Jan 12, 2009 12:00 PM, By MICHAEL GARRY

Retailers are beginning to send promotional text messages and coupons to willing shoppers’ cell phones, but is mobile marketing ready for prime time? By: By MICHAEL GARRY

Like many food retailers, Fresh Encounter, Findlay, Ohio, tries to help shoppers resolve their daily dilemma: What to have for dinner? But this wholesaler-supported chain of 32 stores has come up with an unorthodox strategy for communicating meal suggestions: texting them to shoppers' cell phones.

Last month, for example, Fresh Encounter, which operates under Community Markets and three other banners in Ohio and Indiana, sent a text message to the cell phones of shoppers at a group of stores who had opted into its Text-N-Save mobile advertising program; the message, sent at 2 p.m. on a Thursday and Friday, offered a deal on a whole rotisserie chicken or eight pieces of fried chicken to shoppers who came to the stores after 5 p.m. on those days.

This article is part of SN's Premium content and requires registration. If not already a member, subscribe to Supermarket News today! Your subscription includes:

• Full access to the website, including over a decade of archives.
• The print magazine, delivered weekly, plus the Refresh supplement every quarter.
• More in-depth coverage of the supermarket industry than any other source.
• Surveys and industry data.
• Insight and commentary from industry insiders.

Registered Users	Subscribe Now!
User Name: Password: Remember Me	SAVE with a print/online combo or online-only options.
Already a Print-Only Subscribers? Upgrade to access Supermarket News' premium online content. Call 866-834-1247 to include premium access as part of your subscription!