Chains cannot live on pizza alone
Some of America’s most well-known pizzerias are getting creative with their menus. Domino’s and Pizza Hut, among others, are offering sandwiches, pasta and other grub to broaden their appeal, bolster sales and hopefully draw cash-strapped customers away from the frozen-foods aisle of the grocery store, where many consumers have turned to get their pizza fix during tough financial times, according to Jaclyn Trop’s April 21, 2009, article “Pizza alone not cutting it: Chains roll out new entrees,” in the Detroit News. 
Domino’s, the second largest pizza chain in the U.S., added oven-baked sandwiches at $4.99 a pop to its menu. “We’re trying to preempt what we call the veto vote,” when a group nixes pizza because some would prefer to eat something else, said Tim McIntyre, a Domino’s spokesman. Sales have been strong for its sandwiches, which include Philly cheese steak, chicken bacon ranch, chicken Parmesan and Italian flavors. Pizza Hut is also enjoying success with its new menu of pasta dishes.
Jeremy White, editor of trade magazine Pizza Today, said pizzerias “backed themselves into a corner with couponing and discounting” decades ago. The fierce competition on price is forcing restaurants to recoup their losses by boosting customer orders - not by raising the cost of menu items.
A national trend toward saving money by cooking at home, coupled with rising costs for raw ingredients, including cheese, meat and flour, has pizzerias squeezed at both ends. Domino’s profits fell 32 percent last year and the company closed 108 stores in the U.S. According to Pizza Today, there are about 70,000 pizzerias in the U.S., and 2009 could be the first time in recent history that the industry sees more pizza shops close than open.
New service helps bargain hunters and retailers alike
Priceline.com’s unique business model of naming your own price is finding its way into other online retailing markets. Instead of sitting around, waiting and watching for the perfect gift for your wife, husband or good friend to go on sale from your favorite online retailer, a new online price-capture service can watch for you - making sure you don’t miss out. Based on market research and analytic models from Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y., Pricewhispers integrates its service directly with participating retailer Web sites to allow shoppers to specify the price that they would pay for the item and an expiration date for their price commitment. Then, the retailer will contact the shopper if and when his or her bid has been accepted.
While the benefit of convenience to the consumer is obvious, the Pricewhispers service is founded on pricing science principles and can increase a participating retailer’s bottom line as well as help gather information regarding the amounts consumers would be willing to pay (and how long they would wait to pay for it) for goods and services, allowing stores to adjust their prices accordingly. Analytic models and simulations show that this service can increase online revenues and profits 6-12 percent for retailers by enabling them to segment their consumer base by price sensitivity and to reduce the chances of missing out on some of those sales.
Pricewhispers comes hot on the heels of consumers coming to demand a significant level of participation in their online activities. According to market research conducted by Cornell University in late 2008 and early 2009, over 84 percent of respondents across Canada and the U.S. would like to have a similar level of input via a participative shopping service.
Lavish & Lime and Lemon Lime Kids are the first two Canadian online retailers to partake in Pricewhispers.
Utility meets style in the shower - the metrosexual (r)evolution
The metrosexual market segment has morphed, and packaged-goods giants like Procter & Gamble, Unilever and Dial have identified the next hot demographic in male grooming: men who are interested in a more clean-cut appearance but aren’t obsessing over pomades and lip balms, according to Elaine Wong’s May 16, 2009, article “P&G, Dial, Unilever Target the Middle Man,” in Brandweek. As P&G representative Glenn Williams said, this new everyday man falls somewhere between “metrosexual and Neanderthal.”
P&G researchers spotted the care men take in their hygiene and appearance several years ago while studying male grooming habits in the shower. Old Spice, which was branching out into the body wash category at the time, discovered that men used their significant other’s shower products, but secretly longed for their own.
“They’d have the body wash in their shower, but they’d take it out or hide it [when their friends came over], or they’d be really secretive when they shop in that aisle because they felt this was something they could use, but it sacrificed their masculinity,” said P&G North American hair rep Brent Miller, who once worked on Old Spice. “They loved the benefit, but felt it wasn’t something made for them.”
These middlemen equate good grooming (which includes such previously-feminine beauty items as body wash) with success and confidence. Being men, though, many want their products to have demonstrable utility - often through multiple uses, such as Old Spice’s all-in-one High Endurance Hair and Body Wash. A recent study on behalf of P&G’s Gillette brand, conducted in partnership with New York public relations firm Porter Novelli, found “success” and “confidence” to be extremely important traits among this group. But P&G’s not the only one going after this demographic. Nivea is introducing what it calls the first body wash, shampoo and shaving cream combination in summer 2009 to “get more done in the shower.” Dial, meanwhile, has debuted Dial for Men Magnetic, the first pheromone-infused body wash that offers “attraction enhancing” benefits. Unilever’s Axe created a men’s hair care line following rival P&G’s Gillette launch in June 2008.