Retailers Can Learn From Urban Legends

MARK HAMSTRA

CHICAGO – Supermarket operators can create memorable messages that resonate with customers and employees by using some of the same principles that make people remember urban legends, Chip Heath, a professor of marketing at Stanford University and a columnist at Fast Company magazine, said in a keynote speech at the Food Marketing Institute Show here yesterday. Heath said businesses should focus on a single, simple message that they want to get across to consumers and convey it in a way that makes it memorable by emphasizing its uniqueness, making it appeal to people's emotions and telling it in a narrative story form, much like Subway has done with its Jared Fogle campaign. “By having the right message, you can have thousands of employees working to make your company great,” he said. Heath was one of two keynote speakers who replaced former Vice President Al Gore, who canceled his attendance for "personal reasons" last week.