Category: Drug

Year in Review: 2020 

Jan

19

 

2020 was a record year for Premium, despite its significant challenges. We celebrated 35 years since our founding and six years since we expanded into Canada. As we reflect, we’re in awe of the continued accomplishments amongst incredible obstacles. 

 

COVID-19 Response 

The spotlight on the retail services Premium executes every day became more critical than ever after COVID-19 hit. As the pandemic spread in March and April, Premium answered retail’s changing demands. 

To ensure our Premium Heroes remained safe and healthy while working on the frontlines, we sourced and received protective supplies while implementing new health and safety protocols and training. In April, our National Logistics & Distribution Center (NLDC) safely deployed supply kits of face coverings and hand sanitizer to 4,300 field employees less than 24 hours after receiving the materials. 

 

Client Partnerships 

Premium became Rite Aid’s exclusive merchandising services provider in January 2020.  And, in a testament to our drug channel team, Walgreens, Rite Aid, and CVS trusted us with additional projects and surge coverage as stores were hit harder than ever. 

We expanded grocery and mass coverage and product ordering for Lindt & Sprüngli, and added Foster Grant to our client roster. Expansive resets and revisions in retailers such as Ulta have enabled Premium to develop a specialized Transformation Team, increasing efficiency for clients. 

Additionally, Premium’s co-owners Brian and Kevin Travers announced a $1MM commitment to enriching teens’ lives in disinvested communities through technology in partnership with Best Buy. We will continue to work with Best Buy to open five additional Teen Tech Centers around the United States in 2021 and 2022.  

 

Digital Innovation 

With social distancing, stay-at-home orders and curbside pickup taking prominence, we accelerated the development of our digital brand advocacy solutions to assist our clients in adhering to the new world.  

In July, we introduced Premium On Demand, which facilitates video interactions between shoppers and product experts from their favorite brands. This fall, we supported Best Buy in developing the Health, Fitness & Wearables category via virtual consultations with shoppers and the rollout of an interactive game series to engage stores and train associates called BrandBuzz.  

Premium On Demand

 

Retail Intelligence 

Government influence, consumer attitudes and behaviors, retailer protocols, and local COVID-19 case rates have greatly influenced the store environment this year. Our analytics team provided weekly updates and insights to our clients and leadership team, ensuring field actions and behaviors remained responsive, impactful and geographically appropriate.  

We developed nearly 100 new business intelligence dashboards and rolled out the Premium BI mobile app, enabling clients and field teams to interact with real-time KPI performance visualizations and delivering an in-depth view into new business opportunities.  

Smartcom, Premium’s predictive analytics engine built exclusively for Walmart suppliers, helped clients overcome out of stocks in a tumultuous year for product inventory. 

Our Operations Support Center (OSC) managed nearly 50,000 omnichannel interactions via phone, email, and text. Additionally, our specialists ensured quality by completing 6.6 million photo reviews. Greenlight, our real-time photo validation solution, prevented over 6,000 revisits by providing reps with near-instant corrective action or approval.

 

Employee Recognition & Development 

In our 2019 Town Hall, we asked our team what Premium could improve upon in 2020. Their answer was career development and performance incentives. 

We responded by launching Premium Proud, a new employee recognition program designed to recognize and reward top-performing field team members. In our continuing commitment to help our employees #GrowWithPremium, 18% of our field team members received promotions this year.  

Premium’s training team also developed the University of Premium (UP) this year for self-guided career and personal development. UP will contain several development paths ranging from Field to Executive-level leadership. All employees will be eligible to apply in 2021. 

Read More: 2020 Employee Awards  

We’re proud of the continued focus on culture and employee engagement at Premium. This year, we were certified as a Great Place to Work in Canada and awarded St. Louis’ Top Workplaces for the third year in a row. 

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We’re thankful for our extended Premium family – team members, clients, and partners. As an organization, we deemed Q4 2020 as “Mission: Possible,” and your collaboration has undoubtedly contributed to the many missions completed in 2020. Here’s to a fantastic 2021! 

                 

Hitting the sweet spot for Lindt & Sprüngli.

Feb

17

Premium scaled coverage for Lindt & Sprüngli North America’s family of brands across grocery, drug and mass retail while reducing their operating expenses and increasing sales.

Premium Responds to COVID-19.

Apr

30

As April comes to a close, the #PeopleofPremium have been answering to retail’s changing demands for seven weeks. We’ve encountered challenges never seen before. We’ve sacrificed and pivoted. Tireless efforts on the frontlines and behind the scenes. It’s been all-hands-on-deck at Premium. 

Seamless transitions.

  • IT worked around the clock to ensure our offices and employees could transition into 100% work from home operations in less than 72 hours. 
  • Numerous dedicated teams were sidelined as of March 22nd when Best Buy began offering contactless, curbside service. Just as quickly, team members temporarily transitioned into other areas experiencing increased demand to continue financially supporting their families. 
  • For the surge in new needs, nearly all of Client Services shifted its focus to support project initiatives in essential retail channels. Recruiting, Field Operations, and Training went into overdrive. Zone Leaders and Flex reps stepped into interim recruiting and onboarding roles to support new additions to the Premium team. 

 

 

 

 

Supporting our team members. 

  • The Operations Support Center, Field Management, Human Resources, and Communications stayed in constant contact with our employees, answering thousands of emails, messages, calls, and posts. 
  • We took conservative financial measures and temporary pay reductions to prevent layoffs and furloughs.
  • The NLDC team safely received protective gear (while socially distancing), and turned around shipments of 4,300 supply kits as fast as we think was humanly possible. It was less than a 24-hour turnaround from the time masks arrived, to the time shipments went out. Meanwhile, Karen Boyl, a member of the Walmart PSP team, and Linda Brown, a member of the Google team, went above and beyond sewing face coverings for Premium coworkers.  

 

 

 

 

 

Continued success.

  • We launched the Walgreens GO merchandising team on March 23rd. For the four peak weeks that followed, the team executed 8,000 hours per week. Our collective speed of response and tight collaboration with Walgreens is a significant Premium success story. 
  • At the same time, we stepped up for CVS, and have ramped up to 5,000 hours a week supporting multiple shifts through May. 
  • In April, we began aggressively fielding teams for Rite Aid’s distribution centers, supporting their flow of inventory and fulfillment of online orders. We also provided Rite Aid with 6,000 hours of in-store support, six days a week, across 25 regions. 
  • Walmart Wireless banded together to ensure 96% of the hours at our stores were covered. The team was laser-focused on health and safety while understanding shoppers’ urgent need for mobile connectivity. 

 

 

 

 

 

Reinventing ourselves outside of the store.

  • Samsung’s Home Entertainment team has virtually connected with thousands of Best Buy and warehouse club associates and customers across the US and Canada. 
  • Logitech’s online community of Blue Shirts have been enjoying an all-day Twitch gaming stream. The team has also stepped in to support customers in online retail, providing responses to thousands of unanswered product reviews and questions. 
  • Lenovo STARs made socially distanced visits to stores to drop off Stock the Breakroom care packages for our friends at Best Buy.   

 

 

 

 

 

This is not nearly an exhaustive list. Share your win using #PremiumHeroes. Thanks for all you do, and thanks for being Premium!