Distribution Channels
Soup and Bread will distribute its products via online, retail, and eventually B2B channels. Retail distribution will focus on attracting customers in Downtown Portland and Eugene, where most young working professionals (20s-40s) look for nearby meal options during weekdays, in addition to existing restaurant locations along the Oregon coast. Physical locations will distribute meals and sell soup bags. Online distribution is also crucial since the younger demographic we are targeting is more likely to be online on social media and browsing, meaning more ad impressions via this channel. We believe our online website will be an effective platform for delivery/pickup of meals and/or soup bags, especially among younger demographics. Lastly, as we expand, we may want to distribute via B2B partnerships by selling soup bags in grocery stores or offering meals via Forkable and other corporate lunch services. Other channels, like the app store, could be relevant if we convert our website into a mobile app, but we do not currently see this as a priority since an online website tackles both web and mobile use cases, and we don’t anticipate users will use our app daily (or multiple times a day).
Sales Strategy
Soup and Bread relies on direct sales and potentially grocery partners like Whole Foods or corporate meal service partners like Forkable.
This approach fits well with Soup and Bread since we are a physical restaurant, and to expand the availability of our soup bags, we need to depend on grocers that can support our mission of getting convenient soup bags to customers’ homes.
Marketing and Promotion
We can raise awareness using the existing loyal Soup and Bread customer base. At our existing locations along the Oregon coast, we can launch our new seasonal menus and pre-made soup bags and hang up promotional posters in the windows. When our existing customers come to our locations, they will find our new products in-store, and this will help increase word-of-mouth awareness of our new offerings. This is the right choice for our product and our users because it leverages the visibility of our in-store locations, which our target users will be walking by/into, thereby promoting awareness of our new products. This strategy is compatible with both our older and younger customer segments.
We can also partner with grocery stores in Oregon to stock our pre-made soup bags in their stores. Additionally, we can use similar posters and flyers within the grocery stores to promote our soup bags. When young professionals do their grocery shopping at these stores, they will come across our soup bags.
We can also use social channels such as TikToks and Instagram Reels to share information and raise awareness about Soup and Bread as “Portland’s hottest new restaurant,” for example, or partner with food influencers or young working professionals who could make content about getting Soup and Bread in their daily (work) life. This could raise awareness among our younger customer segments that are more likely to discover food options online.
Customer Service Strategy
In physical restaurant locations, we will ensure that customers can talk with staff and can also write feedback notes that they can put in a box.
We will offer a 100% satisfaction guarantee, supporting refunds for unsatisfactory soup bag orders. Since this is a new feature, we anticipate that it might be a riskier purchase for customers, especially new customers who haven’t been to a physical Soup and Bread location and have never tried our meals in person. So, we’d like to emphasize satisfaction through our 100% satisfaction guarantee.
Online, we will maintain a more active presence, monitoring and responding to Yelp/Google reviews, creating new social media presences on platforms like Instagram and TikTok, and maintaining a customer service email for soup bag and delivery/pick up inquiries. For younger customers, who we predict are more likely to use our online services, we anticipate that a young and active social media presence would be both an effective marketing and support tool (young customers often make posts or comments about issues they’ve had with online services).
To ensure our users don’t get stuck and churn, we need to meet 100% of our customer service claims.
