LAS VEGAS — Sam’s Club discovered well ahead of time that blueberry wasn’t the summer flavor its shoppers were craving this year— it was actually strawberry shortcake. So the club retailer adjusted accordingly, launching a strawberry shortcake-flavored cookie rather than a blueberry-flavored one.
This intel came directly from shoppers, thanks to the retailer’s Member’s Mark Community, Myron Frazier, the Walmart-owned chain’s executive vice president and chief merchant, said during a Groceryshop keynote session on Wednesday.
Sam’s Club’s Member’s Mark Community, made up of more than 200,000 shoppers, offers customers the opportunity to share feedback on product assortment and ultimately help determine which private label goods the retailer offers. Any shopper can join the community via the Sam’s Club app to provide input on ideas and products as well as test items, per the retailer’s website.
While talk of ramping up artificial intelligence and furthering retail media networks took center stage at Groceryshop this year, Frazier’s keynote showed that building loyalty with and offering value to customers can also come from simpler acts, like shelving products and flavors shoppers request.
“We can ask them anything,” Frazier said. “Everything from what’s inside the package, what’s on the package. If it’s an item that they prefer to have delivered. What they like to have in-club. What would they compare it to? What would they replace? Any of these things that you would think about in a retail environment or a merchant decision, we can ask it.”
Sam’s Club also asks Member’s Mark Community participants about parts of Sam’s Club’s business like the checkout experience or potential changes planned for its Scan & Go service, he added.
Frazier gave another example where Member’s Mark Community preferences altered a seasonal assortment — this time around Sam’s Club’s staple holiday meal offering.
For the past three years, Sam’s Club has sold the fixings for a holiday meal that can feed 15 people for around $10 a person. But based on Member’s Market Community feedback, the retailer modified the holiday offer this year, he said.
“[O]ur members told us they wanted an appetizer. They told us that they wanted an extra dessert, and that they wanted an alternative protein because maybe someone in the family wanted ham and not turkey, or vice versa,” Frazier said. “They were very specific.”
He added that Sam’s Club will now also offer a smoked turkey rather than a raw turkey in response to members wanting to save time cooking.
“By working with our members, that helps us have a tremendous amount of trust with them. They guide us, tell us where to go,” Frazier said. “We’re not simply recreating what’s operating in the marketplace. We're differentiating. And the thing that I’ve learned in the lesson: When you listen to members and you make what they want, turns out they actually buy it.”
