Mitchell Grocery Enhances Promo Planning, Forecasting

Mitchell Grocery Corp., an Albertville, Ala.-based wholesale grocery distributor that serves more than 200 independent supermarkets in the Southeast, has signed a multiyear agreement with customer science company Dunnhumby and Aptaris, an enterprise marketing and promotions technology provider, to employ their integrated enterprise marketing and promotions management, forecasting and pricing optimization platform. The new partnership and integrated solution will drive sales and build more profitable and competitive market positions for Mitchell Grocery’s supermarket customers throughout the Southeastern United States.

“Partnering with Aptaris and Dunnhumby allows us to offer the same technology used by major global retailers to our client base of more than 200 independent regional grocers. These optimization tools make our promotions more relevant to shoppers, leading to increased sales and customer loyalty for our supermarkets,” said David Mitchell, president of Mitchell Grocery.

The Dunnhumby and Aptaris integrated promotions management platform speeds collaboration and optimized offers across retail teams and outside resources with deep shopper insights, advanced analytics and forecasting. The cloud-based interface and intuitive dashboards assist with targeted business intelligence for marketing and category planners. Mitchell Grocery’s grocery customers will now have unprecedented control and visibility into total category promotional plans.

Delivering an end-to-end platform, Dunnhumby customer data science and advanced promotional modelling and forecasting capabilities are embedded within Tampa, Fla.-based Aptaris’ enterprise promotional management solution. Beginning with the initial product deal submission from suppliers through the Aptaris Vendor portal, Cincinnati-based Dunnhumby powers Mitchell Grocery’s ability to model and forecast the effects of promotions on sales and profit; as well as the influence on customer shopping behaviors down to the individual shopper for its customers. Mitchell Grocery can now optimize both base and promotional retails through real-time modelling and forecasting, while gaining insights into the impact of pricing activities on the top and bottom line financials.

Activating these insights within the platform, Mitchell Grocery now has the ability on behalf of its customers to create promotional events, including their weekly circular ads, with a 360-degree view of the impact on individual category plans across every store, its customers and its baskets in real time.