Speaking at the launch of new research carried out by grocery think tank IGD on behalf of CCE last month on the 'store of the future', Simon Baldry reported that with the help of new technologies such as quick response (QR) codes and near field communications, the soft drinks giant was planning to innovatively target individual shoppers in the future with far more "tailored" promotional campaigns.
"Promotions as they stand today are relatively blunt instruments," said Baldry. "The emergence of digital technology enables us to be far more tailored in how we communicate with our prospective target shoppers."
Baldry added: "It's not going to replace the traditional gondola we see in a supermarket in the next year or two. But certainly over time we are going to get much smarter in the way that we communicate to shoppers; giving them what they want and tailoring our offer much more to them individually."
At the company's digital centre of excellence, which is located at its HQ in Uxbridge, CCE is working on a whole variety of new ways of communicating with its consumers to offer them "discrete offers" targeted at them as individuals rather than segmented groups of people, said Baldry.