“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”)
© 2014 Wiser Partners, LLC
Panera ~ “VP, CRM”
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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 inbound 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.
© 2014 Wiser Partners, LLC
Panera ~ “VP, CRM”
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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 touchpoints, 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
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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:
© 2014 Wiser Partners, LLC
Panera ~ “VP, CRM”
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Key Internal Operating Relationships continued
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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
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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 retentionfocused), 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 highperforming Marketing teams. This also includes developing the optimal lineup of external
agency partners, contractors, consultants and other supplier partners.
Skill Set
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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)
© 2014 Wiser Partners, LLC
Panera ~ “VP, CRM”
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Skill Set continued
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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
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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
david@wiserpartners.com
513.919.4000 (M)
File: Position Specification/Panera/Panera VP CRM Spec (12 09 14-F-DW)
© 2014 Wiser Partners, LLC