Rouse`s Supermarket #21 3461 East Causeway Approach

Rouse’s Supermarket #21
3461 East Causeway Approach
Mandeville, LA 70448
Progressive Grocer’s
Store of the Month
March 2006
STORE OF THE MONTH: ROUSES MARKET, Mandeville, La.
Born on the
Louisiana’s Rouses
Supermarkets leverages
local expertise and a
blend of old and new in
its latest store.
By Jenny McTaggart
34 •
PROGRESSIVE GROCER • MARCH 1, 2006
PHOTOS:
JERRY WARD PHOTOGRAPHY, ZUMA PRESS
D
own
in the
Bayou
State,
Rouses
Supermarkets, Louisiana’s
largest independent
supermarket chain,
makes superior local
food marketing look easy.
Indeed, the retailer’s spicy
gumbo of assortment,
merchandising, and personal service would be
any national chain’s
dream—or nightmare,
if you have to compete
against it.
A H E A D O F W H AT ’ S N E X T
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bayou
Left:
Corrugated tin
and other local materials
give the exterior of Rouses’
latest format, in Mandeville,
La., a down-home feel. Large
picture: Proud president
Donald Rouse, front, is joined
by, left to right, produce
director Joe Watson, g.m.
Dave Daroca, store director
Donny McDowell, and store
supervisor Clint Adams.
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MARCH 1, 2006 • PROGRESSIVE GROCER •
35
STORE OF THE MONTH
Rouses Market
3461 Easy Causeway Approach, Mandeville, LA 70448
Trade Area Statistics
Rouses Market vs. industry average
% of sales by department
26.9
39.1
Grocery
19.5*
14.4
15.6
3.6
Meat/seafood*
Beer/wine
Produce
9.5
9.9
Dairy
7.8
9.1
5.0
4.2
Deli
4.3
7.2
3.6
3.5
3.5
2.2
Frozen foods
GM/nonfoods
In-store bakery
2.0
3.9
1.6
0.2
HBC
Floral
36 •
Rouses
Industry average
0.9
n/a
Quizno’s
The strategy is in full bloom at
Rouses’ newest “healthy lifestyle” format, in Mandeville, La. Piping-hot jambalaya and turtle soup wait at the food
bar, while an in-store smoker churns
out mouthwatering barbequed ribs.
Muffaletta sandwiches are piled up in
the deli, while nearby a chef crafts a
unique “Louisiana roll” at the sushi bar.
*The percentage for
meat/seafood sales
includes fresh sliced
meats from Rouses
The bakery offers up a smorgasbord
that includes a homemade six-layer
doberge cake and tarte a la bouille—
also known as a Cajun custard pie. And
don’t even mention the king cake!
What would likely take years for an
out-of-state retailer to learn about
Louisiana food tastes and trends is second nature at homegrown Rouses, a 14-
PROGRESSIVE GROCER • MARCH 1, 2006
Estimated population+
Total households
Available grocery dollars*
Median household income
Median age
Owned housing
White-collar occupations
Service occupations
Blue-collar occupations
Not working
White adults (18+)
Black adults (18+)
Hispanic adults (18+)
Asian adults (18+)
1-Mile Radius
3-Mile Radius
6,919
2,707
$320,440
$60,151
37.5
63.7%
30.9%
26.4%
7.5%
35.1%
90.6%
4.1%
1.8%
2.3%
37,303
13,562
$1,746,730
$76,280
36.6
78.0%
31.5%
28.6%
8.0%
31.7%
91.9%
3.0%
1.2%
2.7%
Note: All demographics are pre-Hurricane Katrina
5-Mile Radius
47,918
17,220
$2,250,320
$78,692
37.1
80.7%
31.4%
28.0%
7.6%
32.9%
92.6%
2.8%
1.1%
2.4%
Source: Spectra
*Weekly
Soft opening: . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Dec. 8, 2005
Total area: . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .62,000 square feet
Selling area: . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .46,000 square feet
Number of SKUs: . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .46,000
Total weekly sales: . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .$440,000
Employees: . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .165
Checkouts: . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .11, plus two in customer service
Store hours: . . . . . .7 a.m. to 9 p.m., Monday through Saturday; 7 a.m. to 8 p.m., Sunday
Store designer: . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Architectonics International, Inc., Farmingdale, N.Y.;
Rouses’ in-house design team
store chain founded in 1960 in Thibodaux, La. Its latest store blends classic
and modern food retailing, and balances
two primal and often opposing forces
pulling at today’s supermarket opera-
A H E A D O F W H AT ’ S N E X T
tors: low prices vs. high-quality fresh
and prepared foods.
How does Rouses do it? Here’s an
explanation offered by Charles Hamblen, meat/seafood director at Rouses:
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Left: A vibrant Mardi Gras
display features festive home
decor items. Right: Rouses’
hot food counter draws a hungry
lunch crowd. These shoppers
may not know it, but this leading
independent has been offering
prepared foods for 20 years.
for all kinds of programs. At Rouses
many of the latest food trends—from
chic wines to the booming organic category—are finessed and perfected,
always to suit the tastes of the local
clientele.
Katrina’s mark
“We listen to our employees and our
customers.” And luckily for Rouses,
“People in Louisiana like to eat; they
like to try different things,” he adds.
That openness among the consumer
base makes for a fertile testing ground
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Mandeville, on the north shore of
Lake Pontchartrain in St. Tammany
Parish, is an ideal spot for Rouses’
upscale localized fresh offering. At one
time a popular resort, the town is now
a bedroom community of New
Orleans and home to many well-edu-
cated, high-income consumers.
Of course, much of the demographic
makeup of New Orleans and its surrounding neighborhoods was drastically
disrupted after Hurricane Katrina struck
in 2005, and the disaster has left its
mark in Mandeville as well. The town
didn’t suffer extensive damage, but in
the wake of Katrina and other hurricanes it was left with crowded hotels;
then a severe spike in housing demand
spawned high-rent apartments and
expensive homes that some of the locals
could no longer afford.
Fortunately for Rouses, the Mandeville store, which was under construc-
A H E A D O F W H AT ’ S N E X T
tion when Hurricane Katrina hit, only
received minor damage. But the hurricanes may have influence Rouses’ decision to conduct a soft opening, instead
of a grand opening on Dec. 8, 2005.
“We haven’t advertised the store yet.
We’re going to grow it slowly. We want
to focus on hiring and training first, so
that we can do a better job for the customer,” says president Donald Rouse.
Indeed, another immediate impact
on Rouses is that it has been facing a
hiring challenge at the new store,
according to human resources director
Steve Galtier. “We’ve had to increase
our pay rates to stay competitive. We’ve
MARCH 1, 2006 • PROGRESSIVE GROCER •
37
STORE OF THE MONTH
Quality and quantity: From USDA
Choice Angus beef to homemade
doberge cake, Rouses’ product
selection includes some of the
finest foods available. Lower
right: The retailer also markets a
high-quality private label line
including fresh salsas and salad
dressings.
actually spent more money on advertising for help than advertising for our
business.”
Two for one
The Mandeville unit is the third of
Rouses’ “healthy lifestyle” stores, and
the operator’s second site in St. Tammany. It offers an unusual fusion of two
store types that many other food retailers seem to believe are two separate and
distinct species: the upscale, fresh-heavy
market, á la Whole Foods, and the no-
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frills, value-priced traditional supermarket. (All of Rouses’ stores feature EDLP
pricing).
The 62,000-square-foot store’s layout
reflects this duality: It’s essentially split
in two. On the right-hand side, where
the main entrance is located, prepared
foods are the first things customers see.
Across the aisle from the hot food and
meals-to-go stations is a beautiful floral department, which itself is a storewithin-a-store. As shoppers work their
way through the store, toward the rear,
they’re treated to the fresh smells and
tantalizing sights of baked goods,
imported cheese, produce, meats, and
seafood.
By the time they get all the way to
the back, however, they may be wondering where the “supermarket” part of
the store went. That would be the lefthand side of the store, which consists
of a dairy case, frozens, and packaged
baked goods, along with the other traditional center store aisles. It actually
takes a little work to get to that side of
the store from the main entrance, but
A H E A D O F W H AT ’ S N E X T
maybe that’s a conscious move, an effort
to impress with something special right
off the bat.
“This format gives the feel of an
MARCH 1, 2006 • PROGRESSIVE GROCER •
39
STORE OF THE MONTH
“I’ve quit going to
Whole Foods. I shop
at Rouses because
of their quality and
experience.”
Lake Pontchartrain Causeway to buy her groceries
at Rouses. “I’ve quit going
to Whole Foods. I shop at
Rouses because of their
quality and experience,”
she says.
Indeed, Rouses’ prepared foods lineup is
—Customer at the new founded on two decades
Mandeville, La. store of experience, putting it
far ahead of most food
open-air market, with an emphasis on fresh, healthy retailers. “Twenty years ago we were packaging soups
lifestyles,” notes Rouse.
and hot food,” says Dave Daroca, Rouses’ general
Shoppers certainly seem to be noticing the special manager. “We didn’t think about it as ‘take-home
treatment Rouses gives products and presentation. food.’”
During one visit, a shopper admits she purchased a toll
Like the store in general, Rouses’ prepared food
card to make the regular 40-minute trip across the offering today reflects the latest trends, along with
tried-and-true Louisiana classics. The most modern
element is a Quizno’s sandwich shop in the righthand corner of the store. Rouses franchises the shop,
which is used as the store’s in-store café and seating area
(both indoor and outdoor seating are included). It’s the
fourth in-store Quizno’s unit the retailer has opened.
“We wanted to pick a quality sandwich program,
and Quizno’s does very well,” notes Rouse.
Another modern touch is a sushi station that offers
popular Japanese-style Rouses punctuates
rolls, in addition to a its Mandeville store’s
“Louisiana Roll” featur- blend of old and
new with signage
ing Louisiana crab reminiscent of
meat and designed by antique illustrated
one of Rouses’ sushi posters, like the
one above promoting
chefs.
Rouses’ equipment “Oven Fresh”
baked goods.
is on trend, too. To better showcase hot foods,
for example, the retailer
uses a heated stone
with lamps on top, custom-designed by Rotisol. The
new setup takes the place of steam tables.
“This really shows the quality of our foods better,” says Daroca. Baked chicken, pork roast, and
gravy over rice are just a few of the daily specials that
can be found on the stone. Customers can purchase an
entree and one side dish for $4.09.
In its foods-to-go section, Rouses features inventive
entrees with local flair, such as smothered okra, sausage
jambalaya, and sauteed shrimp over pasta. “These are
all made here,” says Daroca. Prepared refrigerated
entrees include Cajun boudin balls, another local
favorite.
Muffalettas, sandwiches reportedly invented by a
Sicilian in New Orleans’ French Quarter, sell like hotcakes in the deli. Rouses also sells trays of mini muffalettas for shoppers who plan to entertain.
“We sell a lot of trays and meals to go,” adds Rouse.
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STORE OF THE MONTH
The roomy, circular checkout
area at the Mandeville store
lets shoppers see lanes that
are open and ready to serve.
Rouses strives to have plenty
of registers open so that shoppers
never have to wait behind
more than one customer
in line.
“We do some off-premise catering for
parties and weddings. We’ve even done
wedding packages where we do the
flowers and the cake, too.”
Rouses also manufactures its own
brand of salsas, salad dressings, and Italian olive salad, the last of which is used
as a condiment on muffalettas and other
sandwiches.
‘Blast from the past’
The store punctuates its
blend of old and new with signage reminiscent of antique
illustrated posters. “We’re
blending modern and old, so
we wanted to give shoppers a
blast from the past,” explains
Rouse.
In the Meat Shoppe, for
example, a sign sports an illustration of cows being judged
at a county fair.
When it comes to meats,
Rouses is “smokin’,” literally
and figuratively. The retailer’s
in-store barbeque program
uses a Southern Pride smoker
to cook ribs, sausage, beef
briskets, and pulled meats, all sold to-go
in the meat department as well as the
deli. Its barbeque is branded as “Rouses
Bayou Boys Barbeque,” which has now
become its trademark in Louisiana.
Customers can buy individual meat
items, platter combinations, sandwiches,
and side items such as homemade
potato salad and BBQ baked beans. It’s
a big program for Rouses: The fresh
sliced meats account for around 5 percent of the Mandeville store’s total sales.
Other specialty meat items in the
department include pinwheels, seasoned
meats, jalapeño peppers stuffed with
sausage and wrapped in bacon, and turducken, a chicken stuffed in a duck,
stuffed in a turkey. For its overall selection, Rouses features a Choice Angus
program, along with prime and select
cuts.
Seafood, a staple of the Louisiana
diet, is another of Rouses’ signature
offerings. In the mix: boiled crabs and
crawfish, and Rouses’ own brand of
fresh and frozen shrimp, caught in
Louisiana waters.
“On the weekends we can’t keep this
stuff on the shelves,” notes the store’s
seafood/smokehouse manager, John
Powells.
The seafood often finds its way into
Rouses’ meal solution program, which
the stores display in the produce department as well as in center store. One
such display at Mandeville highlights
New Orleans’ crawfish-eating season,
which typically runs from March
through June. The display includes
lemons, onions, garlic, and spices.
Rouses’ local food expertise is fully
ripened in produce, where the retailer
features locally grown items as they
come into season. “We buy from local
farmers whenever possible,” says Rouses’
produce director, Joe Watson. The latest trends in produce aren’t merely local,
however: fresh-cut items and organics
are also big, according to Watson. “We
sell a lot of fresh salsa, cut fruit, and gift
baskets,” he says. A workstation in the
department allows customers to watch
as associates prepare gift baskets and
cut the fruit.
While Rouses outsources a few
of its fresh-cut items, the retailer
tries to do as much as possible in
the store. For instance, when
managers weren’t satisfied with
the consistency of some of the
fresh-cut items they were receiving, they took it upon themselves
to add veggie kabobs and asparagus
tips as grilling items.
Organics, meanwhile, make up
nearly 15 percent of the produce selec- get the slower movers out,” notes Wat- self-serve.” Honey and almond butters
tion at Mandeville, according to Wat- son. “We brought in our first bulk pro- are also available to churn.
son. “Just from the first six weeks we’ve gram at Rouses in July. This is our third.
been open, I can tell that organics will So we’re learning as we go.”
Healthy hits
be really big here,” he adds.
A self-serve peanut butter station in
The Mandeville Rouses merchanBulk foods are also enjoying a strong the produce area is another initial sucstart, comprising about a 7 percent share cess. “This is the first one we’ve done,” dises organic and natural shelf-stable
of total produce sales. The store’s current says Watson. “We’re selling more of the foods and nonfood items in a storemix of 216 bulk items
includes nuts, trail
Mardi Gras celebration
mixes, grains, pastas,
and confections. “I’ve
ouses Supermarkets does an “enormous business” every year during Mardi Gras, and
been rotating items to
2006 looks to be no different, according to president Donald Rouse. (Mardi Gras, which
R
translates to “Fat Tuesday,” fell on Feb. 28 this year.)
Bakery sales at Rouses are lifted by a Mardi Gras staple: the king cake. “Our king cake
sales are already up double digits,” Rouse noted at the end of January, soon after
the retailer had put up its in-store displays. “It could be because some of the
smaller bakeries in the area are still closed from the hurricanes.”
Rouses sells around 100,000 king cakes companywide on average. The retailer ships cakes via Federal Express to all 50 states.
(Customers can place orders at www.rouses.com.) The festive-looking treats, which are baked and covered with a poured sugar topping in traditional Mardi Gras colors, are available plain or with
various fillings, including cream cheese, pecan praline, and strawberry, to name just a few.
Floral and home decor also get a boost from Mardi Gras, notes
Rouse. Customers open their wallets for decorations including
door hangings, festive porcelain dolls, and, of course, colorful Mardi
Gras beads, he says.
STORE OF THE MONTH
within-a-store, Healthy Lifestyles. It
keeps organic and natural versions of
perishables in the perimeter departments.
HBC/nonfood products in the
Healthy Lifestyles section include supplements and vitamins, as well as earthfriendly paper products. In the Mandeville store Rouses is also testing a full
line of Burt’s Bees natural HBC items.
Overall, Healthy Lifestyles is proving to be a hit. “We started this concept in our Covington store,” notes store
supervisor Clint Adams. “The average
transaction in this store is much higher
so far, so we’re going to go back and
enlarge the Covington section.”
Next to the Healthy Lifestyles
department is Rouses’ wine and spirits
section, a true tribute to Louisianans’
appreciation of the finer drinks in life.
“The selection is different in every
store,” says Sunny Groom, Rouses’ wine
specialist. “In this area, people are into
wines. They’re interested in imports and
are open to trying new things.”
They have plenty of opportunity for
experimentation, as the selection
includes more than 2,500 varieties.
Since Louisiana doesn’t have standalone
liquor stores, and allows off-premise
alcohol sales on Sunday, Rouses enjoys
brisk sales throughout the week. A
“wine well” lets shoppers chill their wine
purchases in just five minutes.
Groom says she attends to frequent
special-order requests and stock-up trips
from customers who have wine cellars in
44 •
their homes. Thus, she does her best to
remember customers’ names and faces.
As for which variety goes best with
Cajun cooking, she suggests white wines
that are slightly sweet and lower in alcohol content. “I frequently recommend
Louisiana wines to pair with local
foods,” she notes. Examples in the Mandeville store include table wines
from Pontchartrain Vineyards or
Landry Vineyards.
ments and price
guides, as well as
P&L (profit and
loss) statements,
purchase orders, and
human resources
applications, are
online. We have also
begun mapping our
shelves with a wireless unit to capture
the gondola length;
the shelf length,
width, and height;
and additional information that will
allow us to print
shelf price tags in a
specific order, therefore saving time and
reducing waste.”
Rouses has yet to
use self-checkout
technology at the front end, but there’s
a good reason for that, according to
Rouse. “We have enough checkers up
front and prefer to provide that service.
We try to maintain a company policy
that there will be no more than one customer ahead of a person waiting in line
at any time.”
This commitment to service led
Rouses to design the checkout area of
the Mandeville store in a roomy circular configuration. “We wanted to create a feel of convenience,” explains
Rouse. “This way shoppers can see the
registers, but they don’t see a line of customers waiting.”
As of yet, shoppers haven’t had to
fight crowds at the Mandeville unit. But
as Rouse sees it, that’s a good thing.
“We’ve done store openings both
ways—highly publicized, and quieter,
as we’re doing here. We want to grow
the business slowly.”
Rouse takes a similarly calculated
approach in his plans for the company’s growth overall. “We’re now at
the point where we’d like to build
two stores a year,” he says. Last
month the retailer began construction on store No. 15, a 62,000square-foot upscale market in Slidell,
which is another growing community in St. Tammany Parish. The
store will closely resemble the one in
Mandeville, but it will include a few
exciting new additions, such as a dryaged beef program with a refrigerated display on the sales floor, and a
new in-store restaurant.
Bulk foods currently comprise
an impressive 7 percent share
of total produce sales at the
Mandeville unit. “I’ve been
rotating items to get the slower
movers out. We’re learning
as we go,” notes company
produce director Joe Watson.
And if Rouse is worried by the
competition in his state—which
includes A&P’s Sav-A-Center, WalMart, Supervalu’s Save-A-Lot, Whole
Foods, Winn-Dixie, and other independent operators—he doesn’t let it
show. In fact, he built the Mandeville
store and shopping center (which
Rouses also owns) right up against
an existing Winn-Dixie. ■
Good deals daily
Compared with the rest of the
store, Rouses’ center store aisles are
more about price image, says
Adams. The retailer has used an
EDLP pricing structure for years.
Still, specialty products are given
prominence, via curved shelving.
Like many cost-efficient supermarket operators, Rouses has in
recent years reduced the number
of product sizes it offers. But at the
same time it strives to maintain
variety—and in-stocks—for a discriminating clientele.
“We work very hard to keep products in stock. It’s a daily challenge,”
admits Daroca.
The enterprising independent has
been relying more and more on technology for in-stocks and other issues,
he adds. “We have wireless capability
in all locations. Our store supervisors
use wireless laptops. Operational docu-
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•
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