Catching up with Kim Feil, Chief Marketing Officer of Sara Lee Food & Beverage.

This month, CGT Executive Editor Kara Romanow catches up with Kim Feil, chief marketing officer of Sara Lee Food & Beverage. With more than 20 years of experience in marketing, Feil is now responsible for leading Sara Lee Food & Beverage's global branding efforts, as well as overseeing all consumer, enterprise and partnership marketing initiatives. Find out how Feil is leveraging insight and retail partnerships at Sara Lee to create a quality, fulfilling meal experience for the consumer.

 

The economy is tricky right now with increasing demands on the consumer dollar for fuel, mortgages and education. Consumer goods products are fundamental to every household, but rising fuel and commodity costs pressure consumer goods manufacturers in both food and non-food categories. We are all working hard to balance satisfying our loyal consumers' needs while partnering with our retailer customers to deliver consumer value that is practical in this economy.

 

Having spent 25 years in this industry in both the manufacturer and consulting arenas, I think collaboration between manufacturers and retailers is much more productive and dynamic than it was during the industry consolidation in the 1980's. Many changes have transpired for the betterment of consumers and shoppers.

 

Nonetheless, even with more channels and some unique specialty retail, the mainstream retail shopping experience has remained quite challenging, cluttered and confusing while take home restaurant options have increasingly solved turnkey quality meal solutions for busy consumers.

 

Together, the industry needs to step up openness to try more aggressive new merchandising and marketing approaches, particularly in food. This needs to include the recognition that variety and choice are important, but coordinating a quality, fulfilling meal experience is even more important today.

 

Sara Lee has the unique advantage of recently transforming our entire business by bringing all our food and beverage businesses together into one organization. Key principles of the new company include building all strategies on solid consumer, shopper and customer insights and having the fortitude to try new ideas that challenge the status quo. While we're still new at this, advantaged insights and early partnership with our retailer customers has resulted in quite candid dialog and willingness by them to engage and test new ideas with us. I'm enthusiastic about all that we will learn together and believe this will yield some new industry approaches.

 

If you mean innovation in a broad way: product, package, consumer connection, merchandising and more, then I strongly agree that innovation is the only way we will transform some of the less progressive parts of the consumer goods business. I worry that millions of dollars are being wasted over-focusing on product innovation alone. If product innovation is not accompanied by strong consumer connection and in-store innovation then the impact of incremental new product sales are diluted.

 

In a business world full of sports and car analogies, the women (and men) I work with enjoy this one: "A great long term business strategy is one so well crafted, it's like a little black dress ' a consistently reliable, but flexible, foundation adaptable as market changes challenge it."