Transforming foodservice sales
Table of contents:
What is foodservice sales?
What is a foodservice sales enablement solution?
What is a trade promotion management solution?
Common foodservice sales challenges
Overcoming foodservice sales challenges with integrated solutions
Powering foodservice sales with integrated solutions
Mobile–first solutions for foodservice sales success
Beyond foodservice sales: cross–functional benefits
Implementation tips for boosting foodservice sales
Achieving foodservice sales growth
Ready to transform your foodservice sales operations?
Foodservice sales: integrated solutions in action
In the foodservice industry, having the right tools can make the difference between good and exceptional performance. A recent webinar featuring industry leaders from Kerry Foodservice reveals how combining TELUS Trade Promotion Management and Sales Enablement is revolutionizing how companies approach their sales processes and strategy.
Discover the secret to Kerry Foodservice's sales success
Watch webinar
What is foodservice sales?
Foodservice sales involves selling food products, supplies, and related services to restaurants, cafeterias, hotels, hospitals, schools and other food service operators. It's a complex process that requires managing relationships across multiple layers – from manufacturers to distributors to end operators – while handling specialized pricing, contracts and promotional programs unique to the foodservice industry.
What is a foodservice sales enablement solution?
Sales enablement software is a powerful tool designed to boost sales performance and drive revenue growth, specifically for the foodservice industry. This technology equips sales teams with essential resources, including customer data, product information, and marketing content, all in one centralized platform. Additionally, it empowers sales professionals to efficiently manage their pipeline and track performance against budget targets. By providing easy access to these tools, the software enables sales professionals to engage more effectively with prospects, customers, brokers, distributors and foodservice operators.
What is a trade promotion management solution?
A trade promotion management solution is designed to streamline and optimize promotion planning strategies for consumer goods companies. TELUS Trade Promotion Management, for instance, is a comprehensive cloud–based platform that simplifies the planning and execution of promotional activities across both retail partners and foodservice sectors. This solution addresses the complex challenges faced by manufacturers, such as managing intricate distribution channels and harmonizing diverse data sets. By providing a centralized system for tracking promotions, analyzing performance and making data–driven decisions, trade promotion management solutions enable businesses to boost their trade promotion profitability.
Common foodservice sales challenges
Transforming foodservice sales through data–driven approaches, while beneficial, comes with its share of challenges that organizations must navigate. The first hurdle is often the substantial cost involved, as significant time, IT resources and monetary investments are required, with changes potentially taking months or even years to fully implement.
Once the system is in place, complexity becomes a major issue, as raw data insights can be too intricate for foodservice sales teams to understand or use effectively, potentially limiting the practical application of the data. Additionally, accessibility poses a significant challenge, with data insights frequently residing in systems separate from the customer relationship management (CRM) tool.
This separation creates barriers to retrieving information quickly during critical moments, such as client interactions or foodservice sales presentations. Overcoming these challenges requires careful planning, ongoing training and a commitment to creating user–friendly interfaces that bridge the gap between complex data and practical, actionable insights for foodservice sales professionals.
Overcoming foodservice sales challenges with integrated solutions
There's a clear solution to the challenges facing foodservice sales teams: smart integration. By combining trade promotion management with a sales enablement solution, teams are better equipped to succeed. The trade promotion system delivers essential product and distributor data, while the sales enablement platform provides CRM capabilities and operator insights allowing you to understand where else you should be selling your product. This unified approach puts all tools in one place – from marketing materials to product information. The result is simple: foodservice sales teams can now access what they need where they need it most – in the field.
Powering foodservice sales with integrated solutions
"There's no lack of data, it's just mining it in a way that makes it efficient," shares Angela George, Director of Commercial Effectiveness at Kerry Foodservice. "The amount of visibility that the two solutions – trade promotion management and sales enablement – provide has been an absolute game changer for us.1"
“The amount of visibility that the two solutions – trade promotion management and sales enablement – provide has been an absolute game changer for us.”
Angela George
Director of Commercial Effectiveness, Kerry Foodservice
This integration isn't just about having more data, it's about making that data actionable. Mike King, Senior Sales Director at Kerry Foodservice, emphasizes how this unified approach transforms sales calls: "When you've got all that data in one place, at the fingertips of the sales team, where they can dive in at an operator level, it's huge. It makes for more efficient sales calls. They can be more proactive than reactive.1"
Mobile–first solutions for foodservice sales success
Because CPG sales teams are constantly on the move, mobile capabilities have become crucial. The webinar explores how TELUS Sales Enablement’s mobile capability is revolutionizing the field. This game–changing solution provides sales teams with access to critical data — on–the–go access to product catalogs and selling resources and enhanced proactive selling capabilities — all while in the field.
Beyond operational efficiency, the mobile–first approach enables a better work–life balance by allowing sales professionals to manage their tasks flexibly, react to operator and distributor needs and reduce after-hours desk work. This flexibility means more quality time with family and less time tied to the desk, creating a more sustainable and satisfying work experience.
Beyond foodservice sales: cross–functional benefits
One of the most surprising takeaways from the webinar is the far–reaching impact of integrated solutions beyond the sales department. While primarily designed for sales teams, these tools offer unexpected benefits across various organizational functions.
Finance teams, for instance, gain better visibility into sales pipelines, allowing for more accurate forecasting and budgeting. Simultaneously, marketing teams can track campaign performance in real–time, enabling them to adjust strategies on the fly for maximum effectiveness. The ripple effect extends to demand planning, which becomes more precise with access to up–to–date sales data. Lastly, leaders get clear reports on progress towards goals, helping them make more informed decisions. This interconnected ecosystem of information demonstrates how a well–implemented sales enablement solution can drive efficiency and insight across the entire organization.
Implementation tips for boosting foodservice sales
If your foodservice team is considering integrating a trade promotion solution and sales enablement solution, the speakers share implementation tips for an effective sales enablement strategy. They suggest three main things:
Use the help offered by the vendor's support teams. These teams know the systems well and can guide you.
Find people in your company who are excited about the new system and let them help others learn it.
Give everyone enough time to get used to the changes.
Achieving foodservice sales growth
Success in foodservice sales requires a strategic blend of technology, insight and execution. By leveraging integrated solutions that combine trade promotion management with sales enablement, companies can unlock new growth opportunities across their foodservice channels. The key lies in using data-driven insights to identify expansion opportunities, streamline operations and build stronger relationships with operators and distributors.
Ready to transform your foodservice sales operations?
Watch the on-demand webinar featuring Kerry Foodservice to explore clear, actionable solutions to today's sales challenges. We'll explain how to achieve efficiencies with insights that directly impact your bottom line.
Learn how integrated solutions can transform your foodservice sales approach:
Streamline your sales operations
Improve trade promotion management visibility
Enhance cross–functional collaboration
Drive more efficient sales calls
Enable better decision making through data
Discover the secret to Kerry Foodservice's sales success
Watch webinar