John’s Blog

I am a great believer in the convergence and divergence theory and the food industry is really showing this in action. At one level with have 3D Food printers now moving into the restaurant scene. Food Ink are doing a world tour where guests can dine on food that has come out of a 3D printer. You get the perfect dish based on a food puree produced by the ink. This

The “Waitrose Food and Drink Report” was released in early November. This indicated that 50% of consumers decided at lunchtime on what they would have for an evening meal and 1 in 10 made the decision just before the meal. Many consumers were claiming that this helped them reduce food waste at home. This trend has two major influences: There is a huge opportunity to promote meals rather than produce,

One of the challenges is keeping up with trends…a recent trends worth following are Fico Eataly World, Bologna, Italy. Many of you will know I am a great fan of this retailer, Eataly, they provide an excellent experience. Now they have created the Disney of Food theme parks in Bologna. This could be one of the destinations in Italy. It opened in November 2017. If you are going to Italy, check

Launched in November 2017, this could be a game changer. BuzzFeed and GE have developed a smart cooking appliance that retails for $149 US. The cooker is Bluetooth enabled and the consumer downloads the Tasty mobile app and gets video downloads of recipes that sync with the cooker and auto adjust the temperature as the cooker prepares the meal.

We have seen the increasing interest in herbs, edible weeds and herbal teas. I believe the next wave of interest will be around Adaptogens, plants that are believed to reduce stress. The key plants to look out for are: Rhodiola rosea. ..a perennial from the Arctic Widania somnifera… a member of Solanaceae that also goes under the name of Rennet, Poison Gooseberry Winter Cherry, Indian Ginseng and Ashwagandha Ziziphus jujube…

The largest garden centre in Europe, possibly the world! Garden centres open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week! These were key surprises for me looking at the industry around Moscow. I had been invited to Russia to present a key note address and workshop to the floriculture and horticulture industry on my views on garden retailing over the next five years and how Russian garden centres can maximise

If you have a large market of multi millionaires, your marketing strategies change and this is obvious around Moscow. The Orangery, part of the Crocus Group, has the largest selection of indoor plants in one location I have seen anywhere. It is open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. When I asked why they were open at 2.00am and how can they justify it, I was told that

The florist industry around the world is being pressurized by supermarkets and online retailers selling flowers. I am speaking at the Interflora conference in October and am aware of the concerns of the industry. We need to create experiences where the consumer can buy into the idea of visiting a florist. In Czech, they have Kissing Day on May 1 when men are expected to buy flowers for their partner

Farmers markets and farm shops around the world are concerned about the supermarkets taking their business from them. I do not believe this should be the case as there are many opportunities to create a difference in the market place. In the UK there is a decline in an awareness and understanding of local delicacies and this could be a point of difference. Local meals such as Bath Chaps (Pigs

One of the big issues in Europe is food a waste and the amount of food being thrown away by supermarkets. France has introduced a no waste policy and fresh food that would be discarded is now donated to charities. In the UK Hugh Fearnley-Wittingstall of River Cottage fame has launched Food Share to help reduce the 10 million tonnes of fresh food waste generated in the UK, that would

One of the best ways of getting your name out into the community is to have a selfie location. The key is to make sure your name is clearly visible behind the selfie location. Alas, most businesses forget to do this. Having said that it has been great to see business develop selfie locations on my travels. I will leave you with these selfie ideas from this trip.  

There have been a number of articles about the demise of the florist in recent weeks. Florists seem to be hit by the changes that are taking place in retailing and those that have stuck to the old model have seen a decline in sales. Those that reinvent themselves are finding a new market. An example of this is a florist close to my home town, Fleurs of Bunbury, they

A one day workshop aimed at established retail owners and senior management, by John Stanley. Established retailers have seen the market mature; what they did in the past will not work in the future and new ways of developing the business need to be considered. This workshop provides an “ideas tool kit” to allow mature retail businesses to grow in the future. Program for the day • The three key

9 out of 10 Australians prefer to buy locally made products (Ref: Eloise Keating Smart Company 06/1/2016) According to all the surveys coming out, locally made, is increasing in popularity. Local is very much being used more in conversation, but what is “local”? According to the dictionary, local means “existing in or belonging to the area where you live, or to the area that you are talking about.” The definition

Keeping up with what is happening in the garden retail category is confusing at present. One report was published just before the Chelsea Flower Show based on work done by the RHS which showed that in the UK Millennials and Gen X were not gardening due to the lack of guidance from their parents. As a result they are likely to develop low maintenance gardens, read paving. Only 1% had

As a consultant to retailers for over 40 years I have to admit one of my sins. I was pro adding music into the retail environment. As human beings we hate silence and if we do experience silence we start making some sort of noise…silence is deafening. As consumers we hate going into silent empty stores and hence retailers have relied on “Musak” to create the ambience required to encourage

Marketing continues to get more complicated as new social media marketing tools continue to be developed and the consumer becomes more acquainted and confident with social media. The challenge for many business owners is to keep up with a more demanding consumer, the answer may be to go back to basics and get “on your bike” to quote the old English saying. Whilst marketing your business is becoming more sophisticated,

It is your first time in a new country, the culture is different, the currency is different, they do not speak your language and you have to give a business talk to a professional audience. Many speakers been in this situation and often panic sets in. How are you going to impress this audience or client with so many potential stumbling blocks ahead of you? Speaking to audiences in foreign

J Schwanke, of uBloom, is one of the trend setters. His latest newsletter, Trend Synthesis talks about the four trends he sees being developed in 2016. These trends are what he calls… Distraction. This is where bright colours are used to attract the eye in a world where there is a lot of competition. He is recommending to florists that bright coloured flower arrangements will be in vogue this year.

Retailing is constantly changing and so is how we sell. I remember my early workshops training team members to sell product, we would do a session where we would get workshop participants to identify the features of the products and then convert them to the benefits of the product. We would then develop role play sessions on how to sell benefits. Those skills are still needed, but If I have

I often talk about impulse selling in my presentations. It is something that is important to all retailers and a way of increasing the average sale per customer. In January, Plyush Sharma, a Professor at Curtin University in Western Australia, released a research paper on impulse selling. His research reveals that impulse buying is based on personality traits in the shopper, the biggest impulse shoppers tend to be those that

In December there was a fascinating article in The Daily Mail in the UK about the look of retirement homes in the future. This article discussed the ‘Home Farm” concept where the home a was part of a farm complex with vertical and horizontal food gardens as part of the package. The homes are built around a food production courtyard. This is not a dream, the first one is being built at

As retailers we need to be in-tune with our female Millennial consumers. For some this is easy, whilst for others it is more difficult. I was therefore interested to read an article in the November edition of “Speaker”, written by Frances Rios and entitled “What Women Want.” According to Frances… 91% of women say advertisers do not understand them In the USA 85% of all consumer purchase are made by

Many of you will know that Linda and I own a chestnut farm in Nannup in West Australia. In November a book was launched that features 30 farms in the region that were doing something unique. This coffee table book included our farm, Chestnut Brae. It is wonderful that we have only had the farm for two years, when we purchased it, it was a rundown farm and know it