Education Is Key to Capturing CBD Sales

Educating consumers about CBD is essential to capturing new sales, especially as many existing customers moved their purchases online during COVID, says Rick Maturo, associate client director for NielsenIQ.

“It’s absolutely imperative that retailers work to educate not only consumers but also sales staff, and give them some talking points about these products.” An endcap with informational pamphlets, he says, “can go a long way.”

And offering a separate section with CBD products is beneficial, since it makes it a destination, he says, but “if folks aren’t looking specifically for CBD products, they might miss it. In the future I expect to see it integrated, but given the novelty of this, I think you’ll see more retailers leaning toward that special section or even just an endcap.”

As JustCBD enters grocery stores, it aims to attract customers with flyers and displays. “But perhaps our most distinctive feature will be QR codes that take consumers to our JustCBD Academy, which has video content explaining all things CBD, including how it's extracted and how we infuse into our products,” says spokesperson Melissa Acosta.

HempFusion uses print and digital advertising. It also has a rapidly growing influencer program featuring known athletes who talk about its products and how they’re using and benefiting from them.

For stores, HempFusion says in 2021, retailers will see new educational literature distributed at-shelf; retailer-focused webinars and videos; in-store training by the company’s educators; at-shelf scannable codes with product details; and in-store promotions such as instant redeemable coupons, and both consumer and retailer sweepstakes/giveaways.

PCC Community Markets promotes CBD products with sales tags at the shelf, though no digital promotions at this point. But vendors do provide ongoing aisle training for department staff, HBC Associate Merchandiser Steven Jamieson says.