CARNIVAL CELEBRATES PRODUCE POPULARITY

ROSEANNE HARPER

COPPELL, Texas -- Carnival Stores here gives credit to its produce department for sending sales over the top at its flagship store in northwest Dallas.

The Carnival unit, which opened in March, is posting the biggest sales volume of any of the stores owned by Minyard Food Stores, said Arley Morrison, vice president, perishables, for Minyard Foods, which has 17 Carnival stores, 21 Sack n' Save warehouse-format stores and 46 traditional units that operate under the Minyard banner.

Morrison attributes the Carnival unit's record sales volume -- which averages about $600,000 a week -- to foot traffic generated by the store's location coupled with the excellence of the produce and meat departments. Minyard's flexibility in taking advantage of deals offered by its produce suppliers also is a contributing factor, he said.

"The produce department at that new Carnival is second to none in Dallas. It's ringing up weekly sales that are better than some of our smaller stores do totally in a week -- $80,000 to $90,000," Morrison said.

The 50,000-square-foot store is the largest of the Carnival stores, which cater to the Hispanic population and Hispanics are known to be big consumers of fresh produce. At Carnival, for instance, produce makes up 16% of total store sales compared to 8% to 12% at Minyard stores, officials said.

But there have been days that produce sales at the new Carnival store have "happily amazed" everybody at Minyard Foods, according to Jim Gordon, director of produce operations, for the company.

"One Sunday, at that store, we hit $25,000 in produce. Just that department, in one day," Gordon said.

"Produce and meat are driving the wagon," he added.

Gordon and Morrison attribute the record produce sales primarily to location. The store is situated in a densely populated area that is 95% Hispanic.

The neighborhood is made up of apartment buildings that house mid- to lower-income families and sections with high-income residents edge the immediate area surrounding the store. The high-income crowd is also shopping the new Carnival unit.

"I see quite a few fancy cars in the lot and I've noticed the shoppers from that area. We have such excellent quality produce and meat and word gets around. One customer from there [the high-income area] told me there's nobody over there that's offering the quality we do," Gordon said.

The Carnival store, however, is not without immediate competition. A unit of Houston-based Fiesta Mart, which also caters to the Hispanic population, lies just across the street.

"They seem to be doing a good business, too. I think there's just a lot of business right there in that area," Gordon said.

The location across from Fiesta Mart was purposeful, he said. In fact, the next Carnival store which will be modeled after the flagship store will open late in the fall in Fort Worth right across the road from a Fiesta Mart which is also under construction.

"We figure if Fiesta Mart is coming into this area to try to take our business away, we're going to make them earn it," Gordon said.

Carnival, like other stores in the Minyard chain, has begun to aggressively go after foot traffic with temporary price reduction items in the produce department.

The strategy was begun several years ago in the Sack n' Save division and Gordon initiated using it in the Carnival division last year, he said.

"On Monday mornings, our suppliers might offer deals on 15 or 16 products and it's up to each division which items they take. We'll choose, for example, what we know our customers would want, and the number will differ from division to division. We'll take six to eight for Carnival and probably fewer for the Minyard stores," Gordon said.

The specially-priced items are always quality items that, based on their wholesale price, that can be offered for a super good price and still have at least a 35% gross, he said.

The chain's flexibility plays an important role, Gordon explained. For example, if there's not enough of a particular product available at a deal price for the whole division, the company will buy it for selected stores.

It doesn't have to be a truckload either, he said.

The special, temporary-price-reduction items, are not put into the ad circular. But since they've been made a regular feature, they are a draw every week, Gordon said.

"As a result, people come into the store every week to see what we've got on special. Fifteen to 20% of produce sales [chainwide] are temporary price reductions," he said.

Even so, Gordon said the degree of success at the newest Carnival store took the company by surprise.

"Within two months after we opened that store, we had to double storage space for produce. We raised the ceiling by 7 feet in order to add more warehouse slotting in the cooler for such things as tomatoes and mangoes and the same amount in dry storage," Gordon said.

"And we still have a 40-foot reefer in the parking lot that we're using for additional storage," he added.

One factor in the Carnival store's success is that it's opening carried with it Minyard's reputation for quality and also underscored its dedication to catering to the community, Gordon said.

"We had a Minyard store down the street which was very popular. When we closed it and opened the Carnival store, we brought the store manager from there to Carnival," Gordon said. He explained, too, that the switch to a Carnival unit is seen by the Hispanic community as positive response to its needs.

"As the Hispanic population increases in particular areas of Dallas, we've converted to Carnival and when we do we pick up total store sales by 30% to 40%. We've proved that several times," Gordon said.

A recent bow to the Hispanic community at Carnival stores is the use of a Mexican spice called la fruta on value-added produce, Gordon added.

"We just started doing that in the last couple of months and our customers love it," Gordon said.

At the flagship Carnival, a U-shaped ice table -- a first for Carnival -- just inside the entrance displays such items as sliced melon with lime wedges and a drizzle of la fruta which looks like a red syrup. Fresh coconut slices and pineapple chunks, too, are offered with the spice.

The ice table has been a success, he said.

"Quite frankly we were worried in the beginning," he said, pointing out that the company felt the ice table might not justify in sales the space it was occupying.

On a recent visit to the Carnival flagship, SN noted that the display of value-added items on ice creates a particularly colorful and appealing first element in the fresh foods aisle.