MAD BUTCHER WINS WITH CELEBRATION

RICHARD TURCSIK

PINE BLUFF, Ark. -- It was a mad, mad, mad, mad anniversary sale at Mad Butcher supermarkets here.

The nine-unit operator celebrated its 43rd anniversary with festivities that included crawfish boils, participation in a pink tomato parade, a mosquito festival, one-day sales and a "name your own special" 43-cents-off coupon promotion that allowed shoppers to take 43 cents off the price of any one item in the store.

The three-week-long event in June also included a grand prize of one Kawasaki Jet Ski SX (valued at $3,900), one Magnavox VCR, one 13-inch Sanyo color television, one Sega video entertainment system per store and 20 Learn Games per store.

Roger Burks, the company's senior vice president of retail operations, told SN the retailer used big in-store displays of groceries, special decorations and events such as a candy carnival to stimulate grocery sales. As a result, he said the anniversary sale exceeded all expectations.

"For the three weeks the promotion ran, with all stores combined we're looking at a 12% increase -- which is pretty darn good this time of year," he said.

The 43-cents-off coupon had a "tremendous redemption" according to Burks.

"We had about a 23% redemption rate, which is way above a typical coupon redemption. The bulk of the coupons look like they were applied towards meat, which is for what we are most noted," he said, adding that many shoppers also elected to use their coupons on featured grocery products.

Among the grocery items featured were Coca-Cola at 89 cents per two-liter bottle; Charmin toilet tissue at 89 cents a four-roll pack; Chef-Way shortening at $2.99 for a 5-pound can; Flav-o-rite sugar for $1.43 per five-pound bag; Breast O'Chicken chunk tuna at 49 cents a can; Shoppers Value pineapple, a 20-ounce can for 59 cents, and three one-pound loaves of private-label sliced white bread for 99 cents.

One-day sale items included Mad Butcher hot dog buns at 32 cents per eight-count package; Morton salt, 29 cents for a 26-ounce can; Moon Pies at 19 cents each; Flavorite hot sauce selling four six-ounce bottles for 99 cents; Showboat pork & beans, 69 cents a 31-ounce can, and Austex hot dog chili sauce for 27 cents a 10-ounce can.

Also featured during one of the one-day sales was Preferred Selections soft drinks, a new upscale private-label line from Supervalu that has "taken off like a rocket" since it was introduced three months ago, according to Burks. It was on sale for 99 cents a six-pack.

Burks said Mad Butcher sent grocery characters including Oreo Man and Kool-Aid Man to the pink tomato parade in Warren, Ark., the home of Bradley pink tomatoes developed at the University of Arkansas. At the annual Mosquito Fest in McCrory, Ark., Mad Butcher paid a reward of $25 to the citizen who brought in the largest mosquito.

"We also had parking lot events, such as barbecues, shrimp boils and crawfish boils that were big hits with the public," he said.