Lowe’s Market is continuing to go big with its product displays.
Residents of Lubbock, Texas, were treated to a record-breaking display of watermelons on June 2, 2021. The Food King on 82nd Street hosted a watermelon marketing event of epic proportions, with the world’s largest watermelon display.
Although unverified by the Guinness Book of World Records, the Food King display containing 12,825 watermelons and totaling about 199,000 pounds was substantially larger than the previous mark held by Cub Foods of Edina, Minnesota.
According to company officials, Lowe’s Food King display contained 2,625 more melons and was more than 42,000 pounds heavier than the previous record Cub set on July 31, 2014.
“We never certified it as a Guinness World Record just because it’s almost impossible. They wanted the watermelons put flat where they could actually see every single watermelon,” explained John Potter, director of produce operations.
“When you’re dealing with the amount of watermelons we were dealing with…there’s no way from a safety standpoint, from a logistics standpoint, we could do that.”
Potter remembers being asked to come up with a promotion centered on produce and the idea came to fruition through his partnerships.
“It was a lot of fun. It took a ton of folks to build,” he said. “We have some great partnerships. Our warehouse, Affiliated Foods, partnered in this with us. And, obviously, our watermelon broker partnered in it with us as well. But it was a lot of fun to do – a ton of work. My guys really worked hard for a couple of days – they sold all the watermelons in about five days.”
World’s largest Pepsi display
In 2014, Lowe’s broke the Guinness World Record for the largest packaged product display at a Food King in El Paso Texas.
The display consisted of 71,595 12-packs of Pepsi-Cola product which is more than 17 semi-truckloads. The display weighed 744,588 pounds and measured some 16,689 cubic feet.
Lowe’s hired a licensed engineer to certify the world record measurements.
“To get a Guinness World Record is a big deal,” said Joel Griffith, director of HR. “They come out and they tell you the specs. The 12-packs had to be hand stacked, touching, with no support boards. And we had to have engineers come and study the concrete to make sure that the concrete and the cinder wall that it was on would support the weight.”
For more information on Lowe’s, visit lowesmarket.com.
To read the full Retailer of the Year section on Lowe’s Market by The Shelby Report, click here.
