Getting match fit for retail: Is your brand being "pleasantly persistent" enough?
Barry Dick MW and Helen Barugh cover both sides of the retail buying desk: why pitches fail before the product is tasted, what buyers really judge and how brands survive their first range review. A seven-pillar framework for getting retail ready.
Fero's latest webinar tackled a question every drinks brand eventually faces. How do you actually get listed in UK retail? Once you're in, how do you stay there?
Moderated by Olly Lawson, the session brought together two speakers that have been on both sides of the negotiating table. Barry Dick MW, with senior experience across major FMCG wine producers and UK multiple retail, including managing global importation and UK packing for Waitrose's drinks buying team. He brings the buyer's eye view of what makes a brand retail ready. Helen Barugh has spent years leading grocery channels within distributors, selling into every major UK grocer including Tesco, Sainsbury's, Morrisons, Asda, Co-op and Booths, as well as wholesalers and convenience customers. She brings the supplier side view of building and scaling a listing commercially.
Between them, the session covered seven pillars: the basics, category fit, product proposition, consumer engagement, route to market, operational and commercial readiness and finally the honest pros and cons of retail as a channel.
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Watch Barry Dick MW and Helen Barugh talk through what it actually takes to win and keep a listing across UK retail. Answering real questions with real practical tips on getting retail ready at every stage. They'll demonstrate where the real fixes are, whether you're losing pitches before they start, struggling to land on the shelf, or winning the listing and still losing the business.
About this session
The webinar covers the practical realities of winning and keeping a retail listing across UK grocery. Dick argued that most brands lose ground before a buyer ever judges the product itself, through basic mistakes that have nothing to do with taste, price or packaging. Helen picked up the case for what happens after the listing lands, where average unit sales, promotional depth and buyer partnership decide whether a brand survives past year one. Several concrete strategies came up for building a retail-ready proposition, staying listed once you're in and knowing which channel is actually worth the investment.
Chapters:
04:13 : Pillar 1 - Do the basics well : Admin, compliance, samples, retailer literacy 09:59 : Pillar 2 - Understand the category : Range, data, competitive set, trends 12:58 : Pillar 3 - Product proposition : UPSs, pricing, pack, consumer pull 15:02 : Pillar 4 - Consumer & market plan : Shopper, campaigns, demand, route-to-market 18:51 : Pillar 5 - Keeping on shelf : The retailer-led plan that protects ROS 22:43 : Pillar 6 - Operational readiness : Supply chain, systems, accreditation, people 26:33 : Pillar 7 - Does retail work for you? : The upside against the real cost of entry 32:39 : Q&A
NielsenIQ (Nielsen's consumer/retail data arm, now branded NIQ): Paid Data Services
Barry and Helen closed with the same stark truth from two different sides of the table: getting a listing and keeping one are entirely different problems, and most brands only prepare for the first. Retailers set the price, not suppliers, and no amount of confidence changes that. The only thing that does, both speakers agreed, is data. A brand that shows up with evidence can hold its ground through everything that comes after the listing lands. A brand that shows up with a good story alone, cannot.
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