Elevating Beverage Merchandising with an Innovative Web Platform
Background
Scottish & Newcastle (S&N), a major international brewing group, was formed in 1960 through the merger of Scottish Brewers and Newcastle Breweries. Over the decades, the company has grown into a significant global player, now ranked among the world’s top ten brewers. S&N holds market leadership in many of Europe’s largest beer markets and owns three of the continent’s top ten beer brands: Baltika, Foster’s, and Kronenbourg 1664.
The Challenge
Optimising Bar Space for Increased Revenue
Through extensive consumer research, S&N gained a deep understanding of customer behavior at the bar, specifically what draws their attention when selecting a bottled drink from a fridge. The research provided key insights into how licensees could optimize sales by strategically positioning their bottled products within back-bar fridges.
Leveraging the latest market data from AC Nielsen, S&N was able to determine the ideal product mix for any given venue. Field trials with several outlets demonstrated a significant increase in sales of back-bar fridge products when fridges were stocked with the right assortment for a specific location and outlet type, and when products were placed in the optimal position.
Building on the success of these trials, S&N decided to develop a comprehensive web-based fridge planning solution for the “On-Trade” sector (pubs, clubs, restaurants, and hotels). The project’s core requirement was to create a system that could deliver a bespoke fridge plan tailored to the unique characteristics and bar layout of any individual establishment.
Given the immense variety in bar styles, demographics, and back-bar fridge configurations, the application needed to be capable of handling a vast amount of detailed input and generating a virtually infinite combination of complex fridge plans. Crucially, the final plans had to be easy to understand and share. The solution also had to be quick, intuitive, and simple to use, as it needed to appeal to busy bar managers who would be working in a challenging, fast-paced environment.
The Solution
User-Centric Design and Advanced Architecture
Our first step was to conduct a thorough usability study to understand how a bar manager would interact with such a tool and the typical environment they would be in. This involved in-depth workshops with representatives from S&N’s Sales and category Marketing teams, who were in regular contact with their target audience. We also visited on-premise retail venues with S&N Account Managers to interview retailers directly about their current approach to stocking fridges.
This user profiling study was a resounding success. We identified potential environmental constraints and user preferences, which provided an invaluable, in-depth understanding of the tool’s intended users. The study also brought to light new features and requirements that would have otherwise been missed.
Next, we tackled the complex task of converting S&N’s manual, rule-based processes for generating fridge plans into an automated software application. This was accomplished using sophisticated application and database design techniques,
which allowed us to flexibly integrate sales data, product specifications, bar characteristics, and fridge planning rules.
For a web application with the potential for over 200,000 users, quality and stability were paramount. We established a rigorous quality assurance (QA) environment where S&N could thoroughly test any changes to data, specifications, or rules before they were deployed to the live system.
The entire website is powered by a custom-built Content Management System (CMS). We also set up separate QA and live environments and sourced, configured, and hosted the servers ourselves in a secure, controlled data center. Beyond the initial build, we provided ongoing technical support for both the website and its planning engine, as well as dedicated customer service for bar managers and the S&N sales teams. Our support staff handled technical queries and usability questions, and escalated any account-specific issues to the appropriate S&N Account Manager.
The Result
Simple Functionality with a Complex Impact
The final product, branded planyourfridge.com, is a feature-rich website where bar managers can get advice on optimising their back-bar space and quickly generate customised fridge plans for their specific bars. The plans account for the unique demographics and characteristics of each outlet.
Users can create virtual bar workstations online with realistic arrangements of standard or custom fridges. They can save multiple workstation and fridge plan configurations for future reference. The application also provides options to print or email completed plans and stocking lists, allowing them to be shared with staff and used offline. The completed application successfully achieved its primary goal: providing a simple, easy-to-use web tool for bar staff while performing complex, rule-based processing behind the scenes.
By empowering retailers to merchandise their back-bar fridges correctly, the system is expected to have a significant positive effect on their sales. For S&N, this has a direct impact on increasing packaged beer and cider sales to their retail partners. The brewer is already building on the success of this tool by developing custom sites for key national retail groups.
Jennifer Archibald, Project Manager at S&N UK, expressed her satisfaction with the outcome:
“Everyone at S&N who was involved in this project has been extremely pleased with the final system. The team’s passion for delivering the best possible system, combined with their enthusiasm and deep understanding of the project’s challenges, has led to a tool that is being welcomed by both S&N and our customers alike.”
Technical Summary
To ensure the system’s flexibility and adaptability, we adopted an Object-Oriented Programming (OOP) approach, separating data from the logic and presentation layers. The core fridge planning engine was built using Java and XML technologies, while PHP was used for the client-facing web interface. This architecture allows for the simple addition, removal, or reordering of rules within the engine, providing a high degree of flexibility for future updates. At the heart of the system is a MySQL database that stores all reference and generated data, including a complete history of previous fridge plan generations to support the reporting suite. For the client, this solution enables easy modifications to the interface and workflow without affecting the
underlying data or processing.