Peter Duggan, Strategic Information Services, Bord Bia - Irish Food Board

A novel shopping aid called Recipe Cart, which uses technology to immediately suggest meal ideas as shoppers walk past other ingredients, caught our attention recently.

The campaign was the brainchild of a digital agency in São Paulo which fitted trolleys with touch screen devices. When consumers placed a jar of Hellmann’s mayonnaise in their cart, the tablet detected where they were in the store and suggested nearby ingredients to go with that product. If shoppers like the recipe they can use the display to find the location of necessary ingredients, or share the idea with friends over social networks. Some 45,000 customers were involved in a campaign trial, leading to a 70% rise in mayonnaise sales.

Although the campaign lasted only a month and focused on one product, this idea could potentially be expanded to include a wide database of recipes targeting multiple products and consumer groups, given its apparent success.

This shows that Innovations that provide meal solutions and facilitate purchases of complimentary products have the potential to increase shopper spend and satisfaction by improving the ability to navigate the store, and usage experience.