CSNews Parent Company Embarks on Category Management Initiative

DEERFIELD, Ill. — Convenience Store News parent company Stagnito + Edgell has joined forces with the Category Management Association (CMA) in a promotion and partnership for the updated Category Management 2.0 (CatMan 2.0) initiative. This product ensures a major evolution in best-practice processes for optimizing category performance in retail businesses.

After the process of category management was first developed in the early 1990s, the CatMan 1.0 business model was adopted by virtually every retailer and consumer packaged goods (CPG) manufacturer serving the retail market over the course of more than 20 years.

Led by CMA, CatMan 2.0 is a comprehensively redesigned discipline of the CatMan 1.0 business standard. The final rendition accommodates today's shift to new data, new tools, and collaborative products and processes.

Category management has changed substantially over the years, and current retail marketers have the ability to employ resources that were unimaginable to the Efficient Consumer Response Committee that created the earlier program, the companies said. At the same time, category management's evolution has not been a tightly controlled process.

CatMan 2.0 offers the retail industry the opportunity to take a more holistic approach in providing an efficient model that integrates past tools, data and analytics with today's dramatically improved information and technology resources.

"Industry observers have identified 'best practice' solutions in a myriad of areas. Some practitioners are early adopters of these discoveries, but most lag behind due to lack of awareness or simple day-to-day business pressures and constraints," stated Wendy Fritz, CEO of the CMA. "The biggest barrier, in some ways, has been the lack of a consolidated repository of category management learning that is accessible and current. With CatMan 2.0, we are excited to provide our members with ongoing access to the latest best practices and thought leadership on category management."

Tools incorporated in CatMan 2.0 include:

• Sophisticated data analytics;
• Shopper psychographics;
• Value chain management;
• Predictive intelligence; and
• Store cluster/neighborhood customization

The final product will be available in May via the CMA website at www.catman.global and include a knowledge center. This will equip CPG manufacturers, retailers and solution providers with a process model and resource library that addresses all elements of category management, as well as special advance access for CMA members.

Stagnito + Edgell will promote and market CatMan 2.0 through a variety of communications and information platforms, including in print, digital, events, custom marketing and research.

Kollin Stagnito, CEO and president of Stagnito + Edgell, expressed enthusiasm "in playing a major role in conveying the CatMan 2.0 process to management and all disciplines of our many retail channels. This critical upgrade will provide dramatic improvements and efficiencies in all areas of category management, and the impact will be felt for many years to come."