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READY TO SELL FROM THE FARM - COUNTRY GROCER My name is Francois Bouchard. You’re at
the Country Grocer in Ottawa. I think the first thing for us is we always
look for quality, freshness of product. But we’re also looking for a little bit more.
We’re looking for the story behind the product. Our customers want to know where it’s coming
from; they want to know how it’s made and everything else.
We kind of like to know who we’re dealing with and bring that information back to our
consumer. I think it’s important, the communication
with the farm suppliers is huge. I mean, for us it’s communication, not just during the
growing season – but throughout the year to understand what’s happening. That’s
how we keep that relationship going. I like to go visit the operation. I like to see what
they’re doing. I like to have them come in here and have a look at who we are. I think
that’s what builds strong relationships with our suppliers..
I can’t stress that enough. That communication. I mean, it’s important for me to have contact
with them throughout the year, not just through the growing season, not just ‘ok, my product’s
ready’. I have to get ready for it. I have to know when it’s coming. I have to know
when that season for that crop ends. So I think that communication throughout the year,
for me to go and visit them in the middle of the winter so we can talk about what’s
happening in the summer and what they’re going to be doing.. If there’s any new varieties,
any different products, so we can prepare ahead and maybe start doing a little bit of
excitement with our consumers. Do our marketing that this is coming and this is what’s happening.
We’ve been doing online grocery since 1997. So basically the customers go online. They
order their groceries 24/7 – whenever they want – and pick a convenient delivery time.
They have access to our entire inventory. And then they actually build their orders.
And then I have four employees that all they do is shop. So they become personal shoppers
for our customers. And then we ship groceries all throughout Ottawa, into the United States
and up to Iqaluit and Nunavut Terroritory. One third of the customers that actually order
are not the actual recipient. So you could be ordering for your parents, for example
that are elderly and can’t get out as much. So that’s one possibility. And order for
your children that are at university or college. So we have a whole multitude of people, young,
busy families. People with some disabilities they don’t have the mobility to move around.
We do a lot of small businesses, day cares, home day care, after school program in our
schools. So it’s a multitude of people who order.
What you’re looking at is an order that somebody has placed yesterday to be assembled
and picked today. So they, sometime last night, placed an order for all their goods and needs
and we received it and we’re pulling it off and our staff is about to go and assemble
it. So for us consistency is important. Consistency
of packaging so we’re able to stack it; the accuracy of the invoicing so we are able
to set the prices and pay the suppliers. So all that’s important in our process because
we have over 200 vendors that we deal with. We look at market conditions, we look at the
competition and basically what our customers will pay for is usually ultimately what decides
and determines the price. Bar Code and nutritional information and stuff
like that that we need by law to have on our shelves. The understanding that the UPC – the
bar code for us is crucial that’s what allows us to put it on the internet, the product.
If there’s no bar code I can’t put it on the internet.
Interestingly enough, the online portion of our business is about 20 per cent of our overall
revenue. We go pretty much everywhere in the States
interestingly enough. We have some ex-pats that are looking typically Ontario product
or different products or things that they can’t find anywhere else. And they will
send us an email that says – I’m dying to get, would you be able to supply us with.
And then the list goes on and on. It could be anything from chocolate bars to maple syrup
and all kinds of odd items that are pretty interesting. We’ve shipped pretty much all
over the States. We can get as many as 40/50 a day, sometimes
even more. Most of them are for Ottawa. Some of them will go up to Nunavut Territory. Then
we’ll get the odd couple of orders that will go to the States.
I think we’ve got to keep going with this internet. I think we’re developing some
new technology. Now the quote-unquote internet commerce is everywhere commerce. So you can
do shopping mobile, off your phone and things like that. So we’re certainly into that
and we’ve got some applications that are ready to launch to try to be on top of where
the consumer wants to shop and when he wants to shop.
When I launched in ’97, we were first to launch in Ottawa; third to launch in the country.
Within two months I had six competitors. And back in 2012 we only have one left.
For us it’s a niche and we really work hard at it and that’s what we do.