It’s that time of the year again! The holidays are here and many customers are planning to stockpile and buy food items ahead to celebrate the season with their loved ones at home.

Whether people drive to brick-and-mortar stores or buy groceries online, supermarkets and grocers are an important part of the busiest shopping season of the year. The next couple of weeks will be critical with expected high demands and increased store and website traffic.

Here are some ways food retailers could gear up for the holiday season:

Enhance Online Strategies

People are now buying groceries online more than ever due to increased cases of the coronavirus. Food retailers could meet this new shift in buying behavior, especially during the holidays, by making sure that their e-commerce platform is streamlined and designed with consumers in mind. Likewise, retailers could publish holiday deals so shoppers could plan ahead which items to purchase for their holiday meal preparations. Most importantly, food retailers should prioritize offering multiple fulfillment options on their e-commerce platform, like same-day delivery or curbside pickup, to meet their customers’ need for flexibility and convenience.

Manage Inventory

Whether online or in-store, food retailers should monitor real-time data to make sure that inventory is in check and up-to-date. Consumers tend to buy their preferred food items online when their local retailers are out of stock. Throughout the year, the holiday season is expectedly the time to stock up, examine inventory levels, and fill up store shelves.

Expand Seasonal Staff

To prepare for an increase in orders and foot traffic this holiday season, retailers could hire additional seasonal workers to help with fulfillment, restocking, and filling holiday orders. Retailers like Walmart are hiring 20,000 additional workforces in its e-commerce fulfillment centers throughout the country, and Target will be hiring more resources for contactless services such as Drive Up and Order Pickup and for distribution centers to manage inventory.

Create Compelling Customer Experience

Gearing up for the holidays could entail creating a compelling shopping experience adding value for your loyal customers. Whether online or in-store, food retailers could invest in personalization to enhance customer experience such as customization through store apps and special offerings for consumers. In-store merchandising also plays a key role in meeting customer needs. Food retailers need to level up their merchandising game with display cases that would enhance product visibility of sought-after food items this holiday season. To say that 2020 has been an arduous year would be an understatement. This year has challenged our industry to bend, but we did not break and continued to be resilient. As we enter the New Year full of hope and optimism, we would like to believe that things could only get better for us and the communities we serve