KEEPING IT SIMPLE

ROSEANNE HARPER

SPRINGFIELD, Mass. -- Big Y Foods here makes the meals business look easy.

In fact, simplicity is the key to the chain's success with its International Cafes -- a success marked early on by growing sales and, more recently, profitability, chain officials told SN.

In the prepared foods category where shrink is always a worry, for instance, Big Y's "keep it simple" strategy works to minimize waste, and at the same time offer customers what they really want to buy, said Scott Ruth, director of meat and specialty departments for the 42-unit chain.

The elements of the cafe are few, and each category's menu is kept pruned to a short list of best-sellers. The strategy, Ruth said, ensures quick turnover and thus freshness.

"Our biggest edge in the market is 'fresh.' We're going to live or die by a five letter word, F-R-E-S-H. That's our image," Ruth said. Associates are trained to have that in mind always, he added.

Big Y delivers on that image by preparing food all day, by using fresh ingredients and by opting for "fresh" over "full" when it comes to displays of prepared foods.

You'll see no towering platters of exotica. In fact, roasted shallots on a very small platter were the most out-of-the-ordinary product noted recently at International Cafe at the chain's World Class flagship store in Manchester, Conn., where the prepared foods format was introduced.

"You can have a lot of weird stuff. But it goes back to giving people what they want. If they don't buy it, you're just pleasing yourself," Ruth said, pointing out that just-in-time production is very important.

"Fresh is a commitment we've made to our customers. More importantly, it's what our competition is NOT doing. It goes from making our bagels from scratch, to our pizzas, to our cream pies. It's very important for us to have a point of difference from our competition and this is it. Our food is all restaurant quality," Ruth said.

Another inducement to freshness is that the International Cafe operates like a restaurant, and like a separate business from Big Y's grocery operation, said Roland Asselin, the chain's food service sales manager.

"All my ads for this are like restaurant ads. We consider restaurants, not other supermarkets, competition when it comes to this department," said Asselin.

"If you look at the signs, and pricing by portion and meals, it's all restaurant-like. We adhere to restaurant rules also. For example, our people are certified in food safety. We keep on top of that," he added.

In the same vein, Asselin said he tells associates it's all right to run out of items. That is typically a cardinal sin in the grocery business, but Asselin's reasoning is that customers want their food fresh and thus they're not going to be put off if something they were looking for is sold out.

"If you go into a restaurant and they're out of today's special, you don't get up and leave. You order something else," he said.

"We have the food ready when the customer is ready. That's what's important. Our pizza crew doesn't come in till 10 a.m., for example. And you might find, at three in the afternoon, that there are only one or two chickens on the rotisserie. Or maybe none.

"People want to eat good food and they want to get good service and we thrive on that. As we go along our staff gets more knowledgeable, too," he said, pointing out that the turnover among the company's food-service employees is low.

The "fresh" message is broadcast loud and clear via an open preparation area, where associates can be seen chopping and slicing ingredients for sandwiches and twirling pizza dough that's made from scratch.

Just inside the entrance at the Manchester store -- where the International Cafe was inaugurated a little over two years ago -- customers are greeted with the aroma of fresh baked bread emanating from the bakery, which is situated in the store's right front corner.

Straight ahead, they can see staffers grilling panini and serving up wedges of muffaletta sandwiches, in the first section in the meals line-up. This activity is juxtaposed with the site of sandwiches displayed on platters in a European-style case featuring sleek lines and in-case lighting accents. The equipment is reminiscent of a high-end pastry case, and while there are not a lot of sandwiches piled up, those on display look great.

Only four varieties of panini are made up ahead of time, and only the two best-selling grinders -- ham and cheese and turkey -- are on display. The muffalettas take the spotlight, cutting an intriguing profile thanks to the bumpy pepperoni-cheese bread the store uses for them.

"That muffaletta is huge for us on weekends," Asselin said. "People buy the whole thing, and it's about $20. On a Friday night, it's not unusual to sell 25 of them, whole, at this store. They take them home and cut them up for a family meal."

That particular sandwich is sold by the pound. Each whole sandwich is assembled on a large, round loaf of the pepperoni-cheese bread which is baked in the in-store bakery.

Signs at the counter tell customers what comprises a muffaletta, while others inform them that panini are Italian sandwiches, carefully layered with Big Y's World Class meats and cheeses and then brushed with olive oil and grilled.

Asselin said that grinders are big sellers, and again, he pointed out that the variety is limited to "the ones people ask for every day." Ham and cheese and turkey are the best-sellers in that order, he said.

"I was in a restaurant the other day where they had 32 hot and cold grinders on the menu and I thought, 'How can they do that?' I bet if they really looked, they'd see that only five or six are the sellers," Asselin said.

"People love our grinders, he continued. "If they ever have a complaint it's that there's too much meat on them." Within earshot, a customer seated at a table in the food court was tackling one of the overstuffed sandwiches with gusto. He looked up and volunteered, "These are great. Everytime I'm near here, I come in for one of their grinders or their fish and chips."

New York-style hot pastrami and corned beef sandwiches, the most recent addition to the sandwich menu here, are doing very well, too, Asselin said. "We've carried them into six more stores."

At the sandwich counter, value meals, which include a soda and chips, are offered at a special price. Next in line is the hot foods case, where the company makes no bones about the simplicity of the menu. It's built around ribs, chicken and meatloaf, with a couple of side dishes. Following that is a service case that displays a variety of entrees such as Texas chicken breasts, all priced by the piece.

Next comes a tiered case of chilled, pre-packed items in single-servings and family-sized servings, sourced from an outside manufacturer who is packaging the items under Big Y's private label.

"Between four and seven in the evening, they just keep coming to that case. They get their whole dinner there," Asselin said.

The case is marketed in menu order, with soups and appetizers, such as small shrimp cocktails, first; then salads; then center-of-the-plate items; and desserts. Also in that case are buckets of Big Wings in three flavors, and pre-wrapped sandwiches.

The most recent additions of pre-packed assortment are family-sized meals, with entrees and sides designed to serve four people. Those bundled meals, packaged in an opaque bag, are $10.95. Introduced this spring, they are available only in Manchester and one other unit.

"Those will be a home run for the fall. There are meatloaf, pork loin roast and lasagna. We'll break them into the chain once they get rolling, but they're already doing well," Asselin said. "We worked with the manufacturer on the recipes. For instance, we wanted a New England-style meatloaf."

Small bags of chips and other snack items, as well as bottled beverages, are cross merchandised near the chilled food-to-go case.

Next in line is the pizza station, where stromboli was added to the menu six months ago. Ruth said the product, made from pizza dough, has proven itself as a practical way to add variety to the menu without additional labor or ingredients. "The strombolis are popular, and we have a lot of evening business for whole pizzas to take home," he said.

Because the company focuses on the most popular varieties within a category and adheres to freshness, products move quickly. A pizza is kept a maximum of 40 minutes before it is thrown out, but typically there's not much to throw out because the company makes only six best-selling varieties.

As a consequence, a customer will not see many pizzas on display during mid-afternoon either, Ruth admitted. In fact, a half of a pepperoni, a half of a cheese, and a half of a sausage pie may be all that's available in the lull between lunch rush and the evening crowd.

The traditional deli is at the end of the food court aisle, against the back wall, featuring the chain's own World Class meats and cheeses are sliced to order. The deli service case also shows off large platters of trendy, upscale salads.

"These are our World Class salads. They're made for us from upgraded recipes. We had a tabouli and a couscous salad previously, but these are new recipes," Asselin said.

Directly in front of the traditional deli service counter is a salad bar and a separate fruit bar. "We've found that the salad bar is a big part of meals solutions. You see that we have tabouli on it. That type of salad can be a meal with a piece of bread with it," Asselin said.

Separating the fruit bar from the salad bar makes both stand out. Each has a limited, but colorful, selection of items.

Because the menus are limited and the offerings all fall into the category of simple fare, Big Y aims to make those offerings memorable for their quality. Ruth said Big Y's strategy throughout fresh foods is to search out the "best of the best" of competitive products and then improve upon them.

"We find a good benchmark and then just keep pushing it from there," he said. "For example, Dunkin' Doughnuts was our benchmark for doughnuts, and then there are a lot of local guys doing a great job with pizza. So that's where we started."

Asselin provided another example. "We asked ourselves, 'How do we could compete with a good chicken wing place?' You join them. You find a bigger wing, develop some great flavors and market them." That is how Big Y's Big Wing chicken program was born.

Execution at store level, not surprisingly, has been the biggest challenge in maintaining quality and freshness, the executives agreed. But the answer to succeeding at that is, again, to "keep it simple, have a lot of controls, follow up on controls, and don't be afraid to revisit [elements that are in place]," Asselin said.