Panera VP CRM Spec (12 08 14-F-DW)

“VP, CRM” (Loyalty)

(Boston, MA) Company Overview

With over 1,800 bakery-cafes, and new locations opening nearly every day, it’s no wonder that Panera Bread has been an excellent source of career and personal growth opportunities for more than 25 years. In neighborhoods across the U.S. and Canada, guests enjoy handcrafted, artisan food in warm and welcoming environments, served by people who truly care. This warmth and caring is embedded throughout Panera’s entire ethos.

Panera Bread is widely recognized for pioneering the “fast casual” segment of the restaurant industry. The company was founded to change the world by changing the way America would eat. Panera set out to offer an experience that uplifted, built self-esteem and enhanced people’s lives through food. That began with serving bread the way our grandparents made it - no preservatives, no chemicals, baked in stone deck ovens. In the decades since, the company has worked hard to be an ally for guests by offering nutritious options and transparency that empowers. Examples include being the first national restaurant company to voluntarily post calories on menu panels, helping to create the industry for chicken raised without antibiotics, and voluntarily removing artificial trans fats from the menu … long before it was mandated.

Panera is committed to getting “the tough stuff done with optimism and mastery,” particularly when it comes to their food. Recent initiatives such as Panera 2.0 and the company’s Food Policy have reinforced the company’s leadership relative to both the guest experience and food you can trust. As well, Panera is a well-known leader in fighting food insecurity and is committed to engaging its communities to make a positive impact on the world. To learn more about the company, including their passion for giving back to the community, visit www.PaneraBread.com.

Company 5-Year Stock Performance (“PNRA”)

Position Overview

The “VP, CRM” is responsible for activating and achieving Panera’s long-term objective of building loyal relationships with their customers at scale, as a means of increasing affinity, and as a result, Customer Lifetime Value. The “VP, CRM” fosters 1:1 relationships with Panera’s customers through three strategic pillars: 1) Management of the MyPanera program that rewards customer loyalty and captures customer purchase behavior to enhance understanding; 2) 1:1 targeting that pushes out personalized messages and incentives via CRM to acquire new customers, increase the frequency of existing ones, and maximize customer retention; and 3) Engagement designed to develop and implement immersive experiences for their best customers to deepen engagement and advocacy.

The Customer Engagement/Loyalty team is charged with developing a deep understanding of Panera customers’ purchase behavior, attitudes and interests and then applying that knowledge to develop and deliver customized benefits/communications that enrich their experience with the Panera brand. By deepening customers’ experience with Panera, customers form a stronger emotional attachment to the brand resulting in increased customer lifetime value (CLV). In addition, the “VP, CRM” will also oversee Panera’s Customer Service, consisting of a Customer Resource Group team that responds to all in- bound customer inquiries/issues, and managing the Gift Card business.

Scope of Responsibilities

 Engagement Strategy – Assess Panera’s Loyalty efforts, ensuring that objectives and strategies still resonate, and refine and course correct vision/mission, goals and objectives, where necessary. Build an activation plan that brings Panera’s long-term vision for building customer relationships to life. Utilize solid understanding of big data analytics to capture customer data from a variety of consumer access points (i.e., transactions, social media, web, e-mail, Wi-Fi portal, mobile, customer service interactions, 3rd party data bases, etc.) to build robust customer profiles to enable a deeper customer experience with the brand. Identify opportunities to further deepen customer relationships driving both affinity and advocacy through the development and activation of immersive engagement campaigns.

 Loyalty – Continue to develop, test, learn, implement and measure, the optimal contact and segmentation strategy to determine “the right message to the right customer through the right channel at the right time” in order to increase frequency and loyalty, maximize retention, and enhance CLV. Continually help refine customer segmentation and surface opportunities to help optimize the contact strategy for each critical customer segment. Continue to evolve and enhance the impact of targeted 1-to-1 customer communications to acquire new customers to Panera, increase the MyPanera membership pool, grow customer frequency, encourage higher check through mix, and drive trial of new products. Deliver these goals by utilizing relevant targeted communications, life-cycle management and CRM tactics. Oversee the strategic alignment, integration and execution of all 3rd party agencies that support Panera’s Customer Engagement activities (i.e., data analytics/loyalty partner, email service bureau, POS partner, etc.). Serve as a customer advocate in driving industry best practices and the evolution and adoption of new CRM tools and processes and platform functionality integral to success.

Scope of Responsibilities

 Customer Service – Support Panera’s increasing Customer Service needs through improved productivity and efficiency, faster response time, a focus on continuous improvement in the operations processes and systems, including the use of any third party services and productivity software/systems that can enhance the level of effectiveness and an ongoing emphasis on quality. Create multi-year strategic plans for the Customer Service team that support Panera’s growing business needs and drive customer experience improvement. Note, there could be some restructuring here, and Customer Service might be peeled off from Customer Engagement/Loyalty, but the vast majority of Loyalty work has little to do with the Customer Service component.

 Gift Card Sales – Maximize the sales and profitability of Panera’s gift card program via enhanced merchandising support and promotional activity via Grocery and Drug Store retailers. Similarly, drive sales of eGift cards through Panera’s web properties and external distribution partnerships and increased penetration in the B2B gift card segment.

 Brand Stewardship – While not directly responsible for managing the Panera brand, this individual should collaborate and interact with all the Marketing leaders, internal creative personnel, as well as with external agency partners, to ensure all Panera loyalty programs differentiate and enhance the Panera core brand equities across all customer touch- points, and all relevant channels, both offline and digital.

 Organizational Development – Responsible for directly and indirectly supervising 24 associates (10 people within the MyPanera Loyalty and Gift Card programs, and 14 within the Customer Service team). The “VP, CRM” is responsible for the acquisition, development and retention of top talent to deliver best-in-class performance. He/she must be able to inspire trust with their team, create strategic direction, drive organizational alignment, build organizational vitality, execute with excellence and produce extraordinary results. Oversees administrative functions including annual planning & forecasting, budget management, training and development planning. Manages all vendor and external consultant projects and delivery.

Performance & Success Measures

 New Customer Acquisition (to the MyPanera program)  Customer Retention (keeping them enrolled and active in MyPanera)  Drive increased frequency of profitable visits  Increased CLV  Customer service productivity and quality  Increase Gift Card sales

Key Internal Operating Relationships

This new “VP, CRM” will need to work collaboratively with the VP of Customer & Brand Insights to identify Market Research opportunities to support Panera’s Loyalty strategy and improve decision-making. They will work closely and collaboratively with Panera’s Retail Operations, IT and Financial Planning teams to ensure strategic alignment and executional excellence across all Loyalty efforts. Key internal operating relationships will include:

K ey Internal Operating Relationships continued

 VP of Marketing  VP, Brand & Consumer Insights  VP, Marketing Services  VP of Consumer Packaged Goods  Director of Social Media and PR  Vice President of Customer Facing Technology

Compensation & Benefits Compensation & Benefits

 Base Salary  Incentive Bonus  Stock/LTIP  Vacation  Health/Dental Care  Relocation (as needed, to the greater Boston area)

Candidate Profile

Experience Base

 CRM/Loyalty – Experience designing and deploying a comprehensive, multi-channel Customer Relationship Management program (ideally, both acquisition and retention- focused), utilizing a variety of incentives and rewards to establish and enhance purchase, membership, and loyalty over time. These programs should include both online and offline channels and tools for building and driving engagement and loyalty, supported by the most sophisticated Segmentation, Analytics, and Direct Marketing.

 Service Brands – Ideally, candidates will have experience Marketing a branded service (versus just products)—requiring an involved purchase decision—to consumers, leveraging both online and offline vehicles, within a highly competitive market segment. If possible, we’d like to engage CRM experts who come from the broad Hospitality industry, including Restaurant (Casual, QSR), Hotel/Motel, Car Rental, Resorts, Entertainment, Airline, etc., or Financial Services.

• Functional Development – Demonstrated success building organizational capabilities through process design, organizational development, recruiting and training high- performing Marketing teams. This also includes developing the optimal lineup of external agency partners, contractors, consultants and other supplier partners.

Skill Set

 Analytical (exceptional quant skills and experience)  Strong relationship management and interpersonal skills (high EQ)  Influencing skills (proven ability to persuade others towards an idea or goal)

 Organized and attention-to-detail approach (strong tactical execution)  Innovative (need fresh, imaginative thinking)  Organizational leadership and team development (leads through influence)  Translates core business strategies into actionable initiatives (service orientation)

Skill Set continued

 Intellectual horsepower (highly creative and strategic)  Listening skills (listen first, then respond)  Highly resourceful (stretches people and money; compresses time)  Ability to express ideas clearly both verbally and in writing (communication excellence)  Commercial mentality (keen understanding of P&L & financial analysis)

Personality Profile

 Collaborative  Courageous (not afraid to challenge the status quo)  Self-directed/motivated  Flexible and adaptable  Results orientation  Tenacious work ethic  High integrity and trustworthy  Intellectually curious  Selfless (ego in-check)

Search Contact

David Wiser Principal Partner – Cincinnati, OH Office [email protected] 513.919.4000 (M)

File: Position Specification/Panera/Panera VP CRM Spec (12 09 14-F-DW)