Kress said. Dorazio likened third-party services such as Instacart to personal shoppers.

“That is a premium rush service, whereas Giant Delivers is more of an everyman kind of service. We offer free delivery with only a $30 minimum. Our speed is as fast as four hours, and our assortment is strong. From a holistic perspective, that’s been a part of our evolution is trying to make our e-commerce offering as competitive as possible.”

E-commerce also has helped streamline associates’ jobs. Edwin Ilarios Barrera, an assistant store manager in Virginia, recalled a specific item that a customer was looking for and he was able to find through his phone.

“When I first started, it was a lot harder when a customer would come to you and ask for a specific item. You had to know your entire store,” he said. “But now, I have a whole catalog of SKUs in my phone if a customer comes up to me.

“For example, I had a customer at my store asking me for mango chutney, looking for a specific brand. I went on my phone, went to the Giant App, typed in ‘mango chutney.’ It’s also easier to let me know we carry your product even if we don’t have it in my store. I can always point them to another location, another Giant where they could go.”

Giant Food’s future in e-commerce is rooted in increasing the range and speed of deliveries. However, it also includes possibilities for automation and further technological advancements, which Urban said are being explored.

The company recently launched its Endless Aisles platform. The idea is based on allowing customers to shop online – grocery and general merchandise – and have it shipped to their doors regardless of whether the items are carried in stores. Tens of thousands of SKUs are available, but the goal is to add an additional 100,000, according to Kress. It is currently being “tested and evolving.”

To view the complete Retailer of the Year section, presented by The Shelby Report, click here.

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After taking place virtually for the past two years, the event returned in-person June 25-26 in Washington, D.C., and benefited the USO of Metropolitan Washington-Baltimore.

The two-day event along Pennsylvania and Constitution avenues, between 3rd and 7th streets, featured barbecue and grilled food samples, more than 30 bands performing across three stages, celebrity chefs, cookbook authors and local professional sports player appearances, microbrew, wine sampling and cooking competitions.

The Taste of Giant Sampling Pavilion and Giant Local Flavors tent offered a wide variety of free barbecue samples and wine and microbrew offerings were available for sampling in the Giant Corks to Caps tent. 

Attendees could also learn from the best barbecue celebrity TV chefs and pitmasters such as Myron Mixon and Tuffy Stone. The Giant Kidz Zone featured fun for the whole family, including free rides, games and sampling.

Giant’s team of nutritionists teamed up with Dole, sharing healthy eating tips and sampling Dole products at the Giant Healthy Living tent. Giant’s pharmacists offered free health screenings and distributed health and wellness products at the Giant Health & Wellness tent.

Musical artists – American Authors, Trevor Daniel, Nighthawks, Laine Hardy, Vertical Horizon, The Chuck Brown Band and Sam Grow – performed across the three stages throughout the weekend.

Through its sponsorship of the event since 2016, Giant Food has raised money for its beneficiaries, including more than $1.25 million for USO-Metro in 2021 alone. 

“By putting full support behind their annual in-store Round Up campaign and the Barbecue Battle, Giant has set the gold standard for actions, not words,” said Lisa Marie Riggins, executive director of the USO National Capital District. 

“Thanks to Giant’s unwavering commitment to our men and women who serve, the USO has maintained troop – support without interruption. This partnership has been critical to our success.”

For more information, visit giantfood.com.

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For many associates, the company’s culture extends beyond the boundaries of any corporate office, distribution center, delivery truck or store. They find it encompasses the core ideals of Giant Food. The Maryland-based corporation and its associates make a commitment to customers to provide them with the best products, service, experience and path to live a healthy life. 

That heightened experience travels far beyond any brick-and-mortar store. It goes into their sense of community and devotion to safety, technology and each other. Even those that are just on Giant’s peripheral can see its culture. 

Charity

Externally, Giant’s culture is based on four pillars – local food insecurity and access, military support, pediatric cancer research and social equality.

D.C. Greens is a Washington D.C. based-nonprofit that works to increase food access and health equity in the metro area. Its partnership with Giant Food began in 2017, according to Andrea Talhami, the organization’s programs director. In 2019, the partners launched Produce Rx.

The program gives $20 per week for fruits and vegetables to people experiencing food insecurity and at-risk for or experiencing Type 2 diabetes or hypertension. In 2021, it transitioned from $80 a month to $240 for three months and is available at all five Giant pharmacies in the nation’s capital. At last check, there were more than 930 participants. 

The program began in 2013 with local farmers markets, according to Talhami. Due to their seasonal nature, however, the organization sought participation from a large retailer. 

“The partnership with Giant has been so incredibly helpful for us because we were able to transition our program from something that was operational only between June and October to something that can be offered year round,” she said.

This is just one example of Giant’s charitable culture. Alongside D.C. Greens, the company partners with the Capital Area Food Bank, USO Metropolitan Washington-Baltimore and the Maryland Food Bank, just to name a few. 

The Capital Area Food Bank is the largest partner when it comes to fighting hunger, with more than 91 of Giant’s stores in the organization’s region. They have worked together since 1980.

The relationship with the Maryland Food Bank also goes back a long way – 1983. Within the past 10 years, though, Giant has provided it with more than $3 million in financial support, according to Carmen DelGuercio, CEO of the Maryland Food Bank. 

“They’ve been committed to our mission,” DelGuercio said. “I’m sure there’s several other food banks that they have supported as well. But, from a holistic point of view, [Giant] is not all about just a donation. They are there. They’re focused on providing time, talent and treasure.”

USO-Metro is Giant’s biggest partner under its military pillar and has been since 2011. Together, they put on the Giant National Capital Barbecue Battle. Within the past year – and with customer support – Giant has raised more than $1.1 million for the organization. Giant holds a round-up campaign in stores for the month proceeding the event. 

The Barbecue Battle is currently in its 30th year, with this the seventh in a row with Giant as the title sponsor. That culture of giving is felt throughout the USO organization.

“One group we can never turn our backs on is our military. Their lives consist of transition, readiness and sacrifice for our country,” said Lisa Marie Riggins, president and CEO of USO-Metro. “Giant has set the gold standard for actions, not words…thanks to Giant’s unwavering commitment to our men and women who serve, the USO has maintained troop – support without interruption. This partnership has been critical to our success.”

Dyani Hanrahan, VP of marketing and community relations, explained these types of partnerships encapsulate Giant’s devotion. 

“We have ongoing discussions with our partners to understand what they need now. While we have established programs that we run every year, we are really trying to stay in touch with what’s going on, what’s shifting, and how we need to respond for our partners in real time”

Ilham Tarbouz, district director 91, Count on Us, Count on Me and in-store experience, emphasized the teamwork at Giant Food. 

“Together as a team, we coach and train and develop and promote our associates – whether it’s support of our communities, whether it’s feeding families,” she said. “Our promises to deliver great food is made easily. 

“We support our communities through our giving back campaigns, such as the USO, the children’s cancer research and food bank support. As we speak, the store teams are gearing up for the children’s cancer fundraiser. That is a part of our culture.”

Community

You can’t have a community without the people who inhabit it. At Giant, community and people are the culture. From cashiers to the office to the president, people are the main focus at Giant Food. Alongside the four charitable pillars, the company has three core beliefs that help define  its internal culture. 

• Be a better place to work

• Be a better place to shop

• Be a better neighbor

These core beliefs are expressed through actions and programs. Longtime employees see their customers as part of their community and a representation of the company’s culture. 

“Let’s get it done for the customer,” said Dwayne Holmes, dairy clerk. “They’re coming in because they know what to expect. They know what I can do for them and how I’m going to do it. They trust me. 

“They trust me to know what I’m supposed to do. My job is to make sure they get what they need. That’s all that matters to me. No matter what Giant they walk into, they know that they are going to see somebody like me, somebody who knows the community. They know they’ll find somebody that cares.”

This sense of community is expressed throughout every single one of Giant’s 164 stores. As President Ira Kress put it, “Each store is a community store.” 

All stores are crafted by the associates who live within the respective communities. Associates from cashiers to managers are plucked from the area because they’re the ones who will be shopping there.

“That is our commitment to our customers. People are the center of our brand because they are the center of every community,” Kress said.

To inhabit a culture of care and community, Giant has focused on providing healthy living for its service areas. 

The company has a team of community nutritionists who work one-on-one with customers. Alongside those nutritionists is the community health manager. This person is in charge of programming within underserved communities. A healthy living merchandiser works with Giant’s external partners and the merchandising team to bring programs into the stores that promote healthy products and healthy living. 

These community nutrition teams pair with Giant’s pharmacies to help bring those core beliefs to customers. All of the dietitians have specialties. That could be how to live with diabetes, heart health or assisting adolescents exposed to unhealthy eating and dietary habits early in life. 

Working with the customers, dietitians help build healthy meal plans, providing tips and tricks and how best to shop Giant Food. Nutritionists then team with Giant pharmacists to craft a prescription plan to supplement customers’ health goals.

“You make the time. You personalize,” said Paul Zvaleny, director of pharmacy operations. “That customer interaction is so important. People talk with their pharmacists about a lot of different things. People trust their pharmacists. They trust the process.”

This is just one of many ways that Giant helps foster its culture of community. But it’s not necessarily something intangible or believed. According to Gregg Dorazio, e-commerce lead, Giant’s net promoter score is “much higher than many competitors.”

“It’s very easy to feel that kind of energy. There’s that sense of community and to see the results of it,” he said. The customer is actually recognizing this momentum and this progress. And it’s a resounding ‘yes.’ 

“We have incredibly high brick and mortar NPS, delivery NPS, pickup NPS. I think that’s something I can hold up as a gold standard as our customers recognizing that we have made a difference and that we are continuing to improve and that we are getting better.”

Improving and investing in its communities, while always a priority for Giant, has never been more clear than the ongoing effort to remodel all of its qualifying stores. It currently has plans to remodel a majority of its older sites. Work began before the COVID-19 pandemic and continues today. 

Care

Caring for customers and the community is something every grocer aspires to but Giant Food continues to bring that sense of community inward. The company realizes how important it is to foster a culture of care within its own walls. The people working within Giant are what Kress refers to as the “secret sauce.” 

“There wouldn’t be a Giant without our associates,” he said. “At the end of the day some people work for their paycheck, and that’s totally fine. But the people who really understand their customers and understand their community, those are the ones who make Giant the brand that it is. It isn’t me or some special ingredient. They are the secret sauce.”

Giant prides itself on weaving associates within its brand strategy. Brian Wanner, VP human resources, quoted legendary management consultant and writer Peter Drucker as a basis for the cultural strategy. 

“From a culture perspective, culture eats strategy. You can have the best strategy in the world. But if you don’t have the right people, strategy and culture, the business is not going to move forward,” Wanner said. 

Giant feels this integration of its associates within its overall strategy galvanizes the brand into having a “culture of care.”

This is derived from support of Giant’s associates. 

“Building them up and caring from the top down” is how Jamie Joshua, diversity, equity and inclusion manager, described Giant’s methods. Beyond that, Giant’s culture of care extends to diversity and inclusion, which ranges from celebrating heritage months and cultural holidays to events such as International Women’s Day.

“It’s looking at supporting our associates and what they need,” she said. “I think of navigating through the pandemic. There were lots of check-ins…I’ve been in the store and I’ve watched our Human Resource Business Partners check on people. And I’ve seen our [district directors] do it as well. That culture of care goes from the top down. 

“There is an understanding that we all have growth and learning to do. That culture of adaptability and caring and the ability to say, ‘I got it wrong. How do I fix this?’ That is seen throughout Giant and throughout its associates.”

Giant has faced the same challenges as other grocery retailers around the world. There are workforce and supply chain shortages, rising inflation and the pandemic. 

“It’s been tough,” said Edwin Illarios Barrera, assistant store manager.

Barrera has spent more than 10 years with Giant, joining as a night shift stock worker in 2011. Throughout that time, he has seen the energy the company emanates. The sense of togetherness has only strengthened throughout his time. Flexibility for associates also has made a huge difference.

“When I started, it was definitely this department does this, this department does that. It’s slowly changed. It’s adapting and people are saying, ‘Hey, can you help me out here? Can you help me with this?’ And people are willing. It’s just flexibility,” Barrera explained.

“If you’re able to do other things, people are happy to help. My main role is in the grocery department, but that doesn’t stop me from being able to help in produce or go to the meat department. I know my manager is always willing to help with inventory. It’s just a matter of being willing to help.”

Barrera added that labor shortages have actually brought current associates closer. 

“You can look at it with the downside of not having a whole lot of help, but I think it’s actually pulling people together more, especially the people who have been there for a long time,” he said.

Tarbouz, district director, has been with Giant for 16 years. Throughout that time she has held a myriad of leadership roles. Her proudest career achievement came in 2020, when she was tasked with opening a new store during COVID in Fairfax, Virginia. As part of that, she hired some 300 new associates. Training them came with its own set of challenges. 

“We held orientations, food safety classes, emergency manager classes,” she said. “And since the store was closed, I took advantage of the sales floor, the back rooms. That’s where we held all these classes because we had to follow the CDC guidelines and make sure that there were no more than 10 associates per class. We had to follow the guidelines to the ‘T.’ We made sure that every chair was sanitized right after the classes were concluded.”

As she worked to open the new store, she saw the culture of care on full display. 

“What I witnessed…was all our teams came together, supporting each other collectively.

Whether it was the store teams, corporate, our field teams, all of us had one goal – to have the best grand opening ever. 

“That is our Giant Food culture, working as one family. COVID added adapting to change quickly. We had all that in place, but it was phenomenal to witness.”

On the corporate level, Giant Food in early 2021 completed the expansion of its headquarters in Landover, Maryland. 

The project added an additional 31,000 square feet and 70 jobs to the corporate office. The local Prince George County community helped with the expansion. Together with the Maryland Department of Commerce, Giant received $500,000 in funding. The company was also eligible for the state’s Job Creation Tax Credit, which is equal to $3,000 per new job and increases with other stipulations. 

“We are excited to see that Giant Food, which has been a pioneer among grocery chains in the region, is growing and has added new jobs,” Gov. Larry Hogan said at the time. “The state was pleased to support this expansion, which enables Giant to continue to provide excellent products and services to its many customers.”

Culture is experienced in a variety of ways. Giant explores its culture throughout a variety of avenues. But something that always comes to the forefront is its commitment to the respective communities. 

The internal and external pillars of culture aren’t just “towing the company line,” they are how Giant builds and conducts its business. Charity, community and care are how it connects to customers and associates.

For more information, visit giantfood.com.

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The most recent example of a sporting partnership was the Hy-Vee INDYCAR Race Weekend. Held July 22-24 at Iowa Speedway, about 30 minutes east of Hy-Vee’s headquarters in West Des Moines, it marked the company’s first major foray into racing. The grocer sponsored the full weekend of racing and several cars. The main one, the No. 45 Hy-Vee Honda, was driven by Jack Harvey. 

The weekend kicked off with Free Family Friday, during which fans could enjoy driver autograph sessions, Victory Lane visits, live music and more than 50 food trucks. 

It was the only doubleheader race of the 2022 NTT INDYCAR Series. Saturday’s race was the Hy-VeeDeals.com 250 presented by DoorDash, while Sunday’s was the Hy-Vee Salute to Farmers 300 presented by Google.

The weekend also featured performances from musical artists Tim McGraw, Florida Georgia Line, Gwen Stefani and Blake Shelton. 

The company’s decision to move into INDYCAR sponsorship started with Chairman and Executive Director Randy Edeker, who had begun following European-based, Formula One racing and saw how quickly it was gaining popularity. 

“If you look at Formula One, their numbers are up unbelievably internationally. If you look at their shift, their greatest growth categories is with 18 to 35 [year olds] because they developed a game and a Netflix show called ‘Drive to Survive,’” he said. “I looked in the U.S. and thought, ‘Who’s most like that?’ It’s INDYCAR.”

Before the COVID-19 pandemic, Hy-Vee had run a car in the INDYCAR series with driver Graham Rahal. 

“We formed a partnership with Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing to run a partial season,” Edeker said. “I watched it and I measured it with what we thought that we could do with it. I believe that INDYCAR in the United States could be a rival to Formula One if they formulate the path that Formula One alreay has.”

This is where the idea to showcase Hy-Vee’s newest online offerings formulated in Edeker’s mind.

“That’s why we initially got into it. Then we asked, ‘How do we apply it?’ Hy-VeeDeals.com, WholeLotta Good, PetShip and RedBox RX pharmacy all were in their infancy,” he said. “We started looking at how we drive our social media brands and HSTV. We thought INDYCAR was worth the investment. We decided we would tie it into the race itself because the INDYCAR races are national.”

This year’s race weekend was a rousing success. Nearly 60 percent of the total tickets sold were from out-of-state fans. Across the three days, the event drew more than 80,000 fans, which represented one of the largest weekends in the 16-year history of Iowa Speedway, according to a Hy-Vee press release. 

According to NBC Sports Network, the two races drew a television plus digital audience of more than 1.7 million and delivered some of INDYCAR’s top social media engagement of the year. Across all social channels, the weekend surpassed total engagement with hundreds of thousands of video views. While the exact economic impact of the event is still being tabulated, the effects are certain to linger.

The weekend was a resounding success for the community and for the state of Iowa and race fans. It was more than just a race, the marketing and operations team earned credit for creating a whole festival atmosphere with top-tier talent.

This is not the only national sports partnership for the company has ties with the Kansas City Chiefs, Minnesota Vikings and, most recently, the Green Bay Packers. This carries with it the ability to sell products with the teams’ logos or players’ names attached.

Titletown, a park that sits outside of Lambeau Field in Green Bay, welcomed Hy-Vee in early September, officially naming it Hy-Vee Plaza “to be a gathering space at the heart of Titletown.” 

Alongside this, Hy-Vee launched exclusive cereals featuring Minnesota Vikings wide receiver Adam Thielen and Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce. The proceeds from these cereals will benefit the Thielen Foundation and the 87 & Running Foundation, respectively. Both organizations aim to support youth through mentorship, athletics and critical life skills. Hy-Vee has had other iterations of this program such as its partnership with Kirk Cousins last year. 

While it does help the brand become more recognizable, it also has intangible benefits, according to Donna Tweeten, EVP, chief marketing officer and chief of staff. These come from the connection to the community they are targeting.

“Our sports marketing has been community based, whether that’s supporting a high school team, college team or a pro team that happens to be in the market that we do business in,” she said. “Embedding ourselves in the community, sharing that fandom has been beneficial to us…there’s more blue sky engagement that we get with our fans. 

“Through our sponsorships…you can see engagement, specifically on social media. When people think about the Vikings or Chiefs game this Sunday, they’re thinking Hy-Vee. We know this. We’ve tested. We’ve done the research and have the results to prove it.”

Every time the Chiefs play a home game, people from around the country can see the team enter or exit its tunnel with a Hy-Vee logo on top. 

“Everyone’s in sync in every store doing the same thing in terms of these sports marketing efforts…it allows us a local and national platform to advertise Hy-VeeDeals.com or Redbox Rx or e-commerce,” Tweeten said. “It gets our brand out there in a national audience, which only serves us better for other growth opportunities.”

Hy-Vee is an employee-owned business, which allows its stores large amounts of autonomy for partnerships down on a smaller scale. That could be promoting and sponsoring the local high school, church, band or food bank. Hy-Vee has been using this autonomy, specifically within sports to help promote a wider range of campaigns and services. 

“It all comes back to showcasing the brand,” Tweeten said.

For example, the INDYCAR races and traveling NFL teams will provide a useful avenue to get Hy-Vee’s name into unfamiliar markets. 

“The [race] was a fantastic event that got a lot of positive press for Hy-Vee awareness. It helped catapult the reach of our digital properties,” Tweeten said.

For more information, visit hyveeindycarweekend.com.

To read more about The Shelby Report of the Midwest’s Retailer of the Year, click here.

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