Reynolds Ready to Get Engaged

DEERFIELD, Ill. -- RJ Reyonds, the giant tobacco supplier, is poised to kick off its new Get Engaged customer relationship program that it believes will firmly establish the Winston-Salem, N.C.-based company as a thought leader in the tobacco category and eventually the entire store.

In a meeting with Convenience Store News at the Stagnito Media headquarters here in Deerfield, Michael Purviance, senior trade marketing manager for RJRT, outlined the tobacco company's ambitious goals to provide qualitative and quantitative consumer research, insight, education and employee training for convenience store retailers "who demonstrate high levels of willingness and capability to optimize profitability attributed to the adult tobacco consumer."

Purviance, a 28-year veteran of the tobacco company, told CSNews that one of the goals of Get Engaged is to provide retailers with knowledge that facilitates successful engagements at retail. "Education is our go-in position," said Purviance. "Our company goals are thought leadership and collaborative relationships."

Through Get Engaged, retailers will have access to comprehensive research on adult tobacco consumers, including:

• Market basket and cross purchase behaviors

• Shopper demographic behaviors

• Brand-specific data across all tobacco categories

• Promotion analysis to include impact of multi-pack promos

• Buying frequency at retail and petrol forecourt

• Loyalty considerations

• Day part and seasonality trends

• Geographic variances

Get Engaged will be displayed prominently on the landing page of RJRT's Engage Web site. In addition to shopper insights and a new profitability and modeling tool, Get Engaged will also include a new educational module called EngageU. EngageU will provide online training videos and certification-oriented materials intended for sales associates in the store.

Although the research, which will be updated continuously, is mostly targeted around adult tobacco consumers, the scope of the information gathered will provide insights about optimizing profitability throughout the store.

The tentative timing for the launch is July 2011.