Developing a broader offer

Only 4% of pub customers bought a hot drink and only 2% bought crisps. Both are woefully low when you consider the potential opportunity for both categories,

Get crisps out from behind the bar and find a way of merchandising them in the main customer part of the pub. Think of the margin available in hot drinks (20% of today's pub customers would like to buy freshly ground coffee) offer loyalty incentives like "buy four hot drinks and get your next one free", to raise awareness and credibility. Do you have a coffee-to-go offer or are beverages only for drink-in?

Two thirds of pubs don't sell Champagne by the glass. Pubs attract more upmarket customers than many other retail channels — 22% are AB social classification. Put the product in front of customers on the bar, introduce staff incentives to encourage Champagne by the glass sales, and watch sales rocket.

Try "Come celebrate with us" or "Start your evening with a glass of Champagne — you deserve it" signage; 7% of today's customers would like to buy a glass of Champagne. Have a value, sparkling wine alternative proposition for those who still want to indulge, but are having to cut back a little financially. Make sure you have a rosé option too. Then find out what consumers like to nibble on with their Champagne (tapas-style canapés or finger food) and offer that too — and don't forget premium pricing.

Also note that 20% of pub customers would like to buy newspapers or magazines — 20% of pub customers are there alone. Coincidence?

When it comes to pubs, 14% don't sell energy drinks like Red Bull.

Red Bull value sales can be the same as Coke in some channels (eg, forecourts), so if you're going to be

serious about soft drinks, energy is

a must.

Broadening things further, 23% would like to be able to receive cash-back or withdraw cash in the pub. Seems reasonable. The pub is likely to capture a large part of the withdrawn spend.

While there are challenges in the industry, there are also some exciting opportunities for pubs to develop their offer in order to meet the needs of current and potential customers. Ontrack is the only programme of its kind. The results presented in this article are at an industry average level.However, the real strength of Ontrack is being able to look at the results by individual pub retailers to identify specific opportunities.