2008-08-05 23:35:02 -

- IRI Contacts: John McIndoe, (312) 474-3862 john.mcindoe@infores.com Fax: (312) 474-2512 or Shelley Hughes, (312) 474-3675 shelley.hughes@infores.com Fax: (312) 474-2512 Information Resources, Inc. (IRI) today announced that The McKee Foods Corporation, best known for its line of Little Debbie(R) snack cakes, has selected the retail space planning software, IRI Apollo Designer Workstation, to increase sales and profits for its sweet goods products by customizing product selection and shelf presentation in its retailer customers' stores.

"IRI Apollo Designer Workstation will enable us to improve customer satisfaction by ensuring that we place the right assortment of products in the right stores," says Chris McKee, Vice President of Marketing and Sales, McKee Foods Corporation. "The automated software also promotes collaboration with our

key retailers like Kroger and Safeway and improves category performance and planning efficiency."

Designer Workstation is an easy-to-use desktop product that leverages rules-based automation to revolutionize the retail space planning process. It combines assortment, capacity and merchandising rules to generate hundreds of unique planograms per planner per day.

Recognizing that critical factors such as income, education and ethnicity drive purchasing habits, and that addressing space planning at the regional level is no longer adequate, Apollo Designer Workstation makes cluster- and store-level space planning a reality that was not attainable with manual or one-size-fits-all approaches. Users can rapidly model and evaluate merchandising and assortment rules, eliminate unproductive inventory, select optimal planograms and generate higher revenue and profitability.

"McKee Foods will be using IRI Apollo Designer Workstation with many of its largest, most sophisticated retailer customers, who are also using IRI's space planning services," says IRI Retail President Tom Peterson. "This demonstrates IRI's success model of enabling retailer and supplier collaboration on the assortment and planogram optimization process that improves store merchandising and drives customer satisfaction."

Designer Workstation is a component of the widely used Apollo system, a de-facto standard within the CPG and retail industries, and can be used with other space planning programs as well. Additional detail on the product can be found at: us.infores.com/page/manufacturers/retail_execution/apollo_desig n_work. (Due to its length, this URL may need to be copied/pasted into your Internet browser's address field. Remove the extra space if one exists.)

About McKee Foods Corporation

Founded in 1934 by O.D. and Ruth McKee, McKee Foods Corporation has grown to become America's leading family-owned snack cake bakery. McKee Foods offers over 160 varieties of Little Debbie(R) and 26 varieties of Sunbelt(R) products that are sold in all 50 states, Canada, Puerto Rico and Mexico. The company is headquartered in Collegedale, Tenn., and has production facilities in Gentry, Ark., and Stuarts Draft, Va. McKee Foods also owns the Collegedale-based subsidiary Blue Planet Foods, manufacturer of high-quality granola products including Heartland(R) cereals and pie shells. For more information, visit the McKee Foods Corporation Web site at www.mckeefoods.com.

About IRI

IRI is the world's leading provider of consumer, shopper, and retail market intelligence and insights supporting 95 percent of the FORTUNE Global 500 consumer packaged goods (CPG), retail and healthcare companies. Only IRI offers the unique combination of integrated market information, automated and predictive analytics, innovative enabling technologies, and domain expertise. With IRI, leading retailers and manufacturers are able to quickly discover breakthrough insights driving smarter decisions and actions across the enterprise for breakthrough results. Companies around the world depend on IRI for improved productivity, stronger brands, and dramatic revenue growth. For more information, visit us.infores.com.

IRI Apollo Designer Workstation(TM) Customizes Shelf Product
Presentation and Assortment to Drive Customer Satisfaction