Pampered Chef invests in new technology to enhance its online shopping efforts

Pampered Chef, which sells cookware , kitchen tools and small appliances, relies heavily on hosts to sell its products to consumers. Virtual shopping events have become increasingly popular for consumer brand manufacturers over the past few years. The explosion of e-commerce during the pandemic last year made Pampered Chef realize the importance of its sales platform.

"Our model really relies on leveraging individuals to drive virtual sales and social selling," said Shiv Dutt, vice president of innovation . "More people are at home, more people are cooking, so the demand for cooking products is starting to rise. We are seeing an increase in online sales."

It is reported that Pampered Chef's online sales in 2020 increased by 69.4% year-on-year.

In the early months of the pandemic , as shoppers sheltered in place and spent more time cooking at home, traffic to PamperedChef's website surged 203.3% from January to June 2020, according to web measurement firm SimilarWeb.

When the parties went online, consultants used Facebook, WhatsApp and other social media platforms to connect with shoppers. When the pandemic hit, those virtual gatherings accelerated, Dutt said.

“On one hand, it makes a lot of sense for our sales advisors and purchasing consumers to leverage existing third-party platforms. It’s a low-cost way to bring people together. But on the other hand, we don’t have control over those experiences,” he said.

As a result, the retailer wants to provide a platform for consultants to host meetups. That way, Pamper Chef can create a better experience for consumers and have access to data to continually improve the experience.

Pampered Chef chose AI platform Iterate to help build a scalable model to host parties that can easily add functionality. After two months of integration, the first version was launched in September 2020.

The new platform not only provides Pampered Chef with more insights into customer behavior and data, but it also helps its consultants organize meetups more easily. Dutt said most consultants work about 10-15 hours a week for Pampered Chef, so the new platform will increase their productivity and give them more return on their investment.

What takes 15 minutes to set up on Facebook might only take 30 seconds on the Pampered Chef platform, as all the required elements are already embedded, integrated, and ready to go.

Dutt said that so far, Pampered Chef has seen improvements in attendance, engagement and conversion rates, but declined to reveal specifics because it's still in its early stages. Pampered Chef plans to continue adding features. For example, video conferencing is the latest it has added, and it will monitor how often video is used and whether it helps improve conversion rates.

Some of its current platform features include typical social media features such as chat, likes, comments and notifications, video conferencing, gamification features, and a virtual kitchen built on the platform so consultants can host cooking shows using Pampered Chef 's products. These features are built into the platform without requiring shoppers to download any separate applications.

“Rather than trying to build all of this stuff ourselves, we’re looking for great technology that exists and picking the ones that make sense for us and that drive engagement,” Dutt said. Its gamification technology, for example, uses third-party app software from Dreamify.

Pampered Chef

Online Shopping