Catering to Kids

Store Equipment & Design, July, 2000 by Pascal Kuipers

A Brazilian store has piggybacked a children's grocery one floor above the actual store.

One Brazilian company is reaching out to the next generation of customers in a very novel way: The creation of a working kiddie supermarket where children can learn about food as they stroll the aisles.

The Sao Paulo store enables its young clientele (children between the age of 6 and 14) to wander among food racks that have been scaled down to fit their measurements. And if they want to check on their parents downstairs at the "real" store, all they have to do is go to the mini-submarine in the fish section and use its periscope to peek in on the goings-on below.

The store opened in October 1998 by the Brazilian retail concern Companhia Brasileira de Distribuicao (CBD), which is also known as Grupo Pao de Acucar. The 900-square-meter market is dubbed Pao de Acucar Kid's and is located above a "regular" Pao de Acucar supermarket.

The children's assortment is comparable to that of a regular supermarket, with the exception of cigarettes and alcohol. The fresh categories are all designed with educational aspects; the way fruit and vegetables are grown, for example. Likewise, the meat section educates young shoppers on which parts of cows and pigs are used for consumption and what quality fresh products look like.

In terms of fish, the youngsters can lean what the different species look like in the wild and how that same fish is presented instore. Children can even bake their own bread and learn about the nutritional aspects of food. Finally, a state-of-the-art kitchen teaches the kids how to cook nice and easy recipes.

CONSCIENTIOUS CONSUMERS

Pao de Acucar Kid's staff is specially trained to handle children and teens. Their aim is to help to turn them into conscientious consumers, sensitive to the origins of food, quality hygiene and to environmental aspects of, say, packaging material. They are also informed about the theory behind bar-coding, what weight and measures are used in the store and how to handle money. For their part, parents shopping below can give their children debit cards with which they can actually do their own shopping. Store personnel are on hand to help children find all the ingredients for a certain dish, as well as to make sure not all the money is spent on soft drinks and candy. Moreover, parents can shop with peace of mind knowing that their children cannot leave the store unattended.

But the children are not the only ones who are learning from the project. CBD is learning as well, since it listens avidly to the suggestions and opinions given to them by kids through letters, telephone calls and via the Internet.

Pao de Acucar Kid's is a joint effort between CBD and its major suppliers, each covering 50 percent of the project's $810,000 investment.