5 things: Why you should be marketing to women

Everyone knows women control consumer spending: So why aren’t we marketing to them? The female of the human species drives around 75% of all consumer sales and maybe more. Yet much of the marketing by retailers and brands is still focused on men. This is a huge lost opportunity, said Bridget Brennan, CEO of strategic advisory firm Female Factor and author of Why She Buys: The New Strategy for Reaching the World’s Most Powerful Consumers at the Private Label Manufacturers Association meeting in Chicago this week. In order to win the female wallet share, companies need to establish an emotional connection, she explained, by inspiring them and making them feel appreciated. Sounds easy, but as a husband and father of a daughter I can attest it’s one of the more challenging things in life. —Ron Margulis

EV charging starts to pay off for retail: Sales of electric cars are growing (the Tesla Model Y was the world's best-selling car in 2023) and with them, the need for EV charging stations grows too. When shopping centers and malls started installing the stations decades ago, it wasn’t exactly clear what the benefits would be. But now, studies indicate that retailers’ charging efforts may well be paying off. One recent peer-reviewed study looked at the impact of nearly 1,600 Tesla Supercharger stations in more than 800 U.S. counties and found a 4% increase in monthly visits for retailers within 650 feet of chargers after they were installed. In recent years, convenience stores have embraced EV charging stations, and grocery is also starting to get in the game. Meijer just announced it would add 480 charging stations and Kroger added hundreds of charging stations in 2022. The proof is in the (electric) pudding. —Chloe Riley

You say goodbye, I say Yelloh: The Minnesota-based frozen food delivery service known for more than 70 years as Schwan’s Home Delivery officially went the way of the milkman on Friday, shutting down its business after years of declining sales and what was widely viewed as a disastrous recent rebrand. The direct-to-consumer delivery company, well-known to generations of folks for its yellow trucks, premium ice cream and frozen meals, had about 1,100 workers in 13 states when it announced in September that it would be ceasing operations this month due to “multiple insurmountable business challenges.” At its height, Schwan’s operated in 48 states. In 2022, Schwan’s changed its name to Yelloh. It was a move that “threw away all that history” of the company’s brand, an advertising expert told The New York Times. Pour out a gallon of rocky road. RIP, Schwan’s. —Heather Lalley 

Aldi needs capacity, a lot of capacity: The president of Aldi in the USA said the one thing keeping him up at night as the retailer adds 800 stores in the next five years is the ability of its suppliers to keep up with the added demand. Dave Rinaldo was speaking at the Private Label Manufacturers Association meeting in Chicago this week, sharing that Aldi aims to have stores in most of the lower 48 states by the end of the decade and that goal requires a lot of support from the company’s manufacturer partners, many of whom were in the room. He also shared that Aldi will continue to resist temptations to expand the store sizes, add SKUs and change the focus of the retailer. —Ron Margulis 

Publix brings back Thanksgiving ads: Publix has returned to the pre-Thanksgiving airwaves with a 30- and 60-second spot. The commercial spotlights a young boy helping prepare the meal and eagerly asking his dad if he can sit at “the grown-ups’ table.” We see that the dad agrees, but clocks his son’s unexpected longing for the “kids’ table” and sends him to “keep an eye on the little ones,” where the boy has a much happier Thanksgiving with his peers. In recent years, Publix, who was also SN’s 2024 Retailer of the Year, has released a Thanksgiving or a Christmas ad, but not both, meaning its last Thanksgiving commercial ran in 2022. Time will tell if the spot pays off for the popular Florida retailer. —Leigh Anne Zinsmeister