MARKETING PEOPLE

OLWYN HORAN Head of Marketing, Applegreen

With 171 petrol forecourts in Ireland, 86 in the UK and 24 in the US, the publiclyquoted Applegreen has been steadily expanding its footprint. Now celebrating 25 years in operation, head of marketing Olwyn Horan talks to John McGee about her marketing challenges and the trends within this competitive sector.

What are the key trends within the forecourt retail sector?

Applegreen is fundamentally a retailer that sells fuel, so we are bound by the same trends and customer expectations as any standalone or multiple FMCG [fastmoving consumer goods] business. The food-to-go offers are continuing to trend towards healthier options, and health and wellness are no longer just trends but have become expected in mainstream retailing. We must ensure that we have convenient food to go and cater for both customers who want healthy choices and those who want a treat. In addition, the use of technology for convenience retail is also vitally important and having things like Android and Apple Pay at all our stations helps to keep busy locations moving fluidly for all.

As a marketer, what are your key challenges and how do you overcome them?

When I originally joined Applegreen the recession had just hit, so I had to quickly learn how to be very frugal and innovative when it came to the marketing budget. As a principle, Applegreen only did below-the-line activity, so I had to be more creative around solutions when it came to reinforcing our brand message using below-the-line techniques while embracing social media for speaking to our customers.

Fast forward to today, the main challenges are being able to speak to a media-saturated customer and get your message heard. Back to basics, to a degree, is the solution as is knowing your customers’ platform of choice and engaging with them where possible. The aim is to stay customer-centric and embrace emerging technologies, particularly those that will make your customer’s life easier.

In a competitive market, how does the Applegreen brand gain cutthrough?

Applegreen strives to give customers a ‘better than expected’ experience when they come to our forecourts and enter our stores. We use a model of high quality but at affordable pricing, which penetrates through to the materials and finishes we insist in using for our stations. Upon entering our stations, the customer feels valued by the attention to detail in design, the smell of good coffee and good customer service. Our strategic food partners mean customers can avail of key international brands from Burger King to Subway, Freshii, Costa and Chopstix.

Applegreen has a long-standing CSR initiative under way, how has it worked out?

Charity is a big part of what makes Applegreen and all of us who work there unite. We set up the Applegreen Charitable Fund in 2009 and have raised over €1.5m for all our worthwhile charities. We endeavour to maintain this level of internal commitment to the fund, donating 1c of every transaction to our charitable fund.