Testimonials

“Milton’s has been fortunate to have breads in national distribution with Costco for over 10 years. Our ability to introduce the members to the unique taste of our products prior to making a purchase decision could only be achieved through demos. The demo and it’s interaction with Costco’s members have played a strong role in the growth of our company. We use demos for everything, whether it’s breads, gourmet crackers, snack crackers or our frozen entrees or lasagnas. Demos are the front line of our ability to introduce our product to the consumer. When you have products that deliver on taste, and you have a vehicle such as WDS, the result has proven very successful for us.”

“WDS people are dedicated to their partners and ensure they get the most sales they can together. I’ve been working with them for seven years with products like Vaseline Lotions, Dove Body Wash, Dove Beauty Bars and the Pond’s Brand . WDS demonstrators interacting with Costco members on the sales floor give us the opportunity to really sell our equities. Members ask questions and get answers. We drive incremental sales at the point of purchase you cannot consistently do this via an ad in a circular, handout flyer or on TV. I feel our move to the Profile Demo programs has truly helped. The ability to demo with spokesmodels who use or have used our items on a regular basis, who are themselves Members, who mirror our demographic consumer, and who’ve been trained in the product equities in our portfolio lends tremendous creditability. When they speak with a member that’s shopping in the aisle or buying our items, or in or around our category they’re able to engage and generate the sale. That's what it's all about.”

“We do a full P&L statement on every demo that we run in every Costco warehouse. Each marketing event has to have a return investment for Kellogg’s to repeat the activity. We have been increasing our support for WDS Costco demos pretty much every year. For example we’ve demoed Morningstar Farms Breakfast Sausage Patties, a vegetarian product. Without sampling members might never guess that these sausage patties taste as good as a regular sausage patty. We select brands like Kashi, which doesn’t have the high consumer awareness of other Kellogg’s brands like Special K. Kashi GoLean Blueberry Waffles have blueberries, high antioxidant and a good amount of protein and fiber. Kashi GoLean Crunch Bars are phenomenal bars, on-trend with the glycemic index. These are very good nutritional foods that the members might not know are in the warehouse if we didn’t sample them. We have a constant WDS demo program throughout the year because it pays off with a return on our investment. WDS people are very helpful when we schedule these. They’re very practiced in working with us, making suggestions and seeing that we get the best results. That’s what I like—it’s not simply about sampling, it’s a selling event.”

“We were Costco’s 30th approved vendor and have been there since it started. We have 19 seasonings and other items that rotate through Costco in the different regions. Demos have become a culture with Costco and are our biggest marketing tool. If they [Costco members] can’t smell it, if they can’t touch it, if they can’t taste it, it’s just not going to jump off the shelf. WDS is the most well-orchestrated company I’ve ever dealt with. WDS employees are very high quality and their follow-through is always impeccable. They’ve never let me down. I can call them or e-mail them and within hours, if not minutes, I will get a response. WDS billing is very simple, very easy to understand. The format of the data I get from them is very useful. The format is everything. On a human note, it’s a very wonderful thing that they provide jobs for the community. I’ve worked with a lot of their demonstrators. These are people who have a social life, they’re very interesting. Some have had careers they could write books about. They’re just not ready to go home and watch soap operas all day. WDS is one of the few companies I know that have made things better along the way. Even if I don’t think there is anything they can improve upon, they do.”

“At Costco, demos are one of the primary avenues we use for promotion. Our Spinach and Mozzarella ravioli pasta in the frozen section is supported exclusively through Costco promotional avenues, the main one being demos, and the other being coupon programs. Demo reports from WDS provide us a number of useful pieces of information such as units sold, total cost, and customer comments. We’re excited about using WDS as a tool for promoting our products at Costco and working with WDS as a partner. They have been very responsive in working with us to find additional ways that we can boost the effectiveness of our demo program.”

“Oberto’s going to have its 90th birthday next year. It is still owned by the same family right here in Seattle. We’ve been working with Costco since their first store opened. The work that we’ve done with WDS has been very positive. It’s a great way to build your business and we certainly have built a significant business just from Costco thanks to demos. It not only helps build the product line, it helps build the brand and it’s a fun event—more like a farmer’s market or a fair. It gives us an ability to connect with our consumers and get their direct feedback. Any time you can feed somebody the products that you make you get an instantaneous reaction. WDS are a good group of people. It’s hard to demo some of the new products that are out there—they figure out a way to do it. We use their basic demos and we use a lot of them. In some cases we do Road Shows and work alongside WDS to understand how we can create a little bit more excitement in demoing our product that’s been on the shelf for a number of years. The Costco customer is quite unique. The demographic of a Costco customer is more affluent, certainly more demanding, very focused on quality and value is always important. We’re constantly trying to deliver to them not only the same product, but also some new products and we can only do that in Costco’s case with featuring new products and flavors with demos. It works really well for us.”