Kellogg’s Digs Deeper Into Consumer Data with Cheez-It DTC Launch
Kellogg Company has created a direct-to-consumer site for its Cheez-It brand, providing another avenue for the company to reap the rewards of consumer data.
Developed in part to mark the brand’s 100-year celebration, the CheezItHQ.com website enables consumers to purchase Cheez-It products, apparel and other merchandise, including limited-edition items, from the No. 48 consumer goods company. Kellogg’s is providing free shipping for orders over $25.
"The Cheez-It brand is always looking for new ways to connect with fans, and through this online shopping experience we're offering consumers a new platform to enjoy everything they love about Cheez-It in a fresh, exciting way," said Jordan Narducci, Kellogg’s director of global direct-to-consumer e-commerce, in a statement. "This direct-to-consumer site gives us the opportunity to bring future food innovations to market faster than ever before, while also collecting feedback from our consumers in real time."
Kellogg’s joins such other CGs moving more heavily into DTC as PepsiCo and Bimbo Bakeries, drawn by both the consumer engagement opportunities it presents and the consumer insights it provides. Indeed, this latest DTC effort is just one of several ways in which Kellogg’s is increasing its investments in consumer data, including exploring DTC through its MWell personalized nutrition brand.
[See also: Making the Pivot the DTC]
The company’s Kellogg Family Rewards loyalty program, now nearly a decade old, provides proprietary first-party data with over 33 million addressable U.S. households and another 25 million internationally, Monica McGurk, Kellogg senior VP and chief growth officer, detailed at the CAGNY conference in February.
Its Keystone data platform, meanwhile, combines this data with social media, point-of-sale and contextual data for Kellogg’s to analyze.
“The pandemic has heightened the importance of the investments we've made in recent years to build and deploy global, purposeful next-generation data and analytics capabilities,” McGurk noted. “These capabilities are key to our ability to agilely and efficiently execute and win in the market.”
