5 Steps to Stimulate Holiday Roast Sales

Because customers buy more roasts during the holiday season than any other time of the year, retailers should be prepared to meet the increased demand while also encouraging shoppers to make beef roast the centerpiece of their holiday meals. To help, we’ve compiled the top five holiday roast merchandising tips:

1. Assess sales data to make purchasing and merchandising decisions

Review these lists of the most popular roast cuts and top selling beef roasts by region to determine which will perform best when stocked in your meat case during the holidays:

• Top 10 Pot Roasts
• Top 10 Oven Roasts
• Top 10 Archive

2. Tap into promotions for incremental sales

With rising food and energy costs weighing on consumers’ purchasing behaviors, retailers can capitalize on checkoff-funded promotions to offer purchase incentives and draw shoppers to their stores. Visit the 2011 Promotional Calendar to learn more about promotions taking place this holiday season with partners such as Kingsford Charcoal, Sutter Home and Kendall Jackson.

3. Implement beef merchandising programs designed to stimulate sales, meet consumer shopping behaviors

Incorporate checkoff-funded programs and resources such as the 2011 holiday roast point-of-sale and the Beef Alternative Merchandising program to help merchandise roasts. This on-trend marketing opportunity is proven to drive sales and will appeal to shoppers looking for convenient, perfectly-portioned, nutritious, versatile cuts at a great value. Recipes, photos and merchandising tips are available for the three BAM roast cuts:

• Beef Top Loin Petite Roast Boneless 
• Beef Ribeye Petite Roast Boneless 
• Beef Loin Top Sirloin Petite Roast Boneless 

View the BAM Merchandising page to learn more about BAM and how to order point-of-sale materials for use in your store.

4. Give your Customers Confidence

Show your customers how convenient it is to create a premium roast for a holiday meal by displaying and distributing the following resources at the meat case:

• Confident Cooking with Beef – Everything consumers need to know about choosing, buying, storing and preparing beef
• How to Carve like a Pro – Roast carving tips and tricks
• Interactive Meat Case – An online tool that helps shoppers select a beef cut to purchase and offers nutritional information along with meal ideas and recipes
• Holiday Roast Q&A – Answers consumers’ most common roast-related questions
  

5. Beef up your meat department staff’s roast knowledge

Make sure all your meat department employees are fluent in the language of roasts, so they’ll be able to answer customer questions and help them fully enjoy the comfort and convenience of roasts this winter. Training resources available include:

• Utilize Beef Training Camp to create customized meat department or other store associate training sessions. Modules are available on beef for holidays, pot roasts and oven roasts. Use this one-stop resource to access fact sheets, presentations and videos to fit your tailored training session.
• Share insights and ideas around selling and merchandising roasts available in Beef Fast Facts on Holidays.
• Provide staff with the Perfect Pot Roast Customer Handout which outlines roast preparation methods, cooking tips and recipes that can be shared with shoppers.
• Familiarize meat associates with Beef Made Easy Cut charts to educate them on all the available cuts of beef and how each cut can be prepared.