The American Wholesale Marketers Association and InfoRhythm launched C-Metrics Convenience Industry Outlook Forum, a conference designed to provide a detailed look at convenience store performance for 2012 and into 2013.



The American Wholesale Marketers Association, Fairfax, Va., joined forces with InfoRhythm, Pittsburgh, to launch C-Metrics Convenience Industry Outlook Forum, a conference designed to provide a detailed look at convenience store performance for the first half of 2012.

The conference is scheduled to take place July 31-Aug. 1 at the Renaissance Chicago hotel in Chicago.

Top industry experts will present and analyze actual 2012 sales by convenience industry distributors to 28,000 c-stores nationwide, and then project to the full universe of 146,000 stores, providing the most complete and current look at convenience industry business activity for 2012, with projections for 2013.

The InfoMetrics database, developed for AWMA by InfoRhythm, is the single largest database of c-store shipments covering all SKUs except direct-store-delivery products and beverages. Currently, 58 distributors with 92 warehouses submit their detailed sales data to InfoRhythm each week, where it is compiled and analyzed.

“We have created an exciting, forward-looking conference that will use real-time data,” says Scott Ramminger, president of AWMA. “For the first time, suppliers, distributors and invited retailers will have an opportunity to preview current, this-year data specific to brands-information that will be crucial to developing business strategies for success in the coming months and for next year.”

The C-Metrics provides:

• Weekly projected c-store dollar sales and units shipped and percent of distribution by item, across all categories.

• Data reflecting c-store sales for warehouse-shipped items, excluding DSD sales.

• Coverage for warehouse-shipped categories such as tobacco, candy and snacks, reflecting total convenience retail sales of such items.

“Our distributor partners now have access to information that only a handful of manufacturers could afford, until today,” says Viv Penninti, president and CEO of InRhythm. “Understanding true market opportunity is a prerequisite for sound category management, and we’re proud to make this a reality with the introduction of C-Metrics.”

Keynote speaker will be Renee Sang, partner and global director, customer innovation network for Accenture, Chicago. Sang will provide a strategic overview of retail trends and discuss retail innovation and the emerging customer experience. Her perspectives and review of top line data and trends from C-Metrics data will help convenience supply chain partners identify future opportunities for growth.

“Our industry has been asking for current, relevant, real-time data, and now with the InfoMetrics and C-Metrics platforms, AWMA and InfoRhythm have partnered to bring it to reality,” says Ramminger.

For more information, go to www.awmanet.org/event/outlook-forum.