X5 Group

In 2020, as the COVID-19 pandemic raged around the world, the ready-to-eat category began rapidly developing. This category had already captured enormous market volume in the United States, Asia and Europe, but had only begun winning consumers’ trust in Russia. However, the speed of growth in the category is impressive even now: in 2020, sales of food made by X5’s in-house kitchen at Perekryostok doubled, and grew by a factor of 9 at Pyatyorochka. X5 Retail Group was faced with an ambitious challenge: not just maintain these rates of growth, but multiply them. The first step was a painstaking study of the RTE and Retail Café categories.

Over 4 months, we conducted a comprehensive study of both categories, comprising a total of 14 stages of work. In order to study the segment as deeply as possible, we conducted a desk study, RTE and Retail Café market analysis in Russia and around the world, case studies of the most notable businesses in these categories, semiotic studies of both categories and identified the key development tendencies in the categories with our Future Insights experts. We also conducted large-scale customer experience research in Retail Cafe, concluding with the development of a CJM, focus group on ready-to-eat food with elements of co-creation, and quantitative polls on both subjects.

The results of our research launched a series of business initiatives at the company, confirmed (or rejected) hypotheses made by the X5 Retail Group experts at the beginning of the project and launched the process of reimagining X5’s CTM brands and restructuring customer experiences at the largest retail chains in Russia.