Thresher sales up 60% with 40% off

UK convenience store owner The Thresher Group experienced a 60% sales surge last weekend due to a money-saving coupon initially intended for corporate customers. The promotion, as reported in the drinks business newsletter (29.11.06), was launched as a word-of-mouth deal offering 40% off wine and Champagne in Threshers, Wine Rack, Bottoms Up, Haddows and The Local chains between November 30 and December 10.

A pdf of the voucher featured on South African wine Stormhoek’s website and quickly spread among the public via e-mail. It is estimated the coupon has been downloaded 3.5m times.

"The effect has been fantastic," Roger Whiteside, CEO at The Thresher Group told the drinks business. "Sales are up over 60% in the days the offer has been operative."

The suggestion by certain national newspapers that The Thresher Group might suffer as a result of the unexpected rush of shoppers has not proved true. "It is a heavy discount but there is still a positive margin and we have made more money out of it in the end," explained Whiteside.

However, the drinks retailer was surprised at the response. "We didn’t plan anything like this," he admitted. "We have sent our corporate partners coupons the last two years and on this occasion they sent it onto friends and family."

Whiteside, who was previously joint MD of on-line supermarket Ocado, added, "I have been in internet marketing for years and viral campaigns happen by luck, not by design."

He also made the point that "there are 100s of coupons on the net and this one caught the imagination of the consumer."
However, could the success of this 40% off voucher reduce the year-round impact of Thresher’s three for two deal on all wines and Champagnes? Whiteside believes it won’t, saying, "the current offer is short and sharp and has brought us lots of new customers who were unaware we offer 33% off on all lines all year round."

Web-based searches do show that the 40% discount voucher has prompted some in the on-line community to scrutinise off-promotion individual bottle prices in Thresher’s stores. Whiteside acknowledges that "some look at single bottle pricing but these are sold at a premium because of the convenience of buying at one of our stores over a multiple retailer – people buy a single bottle because they need it right there and then."

He also stressed that stocks for Christmas won’t be threatened by the promotion which ends this Sunday. "We will build up stocks in time for Christmas. Some stores have been hit hard on Champagne but we are replenishing as I speak."

Nick Dymoke-Marr, managing director of Orbital – the UK-based brand owner of Stormhoek – and first person to post the voucher on the internet, told the drinks business: "This discrete offer gone viral proves the point that the internet is a more powerful place than people give it credit for." He added that visits to Thresher’s website increased eight-fold last week and that other retailers have now tried to benefit from the buying frenzy. "A search for ‘Threshers’ on Google [on Monday] returned a sponsored result for Sainsbury’s promoting 25% off wine and [on Tuesday] Virgin Wines was the top sponsored result, offering 50% off wine."

Hugh MacLeod, partner in the Stormhoek winery, cartoonist and influential blogger behind gapingvoid concluded: "With Stormhoek and the Thresher’s offer, we are witnessing something truly remarkable. Welcome to the future of the internet. More powerful than television, more spontaneous than print, faster and more unpredictable than a deadly virus."

The chart shows the rise in visits to websites of Threshers and Stormhoek last week

© db 6 December 2006