CARE, FLAIR AND FARE

ROBERT VOSBURGH

Like the foods they create, culinary professionals working in a supermarket environment can be "value-added," if they apply their knowledge of taste and texture, and their flair for presentation, throughout the fresh departments -- not just the deli/meals case.

Chefs and industry professionals interviewed by SN say that retail food-service professionals are expanding their influence beyond the scope of restaurant-quality entrees and side dishes, to the meat department, in-store bakery and even produce, as operators increasingly turn to perishables as a point of differentiation from the competition.

"They're using me as widely as they can, and get as much out of me as they can," said Jon Smith, the recently appointed executive chef for V. Richard's Market in Brookfield, Wis. "I can produce food for the customer, whether it be through the deli, the meat department or through our [fresh-meals case]."

Smith, a 30-year food-service industry veteran who joined the single-unit retailer in July, said that his ability to maximize the "art" of food in a retail setting is one of his primary assets, one that he can apply to any case in the store. As an in-house consultant of sorts, he is authorized to develop new items, pull underperformers and otherwise tweak selection.

Ann Joy, who joined Carr Gottstein Foods eight years ago as executive chef for the retailer's largest store in Anchorage, Alaska, said that her employer encourages her to use items from other parts of the store.

"Retailers love cross merchandising," she said. "If there's a special on lobsters [in the seafood department], I'll put pepper steaks and filets with them" to create a surf 'n turf entree. Or, if the meat department receives too much meat, "I'll take it and put it in the smokehouse, or marinate and cook it."

Joy cites yet another example: "I just started putting my liver pates in the gourmet cheese case, and I can't believe how well they're selling," she said. "A lot of people looking for appetizers see it and otherwise never would have known we sold it in my department."

Without a doubt, the image of a chef in a white toque and jacket conveys to the customer a sense of professionalism; likewise, the food items chefs prepare exude "restaurant quality." That is the image. What about the reality of employing a chef?

"Supermarket operators are discovering that fresh foods are a very important entity, and that they need to get more involved with it, and get someone in there who knows exactly what they're doing from a culinary standpoint," said Scott Samuels, managing partner of Horizon Hospitality Consultants, Overland Park, Kan.

However, the decision to hire a culinary professional is multifaceted. Samuels said that retailers face a challenge in hiring a candidate who not only shares their overall vision, but also can accommodate the more formal corporate environment present in the retail food business today. In short, the candidate needs to remember that it's not a restaurant he or she will be working for.

"A lot of it is attitude -- 'I went to a culinary school, and making cole slaw and potato salad on a mass scale isn't what I want to do for the rest of my career' -- is what they think," said Samuels.

Supermarket operators looking to tap food-service experience might want to search for candidates who already have worked with mass-production techniques. They are often found in the catering, on-site (business and industry) or hotel segments of the industry. According to Ray Wells, director of career services at the Culinary Institute of America, Hyde Park, N.Y., even today's inexperienced crop of graduates is schooled in the business of food, not just the art.

Wells, who regularly organizes on-campus job fairs, notes that students are required to complete courses on business law, food costing, labor issues and related "non-culinary" subjects. When they graduate, they are familiar with business practices followed in the more general food industry.

Initially, it's the graduate who must decide whether to pursue artistic endeavors, or business advancement -- the path that usually leads to employers like supermarkets.

"In my years at the institute, I've seen students follow what I call the culinary entrepreneurial track, or the management track," he said. "And the Price Chopper-Harris Teeter-Wegmans group can offer [the latter]."

Wells estimated that, currently, less than 5% of CIA's graduates are taking their knife kits directly to the retail segment. But the low number does not reflect the potential, since it's still a relatively new segment of employment, he said.

"I think it's promising. Those that are looking for corporate stability, and the long-range ability to move within a corporation, will be attracted to [the retail business]," he said, adding that in retail, "there is a trade-off. You may not be doing pate. But, you can have just as much fun signaturizing potato salad, if you have the right attitude."

Retailers are tapping into that potential and turning up in greater numbers at CIA's recruitment events. Wells culled files and reported that 25 to 30 graduates went to Harris Teeter, Charlotte, N.C., "over time." Wegmans Food Markets, Rochester, N.Y., has sought sous chefs, line cooks, pastry chefs, bakers and front-of-the-house waitstaff; Price Chopper Supermarkets, Schenectady, N.Y., arrived looking for bakery managers and food-service manager-trainees; and Kings Super Markets, Parsippany, N.J., has sought candidates for its management associate program -- a "four-phase process" that includes department rotation, special projects and one-on-one assignment with an assistant store manager.

The increasing number of graduates and working professionals arriving in the store environment says as much about their concerns as it does about the retailer's, Wells noted.

"They might like the stability of a corporate benefits program; or the hours, which are more controlled, perhaps, than the food-service segment; and, certainly, a career path that stresses moving up in managerial responsibility and knowledge within an organization, rather than taking a track that stresses cuisine and building culinary knowledge," he said.

Chefs can certainly be haughty, temperamental and difficult to get along with. But sometimes, it's the retailer who is unpredictable. For example, a unit-level executive chef/manager at an established chain in the Southeast -- who asked not to be identified -- said he had been brought in as lead chef to manage the store's developing fresh-meals business and it "instantly became a phenomenal hit. We enjoyed unbelievable lunchtime business."

Nearly two years later, however, the chain has pulled the plug on the program, cutting out the meals program. Through attrition, his culinary staff of seven chef associates has been diluted to three, said the source, who recalled how impressed he was when he first joined the retailer at its division flagship store in Florida.

"They overextended themselves, made a lot of bad mistakes, and listened to a lot of bad advice," he said of the retailer's meals program. The retreat from hot and prepared foods is a direct result of the chain's reluctance to give the culinary staff enough rope to make a go of the program, he said.

At V. Richard's, Smith said, the retail-management structure is a little different, "like a hotel, where you work with a general manager or [food and beverage] director." The format is not entirely foreign to him, however, since his 30 years of experience included stints in the catering and hotel segments of the food-service industry.

Smith said his salary is comparable to one he received in the restaurant where he worked before coming to V. Richard's. Medical benefits are better in retail, since "a lot of restaurants in the Midwest are smaller, family-owned businesses, where you might have 10 employees. So, [the benefits] aren't that great."

Joy loves her role at Carr Gottstein because she relishes the customer-service aspect of the job, which she says is an extension of a chef's personality. She admits it wasn't easy to slip into the retail mind-set, at first.

"It was real hard for me to get used to it, because they're looking at a sale, and I was looking to please the customer," she recalled. On the salary side, Wells at CIA said that the mid-$20,000 range is "average" for graduates just embarking on a retail culinary career, based on their degree and what they're reporting back in surveys. He cautioned, however, that there are many exceptions and variables at work in the marketplace.

"This industry is so doggone big that you can always find exceptions to the salary side," he noted. "The whole salary piece is a tangled web."

Samuels of Horizon Hospitality agreed, saying that a 100-unit retailer in a metro market is likely offering experienced executive chefs a base salary of $60,000 to $75,000, plus bonuses and benefits. He compared them to senior-level supermarket management, and said that's the standard operators should apply in reviewing resumes.

"You hire someone that's responsible and has a good track record," he said. "You give them a direction and the tools to be successful and let them run with the ball. I think a lot of retailers have to do that, because to try and micromanage that [fresh-foods arena] -- not really knowing what they're managing -- is difficult in general."

On a more personal level, chef Smith at V. Richard's has surprised himself with the ability to do more, for more people, while maintaining an agreeable schedule.

"The hours are a lot more conducive [and] you have a lot more interaction with the customer," he said. "Our main thrust is quality and customer service -- a chef can't ask for more than that because a restaurant can put out the best food ever, but it doesn't go anywhere unless you have the service to go along with it."

Industry observers note that this type of food-service attitude about -- and merchandising approach to -- fresh foods is one of the principal obstacles that keeps retailers from profiting more from their value-added and prepared-foods programs.

"Retailers -- for the most part -- are afraid of the prepared-foods business because they're not comfortable with it," said Samuels. "And so, they stray away from it. Very often, the operators of the prepared-foods section are left to fend for themselves, which is unfortunate, because it alienates them and shows in the final product."

Culinary professionals can help eliminate this hurdle, because they have a clearer, front-line understanding of getting the food to the customer in the shortest time possible. Chefs quickly note that retail food service is more customer-direct than is found in a restaurant.

Smith provided this example, using a prepared entree of sun-dried tomato and cream cheese-filled ravioli:

"Here [at V. Richard's], I can make 30 of them, packaged and ready to go, in a very short time period. In a restaurant, it's one or two at a time -- with higher labor, and maybe a lack of consistency, if the waiter serves it late, and it's cold, for instance. It becomes a bad experience for the customer," he said.

As any retailer knows, it only takes a single unpleasant experience to lose a customer, and nowhere is this more easily accomplished than through the inability to deliver on fresh-food promises. Wells of the CIA said he hopes more supermarkets will take on chefs, and not only because it's good for his employer.

"It's a great sign for me as a consumer," he said. "It tells me that the [supermarket] is serious about the quality of what they're doing."