Welcome to the Community Call Podcast.
I am Melissa Travers, Director of Community here at BevNET & NOSH, here with my co-host, Sarah Casagrande.
If you're enjoying the show, please follow and review us on Apple Podcasts or your listening platform of choice.
Sarah Casagrande, it's so great to have you here.
So we've been mixing up the folks that I've been bantering with here on the Community Call Podcast, and we thought, what crazier way to mix it up than to bring in someone that doesn't even work at BevNET.
Sarah, you're over at Generation CPG, you and I met at Rodeo CPG.
What are you up to now?
So I recently joined the team at Generation.
I'm a principal, so we're a small boutique agency focused on sales and operations.
Very exciting.
You're in our Slack community, right?
I sure am.
All right.
So this is a message out to our audience.
If you want to hit Sarah up and say hello and ask her any burning questions you have, slack.bevnet.com is where you can reach her and so many more of us over there.
We wanted to start off with a little bit of a little bit.
Beverage goblin.
Are you the beverage goblin?
I am.
That's what my husband calls me.
I always have multiple beverages going at one time.
Coffee, chlorophyll water, kombucha, all the things.
Oh, you know, you just foreshadowed something we're about to talk about.
I did.
Yeah, that's not intentionally.
That's the beverage goblin.
Hard at work.
Of course, we have our beverage fridge here at BevNET, and you grabbed a couple of beverages.
What did you grab?
Well, I wanted to grab things that I've not tried before.
So I have the elixir shot in my hand.
I chose the Beats.
This one's for endurance.
And I figure I need that today because I'm starting the day off with you on a podcast.
And then I have the Heal Tea, Hibiscus Mango Sparkling Tea.
I have not tried this one before, but it's caffeine-free.
I already had a lot of caffeine this morning, so I think I'm done with caffeine for the day.
You woke up and immediately started beverage goblin-ing.
Every morning.
Every morning.
Yes.
I love Heal Tea's stuff.
And I do really appreciate that they don't have any caffeine because there are so many ways to get caffeine.
I really like that one, and I like all of the other flavors they have as well.
I happened to grab this Ouroboros Magnolia Bakery collab.
This is their apple cinnamon flavor.
I thought this was so incredibly tasty.
I love that they had a little bit of juice in there, so they have apple juice from Concentrate, and then apple flavor, cinnamon bark extract.
But I think this is the first Ouroboros that I've tried that has juice in it.
And it's like giving a little bit of spin drift in the way that like it has a nice flavor to it, but it has, you know, only six grams of sugar and 20 calories.
I really, really did enjoy that.
I feel like that little splash of juice makes a big difference.
But no cupcakes?
You know, there don't, it doesn't look like any cupcakes were harmed in the process of making this beverage.
Good, good, okay.
But you never know for the, I mean, I could add my own cupcakes.
I think you should next time.
Well, I'm glad we could support your beverage goblening for the day.
That was the first thing I did when I walked into your office.
I went right to the BevNET fridge.
You're going to have to grab a couple so you can continue goblening.
They might be in my purse already.
Well, you foreshadowed to something that I wanted to talk about with you.
Whole Foods Market released their top 10 food and beverage trend forecast for 2025.
One of their trends was hydration, so you're not the only beverage goblin out there.
There are a lot of us out there.
You have an army of beverage goblins.
I do.
They're all behind me.
So one of the top trends was hydration.
We see so many electrolyte beverages.
They listed chlorophyll water in there, protein water.
For brands, they had prickly cactus water.
So that was certainly fun to see.
They had on that list as well international snacking, which I don't know, are you an international snacker, Sarah?
I mean, I dabble.
I celebrate all different types of snacks.
They mentioned Ciete's grain-free cookies.
Oh, the Mexican wedding cookies.
Oh, they're so good.
I mean, that really is an example of a better-for-you cookie that I would totally happily eat, whether I was trying to eat healthier or not.
It's gluten-free, right?
Yeah, they're gluten-free, grain-free.
Normally, I run from anything that says gluten-free, but those, I run to.
They also had Aji's tomato lansa.
Oh, I haven't seen that.
I actually saw Aji's at the fancy food show, and they were sampling their lansa, which it's so delicious.
It's a fresh Indian condiment, and I feel like I could eat it like pudding with a spoon.
They also had Ghee, Korean seaweed chips.
That's a favorite of yours.
It is.
Fabulous, delicious, crunchy.
The sweet one is really different.
Have you tried all of the flavors?
I don't think I've tried the sweet one.
The sweet one's my favorite.
It's just so unique.
It's so different from the others.
They also mentioned Confusion Snacks, Chili Masala Popcorn.
They didn't mention Nomad is a brand of popcorn, and they do a ramen popcorn and a chimichurri popcorn.
Can you snack goblin too?
I mean, why not?
Snack goblin.
Snack goblin.
I feel like if you're a snack goblin, you have multiple beverages, but also like a bag of popcorn open, a box of crackers, maybe a bar to also open at any given time.
When I'm snack goblining, I imagine myself like Garfield with the entire lasagna.
Yeah.
Yeah.
It's just I don't have an odie to kick off the table.
You could get a dog.
So anyways though, international snacking.
I mean, we see the international aisle and products and brands exploding everywhere.
We're actually doing a show about how to scale a cultural brand on Community Call on October 31st at 1 p.m.
Eastern.
We're going to have Miele, Brooklyn Deli, New Wind Coffee, Day Day Cook.
And this all started with a question that Kartik from Dusra asked.
Our joke is that we can't have a Community Call podcast without mentioning Kartik.
So we're going to do that show on October 31st.
And Dusra, by the way, is also an amazing snack that has Indian roots, like really delicious kind of crunchy, well-spiced little pieces.
And then there are caramelized white chocolate bits in there too.
So, so delicious.
So definitely tune in October 31st at 1 p.m.
for that Community Call.
They also talked dumplings, crunch.
Crunch, I thought, was an interesting one, because that's not like, that seems like sort of a broad trend.
It could mean a lot of different things, crunch.
Did crunch ever fall out of flavor?
No, no, no.
Crunch has always been there.
But now it's getting the spotlight.
It deserves.
What's one of your favorite ways to add crunch to something?
Well, you taught me this trick.
Every time we would travel together, Melissa and I used to work together, she would make a kale salad for both of us, which was so sweet.
Wrap it up really nicely for the plane.
But you always had the crunchy component, like the nuts or cheese.
You mix them together.
What did you do to those?
OK, so it's a combination of garlic breadcrumbs.
And like I make a big batch of those and put them in the fridge.
So garlic breadcrumbs then in chopped up almonds.
Oh, OK.
And then I couldn't remember what kind of nuts.
Yeah.
Or sometimes I feel like I may have used different nuts in the past, but usually almonds.
And then I put them in a little saran wrapped packet because you don't want the crunch to sogg.
You don't.
Yeah.
The level of care that you put into those salads.
She always included a little napkin, the dressing on the side.
There was like a some kind of meat stick with it.
Am I remembering that right?
Those naturally CIMO, Whole Foods Market sells the naturally CIMO salami wrapped provolone, I think.
So I chopped those up because you don't want the kale salad to be too healthy.
No.
Right.
That's what the crunch and everything else is.
The cheese.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Well, I'm glad that you appreciate my crunch, Sarah.
I do.
I think you started this trend actually, because this was what?
2021, when you first made me that salad.
Yeah.
I've been crunching for a long time.
Big time cruncher.
Well, I'm glad that everyone else is catching up.
On the Whole Foods Market trend report, they also mentioned Good Sam's Crispy Pineapple Chips, the Papadelic's mushrooms, freeze-dried mushrooms.
Oh, obsessed.
Those are so good.
So good.
fai bai Jing's Chengdu Crunch.
And then they also talked about their privately-able salads.
I don't know if you've seen the 365.
I've seen them.
I haven't tried them.
I'm very curious.
They took the idea from me, I think.
They owe you some money.
So they also talked about tea, both tea flavors, heel tea, for example.
They mentioned Heritage Coffee's Cardamom chai Ice Cream, which I've tried and it's so, so good.
Troll Milk Tea and other teas and tea-flavored things, Sourdough.
Sorry, I'm like, Sourdough, here we are in 2024.
It's here to stay.
I get it.
Maybe it's just a trend that just keeps satisfying and delighting people.
They were talking about, there's a sourdough spaghetti, frozen pizza with sourdough crust.
I feel like sourdough never went anywhere, but they talked a little bit about how during the pandemic, everyone is made.
Did you make sourdough during the pandemic?
Everybody else was making sourdough.
I didn't because I was eating everybody else's sourdough.
Someone had to eat the sourdough.
Somebody had to.
I mean.
I couldn't do that.
I feel like that was, I don't know, I was trying to get my kids on the Zooms and I was trying to do my work.
I didn't have any time for sourdough.
I didn't either.
I was too busy drinking beverages.
Well, someone had to eat the sourdough, so I think that was very helpful.
One more that I'd like to mention is protein.
And they were also talking about meat with, mixed with organ meats.
So Destal Ranch has a ground turkey with heart and liver.
They mentioned a brand called Eel River.
It has a grass-fed primal blend, which I thought was interesting.
So mixing in organ meats with the protein itself.
And that was, it's so funny, because if you look at like the Westinny Price Foundation, Sally Fallon, these sort of ancestral eating organizations that have been talking about things like kombucha and sourdough and these ancestral organizations.
I mean, they've been talking about raw milk and sourdough and kombucha and organ meats for so long.
And it's just interesting to see better for you brands and trends pick those up and then, you know, drop them off a little bit.
Good to see that.
Which trends do you think Whole Foods missed?
Oh, I was surprised not to see Women's Health on that list.
Me too.
Yeah, so we were talking about this a little bit yesterday.
And that was one that I picked up as well.
I feel like the supplements that you see, my social media feeds are filled with like so many options, whether they're dietary supplements, or just influencers talking about how you should eat, how you should exercise, what you should be taking.
Well, they talk a lot about protein too.
So I feel like it's my full-time job just to get enough protein every day.
But it's kind of related to Women's Health, right?
I'm curious too about balancing hormones, which types of foods help with that.
It was surprising not to see that on the list.
Yeah, I totally agree.
I also thought that maybe they would talk about alt-intoxicants, so I'm always talking about intoxicants.
But you know, stuff like kava, this past BevNET Live in New York, we saw ketones a little bit more prominently.
So yeah, kava, ketones.
I was surprised not to see anything.
I love kava.
I hadn't tried it until this year.
Do you get a buzz off kava?
Not really, but I feel calm, which I know is the goal.
But I don't really feel like, I know some people aren't supposed to drive when they're drinking it, because it can make them sleepy.
Maybe it's all the caffeine I'm consuming, but that does not happen to me.
So you're pitching retailers all the time and talking to buyers, trying to help brands figure out how to position their products and how to get them on shelf at retailers.
Do you think that a trend report like this is something that brands should put in their dex and talk about when they're pitching?
Does this help?
I don't think it hurts.
I think it really depends on the retailer.
Some will take it more seriously than others.
I think especially if you're an unknown brand and just trying to spotlight when you don't have data, you don't have anything else, like you don't have a big selling story, it can certainly help.
But is it going to be the end all be all?
I'm not sure.
If I mean, if you're pitching Whole Foods, it's got to help, right?
Obviously.
I mean, that's...
You can point to the trend and say, hey, listen, this is what you want.
You told me this is what you wanted.
Well, our team over at NOSH did a great recap of the Whole Foods Market Trend Report.
So head over to nosh.com to check that out.
Sarah, thank you so much for joining me today to talk about the Whole Foods Trend Report and Beverage Goblinning.
Will you come back?
Can we do it again sometime?
I would love that.
And thank you for hosting me.
And thank you for letting me try all these tasty beverages.
Try steal.
Yeah, I mean, same thing.
Potato, potato.
When you get up, your purse is just going to clank, clank, clank on your way to the door.
Guilty as charged.
Well, in this episode of Community Call, I talk trends with another key retailer in the natural organic space, which is Bristol Farms.
With 19 locations in Southern California, Bristol Farms offers an important opportunity for emerging brands looking to build a retail presence.
I chat with Darren Viscount, Senior Category Manager, about how Bristol Farms approaches the trends migrating from the supplement aisle to food and beverage, how they approach functional products and non-alcoholic beverages, and best practices for submitting products for review and making the most of your space on shelf.
Please enjoy.
Today's Community Call is with Darren Viscount, the Senior Category Manager for Natural Living and Over-the-Counter at Bristol Farms.
We'll be discussing how Bristol Farms categorizes supplements and functional ingredients, which trending functional ingredients are crossing over to food and beverage, and the best ways for brands to collaborate with Bristol Farms.
Darren, it's so great to have you here.
Thank you so much for joining Community Call.
Yes, thank you for having me.
I know you've been super busy, and I think we've all been watching you on LinkedIn, make your way across the country.
So again, it's so great to have you here.
You have an extensive background in grocery retail, which I think is certainly helpful for folks to understand as we jump into this conversation.
What are the other retailers that you worked at, and what positions did you hold?
So I've actually been almost a category manager for every category within grocery retail.
The only category is food service that I have not been a category manager for.
So I've been doing this for 27 years now.
I've worked for, obviously, recently.
Currently, I'm working for Bristol Farms.
I've worked for Jimbo's in San Diego.
I've worked for a chain called Healthy Origins in Alabama.
And then I also work for a nonprofit called Sempa.
Probably about five years ago, they put on a few shows like Soho and some other trade shows.
And then probably the longest store I've worked in was called Healthy Home Market that was in Charlotte, North Carolina.
But again, I've been a category manager for mostly Center Store, I would say.
Well, that's certainly a comprehensive history.
And I'm sure that sort of helps inform all of the ideas and kind of understanding that you have about the trends that we're going to talk about today.
Normally, we would think, I don't know, normally I think of buyers as sort of like hidden away in a back office and like under a mound of like samples and category reviews.
But it's been so nice to see you a little bit more front and center.
How does that happen?
How did you sort of make the leap from being a buyer who kind of stays behind the scenes to really putting yourself out there?
You know, like I said, I kind of started about a year ago on LinkedIn.
And I kind of want to share my own personal story.
But also, you know, all these years, I always think I have the same conversation every day, basically, for these last 27 years, because you know, there's basic retail philosophies of retail, you know, where you're looking at new items, you're looking at promotions and so forth.
That doesn't matter what category that you're in.
But it kind of, you know, as I saw a kind of LinkedIn community, you know, my goal was, my own personal mission was create community and help others, you know, succeed and win in life, you know, whether it's in retail or personal.
So, you know, I want to use my experience.
So I got, you know, I felt like I had a purpose.
My purpose was to help others win.
And then I kind of started going to different local events.
And then I started going to CPG events.
And then I started going to obviously more national events.
And I realized that, you know, the common thing that we all have is community.
The common thing that we all have is that we're trying just to, you know, to be successful, to, and I was really like, I love the stories of small entrepreneurs trying to figure it out.
So I figured, okay, well, how do I, you know, I don't, I didn't need to worry about like these big, big retail or big vendors, because obviously they kind of figured it out.
I really want to support smaller vendors who are just trying to make it into the market, who are trying to be more, the more emerging brands.
And for me, like I said, it's been, this last year, I would say the most personally rewarding that I've ever had in my career.
After the 27 years, I was like, okay, now I feel like, okay, there's a reason why I exist, you know, I mean, I think we all try to figure out what our purpose is.
And my purpose is to help others, you know, I was always taught from an early age to be serviced to others.
And so this is for me, like how I can be serviced to others, you know, using my own experience to help them succeed.
Well, certainly the emerging brands in our community and in food and beverage in general can use the help that you're offering up.
So I'm sure that's very much appreciated.
As we discussed, you've been in a number of retailers and overseen a number of categories.
Can you describe in detail the categories that you oversee at Bristol Farms right now?
Okay, so currently at Bristol Farms, I do supplements, health and beauty, OOTC, over-the-counter items, and then I also do a new topic or what we call social drinks, or social leaning where it's the non-out category.
They ended up putting it into my category because they obviously saw that they were looking more at the functional benefits.
It was a trending category, so they felt like, okay, as a natural living, we tend to be the clean setters, meaning that people, the active ingredients or functional ingredients typically start out in a lot of supplements, and then kind of transition into food.
So for us, it was a natural progression to think, okay, well, drinks are becoming, everyone drinks something, but they're also looking for functionality.
I think, I look back, what the first, I guess, considered functional drink was, was kombucha.
That made it kind of like, I remember like 10 years ago, kombucha being something, and I'm like, oh, no one's going to drink that.
Like, it's a weird, like a two granola, and then all of a sudden, it's like it became mainstream, and you'd get it at like every store.
And I think that was really the start of the functional drink.
So it's something that we all are looking forward to kind of improve our well-being.
So that would be kind of my role at Bristol at the moment.
You know, I still am kind of surprised myself that kombucha made it as big as it is, you know, it has like a scoby, which is a big rubbery.
I mean, it is kind of wild when you look at something like that, that succeeded.
I mean, I certainly never would have thought so.
I guess it shows you.
Life is short but full of surprises.
Yeah, it was interesting because I went to like a conference, it was about 15 years ago, and it was Weston Price.
I don't know if you're familiar with that, but it was this conference.
And I saw it there and they were talking about a lot of fermented foods and I remember seeing this kombucha and I can actually remember the brand, I don't know if I can say it, but it was like, I was like, someone day, someone should come out with more of like a mass type of kombucha, because the original kombucha didn't honestly taste amazing.
It kind of tastes a little flat or kind of like, just had an off taste to it.
And I'm like, well, if they could figure out how to make it on me, obviously, I wish that High Insights 2020, and I wish I would have been that person who figured it out.
But it was pretty amazing to see like when it started to go mass, it was like, okay, you know, that's pretty amazing.
It's something that started in like someone's basically kitchen could then become like this mass thing and an everyday drink was pretty amazing.
And then I think the way again, it really helped facilitate the functional drink category.
And I mean, it's so true, like the Weston A Price Foundation, they were touting raw milk, raw, grass fed liver and kombucha.
It's crazy that, yeah, it's just crazy that it took off.
Well, we'll get into some more trends for sure.
I'm sure you have a really interesting take on that.
Can you help us understand how Bristol Farms determines their supplement category and what the criteria are?
Like, you know, I'm sort of thinking about products like powders, maybe some functional chocolates.
Where is the dividing line between a supplement and a food or a drink?
I mean, for us, the way we like, even we have chocolates, going back to chocolates, we have chocolates that have functionality.
So again, we want to, you know, we want to educate our customers.
So by having it in what we consider the natural living in our stores, our retail stores, is we felt like, okay, we're the ones are going to be able to explain it.
Our customer is a little different than like a true natural food stores, you know, someone who is a transitional type of customer, meaning they're coming in, they're already doing conventional items, but they want to start doing more natural.
My friend told me I should do this ingredient, so really the reason why we want to do it is because obviously in our category, we tend to be a little more educated on ingredients.
We're not just doing potato chips, we're actually doing like something that has a little functionality to it.
And we felt like, okay, well, we want to be connected to our guest.
And by doing that, we're able to educate our guests.
And we know an educated guest is going to be obviously a better fit for our type of business model.
So the more educated customer, the more they're going to obviously fill the basket.
And that's kind of ultimately why we want to lean in on more of the functional portion of our foods.
So really just has to have something we consider functional to the body.
It elevates the body, whether it's mind, body, function, sleep, all those type of attributes that we're looking for.
And that's how we kind of categorize the difference between just a regular grocery item and a natural living grocery item.
And then if you do have something like, for example, a functional chocolate or a beverage pad or something like that, do they tend to be with the chocolate, for example, being merchandise with the chocolate, but overseen by you and also need to follow the category review process that you oversee?
Correct.
In our store, we do try to put the chocolates with the chocolates.
Yesterday, I met with someone who did functional creamers.
So we try to put those next to the everyday creamers that maybe don't have the functionality, but they're more flavor.
So we do feel like we kind of think about where our customer is going to look for it.
If they know, okay, I need to get a creamer and I'm going to get coffee, obviously then we want it to be near the category that we feel like they're going to shop the store.
We don't want it.
It's not a treasure hunt in our store.
Ultimately, we want to ease the shop.
I feel like if you look at the business model, we want to help the buying decision for our customers, and we want to make it sure it's easy.
We already know that customers are pretty stressed and we don't want to make the shopping experience more stressful.
Yeah.
And also, I think that alleviates stress on the brand side.
It's hard enough to convince a consumer to trade from the creamer they always buy to this new functional creamer that you have.
At least if they're side by side, then the consumer has an opportunity to make that decision in real time.
For sure.
I mean, we definitely look at good, better, best, and not because one brand is good and whatever, but we're looking at like, okay, if you're a starter person, the starter point in going back to the creamers, the starting is just a basic creamer.
But then someone's like, well, that's not maybe helping my supporting my health.
So then they're going to go to the next and the next.
So that's always our goal is we know we still have to carry the basic creamer, but we're hoping that people will find the functionality creamers really be more supportive of their overall health.
And that's all ultimately supports our mission as a company.
You spoke a little bit earlier about how important education is and how Bristol Farms takes a big role in helping to educate consumers.
How do you do that?
You know, it always starts with our team.
You know, I mean, I always say, you know, yes, we're a store that's filled with product, but we're also a store filled with employees or team members.
And so I know, you know, we want to have a happy environment for our team.
So really it starts with education.
So we on a regular do every Monday, where I do Zoom calls, where we bring in vendors who will do calls with our natural living managers so they make sure they feel comfortable.
And then I also make sure that the retailers, the brands go into the stores and actually have the, especially if it's a product that needs to be tasted.
We make sure that they're doing samplings with the team because ultimately someone comes in, yes, it's a higher price point.
But because it carries a higher price point, customers are going to ask us how's it taste?
Because it's always going to, like any type of drink or powder, it has to taste good.
Because it can have the most function in the world, but if it doesn't taste good, people aren't consistent.
And especially when it comes to supplementation or functional ingredients, it only works when you're consistent.
It's not a drug where it's a one and done.
It's going to take time to build up in your body.
And then the other thing that I initiated, which I think is probably the most successful program that I think I, obviously we're going to do consumer events.
But for our teams, we actually started every other month where we bring them into the corporate office into our training center where we bring brands into our training center and we do lectures throughout the day.
And then in addition, we do a tabletop.
So we do this five times a year and each training is focused on a certain thing.
So I have one that's focused on all local brands.
I have another one that's focused on attributes.
So, you know, woman owned, black owned, like regenerative farming, you know, those type of things where we want to highlight to our teams.
These are functions that we can now then support with with our customers.
So we're very big on education because ultimately, you know, I always think that when people come to our stores, they're overwhelmed.
And if anything that we can do to help make their buying decisions easier, and less, I always say, reduce buyers remorse.
That's all to our goal.
You know, and then also, my own personal mission is I want to make sure people are healthy, live long, they feel, you know, whether it's you're living 100 years or you're living 50 years, it's like, how do you, how do you going to feel?
Like, honestly, it doesn't matter, like the length of time you're on this work in this earth, and how you feel in that length of time.
So whether it's 50 years or 100 years, I want you to feel the best.
And we want to make you feel the best.
Sounds like a good value proposition to me.
So the trainings that you're hosting at the headquarters, are brands able to either do a training, or send samples, or send anything for them?
So we have a combination.
So we do have, for all the teams, I get goody bags that have samples throughout all of our brands.
But we also really want to have it in person.
So we do require, like either whether it's a broker, or a rep, or even the owner, or the formulator come into the actual office.
Because for us, we want to pull them outside the store because we know team members are overwhelmed in store, they're busy placing orders, helping customers unpacking boxes.
So for us, it was a dedicated time.
So we want as many touch points with a brand as possible.
Those touch points, one of my philosophies is I'm very analytical.
My role as a category manager is just to get sales.
I mean, honestly, yes, we want to have good products, we want to have good ingredients.
Ultimately, that's the priority.
But at the same time, I'm held accountable for numbers.
And our in-store teams, they're more the emotional portion of our business.
Yes, they have to understand the numbers, but ultimately, they're connected to whether it's the wrap or the ingredients or the taste.
And so really having more touch points was my ultimate goal this year.
It's like, it's not brand A, it's brand A that is also represented by this amazing person.
And so they're able to have that emotional connection to the brand.
And so ultimately, if we feel comfortable with how we sell and how we're connected to a brand, we're going to sell more products in the end of the day.
So it's kind of a win-win for both the brand and our company as a whole.
Well, I'm sure that the brands on your shelves want to sell as much product as possible.
And this sounds like a really good way to help support that.
Where do brands go in order to get in touch with someone at Bristol Farms, like, you know, to send samples or anything like that?
You know, each category's manager is a little different, obviously, because how they're able to manage is obviously going to be a little different than each.
But I actually talked to a few of them today.
And most often, we are trying to get a portal together so that someone can go through our portal, they can see our attribute requirements, and they're able to submit.
But right now, currently, I guess we're kind of a little old school where people can email us.
For myself, it's usually email.
I have a lot of people on LinkedIn that will DM me because I'm a little obviously more active on that app.
So I would say probably email is the best.
I know some people will try to call us.
I would say probably of all the kind of ways to communicate with us, that's probably the least effective.
And again, talking to a few of the Category Managers, I think we've become in a society where most of us don't love being on the phone.
And I think texting is kind of that quick communication.
So really just getting to the point.
I always look at when I'm working with brands or kind of educating brands at how to communicate with Category Managers is they're looking at every time you present a brand to me, they just see more work.
And it's not because they don't have to see your mission or your attributes or who you are.
But we have a limited amount of time in a day.
And how you can efficiently communicate to that buyer is ultimately.
So email can definitely, if you do it properly, I think it's still the most effective way because you can still communicate your brand story, but you can kind of simplify it.
So I always say when someone's email me, simple is better.
The more like if you're able to answer my questions before I ask them, that's ultimately what I'm looking for because it eases my workload.
So I guess that's, long story short, I think email is still the most effective way to communicate with us.
And email addresses, can folks find those online?
We do have a few of those.
I mean, I guess if you do a search, typically, a lot of people will reach out to me trying to communicate with other category managers because they kind of do like, okay, I'm just going to send it to everyone.
But I think as I became a little more visible, people reach out to me and say, hey, by the way, I have this frozen, whatever.
Who's your category manager?
And oftentimes, I'll do that, but it's always can be a tricky proposition because it's hard because I maybe not know your brand and if I forward to the correct category manager, am I advocating for it?
Do I have enough information?
It's a little challenging because I really haven't done research on your product.
I just know the category that you probably fit into.
So oftentimes, we'll direct people to rehab or receptionist to actually, well, I tell people to reach out, we have a normal number or corporate number where they can reach that front desk and then that front desk associate will then connect them to the correct buyer.
So there's a couple of ways, but right now we're actually trying to, again, create a system where they can just go on to our website and be able to see what our requirements are.
And then if they meet all those requirements, then it goes directly to us.
So that's probably coming with the next six months to ease the communication with buyers.
So let's go back to you and your role at Bristol Farms.
Did you say that there's a natural living manager in each store?
So what, you know, Bristol is unique.
You know, we've been around for a very long time, and natural living was added about five years ago.
So we were a traditional gourmet retailer that the company of our own Good Food Holdings also has sister banners, Lazy Acres, New Leave, New Seasons, and Metropolitan.
And they saw that, like, especially our sister company, Lazy Acres, they saw the success of the natural living category, and they wanted to be a, we wanted to be a full service retailer.
And so about five years ago, they introduced natural living to either, whether it was a new build or a remodel type of stores.
So over time, they've slowly added in natural living departments, like full service natural living departments, where they're helping the customers.
So of our 13 locations, we have what we call 17, or I'm sorry, seven full service, meaning there's someone on the floor that's going to assist you in your buying decision.
And then we have six locations where we have natural living products, but they tend to be a little less, they don't need the selling and selling, so that we would just carry like melatonin or vitamin C.
You know, you're more of your basic commodity items.
So that's kind of how we work all 13.
So right now we have seven locations that actually have a natural living department manager.
And can they make their own decisions or all the buying decisions made by you?
So how I work with my teams is I want, you know, I don't work top down.
I work at the same level as they do, because ultimately I always say, you know, when I'm bringing a new brand, I will never sell that product personally.
I will never be in the store selling it to a customer.
So I want the buy-in from our teams.
So even though I will make the final decision, you know, there still has to be someone who says, okay, this is the right fit.
This is what's meeting our purpose, our attributes.
What I try to do is, you know, the way I look at category management is I have our home runs, meaning I can look at something and I know it's trending.
It's going to be a home run because it's good packaging, has a good brand story.
Those I don't necessarily involve the teams.
But then when I have products, they're like, okay, it's going to take a little bit more education.
It's going to get off the shelf.
Then what I do is on our weekly Monday calls, I'll present them new brands and say, okay, what's your feedback or I send them an email.
And then the other thing that we do with those every other month, trainings that we do at our corporate center, I also bring in new brands.
So I have 10 new brands that we currently don't have on the shelf, but I want to get the feedback of the teams.
So I've been here for three years and we've had the highest percent growth in any category.
A lot of that came from that the teams owned, in my past experience, I would watch category managers like this force out product.
And then the in-store teams would be like, oh my gosh, why are you pushing this on me?
This isn't going to sell in our store.
It's too high retail.
So I found that when I manage all these categories, the more involvement that I get for the teams, the more they're going to be on my side.
Ultimately, we're working as a team.
So they feel very comfortable with me because on our Monday calls, we have customer requests and they have easy access to send me information saying, I saw this brand or we're getting a lot of customer requests.
And I try to be very active because my experience is, I'm active with our teams and I communicate and I am quickly responsive to them.
They tend to be like, okay, I helped you make that buying decision and they're taking more ownership of that brand and it's more successful.
So smart to tap the in-store resources because obviously, they're the ones who are talking to the public every day and they have a really good idea of what they're going to want.
So on that note, you mentioned that brands can train the natural living managers or whoever it is in that store.
Do you typically find that brands will set up that sort of training internally right before they do a store demo and do them both at once?
Not always because most of the demo teams are not.
I mean, one of the requests I do have when they're demoing, especially if they're having a product that's going to be tasted, I want to make sure that they walk over to the team and say, if it's a drink, I say, okay, make sure you go over to our department, the people within the department, having them taste it while you're doing it anyways.
But then I also, most of our trainings occur like it's a dedicated time.
Someone's calling up and say, okay, I'm going to be here at noon.
Can you make sure that you have two or three people that are there to be able to educate at that time?
Because again, I want to have as many touch points to a product or brand as possible.
So especially if it's a product that needs to be tasted, because we want to make sure that because most of our customers will look at a drink and go, okay, what's it taste like?
Even like I am very straightforward with our team, like if you don't think it tastes good, but it has a lot of benefit, I want you to tell the customer that because honestly, I want them to make sure they don't get home and be like, oh my gosh, this tastes like it's the worst tasting thing.
There's been many brands like liquid supplement brands that used to be back in the day that tasted, they smelled tasted like feet.
But I was always really honest with the customer, say, this is not going to taste amazing, but you're going to feel amazing.
And that really helps with making sure that we're helping the buying decision of our customers and our guests.
So yeah, it's kind of a combination of both.
But typically demo people are not going to be probably as educated on the product as someone who's the brand rep is going to be or even the brand owner.
So ultimately, that's who I want to do the majority of the training with the jeans.
Let's go back over to supplements.
We talked a little bit about how trends in the supplement aisle bleed over into food and beverage eventually.
What are some of the trends that you're seeing in supplements?
What do you see turning lately?
Our strongest categories are still the probiotics.
I think when you look at, I'd say probiotics, anything to do with sleep or anything to do with protein or immunity.
It's immunity as a little less this year.
Obviously, because of COVID, we all got immunity fatigue, like having that conversation.
But I'd say right now, most people are looking like, especially the nootropics, they're looking for mental health, they're looking for stress reduction, more the adaptogenic effects.
So right now, like I said, our categories, the strength would be protein.
Everyone wants higher protein.
Everyone wants more functional ingredients.
Everyone wants a probiotic.
So, you know, I mean, I would say the average customer walking store, nine out of 10 customers have three issues.
Either they have no energy, they can't sleep, or their mood is, they have a depressed mood.
So one of those things, or all those things addressed by the products is gonna be a win in my opinion.
That makes sense.
And then when we think about those topics of sleep, protein and immunity, I mean, protein, I feel like is a little bit more straightforward, but I'm curious to hear for sleep and immunity.
What are some of the specific ingredients that consumers are looking for?
For sleep, is it like melatonin or magnesium?
What are some of the ingredients that consumers are seeking out?
Definitely for sleep, there's still the two most popular, either be melatonin or anything like with asphagondin or magnesium.
Magnesium is like, I think, every day I'm introduced to a new magnesium.
It's kind of replaced.
I always say, it's funny, I was having a conversation with someone the other day about calcium, and how rarely, calcium was something that every person took.
If you asked me 10 years ago, if you took one mineral, you're taking calcium.
And then recently, I looked at our movement reports, and we can't be honest with you, we can't give calcium away.
I think the conversation about bone health kind of took that away because it was hard to, I hate to say, make calcium sexy.
And I think with magnesium, like it addressed so many different functions in our body, whether it was sleep, or constipation, or mood.
There were so many value things that I think, okay, it's like anything, it's like how do you grab the most consumers?
And I think magnesium was really like, okay, everyone has one of those conditions.
So it was really the broadest type of mineral.
And it affected the most number of people.
And it was one of those things like I think magnesium, I remember selling a product years ago, this magnesium, citrate, and powder.
And it was always my go-to, and it still is the number one magnesium.
It was always my go-to because if someone, you know, a lot of supplementation we take by faith.
You know, you take a multivitamin, you're assuming it's going to make me live longer.
Do you always have that like full effect like you?
I take multivitamin, I can't say that I like, immediately can run like a marathon.
But like with magnesium, most people who take magnesium have some type of immediate effect, whether it's through constipation or mood or stress, like you can feel it.
So to me, it's always that kind of that gateway nutrients that, you know, ultimately, people will be more fooled on functional ingredients like supplements, if they feel something, you know, that's always been the biggest challenge is it's not a drug.
You know, drugs, you take one, you take Tylenol, and immediately you know what the effect on it.
You know, you have a fever, it's going to reduce your fever.
A lot of supplements, it's definitely something you build in your body.
It's something consistency that you have to do.
So I think magnesium, why it's become so popular, is ultimately it's something you can notice pretty quickly.
I've never thought of magnesium as being sexy before, but I will now.
I don't know if that's always the right word, but I feel like...
No, you're right.
Yeah.
Yeah.
We have, you know, everyone has like three seconds of attention.
You know, I mean, all this, the apps basically train us on, if I don't understand it within three seconds, I'm moving on to the next thing.
And so ultimately magnesium did that.
You know, I always think of L-theanine in that same category where, and I don't know if it's just a psychosomatic sort of thing, but for me, like magnesium, I can feel an L-theanine.
I usually can.
Are you seeing L-theanine continue to be a sought after supplement and ingredient in beverages?
And do you also think that can you do you feel it immediately?
I have had people because it helps you with that brain fog and stuff.
I definitely see it in a lot of things, especially the social tonics.
And that's pretty a common ingredient that I'm seeing in a lot of the social tonics.
It's something that, you know, I don't know if people come in individually looking for L-theanine as much as some other other, whether it's adaptogenic herbs.
I think it's included in a lot of formulas because we know it has an effectiveness.
I don't know if customers are necessarily connecting to that.
That's the thing that's the ingredients that I'm having the most effect with.
But I think as formulators, we know that there's enough science behind it.
That's something that we should put in most of our things because we know it's going to benefit it as a formula.
How about immunity?
What are some of the ingredients you're seeing folks seek out to support immunity?
It's still the basics.
Elderberry is still trending.
Anything that's in adaptogenic, even Ashwagandha, I see a little bit of olive leaf.
Olive leaf maybe saw its day a few years ago.
Vitamin C is still trending.
again, immunity, I think people just have a little bit more faith that they're taking it and things that are supportive of their lung health and their overall immunity.
B polen seems to be anything.
B propolis does really well for us.
Those type of specific ingredients, I think, do well.
So I think it's still the tried and true immune formula, immune ingredients that we still saw on a regular day.
What about kava?
Do you guys do anything with kava?
And that might even be carried in the alcohol department.
I don't know.
I definitely see kava trending again.
I think kava, obviously, I forget how many years ago, had a kind of a negative thing where everyone is like, they were taking it off the market because there was like, we didn't know whether it was safe.
And I think then obviously we brought it back.
And I think now I'm seeing a few more formulas.
I've seen a few more functional drinks because they, once again, it's one of those herbs, you know pretty quickly if you do the right amount, the right type of ingredients.
So I think it's trending.
I think it's going to be, I think it's going to, you know, kind of like ashwagandha was kind of like that for the last three years.
And I think kava is kind of having a resurgence for sure.
How about form factor trends?
Are you, I mean, I don't know, I feel like I see more and more gummy vitamins available every day.
But maybe also in terms of packaging, like, you know, you do see some more on the go offerings, like stick packs, of course, but also like I'll see little packages of vitamins, that kind of thing.
Are there any trends you're noticing in form factor?
I mean, still the gummies.
I mean, the gummies is definitely still the number one delivery service.
And it's one of those things, like the reason why is, you know, it's all about, like, again, going back to consistency, you know, how do you not feel like it's just like, you know, a lot of people take supplements and they think, okay, well, you know, it feels like I have to.
And I think the gummies, like it kind of overtook liquids because liquids were sometimes hard to cover taste, where the gummies have been able to overcome that taste.
But I think then people are more likely to do it on a consistent basis, because again, it's only good as how often you take it.
You know, I mean, if you're going to take it, one, it's going to have no effect on if you take it for 30 days or 60 days, you're going to notice it.
So I think it's still, and in stick packs, I think there's this convenience factor to that, where you can put it in your bag, and like I do that, like I do a lot of liquid hydration, our powdered hydration, where I'm someone who, I drink, going back to the drinks, everyone drinks something every day.
It's not, are we not convincing people to drink?
That's the good news.
It's like, what are you going to drink?
How often are you going to drink it?
What type of drink are you going to drink?
So I think that powders became an easy solution to that because they tasted good.
It ultimately is flavor forward with active ingredients.
And so I think that's why packets or powders became popular.
Because again, back in the day when liquids were kind of another delivery system, they always tasted a little off.
And it was hard to convince someone, okay, this tastes off, but you have to do this on a daily and you have to hold your nose as you drink it.
And I think that ultimately, I think that's why powders have done so well.
So it's still powders and gummies are leading to charge of delivery systems.
All right, you're talking about drinks.
I think we should talk about drinks.
You also oversee any of the social tonics or maybe what we might consider nootropic beverages.
Does that include sort of the kins and the desois of the world?
Correct.
Yeah.
So anything, so we kind of categorize, we have different types of drinks.
You have your energy drinks that just have caffeine in it.
So what we consider, I guess, for Sober Curious or Sober Social Tonics, anything that has some functional ingredients.
So that would be whether it's altheanine, ashwagandha, green tea, saffron, things like that.
Those are what we consider social tonics.
So all those brands you listed are ones that would be considered a social tonic in our store.
And we categorize them all together.
Because again, it's like people still wanted to do the alcohol flavor.
So a lot of them taste like alcohol.
And then we kind of want to separate it because we want to show people, okay, this has something that's going to benefit you and your well-being.
So we felt like, okay, if we put it all into one category and kind of then put it into its own section within our stores, that that kind of highlighted it.
And we knew the really why we leaned in on it as well is because we knew that was something you're not necessarily going to typically find in your conventional stores at this point.
So something that we could kind of be first to market.
And that's, again, why we kind of lean into that category.
And did you say that you don't oversee caffeine?
So we have a different category of manager.
If it's just a drink that has like a caffeine in it, we consider that more of an energy drink.
And that's where we have our everyday drinks.
That's going to sit next to water or some of the probiotic drinks on the market.
So that's another.
We all, there's still the grab and go area.
They're just kind of, we separate the two because we felt like, you know, typically the social products have a little bit higher price point than a typical soda does.
And so by having that, and we really did the call outs for the ingredients and the functionality, we could say, okay, yeah, we know these are a little bit more expensive retail, but they're going to benefit your well-being a little bit more.
But if a product had caffeine and functional ingredients, that would be you.
Correct.
Then I can do both.
And a lot of the social product brands have both, typically have more of a natural source of caffeine, so typically like green coffee bean, or they might just do green tea, because they know that those type of people are a little bit more, they're looking for more health conscious drinks.
So they don't want your traditional caffeine, but they know that they need a better for you type of caffeine.
And that's usually going to come from a green tea or a green coffee bean, is typically what I see most often.
And then for Bristol Farms overall, for brands who aren't at Bristol Farms, but would like to be, what do they need to know about the best way to submit their products to Bristol Farms?
You know, and it's how you communicate to us, you know.
I mean, it's kind of keeping it simple.
Like a lot of times when people present to me, you know, they're obviously leading with their attributes and their brand story, which is great.
But, you know, when I'm exposed to or I'm getting like 100 different submissions in a week, I have, you know, like anyone, I have so much time or so little time to be able to review something.
So it's a lot of time how they're presenting it.
Like, you know, is it in distribution?
Is it direct?
Where is it fit?
You know, do you have a visual picture?
Like a lot of times I ask them, where do you think it lives?
Does it live in this section or this section?
A lot of times like, well, it could be.
I don't know.
And realistically, when you're presenting to a category manager, if you simplify it, you know, like I always tell everyone just bullet point it like this is the retail.
This is the distributor it's in.
This is the brand that are their competitors.
This is the spins data.
This is a visual picture of where you're answering all those questions I'm going to ask you anyways.
And so that's really how they should be presenting to us, that really simplification, you know, sitting down on a whiteboard and saying, okay, these are all the questions I continually get asked.
My presentation and how I present should answer all those questions immediately and not have to then I'm not required to do follow up.
And is there a category review calendar?
So other category managers, yes, for myself, not currently.
I don't have that because when I came in, I was kind of like, I always say I was in a fixing mode.
And I kind of had to react quicker because if I held myself accountable to a category view, I knew that this section needed to be fixed, but I couldn't do it.
I didn't want to miss the opportunity.
So we want to either be first to market, but it really has been successful for us because, like I said, we've had significant growth over the three years I've been here because I've been able to be proactive and react pretty quickly to trends, and at some point I will have to, as either I become more visible, I will have to go to a category review to make my life a little easier, truthfully.
But everyone's going to be different.
Like I said, all the other category managers, especially the other grocery category managers do a category review because we utilize planograms and obviously we have an in-store team that has to execute those planograms, so it's obviously easier to be able to manage that if you have a category review.
And where is the category review calendar available?
Typically, that's a good question.
Sometimes, I don't know if it lives on our website, but a lot of times when they reach out to the vendors, they have an actual calendar that they will email you saying, this is when I'm reviewing, or when there are a lot of like our grocery brands are through brokers, so a lot of the brokers are aware they have multiple brands, they know it also from just our history.
And again, we have a unique proposition.
In Bristol, the majority of the category managers basically have been here for 20 plus years.
So they have that kind of like that system already down.
Me being a little new and having to kind of like in a fixing mode with Natural Living, I had to kind of just I had to see the fires and put out the fires.
And so it's kind of taking me those three years to fix, you know, put out those fires and now having building a program that I know will have longevity.
And then one last question about submitting.
So you get the category review calendar.
And then when you send an email to the buyer, you talked about a very simple bullet pointed email.
Do you typically like to see like a deck and a cell sheet or those usually the attachments you want to see?
Usually the attachment, but I want a deck that's simplified.
Like one thing that I would say in an email, I hate when people send me to their website, say, to find out more information about my product, follow this link.
I don't have that time to do the research.
So you're just looking at like, I actually did a presentation.
I wish I don't have it right in front of me, but we did a presentation about how to do a sales deck.
And it was really understanding like, you know, the question I'm always going to ask everyone is it in distribution?
Is it direct?
Do you have a broker?
Do you not have a broker?
Are you direct?
Is it just, you know, all those questions, that's kind of what I'm looking at in a brand deck.
Because yes, I'm looking for the attributes.
I want to know what the ingredients are, but that should be a one page thing.
You know, I want to find out about the founder, but that should be one page of the sales deck.
Ultimately, I have to figure out, okay, you know, because we're in a different retail environment where, you know, we have less team members in store, there's a lot more turnover now.
So, I'm looking at when I'm working with the brand, like, is that a distributor that's easy to work with?
Do you have a promotional calendar that's going to be simple?
Do all those things are really what I'm looking for?
Like, I have to not only look at the attributes, but I have to figure out, like, is it going to be easy for our in-store teams?
Because always going back to the in-store teams, they're emotional.
So, I always, you know, and I look at brands where it's really hard to meet a minimal, or it's really hard to order, and the teams will kill the brand because they aren't looking at the attributes or the benefits of the product.
They're basically saying, oh my gosh, I got to place the order, and it's going to take forever, and I can't meet the minimum.
And that's not what you want to be focusing on your brand because ultimately, they don't have, they're held accountable for margins, like everyone.
But at the same point, no one wants to create extra work.
And so it's always about how you present, whether it's to myself or then once you're in store, how you're presenting teams, like how do you reduce that workload for people, is always the way you present.
I have a question here from Sean Dunn, who wants to know if you prefer working through brokers or directly with the business owners themselves.
It's a combination of both because when you're looking at brokers, some brokers have so many brands that I look at and go, okay, well, if you have 50 brands, how can you ever really dedicate your time to one brand?
But the benefits of brokers, obviously, they have a lot more connections or they have a lot more resources at the same time than maybe a smaller brand does.
I mean, I do work with a lot of direct brands.
I said, okay, well, can you find a local distributor?
I work with them because, and Sean's one of them, like when he first presented to me, he was starting off and he was working with a small local brand.
I knew he was going to be able to support our in-store teams, whether it's tasting, get them connected in a lot of demos.
So having that touch point with the person who's the decision-maker was nice because we could quickly have reaction and we could quickly build a promo with him.
So it's really just going to be dependent on the actual product.
So I would say it's a combination of both.
But I'm always looking at how is it going to be easier to sell?
I mean, our thing that we have to do, one of the challenges with direct brands for our stores, is we have to go through something called Repositrack, which is a third-party that will review, like making sure you have insurance, making sure that you have a recall policy.
So it does take a little bit more time, typically, for me to go through a direct person, because there's a little bit more, there's a lot more, are we going to meet minimums, whether the quality requirements is case requirements.
So it's a little bit more work, but I kind of do it as a brand by brand type of review.
So I would say it's both.
But I guess after all these years, I'm kind of intuitive.
I can look at a direct brand and say, okay, I can see that you're going to be responsive in a good way.
And I really feel like I have many brands like Sean's, who has just like all in.
And I know he's like, he will do anything to grow our sales.
So that's why I like a direct brand.
Where a broker, unfortunately, they might have that brand for six months and they move on to another brand.
So it's always a little bit more challenging to be a little more consistent with them.
But it really just depends on the brokerage truthfully as well.
Great question, Sean.
Thanks for that.
And I have a question from Scott Hartman, who wants to know who are some of the brokers and distributors that you really like doing business with?
I'm sure that if brands out there want to work with you the most easily and seamlessly, that would be helpful information for them to know.
Yeah, it really depends because some brokers are obviously specifically two supplements.
And then there's some brokers that are just exclusively to drinks that I like to work with because they really understand that category.
So, I don't know if I should say specific brokers in our area because I don't want to offend anyone, but there's definitely brokers that...
And then there's some national ones.
I mean, the benefit of national, they definitely have a little bit more of a promotional calendar.
So, most people would know what some of the national ones are.
So, it really just depends.
If it's a regional brand, like if you're just starting off and you're in a merging drink brand, I'd probably say go with a good regional broker because they're probably going to only have 10 brands and they can probably nurture your brand.
But we definitely live in a different environment because back in my day, you would have a broker and they would stay with that broker for five years.
We definitely are in a different environment where people would kind of stay with the broker.
They get built with a small broker, but eventually they go to a national broker because they have national distribution.
And so, I would say that's kind of the lifecycle of a lot of these brands.
They start with regional brokers and eventually go national because again, they already have the support team and they also have the connections to a lot of the more mass or more of the larger stores.
So, they're going to get into more doors.
I don't know if that answers it.
Those, absolutely.
Those are some great questions.
Thanks for sending those.
And Darren, it was such a pleasure chatting with you today.
You know, we were able to talk about supplement trends, exactly how brands can be successful with Bristol Farms.
And I think we made magnesium sexy.
So, I don't know, I think our work here is done.
Thank you.
Yes, I want everyone to do a post night, which is like sitting next to and caressing a magnesium model.
I'm going to do that.
I'll take my natural calm and then post a picture.
Well, thank you so much for joining us today.
It was such a pleasure to have you.
That concludes another episode of the Community Call podcast.
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