PRICE CHOPPER WEB SITE TO LINK RECIPES, INTERACTIVITY

DENISE ZIMMERMAN

SCHENECTADY, N.Y. -- Interactivity features of Price Chopper Supermarkets' World Wide Web site will be enhanced when the chain activates direct links between recipes and home shopping and delivery services.

Recipes published in the chain's Chopper Shopper Journal, including special items for last week's Super Bowl Sunday, are accessible through the electronic page now; soon, the ingredients in those recipes will be linked to a computerized shopping list for home delivery.

"If you see a recipe you want to create at home, and you are out of one of the ingredients, you can just hit your computer mouse and it creates a shopping list for you," said Barbara Page, a Price Chopper spokeswoman, describing the service that will be added to the web site.

Integrating consumer-oriented information, such as recipes and tips for entertaining, with sales and services, such as home shopping and delivery, is one way retailers are testing the profit potential of the World Wide Web.

Another opportunity to build sales and shopper loyalty -- promoting frequent shopper programs online via the web -- is also being tested by Price Chopper and other retailers such as Food Lion, Salisbury, N.C., and Giant Eagle, Pittsburgh.

Few retailers have been able to quantify the effect of promotions delivered via the World Wide Web, but many are monitoring the frequency of visits to their sites. Price Chopper's site is accessible through the Supermarket Shopping Network site (http:// www.mysupermarket.com).

Page said Price Chopper's

World Wide Web site will continue to add services and features in the months to come and the immediate focus is to provide consumer-oriented information.

Among the services highlighted on the web site since it went live last month are the COOKS (Call On Our Kitchen Specialists) program, which invites consumers to call a toll-free staffed cooking hotline; a special order service through which shoppers can arrange to purchase items not typically carried in Price Chopper stores, and free raffle ticket printing for nonprofit and civic organizations.

"We want to keep it fun, friendly," Page added. "One thing we'd like to get into is contests and [programs to encourage] customer response." An electronic mail component, enabling consumers to contact the chain, will be activated by summer.