Cinco de Mayo Promotions Drive Early Season Demand for California Avocados

With a robust early season crop of avocados available, the California Avocado Commission promoted the fruit with Cinco de Mayo promotions at Mollie Stone’s Markets and Sam’s Club Stores located in the western region, to name a few. These promotions, which ran in the weeks leading up to and including the holiday, helped secure distribution for early season California avocados and drive awareness of the fruit’s availability heading into peak season.

As part of the Cinco de Mayo promotions the Commission hosted sales contests at Mollie Stone’s Markets, a regional specialty chain of stores, from April 18 through May 6. Sales contests are especially beneficial as they drive distribution over a two- to three-week timeframe during which display sizes are larger and therefore require more cases to support the chain’s needs. Mollie Stone’s locations used CAC display bins to draw attention to locally grown bulk and bagged avocados and cross promoted items around a Cinco de Mayo theme. The in-store displays were supported by ad promotions as well. The Commission awarded nine Mollie Stone’s stores prizes for their exceptional produce displays and double-digit sales increases on California avocados over last year.

A total of 142 Sam’s Club locations west of the Mississippi ran digital ads and promoted bagged California avocados from April 15 through May 9. To support this promotion, two new Distribution Centers in Pauls Valley, Oklahoma and Harrisonville, Missouri, were utilized to distribute California avocados. These centers do not typically handle California fruit. This new Sam’s Club distribution, coupled with their agreement to replicate creative executions on their own media platforms with “the best avocados have California in them” messaging, broadened awareness of the California Avocados brand to a geographic region that has not been typically targeted.