As executive chairman and founder of TABS Analytics, I sign a lot of papers. But recently, I signed one of the most important papers of my career:
I signed a document to sell TABS Analytics.
We were acquired by a like-minded company, Blacksmith Applications of Boston, Massachusetts.
Shelton, Conn. – August 31, 2020 –TABS Analytics today announced that for the 5th year in row it has earned best-in-class distinctions in the Promotion Optimization Institute’s (POI) 2020 TPx Vendor Panorama report. This year TABS Analytics was recognized in three categories: Post Event Analytics, Dashboard and Data Management.
Shelton, Conn. – August 17, 2020 – Despite more interest in online shopping during the COVID-19 pandemic, eCommerce grocery saw only a slight uptick in sales from new users this year, according to the TABS Analytics Annual Food and Beverage Consumables Study. Overall, online grocery transactions increased 15% year-over-year, as existing buyers made more frequent purchases, and smaller eCommerce retailers saw massive surges in new buyers. Walmart was one of the beneficiaries of the shift to online, as it overtook Amazon in share of transactions for the first time.
Shelton, Conn. – July 13, 2020 – TABS Analytics, a Nielsen Connected Partner, announced today that it is collaborating with Brewers Advisors to launch a powerful software and analysis platform designed specifically for breweries that simplifies the use of Nielsen scan data. TABS Market Insights Connect™ clearly identifies sales problems, opportunities and indicated actions.
When consumer packaged goods (CPG) brands make changes to their packaging, they want to improve perceptions about certain product features, such as taste, health or other trending characteristics. The goal of making these significant and visible changes is typically to enhance brand equity, not to increase sales. But at the same time, you need to be aware that there’s a real possibility the new packaging will harm sales or cause the product to lose shelf presence.
TABS Analytics’ sister company, Decision Insight (DI), has extensive packaging research experience. Read on to learn more about strategies for making packaging research work for your brand.
As we enter 2020, let’s take a look at how some key grocery retailers have performed in 2019 through their first three fiscal quarters. I want to share my thoughts on what I think has worked – and hasn’t worked – for several prominent players. Below are sales and profit results from the top 4 grocery chains in the US plus Walmart Global for comparison (60% of their sales are grocery/consumables) for 2018 and the first three quarters of 2019.
TABS Analytics continues to rank among the top of vendors supporting trade promotion and loyalty programs, according to the Promotion Optimization Institute's 2019 TPx Vendor Panorama report. 2019 marks the 4th year in a row that TABS has been included as a best-in-class vendor. For 2019, TABS was cited with this distinction in two categories: Dashboard and Data Management. POI noted that the company is "highly innovative, shows the insights in very consumable formats, and has deep insights."
The TPx Vendor Panorama was developed to help guide consumer goods companies to successfully execute trade promotions at the headquarters level by identifying vendors’ strengths and weaknesses. The report examines all aspects of trade promotion – also referred to TPx, which includes trade promotion management, optimization, effectiveness and analytics.
For some strange reason we are fielding lots of inbound traffic from managers seeking a better model for baseline sales. This has been a persistent issue in the industry for at least 20 years, but only now are the calls coming…odd. For those of you not familiar with the concept for the CPG industry, a sales baseline is an estimate of sales in the absence of retailer price promotion. You can learn more about the concept in this sales baselines blog post and trade promotion optimization white paper.
Just know that without an accurate baseline, trade promotion optimization analysis will be inaccurate, and more importantly many of the decisions made from the analysis will be wrong. Some in the industry will say there are many ways to calculate a baseline (true), and given that, there is no way to tell which model or estimates are the best (false). There actually is a method for measuring which baseline estimates are the most accurate, and if you are interested in the technical details you can find them in this academic paper.
Shelton, Conn. – September 24, 2019 – Consumers are more frequently shopping for groceries online, according to the TABS Analytics 7th Annual Food and Beverage Consumables Study. E-Commerce grocery purchases nearly doubled in the past year, with 66 percent of consumers noting their loyalty to shopping through this channel and Amazon, Walmart and Target making the largest gains in penetration. However, the greater demand is revealing significant structural problems – low margins and unpredictable shipping and fulfillment costs – that will impact the profitability and sustainability of the business model.
Shelton, Conn. – July 22, 2019 – TABS Analytics today announced that Arthur (Art) B. Drogue, who held executive roles at Unilever, Best Foods, Nabisco and other major Consumer Packaged Goods companies, has joined TABS’s board of directors.
