How to Create Your Own Retail Coupon Program

by Lauren Chew (love + chew)

December 10, 2021

Things to consider when you’re setting up a merchandising & couponing program (as an early stage brand) 

Many founders overlook the importance of merchandising as well as couponing in their retail outlets.  At $12-15 per store visit, the cost of hiring a merchandising firm can quickly add up, especially since most merchandising firms have monthly minimums.  In addition, working with a traditional clearing house in the couponing space can require $10,000-$20,000 in capital.  How does a small brand with a small marketing spend drive sales in store? 

 

As a founder, I encourage you to personally visit as many of your stores as possible.  I think it’s important to get a feel for your stores – ie. if your product is located in the right location in the store, educate staff on your products, and offer them samples, and of course drop off coupons next to your product on the shelf.  Did you know that shoppers often ask staff to learn about new products?  Plus, the staff love meeting the person or team behind the brand and hearing your story. 

 

When you’re not on promotion, coupons on shelf help drive attention to your products as well as encourage trial.* 

Instead of using a traditional clearinghouse, we partnered with Perinovus, to purchase the coupon bar codes and then we instructed the retailers to mail the coupons to us for reimbursement. We also ask stores to mail the physical used coupons to prevent fraud.  Essentially, we are acting as our own clearinghouse.  Once we receive the coupons and the invoices in the mail, we cut the retailer a check.  To streamline this process, we do this once a month.  While we realize this may not work if we were in 5,000+ stores, this works for us for now. 




CONSUMER: Redeem only by purchasing the brand and size(s) indicated. May not be reproduced. Void if transferred to any person, firm or group prior to store redemption. Any other use constitutes fraud. Consumer pays sales tax. Discount may not be combined with any other offer. No chashback. LIMIT ONE COUPON PER PURCHASE. DO NOT DOUBLE.

 

RETAILER: [INSERT COMPANY NAME] will reimburse you the face value of this coupon plus $0.08. Consumer pays sales tax. Mail redeemed coupons and invoice to [INSERT COMPANY ADDRESS]. 

©[INSERT YEAR, COMPANY NAME] All Rights Reserved.

 

Did you know that Whole Foods Markets provides weekly sales data, and you can easily track your marketing efforts?  Not all chains provide this level of data, but you can look into requesting reports from your distributors, or even purchasing it. 

 

This stuff works- we saw a 70% increase in sales since we started this initiative. It’s time consuming but well worth it – it took me 3 full days to visit 17 stores throughout the Bay Area.  The best part is when I enter a store and the staff already know me. Good luck and feel free to reach out to me with any questions at lauren@loveandchew.com. 

 

*Please note that small independents will often not accept coupons so check with your specific customers.

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