Tudor Mihailescu, Freshful: “We received spectacular feedback from customers on the DRS packaging collection service”

“Customers want personalized products; they want to buy local and healthy products. In this context, Freshful came to change some paradigms. The “closest” store is the mobile phone with which you can shop online, with availability at any time and delivery anywhere, at home, at the office or to relatives and friends.

We wanted to address the biggest barrier we all face, namely time. We wanted to transform shopping into an experience that no longer consumes time. Our efforts aim at ultimate personalization, in which the store is open all the time, delivers wherever you need it and offers your favourite products,” Tudor Mihailescu, General Manager, Freshful said at Retail Forward 2025 organized by The Diplomat-Bucharest.

Key statements:

• Up to the marketing message, the basic product is the one that can bring personalization. Our store constantly adapts to customer needs.
• We received spectacular feedback from customers on the DRS packaging collection service. We ended February with over a million-packaging collected and recycled, given that this service was launched 3 months ago. We will probably reach about 100,000 packages collected per day during the summer.
• Proximity is the future of retail. It is a complicated year and it is very easy to talk about what is happening around, but we have decided to focus only on the things that we can influence and on our business. We want to offer an increasingly better service, because it is the best method of attack, but also of defence against challenges.
• Our mission is to bring our customers local and quality products, with ingredients from safe and sustainable sources.

Freshful introduced the DRS packaging collection service directly from home in November 2024. The adoption rate among customers exceeded expectations, with over two million packages collected in the first two months after launch. Over 25,000 customers used the service and handed over 65,000 bags of packaging. The 70-liter DRS packaging collection bag is the most added product by customers with the Add to order option, which can be added to the cart even after placing the order.

In 2024, Freshful reached one in seven homes in Bucharest, with most customers placing an order every two weeks or less. The top most ordered products include natural foods such as parsley, green onions, dill, and organic bananas, as well as products such as sunflower oil, plain water, and various types of flour.