How Hussmann Helps Retailers Create Merchandising Magic
While retail design trends come and go, there’s one thing that simply endures: a beautifully lighted refrigerated case full of mouthwatering fresh food.
That’s where Tim Ryan, VP and GM of portfolio solutions at Bridgeton, Mo.-based Hussmann Corp., comes in. You might say that Ryan has one of the most important jobs in the grocery industry: helping retailers sell more of the most popular (and higher-margin) products in the store.
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Progressive Grocer had the incredible opportunity to visit the Hussmann facility in Chino, Calif., where this kind of merchandising excellence is born. Ryan and the rest of his veteran team sat down with PG and talked refrigerated case trends, retailer expectations and the company’s unique capabilities.
Progressive Grocer: Tim, tell me about your background and how you came to your role at Hussmann.
Tim Ryan: My journey began over 32 years ago. I was a young manufacturing engineer who joined the Hussmann business in St. Louis, Mo. I’ve had quite the journey with the business. Throughout my career, I’ve had the opportunity to work in six different states and in Monterrey, Mexico. I’ve also been able to work in almost all functions of the business: marketing, product management, engineering, sales, manufacturing and leadership.
PG: What is it that attracted you to refrigeration and this industry?
TR: What has kept me in this industry is what we’ve been able to do for the customer — the solutions we’re able to develop with the customer and the impact we have on the greater population. If you think about the overall market size, Hussmann’s market position, and the number of people that depend on safe, healthy, fresh food … there’s a good chance that more than half of the population is pulling their food out of Hussmann merchandisers.
PG: What could possibly be more important than that work?
TR: Critical, right?
PG: We are here in this big, beautiful Chino facility, where so many of the perimeter cases in America’s grocery stores are designed and built. How long has Hussmann had a Specialty division?
TR: Hussmann Specialty started in Southern California over 59 years ago. The company decided to specifically target this part of the country due to its competitive food retail space. Here in Chino, we create custom merchandisers designed with unique characteristics, typically to draw attention to higher-margin fresh products.
We invite retailers from across the country and across the world to come to this space. They come not only to see what we’re doing here, but also to see what the market is doing. Our Hussmann Specialty team is very cross-functional — including industrial design, engineering, sales specialists, manufacturing, marketing and lab technicians. The teams come together with one focus: delivering a solution that is unique to the retailer’s needs and provides merchandising excellence.
PG: There’s so many people here in Chino that have been with the company for decades.
TR: We are incredibly fortunate to have an extremely tenured team, which includes employees who have been here over 40 years. We are truly a family.
PG: What are retailers expecting from Hussmann Specialty solutions?
TR: We help the retailer develop custom merchandisers to display higher-margin products within the food retail space. Retailers are looking for innovative ways to keep their fresh food cold and safe. These fresh products include meats, seafood, produce, deli, bakery, prepared entrées, beverage, cheese and more. For the retailer, these merchandisers hold products that drive some of the highest per-square-foot sales in any food retail space today.
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PG: Like all of these specialty merchandisers I am looking at.
TR: Yes, our specialty merchandisers have been the top-selling segment and the fastest-growing segment of food retail for many, many years. And what’s driving that is the fresh perishable products, which attract consumers to brick and mortar, especially in the day of e-commerce. We continue to see the fresh category growing, with recent emphasis on deli, sushi, and grab-and-go solutions. Consumers are changing their meal patterns, using the fresh categories as a way to maintain a healthy food lifestyle. In order to keep up with these consumer trends, retailers are now looking for more cases to merchandise fresh perishable products. Many of these merchandisers are self-service.
Also, from a revenue perspective, retailers continue to see the meat and produce departments delivering the highest return per square foot in the grocery store. Retailers continue to look for the high-end unique displays that are able to attract consumers and drive high-margin sales.
PG: You guys do so many customizations. What makes a specialty case a Hussmann Specialty case?
TR: The customer drives it. They want to stand out from the rest. So, we help them develop something unique that suits their needs. Here in Southern California, we have the Hussmann Specialty Design Hub. Our dynamic design center has the unique assets that bring the retailer’s imagination to reality. Through collaboration and agile innovation, we make their vision come to life — a truly exciting process!
Collaboration across trusted partners — merchandising managers provide the vision of how they want to present their food, and it’s fun learning with them. It’s a real partnership because we bring our long history of meshing merchandising with our mechanical, electrical and thermal engineering expertise to guide the merchandising innovation. It’s symbiosis going on throughout the design process. We establish a relationship quickly, built on shared understanding and trust.
PG: How is Hussmann Specialty going to keep up with all the changes in food retail, now and in the future?
TR: The key for us is keeping an ongoing dialog with the retailer. That’s the secret. Our ability to have those conversations and maintain those relationships has been critical for the last 59 years. Our success can be attributed to close relationships with our customers in order to truly understand their needs and innovate products to enable their success.
At the end of the day, Hussmann always puts the customer first. We listen, we partner and we create. And at Hussmann Specialty, we deliver unique solutions that fulfill retailer needs.
