Bilingual in-store marketing—a sign of the times

DSN Retailing Today, May 17, 2004 by Debbie Howell

Having the right merchandise is just a starting point in effective ethnic marketing. Increasingly, the best practices require a broader approach of bilingual signage and advertising and a front-line outreach of ethnic workers to earn trust among shoppers--especially recent immigrants who may not speak English.

For retailers that establish a strong bond with an ethnic group, the payoff in customer loyalty can be significant. Those that cater to ethnic groups, such as Hispanic or Asian supermarkets, have perfected this strategy and can provide ideas for multicultural marketing that can be translated to mass and specialty retail formats.

"They're not just accommodating ethnic shoppers, but embracing ethnic shoppers and becoming a part of the community, which is a huge part of the store choice paradigm for ethnic shoppers," said Jim Hertel, senior vp of Willard Bishop Consulting, a firm that specializes in strategy and research related to the food industry.

Those retailers that wish to market to ethnic groups but still want to retain Anglo shoppers must carefully choose how far to go in such ethnic marketing efforts. In most cases, these decisions are done in a neighborhood-specific approach that takes into account the percentage of ethnic shoppers and their interests.

Besides conducting a market analysis of a new store location, executives literally walk a neighborhood to help make such decisions, said John Simley, a spokesman for The Home Depot. At a store in Brooklyn with a large orthodox Jewish population, for example, Home Depot learned of specific needs, such as offering kosher kitchen designs and round-top doors not typically offered chainwide.

Recruiting an ethnic employee base that reflects the makeup of the neighborhood, including those who can speak native ethnic languages, is another key marketing tool.

"You've got to meet customers on their own terms, and if they want to speak to you in their native language and you can do it, you should make the effort to reach out," Simley said.

Simley said Depot actively recruits such employees, noting that knowledge of another language is a definite plus if the candidate is service-oriented, the first priority. At one store in Queens, N.Y., the base of employees once spoke up to 14 different languages.

Sears as well works to make sure it has ethnic employees representative of the community. Billye Alexander, vp of multicultural management at Sears, said a new priority this year is to strive for having Spanish-speaking employees at critical touch points in stores with a heavy Hispanic customer base. She said such critical areas include cash wraps, commissioned sales areas, the sales floor and merchandise pickup areas.

Ethnic recruitment is a priority at Costco as well, with the goal of reflecting the community's makeup. That translates to all levels, from store associates to management.

"We always try to recruit an employee base that reflects the diversity of the community," said Richard Galanti, cfo at Costco. "It's good business."

Despite the lack of industry data on ethnic representation in retailing, most agree that recruiting multicultural employees has become a greater priority, especially considering the explosive growth of the Hispanic population that now totals 35 million.

With this demographic, which in itself is quite diverse in cultural tastes and nationalities, Spanish-language marketing is key. Many experts agree that first-generation immigrants are more inclined to shop a store that offers signage and advertising in Spanish. This need becomes less pronounced with second-and later-generation Hispanic Americans as they learn English and adapt to American culture.

When to use bilingual signage is a gray area retailers constantly grapple with. In neighborhoods with a heavy concentration of first-generation Hispanic immigrants, however, this move is a necessity for retailers targeting these shoppers.

Depot, Costco, Sears and Wal-Mart are among retailers that have added bilingual signage in stores with a large Hispanic customer base. In July, Sears will take that a step further with a national rollout of Spanish-English signage around center cash wraps in all stores. Closeout retailer Big Lots, which estimates about a-third of its stores are in Hispanic-concentrated markets, uses bilingual signage in those stores only.

Ethnic-targeted advertising is another hot topic for retailers these days, with many companies expanding their efforts. But while Spanish-language ads can be very effective, simply translating an English ad doesn't guarantee success.

"You can't just take English and translate it into Spanish. There's a cultural aspect to it you have to understand to really communicate," said Kent Larssen, vp of marketing at Big Lots.

Rather than use its comedic national spokesman Jerry Van Dyke in Spanish-language advertising, for example, Big Lots instead produced a television commercial depicting a Hispanic woman talking to her daughter about the value of closeout shopping, keying in on the strong culture of family among Hispanic Americans.