An Earned Reputation Never Expires Reputations aren’t conceived in think tanks or focus groups. Ours has been earned in the trenches and validated in our outcomes. For decades, RDD’s leadership team has been writing the perishables marketing playbook. Today, we’ll let you take a peek inside.
Our company specializes in perishables sales and merchandising, leveraging our wealth of experience to provide exceptional results for our clients. With a strategic approach, deep industry knowledge and unparalleled customer intimacy, we help businesses achieve their merchandising objectives to accelerate sales and share growth.
Value creation rarely comes from firms in the middle of the pack. We are learners, leveragers, and leaders of:
PerishablesWe spearhead strategic expansion into vital and growing perishables segments, emerging omnichannel retail formats, and new supply chain & grocery entities.
PortfoliosWe purposefully reinvest our brokerage revenues to provide an expanding menu of value-accelerating services to our client and customer stakeholders.
ThoughtWe stay plugged into broader category brand, shopper, retailer, and digital commerce insights. Then we artfully apply them to fuel sales and share growth.
TechnologiesThe perishables industry was leveraging data before “big data” was big. RDD has always led the sector with fact-based programming and merchandising solutions. Data, analytics and insights are the starting point for every merchandising solution we activate.
RDD Leadership Keeps It Fresh RDD is led by Bob Weinmann, a trusted, passionate, and admired food industry executive and his hand-selected team of respected industry veterans. Basically, we’re the team you’d assemble if you were entering a perishables merchandising fantasy league.
RDD’s transformative president, Bob Weinmann, has spent the last decade empowering and encouraging every employee to envision, design, articulate, and activate distinctive strategic initiatives that build and sustain competitive advantages for our client and customer stakeholders. He’s also a philanthropist, serious home chef, and overall renaissance man.
Larry is a food industry veteran with 49 years of experience. He was an original employee of RDD back in 1998 and in his role as Senior VP and General Manager has become a key leadership contributor to the growth of RDD to its current position as the largest perishables Food Broker in the NY Market.
Christopher Vuono is RDD’s customer expert, cleverly identifying business development & merchandising opportunities and mobilizing collaboration across clients/manufacturers, wholesalers, and retailers for superior sales results.
Chris is an accomplished CPG sales, marketing & procurement professional with 30 years of industry experience. He spent 21 years at Wakefern in various procurement and category management roles, with perishables assignments in the Fresh Produce, Dairy/Deli, and Meat departments.
James expertly directs, manages, and grows sales for a diversified portfolio of RDD clients. He’s a NFRA Frozen Food Council and Eastern Produce Council member and has accepted 2 Golden Penguin awards on RDD’s behalf in 2023. When he’s off the clock, he enjoys golfing, glamping, and a good rigatoni with spicy vodka sauce.
Tommy may be new to RDD, but he isn’t new to perishables merchandising. His expertise draws from 15 years in a variety of category management and sales development roles at Wakefern, and more recently 2 years as Director of Retail Business Development and Sales at Hazel Technologies–which develops new solutions to extend the shelf life of fresh produce and reduce food waste in the supply chain. Tommy leverages his analytical mind to turn big data into big sales for our clients.
Carolee has blessed RDD with her sense of humor and people management prowess since 2010. She’s a proud SHRM member, earning her certification in 2019, and a SHRM badge for Talent Acquisition in 2023. Carolee is also a member of New Jersey Business & Industry Association (NJBIA) and strives to help herself and others stay healthy and happy.
Art is one of the RDD originals, joining the team in 2000. His ability to exceed ACV goals is underpinned by four decades of experience in the consumer packaged goods industry and his patient personality. Outside of work, Art stays active by golfing, bowling, and maintaining his MVP status in his softball league.
In a commercial world characterized by constant moving parts and players, the last thing a grocery supplier needs is a stagnant sales agency partner. Fresh isn't only a highly desirable attribute for perishable products but also for your retail sales and merchandising partner. RDD's decades of success are underpinned by our ability to balance legacy tactics and fresh thinking. Here's a short timeline of the industry and our place in it:
New analytic tools and disciplines usher food merchandising into a new era—and that era needs a new merchandising innovator to transform insights into performance-enhancing activation.
Robert Cignarella, longtime food sales and marketing executive, founds RDD to offer a perishables-focused merchandising service solution with a far-reaching impact. Soon RDD becomes synonymous with Metro New York perishables merchandising innovation, fact-based selling culture, and field activation excellence.
RDD upgrades customer service analytics system to GenWeb. RDD also begins subscribing to IRI to support category management facilitation and begins using Nielsen Spaceman software for plan-o-grams.
The emergence of e-commerce and online shopping lays the seeds of Omni-channel shopping, impacting the entire food supply chain. Growing consumer demand for convenience presents a challenge for marketers and merchandisers. RDD recognizes this trend, and adjusts programming to support grocery partners' proprietary e-comm platforms.
The advent of shopper loyalty card programs delivers an expanding toolbox for targeted shopper engagement.
Grocery loyalty card data widens the well of shopper insights & analytics for ambitious merchandisers, catapulting Shopper Marketing to the forefront of shopper engagement. RDD becomes one of the first broker agencies to utilize Wakefern's PPI analytics to turn big data into big gains for our client manufacturers and offer proprietary digital e-comm promotional solutions.
RDD becomes one of the first broker agencies to utilize Wakefern's PPI analytics. RDD also implements StoreFlix software to report retail store conditions.
New retailer-directed merchandising solutions means new opportunities to optimize the supply chain and improve product availability. As always, RDD is an early adopter and aligns retail merchandising resources with ISE programs to our clients' advantage, while continuing to enhance retail conditions reporting and leveraging mobile devices.
RDD is among first broker agencies to subscribe to Iri NYC 5-Boro database. Wakefern launches dunnhumby analytics and RDD collaborates with clients to integrate dunnhumby data into effective business management. Today, over 70% of RDD's business under management at Wakefern is facilitated using dunnhumby.
Motivated by the drive to achieve greater efficiencies, retailers adapt new technologies to improve shelf management and merchandising performance. RDD becomes a recognized early investor and adaptor, driving successful utilization for both customer and client participants.
RDD upgrades syndicated data platform to Circana Integrated Fresh, providing robust visibility to both UPC and random weight products.
RDD debuts its branding refresh - boasting a bold, modern logo, new website and redesigned company aesthetic.
We're not oracles, but we've been in the business long enough to know the industry will continue to shift in ways both predictable and nonplussing. What we can say with certainty is no matter what happens, RDD will be here to adapt, invest, and innovate.
We’re not just perishables people, we’re people people. We work diligently to keep client, customer and employee relationships profitable, reliable, and fun. That’s business, RDD style.
We’re always looking to add new industry professionals to our team.
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