A license to sell, part I

Instead, what we do is facilitate the marketing of the brand in ways that add value at every step. In other words, we make sure the product you work so hard to produce goes from the meat case to the shopping cart and from the kitchen to the plate.

But what about the folks who do sell the beef? Ever wonder how they get licensed to carry and serve it? We sat down with Mark Polzer, CAB vice president of business development, to get the scoop. He broke it down into three main categories: retail, foodservice and international. We’ll cover the first today and the second and third in the coming days.

Behind every CAB steak in your grocer’s meat case are two licenses: one for the companies that distribute the product and another for the individual supermarket, which could be an independent or part of a large chain.

Mark says the regional sales team approaches these entities to talk to them about the many advantages (all leading back to increased profitability) of selling the product. Part of the conversation? Clearing up Angus confusion.

When a retailer signs on, it agrees to dedicate a portion of its meat case to CAB product. And then they’ve got to back up that promise.

“They will report their sales to us so we can verify that, if they’re advertising our product, indeed that’s what they’re buying,” Mark says. It’s our brand assurance tracking system that no other brand has, but it’s been put in place to maintain the integrity of the logo and to make sure that customers aren’t disappointed when they’re buying Certified Angus Beef.”

There are some basic requirements in terms of minimum volumes retailers must achieve, but they’re really put in place to make sure that it makes sense for them to have an individual area of their meat case dedicated to Certified Angus Beef.

But once the licensee is secured, the work doesn’t end for the CAB staff. In addition to ongoing education, the brand also helps from a marketing standpoint, through:

• Providing point-of-sale materials

• Creating or providing existing graphics and photography for newspaper ads

• Designing custom newspaper ads

• Recording voiceovers for radio ads

Mark says while the brand can’t provide monetary support for its retailers (like by reimbursing advertising costs), it can provide a real value through these services — and it all leads to more pounds sold.

Join us tomorrow to read about licensing on the foodservice side.

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