Family Dollar's Shopper Focus

The words “value shopper” may not conjure up excitement for retailers and CPG manufacturers, but there is enormous potential with this customer. So say Family Dollar CMO Jocelyn Wong and Catapult EVP Michael Miller – and that’s the message they’ll share with attendees at the Shopper Marketing Summit this month.“Sometimes it’s sexier for [marketers] to focus on Millennials, or leverage innovation that drives trade-up,” says Wong. “But the reality is, the value customer is the future – and she’s sexy as hell.”Family Dollar’s core customer has among the lowest incomes of all the dollar store shoppers, according to Wong, and she sees that as a significant opportunity. “I think about the 47 million Americans who live below the poverty line or the 50% of U.S. households making less than $50K/year.”To succeed with this shopper, marketers need to go beyond the demographics and really examine the differences, needs and wants among the value consumer “so you can truly leverage insights to drive the business,” says Miller. An African-American family making $40,000 a year living in rural Mississippi is going to have different trip missions and shopping behavior than one living in Chicago.Miller and Wong look more broadly and bring total VALS (values, attitudes and lifestyles) psychographics into their research mix, and recently completed a nine-month segmentation study that overlays trip/mission data. Panels are leveraged on an ongoing basis, and relationships that Family Dollar has built with its suppliers all lead to the retailer knowing a vast amount about its core customer. That shopper they say is an optimist always there to help family and friends no matter her own struggles; name brands are important and so is quality and value; resourcefulness and resilience are two of her most pronounced qualities; she always finds a way to get by and does not define herself as low income or poor; she is proud of her accomplishments and never looks for pity; and her wealth is in her family and her ability to adapt to provide.“Like our shopper, we make tough choices as well,” says Wong. “We work with our vendors, keep our costs down, and conservatively staff our stores so we can deliver the best price possible. We do this for our shopper so her choices are a bit easier; so she can say ‘yes’ in a world so often ruled by ‘no.’”“With our most recent customer segmentation data,” adds Miller, “we can now develop great insights that lead to relevant marketing.” Family Dollar’s “Fabulous” campaign is one example. Wanting to drive awareness of the retailer’s assortment of ethnic beauty care products led to the new annual program. With the shopper insight that its African-American female customers are extremely social, “we’ve tapped into well-known vloggers (video bloggers) and bloggers to produce phenomenal digital content for us,” says Wong. “For our customer, all of these YouTube channels and vloggers – they are full-blown celebrities.”In 2013, selected vloggers were invited to a private Family Dollar “Fabulous” event in Charlotte, North Carolina. The success of that one-time affair led to a 12-month, 360-degree initiative that kicked off in October 2014 at New York City’s Hilton Midtown with the second annual event. Once again, actress and Family Dollar spokesperson Vanessa Williams attended the invite-only all-day happening where influential bloggers and vloggers were able to meet beauty suppliers, learn about the array of products available at the retailer, receive beauty tips and tour a Brooklyn Family Dollar. The retailer also debuted its new spring apparel collection, “just be …,” with a red-carpet fashion show.An advertorial in Ebony magazine, in-store signage, endcaps, promotions in its circulars, online contests, social media, emails, mobile coupons and radio partnerships are all part of the year-long “Fabulous” plan.“What I love about this program,” says Miller, “is it’s hyper-focused on a very specific customer and there’s a business objective with clear barriers – price, assortment, relevance – that our marketing can overcome.”

Family Dollar's Shopper Focus

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