customer insight

Insights today for tomorrow’s decisions
Spring 2005
Winning Retail
Strategies Start
with High Value
Consumers
Ethnic Marketing by the Numbers:
Integrating Diverse Data Can Reveal New Opportunities
Jack-in-the-Tiffin-Box: Unconventional Paths to
New Product Idea Development
Winning the Case for Better Distribution:
Optimizing Distribution for Mid- to Small-Sized Manufacturers
Canada’s Aging Boomers: A Golden Opportunity
CONSUMER
INSIGHT:
For More Information
ACNielsen U.S.
150 North Martingale Road
Schaumburg, IL 60173
800.988.4ACN
/>ACNielsen Canada
160 McNabb Street
Markham, Ontario
L3R 4B8, Canada

Understanding
Consumers,
Completely.
In every issue…
Volume 7, No. 1
Business Tools

Featuring:
ACNielsen Retail ACView
CBP—Category Business Planner
Spectra Distribution Builder
Homescan Shopper Trends
ACNielsen Target Track 2.0
TDLinx Location Information Management
Homescan New Product Alert
Homescan Shopper Optimizer
Spectra Advantage Canada
LiquorTrack
Spectra Category ShareCast
Spectra Targeted New Customer List
Publisher
ACNielsen
Editor
Mark Chesney
Contributing Writers
Todd Hale, Senior Vice President
Consumer Insights, ACNielsen
Chris Hammer
Senior Product Manager
U.S. Marketing
John Skolnicki
Associate Client Director
Client Service
Sangeeta Gupta
Subhransu Rout
Seemeen Khan
ACNielsen ORG-MARG

Steve Kapinus, Director
Spectra Business Development
Design & Layout
Blue Lemon Design
Editorial Board
Joe Bucherer
Josie Cirasella
Laurel A. Kennedy Marketing/Communications
Kathy Mancini
Renee O’Malley
Danell O’Neill
Slack Barshinger & Partners
Copyright © 2005 ACNielsen. Printed in USA. All rights
reserved. ACNielsen, ACNielsen with globe design,
ACNielsen Answers, ACNielsen Retail ACView, ACNielsen
LabelTrends, Answers Interactive, CBP, Consumer Direct,
DecisionSMART, Homescan, RDH and Scantrack are
trademarks or registered trademarks of ACNielsen (US), Inc.
Spectra, the Spectra logo, Spectra HispanIQ, Spectra
InfiNet, Consumer 360 and the Consumer 360 logo are
trademarks or registered trademarks of Spectra Marketing
Systems, Inc. TDLinx and the TDLinx logo are trademarks or
registered trademarks of Trade Dimensions International,
Inc. Other brand, product or service names are trademarks
or registered trademarks of their respective companies.
3
contents
| Consumer Insight |Spring 2005
10
18

6
14
Spring 2005, Volume 7, No. 1
6
Winning Retail Strategies Start with High Value Consumers
High value consumers no longer declare allegiance to a single channel for life. The
battle for these sought-after shoppers is difficult. Like any good battle plan, success
relies on the quality of field intelligence and the ability to deploy assets for maximum
impact. The Food Marketing Institute (FMI), along with ACNielsen, conducted a
landmark research study of U.S. households and how they shop for food.
10
Ethnic Marketing by the Numbers:
Integrating Diverse Data Can Reveal New Opportunities
The ethnic makeup of the U.S. grows by about 2.5 million people each year. Today,
Hispanics and African-Americans comprise more than a quarter of the total U.S.
population. With this demographic shift comes greater economic clout for minori-
ties. Manufacturers of consumer packaged goods must increasingly appeal to
minority groups and reflect their cultural preferences to succeed.
14
Jack-in-the-Tiffin-Box: Unconventional Paths to
New Product Idea Development
To grow, many companies today focus on new product development. Under the best
of circumstances, product innovation is a challenging activity. The challenge grows
when the targeted consumer is a child. How, then, can companies gather informa-
tion to guide product development efforts, especially as they relate to children? In a
recent effort, ACNielsen ORG-MARG researchers addressed this issue using an
innovative approach to gather credible, useful data.
18
Winning the Case for Better Distribution:
Optimizing Distribution for Mid- to Small-Sized Manufacturers

Everyone knows the best packaging, best quality of food, and best advertising
campaign gets you nowhere without distribution. With competition fierce on retail
shelves, small manufacturers need insights that can help prove why they should be
there. By gaining distribution in key retailers, the payoff can be huge.
22
Canada’s Aging Boomers: A Golden Opportunity
They aren’t babies anymore. The brash, postwar generation that once lived by the
anthem “I hope I die before I get old” is getting old, and is still the most influential
consumer group in Canada. These baby boomers will continue to set purchasing
trends for at least the next 20 years, which represents a golden opportunity.
22
4
executive insight
Consumer Insight | Spring 2005|
Tim Callahan
President
ACNielsen North America
At ACNielsen,
we are also
continuing our
cultural change
to meet the
needs of you,
our clients.
Cultural Change. It has become a popular business term. When companies
talk about globalization, branding, organizing, resourcing or outsourcing, we
hear about it. Companies that are acquired (or divested) go through it. We
have also seen consumer demographic shifts, right here at home, that speak to
cultural change. And all of it impacts our business.
At ACNielsen, we are also continuing our cultural change to meet the needs

of you, our clients. Our recently completed Consumer 360 conference repre-
sented a key milestone in our journey, as we shared the ACNielsen and VNU
vision for the future of our industry-leading services. Just one year ago, we
unveiled our Homescan MegaPanel, the industry’s largest consumer panel.
Today, it has expanded to over 90,000 households and is ahead of schedule
for completion. We also introduced LabelTrends to understand product health
claims at the shelf. Consumer Direct, DecisionSMART and Retail ACView are
other new and exciting services now available. Spectra Marketing has also
launched Targeting Plus, Spectra HispanIQ, Spectra InfiNet, and Category
ShareCast, to name a few.
The conference also served as a reminder to me just how much the industry
has changed and how we all have to continually work to stay ahead. We will
continue to be consumer-centric, comprehensive, technologically open and
flexible. Our strategy will be sharply focused on the industry’s most challeng-
ing marketing and sales issues, including:
• Complete coverage of consumer behavior at all levels of the marketplace—
in the store, at home, on-the-go and online—along with measurement of
media consumption;
• Deeper knowledge of consumer attitudes and preferences, built on expanded
consumer panel research, customized research and other sources;
• A practical and action-oriented focus on the specific marketing and sales
issues that have the greatest impact on growth, including marketing ROI, new
product development, segmentation and targeting, assortment, pricing, promo-
tion, supplier management, consumer management and in-store execution;
• New data harmonization and business intelligence capabilities to integrate
information from a wide range of sources and organize it effectively and
accurately against specific marketing and sales issues;
A Drive for Innovation
5
executive insight

| Consumer Insight |Spring 2005
• Web-based decision-support services
that place information and analytical
tools in the hands of the right people
at the right time in the right place;
• Advanced modeling & analytical
services that deliver effective and
easy-to-use tools for analyzing marketing initiatives and accurately
forecasting the impact of alternative approaches;
• Assertive, proactive client service that helps clients challenge assumptions
and develop creative solutions, based on a strong blend of broad consumer
marketing knowledge with deep expertise in specific business issues.
At the conference, Steve Schmidt, ACNielsen’s president and CEO, put it best:
“Our job, pure and simple, is to help the industry grow.” This is easily said,
but in today’s complex marketplace—driven by diverse, ever-changing con-
sumers—it takes focus and commitment. Our strategy is far reaching, but the
associates at ACNielsen are confident and energized.
Our goal is to match your drive for innovation in marketing with an equally
intense drive for innovation in information services. We will continue to
help you identify your best opportunities, focus your spending and reach the
right consumers, at the right time, in the right place, with the right messages
and incentives.
To do that, we will:
Listen—to your needs, to your issues, to the things that are keeping
you up at night;
Learn—your business, your challenges, and how we can help solve them;
Leverage—the global power of One VNU to provide you the insights and
expertise unmatched in the industry, and;
Lead—the industry, by taking on the issues and initiatives that will continue
to supporting your business.

Listen, Learn, Leverage, Lead. This is our focus and commitment to you
and the industry.
6
cover story
Consumer Insight | Spring 2005|
Winning Retail
Strategies Start
with High Value
Consumers
Todd Hale, Senior Vice President
Consumer Insights, ACNielsen
7
cover story
| Consumer Insight |Spring 2005
A
lthough cinematic in scope and intensity, there is
nothing entertaining about the battle between gro-
cery and other formats for high value consumers
who no longer declare allegiance to a single channel for
life. Like any good battle plan, success relies on the quality
of field intelligence and the ability to deploy assets for
maximum impact.
Setting the Benchmark
One of the most powerful allies supporting the 46,000 U.S.
retail food stores in their crusade for food basket domi-
nance is the Food Marketing Institute (FMI). In keeping
with its charter to conduct programs in research, education,
industry relations and public affairs, the FMI selected
ACNielsen to “conduct a landmark research study of U.S.
households and how they shop for food. This study is

expected to create a basic benchmarking tool regarding con-
sumer shopping behavior and attitudes.”
The result of that initiative is the FMI/ACNielsen study
Winning Strategies for Your Most Important Shoppers,
which will be summarized in the pages of Consumer
Insight magazine in a two-part article. This, the first
installment, discusses research design, objectives and
topline findings. Part two will contain a more granular
discussion of store universe trends, alternative channel
development, category trends and consumer-centric
retail opportunities.
Research Objectives
The purpose of the study was to demonstrate how retailers
can leverage both behavioral and attitudinal consumer
insights to create competitive advantage and differentiate
offerings. Research objectives include:
• Examine how shopping behavior differs across segments.
• Determine the ways demographics and attitudes impact
where and how consumers shop.
• Detail the competitive arena for retail shopper
segments, including the mix of channels shopped.
• Identify the departments, categories and services
that appeal to the unique needs of different retail
shopper segments.
Key Learnings
Seven areas of learning emerged from the research. Some
findings were surprising. Others reinforced historical
trends. Still others were encouraging signposts for predict-
ing consumer behavior. All provide a fact-based foundation
that retailers, wholesalers and manufacturers can use to

develop consumer-centric strategies to woo and win high
value shoppers.
1. Grocery Trip Erosion Continues. Everybody wants a piece
of the top-spend consumer. Grocery’s longstanding trip
frequency advantage was based on three factors: proximity,
proliferation and product set. Now that competitive
formats have mounted aggressive expansion campaigns and
awakened to the pulling power of fast-moving consumer
packaged goods, those traditional Grocery advantages
have diminished.
Look for an increasing number of trip diversions to non-
Grocery channels as consumers combine multiple trips into a
single stop, picking up packaged goods at the dollar, home
improvement or office supply store.
2. Shopper Focus Is a Must. It’s a case of lifestage strategies
trumping monolithic marketing. The days of lumping
customers into one homogeneous segment are over.
The age of lifestage marketing is upon us, and shopping
preferences reflect the progression of family formation
from young singles to maturing families to older singles.
Household composition surfaced as a major driver of
channel shopping and category buying dynamics. Different
lifestage shoppers exhibited different shopping and buying
habits, calling for a diversified set of marketing and pro-
motion strategies. Know thy customers’ wants and needs,
and leverage frequent shopper programs to target top-
spend shoppers and specialty sub-segments such as the
elderly and ethnic groups.
8
cover story

Consumer Insight | Spring 2005|
3. Cross-Channel Shopping Opportunities. Two trends
headlined in the business press these days afford intriguing
opportunities for retailers: co-opetition and acquisition.
Coined by Ray Noorda of Novell, and championed by
professors at the Harvard Business School and Yale School
of Management, the idea of co-opetition is simple: collabo-
rate with the competition to succeed. It’s a spot-on
approach for Grocery stores, given their high degree of
interaction with other channels.
In the case of Specialty Retailers like electronics, home
improvement or office supply stores, Grocers could pursue
store-within-a-store concepts to establish a satellite operation
without investing in a capital-intensive Greenfield operation.
Another alternative would be to propose joint promotions
that benefit both parties like specialty retailer gift cards, sam-
pling stations and cross-shopping reward programs. Either
way, strategic co-opetition can strengthen grocery sales while
diverting trips from poaching formats such as Mass
Merchandisers or Warehouse Clubs [See chart 1].
Retailers might borrow a page from the manufacturer
playbook (think P&G and Gillette) and consider mergers
and acquisitions as an alternative strategy for fending off
increasingly ravenous competitors. Operating advantages
associated with volume buying clout, and an expanded
footprint boosting brand presence and convenience, are
just two of the potential benefits.
4. Trip Capture Opportunity. Grocery’s legacy strength in
food remains a powerful force for offsetting trip decay.
Top-spend Supercenter customers (defined as the top

one-third of Supercenter shoppers based on their annual
dollar expenditures within this retail format) head for the
Hi/Lo Grocery frequently when looking to shop the dairy,
deli, fresh produce or meat departments.
Assortment has been a pivotal tactical advantage for
Grocery channel, but given the growth in value-
priced/reduced assortment retailers (like Wal-Mart, Club
Stores, Save-A-Lot and Aldi), one must question the con-
ventional wisdom of this practice. Increasing assortment
above 320 items yields an incremental 25% sales gain for
Hi/Lo Grocery vs. just 8% for Supercenters and 12% for
EDLP formats. The challenge: optimizing assortment for
maximum pull and repeat business without carrying excess
inventory. One approach would be reducing center store
assortment while beefing up natural and organic offerings,
expanding the entertainment and home goods sections.
5. Attitudes Matter. Want to categorize customers by chan-
nel segment? Use behavioral data. But if you want to strate-
gize how to differentiate offerings, examine shopper atti-
tudes. For this section of the study, panelists answered a bat-
tery of questions to ascertain attitudinal differences toward
grocery shopping. The wide-ranging scope covered prefer-
ences for everything from free-form to list shoppers, from
scratch to RTE meals, from the promotional indifferent to
ad sensitives, from shopaholics to the shopping challenged.
Enough differences surfaced by format to suggest clear,
attitude-driven competitive opportunities. Some examples:
Hi/Lo Grocery retailers will find their top-spend shoppers
highly responsive to ads and frequent shopper programs—
more so than other channels.

It will come as no surprise to EDLP formats that their bud-
get-minded customer base uses price as the dominant selec-
tion factor. Specialty Grocery top-spend shoppers weighed
in with high scores on questions about healthy foods,
home cooking and scratch meals. Supercenter top-spend
shoppers opt for one-stop shopping at large properties.
6. Food First—Perform on the Perimeter. Talk about a
good news/bad news scenario. While Grocery earns high
satisfaction scores on top-ranked selection attributes such
as convenience, weekly specials, fresh produce, fresh meat
and wide selection, it remains highly vulnerable to incur-
sion by price/value-oriented operators on the very impor-
tant good value and low price criteria.
As competitors push forward with aggressive expansion
campaigns, the current strongest point of difference for
grocery—convenience—will begin to dissipate. Weekly ads
Chart 1: Alternative Channels Important to Grocery
Source: ACNielsen Homescan, Total U.S.—52 weeks ending 6/26/04
Top Top Top Top
Supercenter Hi/Lo EDLP Specialty
Hardware/Home
8.1
8.4 8.8 8.9
Improvement
Liquor 5.6
7.3 6.5 6.6
Pet 4.1 5.4 4.7 6.2
Bookstores 3.9 5.0 4.0 4.4
Stationery 3.5
4.5 3.7 3.7

Electronics 3.0 3.5 3.4 3.5
Office Supply 2.9 3.4 3.0 3.5
Toy Stores 2.5 3.0 2.6 2.8
Trips per shopping household
Three primary data sources were used to acquire the necessary
input for the study: ACNielsen Homescan Consumer Panel,
ACNielsen Strategic Planner service and the ACNielsen
Wal-Mart Channel service.
Behavioral (purchase) information was garnered from the
ACNielsen Homescan Consumer Panel, which provides longitudi-
nal buying and shopping information for 91,500 U.S. households.
ACNielsen Homescan information encompasses purchase date,
shopper demographics, retailer/channel shopped, frequent shop-
per card usage, payment method, coupon source, trip purchase
amount, and for each UPC, the number of units purchased, price
paid and deal type for each household shopping trip.
Attitudinal information was captured by fielding a 38 point ques-
tionnaire that investigated how ACNielsen Homescan panelists:
• felt about the grocery shopping experience,
• defined and shopped the store universe,
• ranked store selection characteristics such as size, assortment
and perimeter departments,
• responded to price and promotion strategies such as feature
ads, frequent shopper cards or everyday low pricing (EDLP),
• viewed meal alternatives including home-cooked meals, ready-
to-eat prepared meals and away-from-home meals,
• rated overall satisfaction with services provided by the store
shopped most often for groceries.
Additionally, panelists were asked to select the three most impor-
tant attributes influencing the “where to shop for groceries” deci-

sion from a list of seventeen pre-determined options ranging
from fresh meet, to good service, low price and convenient loca-
tion. For the store shopped most often for groceries, panel mem-
bers provided satisfaction levels with that store’s delivery against
the same seventeen attributes.
9
cover story
|
Consumer Insight
|
Spring 2005
and frequent shopper programs serve as a means to distin-
guish grocery formats, but at a cost prohibitive to most
EDLP retailers. The lesson: focus on what grocery does
best—food—while providing a diverse assortment appeal-
ing to top-spend shoppers [See chart 2].
7. Differentiate, but Don’t Forget Price/Value. Value pric-
ing is here to stay, with a vengeance. The trick is finding
the balance between spending on differentiating programs
and services, without compromising the ability to price
competitively in key categories.
Hi/Lo Grocery and Supercenters registered the highest
availability scores across the most services (prepared
food/meals, fresh flower department, banking/ATM, in-
store pharmacist, longer store hours, natural/organic food
section and in-store film development). Many services were
available at fewer than six in 10 outlets, leaving room for
geographic extension [See chart 3].
Demand was underwhelming for additional services which
included drive-through pharmacy, in-store sampling, on-site

coffee shop, gas pumps and cooking lessons. Adding these
services to the format mix might attract a marginal number
of new customers, but prove to be an excellent way to
cement relationships with loyal shoppers by retaining their
interest and patronage with intriguing new offerings. The
cost-benefit equation would evaluate improved customer
satisfaction and competitive differentiation benefits against
incremental cost.
Chart 2: Areas of Strength Aren’t Driving Satisfaction and
Satisfaction With Price/Value Is Very Low
% Responses from Attributes most Extreme
Top Grocery Important in Satisfaction with
Shoppers Grocery Store Selection Attributes
Fresh Produce 45 33
Good Value 45
22
Fresh Meat 43 30
Weekly Specials 38 35
Low Prices
37 18
Convenient 35 52
Wide Selection 32 30
Threat as price/value formats become more convenient
Source: ACNielsen Homescan
Chart 3: Interest in Additional Services Varies by Format—
Most Do Not Appeal to Large Percentage of Shoppers
Red indicates: Differentiation and Shopper Satisfaction Opportunities
Source: ACNielsen Homescan
% Responses Top Hi/Lo Top EDLP Top Specialty Top
from: Grocery Grocery Grocery Supercenter

Self Check-Out 16 18 20 19
Lanes
In-Store Samples 14 13 15 11
Coffee Shop
13 11 9 12
On-Premise 13 10 9 14
Gas Pumps
Video Rental
12 12 6 15
Drive Thru Pharmacy 11 11 5 15
Longer Store Hours 11 11 12 8
In-Store 11 11 11 10
Cooking Lessons
Pick-Up/Deliver
10 10 6 13
to Car Service
Dry Cleaning 10 9 6 11
Bulk Candy & 9 8 7
12
Nut Section
Survey Design
Most Requested Services Ranked within Top Hi/Lo Grocery Shoppers
Continued on page 35.
T
he ethnic makeup of the U.S. has begun changing
markedly. The total population grows by about
2.5 million people each year, led recently by a
consistent, steady rise in the number of ethnic minorities.
Today, Hispanics and African-Americans comprise more
than a quarter of the total U.S. population, and their

numbers continue to grow. If current trends continue, by
2050, close to half of the population in the U.S. will be
non-white, and nearly a quarter of it will be Hispanic.
With this demographic shift comes greater economic clout
for minorities. In the U.S., the combined buying power of
Hispanics, African-Americans and Asians now exceeds one
trillion dollars—an all-time high—and is expected to keep
climbing. Furthermore, many of these minority consumers
are young. About one-third of all Hispanics and African-
Americans in the U.S. are currently age 18 or under.
For manufacturers of consumer packaged goods (CPG),
these demographic trends add up to a timely marketing
opportunity. Companies must increasingly appeal to
minority groups and reflect their cultural preferences to
succeed. And the time to build such brand loyalty is now,
as this growing force of young consumers begins maturing
and expanding its buying power.
But how? The discipline of ethnic marketing, while estab-
lished in the U.S., is still relatively new. As such, pursuing it
presents a number of challenges for CPG manufacturers.
For example:
• Data sources on ethnic buying habits tend to be frag-
mented and segregated, making it harder to compose a
well-rounded picture of the minority consumer and a
strategic plan to reach him/her.
10
feature
Consumer Insight | Spring 2005|
Ethnic Marketing
by the Numbers

Integrating Diverse Data Can
Reveal New Opportunities
Chris Hammer
Senior Product Manager
U.S. Marketing
John Skolnicki
Associate Client Director
Client Service
11
feature
| Consumer Insight |Spring 2005
• The information infrastructure for tracking ethnic buy-
ing habits is not as robust as the tools are for studying
general market patterns. To manufacturers, that means
not always being able to track the success of a market-
ing plan focused on minorities and not knowing if
they’re implementing the right type of ethnic marketing.
• We lack an abundance of business divisions dedicated
to multicultural business, which can make it too difficult
to gain support and funding for addressing ethnic
marketing needs.
Integrated Data: A Source of New Insight
A case in point comes from a VNU client case study.
Seeking to expand incremental sales of laundry care prod-
ucts to Hispanic consumers, the client wanted help in
understanding where and how best to do it. For advice, it
turned to VNU, parent company of ACNielsen. As an
industry leader in market research, VNU supports about
9,000 clients in the CPG sector as they address complex
sales and marketing issues.

The traditional approach to ethnic marketing has been to
take fragmented approaches to target the ethnic consumer,
evaluate ethnic consumer opportunity, execute an ethnic
marketing program and track the return on investment of
implementing the program. To date, it has been difficult to
find data integrated throughout this data process, and thus,
it has been a challenge to gain a fully nuanced picture of
ethnic consumer behavior.
VNU’s insight into ethnic marketing has been to adopt a
“One VNU Approach” that integrates data from multiple
sources across our organization, including ACNielsen Target
Track, ACNielsen Scantrack, ACNielsen Store Level Data
and Spectra HispanIQ. The result, for this client as well as
others, has been a deeper understanding of the ethnic mar-
ketplace and greater success in appealing to it.
Successful ethnic marketing focuses on getting four things
right—namely:
• Picking the right geography, or studying an area where
the relationship of the market to the retailer creates
opportunity.
• Picking the right category segments, or drilling down
to the appropriate category/brand level to identify
opportunities among items that are important to
Hispanic consumers.
• Picking the right marketing mix, or putting together the
right product with the right promotion to create a win-
ning ethnic brand.
• Picking the right execution strategy for the right place, or
knowing how to reach the consumer you seek in the
store where he or she shops.

Doing Laundry in L.A.
Nearly half (48%) of the Hispanic population in the U.S.
today resides in just six cities—Los Angeles, New York,
Miami, Houston, Chicago and San Antonio. In each of
these metropolitan areas, Hispanics comprise a significant
percentage of the total population base.
In analyzing Hispanic consumption of laundry care prod-
ucts for our client, VNU decided to focus its study on Los
Angeles. The city is home to a large and very diverse
Hispanic population that represents more than 45% of the
total market.
To find opportunities, we started by identifying retailers
with the greatest share of the Hispanic market for laundry
care products on the premise that category success for key
retailers would be vital to overall category success in the
market. In Los Angeles, one retailer holds 40% of the
Hispanic laundry care product market. VNU focused its
attention on understanding this retailer’s results.
The next step was to identify the laundry care products
preferred by Hispanic consumers. VNU wanted to know:
Which brands are underdeveloped and which offer the
best opportunity?
Gathering information on consumption by minority group
is a growing strength of ACNielsen. Using its Scantrack
Retail Measurement Service, the company drills down into
sales data by store and ethnic group, leveraging all
Scantrack stores in the market. The resulting “snapshot”
lets ACNielsen compare Hispanic buying patterns against
total market performance.
12

feature
Consumer Insight | Spring 2005|
The data showed that Hispanic consumers prefer heavily
scented laundry care products in powder form.
Superimposed on its data for retailers, VNU saw these
preferences held true by store as well as by total market.
The second area of analysis was consumer targeting. To
understand the Hispanic consumer in L.A., VNU used data
to map out a continuum of buying behavior across the
total market that it calls “acculturation segmentation.” At
one end of the continuum are Hispanic shoppers who
behave most like the market overall. This group is consid-
ered “acculturated.” At the other end are those whose
preferences show a strong cultural influence. They are the
least acculturated. In the middle is the bicultural Hispanic
segment. Accounting for 53% of all Hispanic adults in the
U.S., this group demonstrates a blend of buying patterns.
The segmentation acts as an integration platform for link-
ing databases on product consumption from Simmons,
Scarborough, TDLinx and Spectra Store Trade Area.
When VNU looked across the data, it saw that Brand A,
the market leader in laundry care products among
Hispanics, had been losing dollar share for the past year
and was an underdeveloped brand. Furthermore, its sales
slide for Retailer A mirrored a trend for the total market
[See chart 1]. A gap was emerging when VNU looked at
the market through all these lenses; namely, that Brand A
was missing an opportunity to capture Hispanic dollars in
this product segment of heavily scented laundry care prod-
ucts. But how could the gap be closed?

Measuring the Marketing Mix
To answer that, VNU needed data in one more area:
Hispanic marketing execution. Knowing which UPCs
offered the greatest opportunity for Hispanic sales,
which stores to target, the demographics and psychographics
of the customers frequenting those stores and the best pro-
motional vehicles for reaching those customers could help
the client decide where to focus their efforts.
Further analysis of the databases revealed that Brand A was
overdeveloped in heavily scented UPCs. It had more than its
fair share on Retailer A’s store shelves, but was capturing
fewer sales than could be expected from the segment. It
made sense to focus on just the SKUs with a successful track
record to close the gap. For the retailer, that share gap repre-
sented $2.2 million in incremental sales that were possible
[See chart 2].
The last step in successful ethnic marketing is execution—
knowing which stores to target, which customers to
approach and how best to reach them. VNU’s analysis iden-
tified the top 50 stores of Retailer A with declining brand
sales. It targeted an additional 50 stores with heavy Hispanic
Laundry–
Heavy Scent
Total Market Retailer A
29%
44%
25%
42%
36%
46%

Liquid–
Heavy Scent
Powder–
Heavy Scent
Chart 1: Heavy Scent Powder Is Preferred
Form Among Hispanics
Source: ACNielsen Target Track, 2004
Percent of Dollars, Heavy Scent and Heavy Scent by Form
Retailer A Retailer A
Hispanic
• Hispanic Total Category sales=$28.2MM
–Each share point reflects $282K opportunity
• Existing share gap=8.1 share points
Category Dollar Share
31.8%
23.7%
Chart 2: Brand A Share Gap Represents $2.2MM
Opportunity for Retailer A
Source: ACNielsen Target Track, 2004
13
feature
| Consumer Insight |Spring 2005
penetration [See chart 3]. Focusing on these two areas will
help realize nearly $2 million of the $2.2 million in poten-
tial sales. Further analysis revealed that Feature and
Display delivers the best promotional lift among Hispanic
consumers, and Brand A’s promotions are less effective
than the category average.
Data from Spectra HispanIQ gave VNU a demographic
breakdown of the Hispanic residents in the area defined by

that store cluster—whether they spoke more Spanish or
English, where they fell on the acculturation continuum,
their education level, the size and age of their families and
their media preferences [See chart 4]. From that analysis,
our client could begin to craft the messages and promo-
tions to reach those audiences. Once the marketing plan is
implemented, the client can use Target Track to evaluate
return on investment of the funds dedicated to this effort.
Business Tools for
Retail Tracking
Trendable ACV Market Share and
Store Count Information
Retail ACView
™
is a revolutionary trendable ACV market share
and store count reporting tool, providing retailers with an easy
and reliable means to measure competitive market share for
yourself and your competitors over time. Retail ACView offers
the industry—for the first time ever—trendable, account-level
market shares modeled to reflect total store sales
across the full food, drug, and mass channels, as
well as account-level store counts incorporated
from TDLinx. TDLinx is the industry’s premier
source of comprehensive coverage of retail
location information.
The Retail ACView suite of reports is accessible via the secure
ACNielsen Answers
®
web portal and delivers:
• Executive Summary Scorecards that provide performance

results and insights at the total market and individual custom
trade area levels. These quarterly scorecards are full of
insightful charts and graphs that highlight key competitors’
performance,
emphasizing ACV
market shares and
store counts, coun-
ty-level trends, and
competitive threats.
With this level of
information, you
are able to quickly
isolate organic from new store growth, quantify competitive
threats, and identify the relative importance of certain geo-
graphic regions to your business.
• Detailed reports that offer granular views of ACV market
share, store count and cross trade area trends. These reports
help you quantify seasonal and channel trends with previous-
quarter and year-ago comparisons, identify market entrants
and high-growth competitors, and isolate promising or vul-
nerable trade areas.
The reports are designed to reflect the way you evaluate your busi-
ness, and allow you the flexibility to obtain market insights by:
• Channel Type: Choose any combination of food, drug and
mass; club and dollar are also available for store counts.
• Market Type: View the market using industry-standard defin-
itions (DMAs, MSAs, or ACNielsen SMMs) or your own
custom trade areas.
• Time Period: Analyze eight quarters of trendable history and
gain visibility into long- and short-term drivers of share change.

If you are a retailer and wish to learn more about Retail
ACView, please contact your ACNielsen Retail Services repre-
sentative or visit our web site at .
or call 1.800.988.4ACN
Chart 4: What Does Retailer A’s
Hispanic Consumer Look Like?
Source: Spectra HispanIQ
Less Bi- More
Acculturated Cultural Acculturated
Psychographics Shop at stores Convenient Shop at
(Opinions that stock my location specialty
and Media) favorite brands important shops
Listen to radio Use Internet Use Internet
for news for shopping for shopping
updates information information
Read newspapers Often notes ads Magazines are a
on a regular basis at bus stops source of information
Enjoy watching Enjoy watching Pay attention to ads
kid TV shows kid TV shows in movie theaters
• Least Acculturated Hispanic consumers shop at stores
that they know carry their favorite brand.
• Radio and newspapers, not the Internet, are the best
way to reach Least Acculturated Hispanics.
• Both Least Acculturated and Bi-Cultural Hispanics enjoy
kids TV shows.
Continued on page 35.
Chart 3: Focus on Underperforming
Brand Stores Uncovers $694K Opportunity
Source: ACNielsen
Current Brand New Brand Brand $ Percent of

Share Share Increase (K) Category Dollars
Store 1 18% 26% 17.6 0.3%
Store 2 11% 19% 2.3 0.0%
Store 3 20% 28% 10.4 0.2%
Store 4 26% 34% 15.1% 0.3%
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Store 50 20% 28% 9.3 0.2%
Total 694 13%
Implementing right assortment/promotion can result in an 8 share point gain
14
feature
Consumer Insight | Spring 2005|
Jack-in-the-Tiffin-Box
*
*Tiffin box: In India, “tiffin” refers to a light meal eaten during the day.
The boxes in which these meals are packed are called “tiffin boxes.”
T
o grow, many companies today focus on new
product development. It’s not an easy route; even
under the best of circumstances, product innova-
tion is a challenging activity that calls for creativity coupled
with a sound understanding of the consumer’s socio-
cultural needs.
The challenge grows when the targeted consumer is a
child. While often amazingly perceptive and articulate, chil-
dren can be limited in their ability to provide the kind of
socio-cultural data that market researchers seek. They are,
for instance, disinclined to articulate their “need gaps” in
focus groups.
How, then, can companies gather information to guide

product development efforts, especially as they relate to
children? In a recent effort, ACNielsen ORG-MARG
researchers addressed this issue using an innovative
approach to gather credible, useful data. Although our
study focused on schoolchildren in Delhi, India, we believe
the methods used and insights obtained cross cultural and
geographic borders.
Background and Objective
Mothers in India—like mothers everywhere—try each day
to feed their children the nutritious foods their growing
bodies need.
One way Indian mothers do this is by packing traditional
Indian fare that they consider healthy and nourishing into
the “tiffin boxes,” or lunch tins, that children carry to
school. During recess and on bus rides home, schoolchild-
ren snack from these tiffin boxes—or at least their mothers
hope they do. The fact is that children and mothers in
India—like kids and moms everywhere—don’t always
agree on food. And so the tiffin boxes often come home
containing uneaten meals.
Unconventional paths to new
product idea development
Sangeeta Gupta
Subhransu Rout
Seemeen Khan
ACNielsen ORG-MARG