Senior Vice President & Chief Marketing Officer, Spartannash
Search every verified Erin Storm interview, podcast appearance, and on-the-record quote — each transcript cross-checked by AI and human review to confirm speaker identity. Erin Storm, Senior Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer at SpartanNash, has discussed her transition from an 18-year career at Kellogg/Canova to the grocery retail space. She said she was surprised by "how little brand management there is" in grocery retail compared to CPG, noting there is "a lot of marketing execution, but not as much of that long-term planning." Storm stated she has reorganized her team to add more insights and brand management roles, and described hiring for open positions to build that capability. Storm has outlined a strategy for managing marketing across SpartanNash's 200-plus stores and multiple banners. She said the company is "bucketing" its banners into groups such as mainstream and upmarket, executing similarly within each bucket while maintaining "creative nuances and logos." Storm noted that local banner names carry community equity and that wiping them away "takes away a little bit of that community involvement." She also said the company is working on its first-party data capabilities and standing up a retail media network that is "more consumer-based than banner-based." Regarding assortment, Storm said the company is looking at the balance between new health trends and established products, and that the own-brand portfolio is being evaluated for healthier offerings.
“Something that surprised me though was how little brand management there is. So, there's a lot of marketing execution, but not as much of that long-term planning that you maybe see in the CPG space, right?”
“I've reorganized the team and added in actually more insights to make sure we're grounded in the shopper and brand management roles into the organization.”
“I really wasn't ready to leave that and saw this, you know, retail food distribution as just another way to build my skill sets and like somewhat adjacent business.”
“From the own brand side it's kind of like a mini CPG within a real retail space. I have to sell in my products to my category managers just like I would in a CPG space. So we've got to make sure we've got innovations that are growing the category and we're marketing our brands in a way that is of interest to shoppers.”
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