Foodservice distribution marketing
A chef moves one line at a time, so the campaigns are built for the second order and the third rather than the first.
Where the money moves.
Switching happens one line at a time. A chef trials a single product because the current one arrived short on a Thursday, likes the yield, and three months later half the order sits with the new supplier. Nobody signs anything. That is why range and reliability outrun brand campaigns in foodservice, and why the measures worth reporting are lines per drop, drop size and penetration inside a venue group rather than reach. Campaigns are aimed at the second line and the third, because that is where the account actually changes hands.
Delivery performance is a marketing asset, not something operations keeps to itself. Chefs plan labour around a delivery window, and a supplier who states the cut-off time, the drop window and the substitution policy plainly earns trust faster than one advertising quality in the abstract. Where the service record is strong, say it. Where a route is under pressure, the campaign waits until it is not, because winning accounts into a run that cannot serve them costs more than the accounts return.
The calendar is set by menus and trade shows, not by quarters. Venue menus turn over with the seasons, so a range launch has to land while a head chef is costing dishes rather than four weeks after the new menu prints. Aged care, clubs, quick service and cafes each move on their own cycle. We plan the year backwards from those moments and hold budget for the shows where product gets tasted, because sampling still converts foodservice better than anything written about it.
Reps carry the relationship, so the content has to fit in a rep's hands. Cost per serve, yield per portion, a plated photograph a chef believes, allergen and labelling detail that survives a technical question, and a specification sheet that opens on a phone inside a cold room. Produce that properly and your business development managers stop building their own version in PowerPoint the night before. Produce it badly and the sales team quietly ignores everything marketing sends them.
What we run.
Range launches timed to menu cycles
New lines introduced while chefs are costing their next menu. Sampling kits, plated photography, cost per serve maths and a rep script, released by segment so a club bistro and a childcare kitchen never receive the same pitch.
Chef facing product content
Recipe cards, yield tables, plated shots and allergen detail built line by line, formatted for a phone screen in a cold room and for the printed folder your rep leaves behind after a tasting.
Trade show and sampling programmes
Stand concept, pre-show invitations to the accounts you actually want, on-stand capture that records what was tasted and by whom, then follow-up written against that sample rather than a generic thank you two weeks later.
Venue group account campaigns
Multi-site groups are pursued as accounts, not leads. Named contacts across procurement, executive chef and venue level, content built for each of them, and every touch logged against the group so your national account manager sees the whole approach.
Ordering platform adoption
Online ordering only pays back when accounts use it. Onboarding emails, in-app prompts, rep-led setup and reporting on the share of each route ordering without a phone call to your customer service team.
Questions we get asked.
It adds the part of the decision your reps never see. A chef searching for a substitute at 5am, a venue group procurement lead comparing range before they will take a meeting, an operator checking whether you deliver to their suburb. Digital puts those people in the rep's diary already interested. The relationship still closes them.
Claims come from your product specifications and nowhere else. Anything a marketer would like to say is checked against the label and the specification sheet before it ships, and any nutrition or health claim is written to the wording your technical team has already approved under the Food Standards Code. If it cannot be substantiated, it does not run.
Yes. Brand funded activity is built with the acquittal in mind: agreed placements, dated evidence, spend recorded against the funding brand, and results reported on the funded lines rather than on total account growth. The pack goes back in a form the brand's own marketing team can take into an internal review.
Accounts opened, accounts reactivated, lines per drop, drop size, and movement inside your target venue groups, with the channel detail sitting underneath. Activity numbers are included but they never lead. If a campaign cannot be tied to an account or an order, we say so plainly instead of presenting engagement in its place.
Also in wholesale and distribution
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