Retail & FoodService

For the first time, foodservice distributors and manufacturers will be able to benchmark and track their market performance by product and operator segment based on actual sales from major broadline distributors with a new service from The NPD Group, a leading global information company.  SupplyTrack®, which expands on NPD’s 30-plus years of tracking foodservice industry trends and performance indicators, will incorporate sales information on every product shipped from a critical mass of distributors to each of their foodservice operators.  …

April is National Grilled Cheese Month and the cheese experts at the California Milk Advisory Board (CMAB) are celebrating the cult-like devotion to this classic favorite by offering three inventive and delicious ways to serve it up. …

While poultry—particularly chicken—is well-represented on restaurant menus, many diners are hungry for change. More than half of consumers (55 percent) want restaurants to offer a greater variety of chicken entrées, and 40 percent of consumers want to see more options for turkey entrées on the menu. …

Heinz Foodservice and Communispace – a consumer collaboration agency – revealed the strategic insights behind the successful relaunch of HeinzFoodservice.com. Through “Let’s Dish,” a Communispace online community of foodservice professionals, Heinz discovered a considerable lack of business-building resources for foodservice operators and redesigned its website to fill this void. Only eight weeks after the relaunch, website traffic exceeded total visits from the previous year and continues to increase steadily. …

The Pennsylvania Beef Council partnered with Marcho Farms, Souderton and the beef checkoff, through the Northeast Beef Promotion Initiative (NEBPI), to host an educational veal tour on Tuesday, April 9.  Two chef instructors and 18 students from the JNA Institute of Culinary Arts, Philadelphia, attended the one-day event, gaining a first-hand look at the veal industry. …