LAS VEGAS — Kroger has linked up with French weekly meal planning service Jow, Jacques-Edouard Sabatier, the startup’s co-founder and CEO, announced during a Groceryshop panel on Tuesday.
Kroger customers can sign into Jow and fill out a profile that indicates their dietary needs, what kind of kitchen equipment they have and other information, like whether they have kids or pets. Jow then recommends recipes based on that profile information.
The partnership kicked off nationwide a few weeks ago across Kroger’s banners, Sabatier said in an interview. It comes at a time when Kroger is expanding its personalization and shoppable recipe tools for its customers. For example, Kroger’s app has a “store mode” feature that allows customers to use visual in-store navigation to shop for items and receive real-time offers from CPGs, Sanjiv Karani, head of platform products and innovation at Kroger, noted during the conference session.
Founded in 2017, Jow has raised roughly $28 million in funding to date and works with several major retailers in France, including Carrefour. The Kroger partnership marks Jow’s expansion into North America.
Two years ago, Kroger launched Chefbot, an artificial intelligence-based digital tool that uses photos of what ingredients people have to then recommend recipes they can make with those items. Chefbot is still in use today, Karani said, noting that a drawback of the tool is that it can only analyze a limited number of items.
Sabatier noted that Jow can encourage shoppers to buy higher-margin products that are relevant to their preferences or their favorite products. Grocers retain customer data when people order through Jow, but Jow keeps the information people share when setting up their profile, Sabatier said.
Jow provides video tutorials to show people how to make the recipes. Typically, people know between 10 to 15 “magic” recipes, with Jow aiming to boost that food discovery to give them more options, Sabatier said.
