Nielsen buys fresh food industry consultancy

The acquisition includes all the company’s assets, including data, analytics IP, tools and ongoing client work.

Employees of the Perishables Group will become part of Nielsen’s North America consumer analytics team with the company’s data feeding into Nielsen’s existing retail measurement operations.

The two companies have previously collaborated on the FreshFacts Online service which was designed to help companies evaluate their performance in the perishables category.

John Lewis, Nielsen’s president and CEO for Consumer North America, said: “With Perishables Group now fully part of the Nielsen organisation we can accelerate our work to integrate total-store information, thus providing a holistic picture of store-level activity.”

Perishables Group was founded in 2000 by president and CEO Bruce Axtman as a spin-off from Willard Bishop Consulting, where Axtman was a partner.

Axtman will continue to lead the renamed Nielsen Perishables Group.