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Traditional catering channel business models typically involve blanket or selective visits to core restaurants. In the Chinese market, Knorr was one of the first companies to hold chef promotion events, with standard costs of 30,000-50,000 yuan per event. A private competitor, however, raised the cost to 170,000 yuan per event. In the past, giving small gifts at these events was enough to please attendees, but now, without gifts worth over 200 yuan or the presence of particularly important chefs, key hotel chefs simply won't attend. For manufacturers, spending 50,000-100,000 yuan on a chef promotion event yields no visible results—money is spent without effect, and the path of chef promotion events is narrowing.
We analyzed the promotional methods and channel operation guides of companies like Unilever's Knorr, Nestlé, and Lee Kum Kee in the catering channel. We found that these companies invest heavily, and these methods are more suitable for enterprises with strong financial resources. They often invest heavily in catering outlet promotions, while other condiment companies are often afraid to do the same. A few bold followers often end up with significant losses. Is there no more economical and effective promotional approach for the catering channel?
A medium-sized condiment company, under immense sales pressure, sought breakthrough opportunities everywhere. After extensive research, they learned that Guangzhou Mingdao Marketing Consulting Co., Ltd. is the most renowned marketing consulting firm in the condiment industry. They came to us, and we developed a 'Catering Outlet Sales Activation Plan' for them, which applied the latest cloud computing technology—the 'Sales Activation King' system for catering outlets. The specific plan was as follows:
During the company's market sales process, product sales were poor, prices were not competitive, and at retail outlets, products were often purchased by the box rather than as whole cases. In the past, promotions revolved around 'buy ten get one free' or 'buy five get one free' to supplement retailer or wholesaler profits, but end users in catering outlets rarely received incentives. The purchasers at catering outlets often only received gifts from retailers during holidays, such as gifts for chefs. This meant that relationships were maintained with catering retailers or wholesalers, not transferred to the condiment company or its distributors. As a result, once promotions stopped, products stopped moving, or after a year or two of sales, prices became transparent, retailers and wholesalers stopped making money, and they switched to selling competitor products. This is a key reason why some condiment companies find their market share shrinking in regional markets.
In the catering channel, chefs' praise is useless; what matters is actual sales. The quantitative indicator of praise versus sales is whether products are purchased in whole cases. In fact, for familiar condiments like soy sauce, vinegar, chicken essence, sauces, and hot pot bases, chefs are already familiar and don't need special trials. Even new compound seasonings can quickly move to substantial purchases after a small trial. The key is having a special pull strategy.
We designed scratch cards. Why this method? Scratch cards are familiar to market operators and easy to accept.
Unlike traditional scratch cards, we placed one scratch card in each box and noted it on the outer packaging. When the catering outlet purchaser opens the box and scratches the card, they reveal an 8-digit code, which they send via SMS to a platform. The platform immediately starts accumulating points for the purchaser (chef, owner, or procurement).
Based on points, the company redeems attractive products for catering outlet purchasers. In the actual consulting project for the above company, we set prizes such as iPads, iPhones, branded kitchen knives, belts, and watches, which were very popular among chefs.
Now let's look at the actual results.
Guangzhou Mingdao developed a detailed operation manual for the company. At the beginning of implementation, we noticed from the management backend that the results were not as good as expected. We started visiting retail and catering outlets and found that the problem was that catering outlets were unaware of the points activity. Why didn't this great activity reach the catering outlets?
After market visits, Guangzhou Mingdao's marketing consultants discovered that the original plan, which specified 'must place activity announcement ads at condiment retail stores' and distribute flyers, was not implemented properly. In reality, retail outlets thought the activity was great, so they opened the boxes and kept the scratch cards for themselves, meaning catering outlets still had no effective pull. The flyers were also set aside by retailers, some used as scratch paper. Essentially, the plan wasn't used, so no results were seen.
Guangzhou Mingdao's consultants immediately revised the activity execution manual with the company, clearly stipulating that only catering enterprises could participate in the activity; retailers, wholesalers, and distributors were not allowed to participate.
The management backend curve quickly began to rise, with the number of new catering stores increasing steadily each day. The new catering condiment products successfully entered various types of catering outlets.
Three months later, the first catering outlet redeemed points, and the number of new catering stores increased steadily at about 17 per day. After six months, the daily increase reached 35 catering outlets. To date, the company has added 12,000 catering outlets, and the new catering products have fully achieved sales activation breakthroughs!
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