Hello, and thank you for joining us.I am Melissa Travers, Director of Community here at BevNET & NOSH, and I am pleased to welcome you to The Nombase Podcast.Don't forget to check out nombase.com, BevNET's platform for the CPG community, where you can find our partner directory, press release hub, and episodes of this podcast.Today on The Nombase Podcast, we are digging into a question that so many CPG brands wrestle with.Are trade shows like Expo West really worth it?This conversation was sparked by a thoughtful LinkedIn post from Scout Brisson, CEO of non-alc aperitif brand De Soi.She was reflecting on her experience at this year's Expo West.A few months out, we wanted to hear what De Soi got from the show, how they measured the return, and what factors helped determine whether attending a trade show is the right move.Joining Scout are Troy Bondi, co-founder of pasta sauce brand Saws, and Sarah Yankee, COO of luxury home and body care brand Homecourt.Each guest brings a unique lens to the conversation from post-show ROI to how brands are deciding which shows align best with their goals and growth strategies.So Troy, Scout, and Sarah, again, thank you all so much for joining.This is going to be a fantastic conversation.I'd like to start off with some intros and Scout, please, let's start with you.Tell us a little bit about yourself and De Soi.As you shared, thank you, Melissa, for having me on.I'm the CEO at De Soi.So we are part of the rapidly exploding non-alcoholic space as the trends are pretty insane.People are drinking less and less by each generation.We make non-alcoholic aperitifs that are all functional for the buzz without the booze.My personal favorite flavor is our spritz Italiano, which is a non-alcoholic aperol spritz.The brand was co-founded by Katy Perry and the award-winning distiller Morgan McLaughlin, actually back in 2020.Then we launched the brand in Jan of 2022.So I come from a little bit of that startup meets corporate world.I started my career in management consulting at McKinsey before getting earlier stage in the venture space at M13 as part of their incubation team.Then right before De Soi at the beginning of COVID, starting my own business in the better free snacking space.I'm definitely really passionate about making, selling products that are wellness focused and make us feel as good as they taste, and really fun to be part of the world of CPG.Well, De Soi is certainly one of the hottest non-alch brands out there.So clearly, you are doing a fantastic job.Troy Bondi, co-founder of Sauz.Let's hear from you a little bit about yourself and the brand, Sauz.Thank you as well, Melissa, and I'm Troy Bondi.I'm a co-founder of Sauz.We're a new generation of pasta sauce in grocery, really bringing innovative on-trend flavors, and what we feel is a cheeky, fun, dynamic, and disruptive brand to a set that in our mind needed some innovation.I launched the brand in 2023.I was a sophomore in college, and I'm a first-time CPG founder, so I'm learning the hard way, but it's good to be here.Excellent.Well, thanks for joining us.Last but certainly not least, we have Sarah Yankee over at Homecourt.Sarah, please tell us a little bit about yourself.Hi.Thanks for having me, Melissa.My name is Sarah Yankee.I'm the CEO and co-founder of Homecourt.This is a luxury home and personal fragrance brand that I started with Courtney Cox, best known as Monica and Friends.We launched the brand D2C in 2022, and we now have seven fragrance franchises that are available in three product categories.Home, so think of surface spray, dish soap, candles, room deodorant, body and personal fragrance, including hand wash, hand cream, shower gel, and body butter.Then recently laundry, which includes our laundry concentrate, our linen spray, and our laundry fragrance oil.Prior to Homecourt, I did work in the beauty industry for many years.I was a brand manager at L'Oreal in luxury fragrance for brands like Victor and Rolf, and Perlman is a schooler.So I bring a lot of big corporate beauty experience to now a smaller startup that's innovating in the fragrance category.Also certainly Homecourt and De Soi have public figures as co-founders.So it'll be interesting to hear how that might change the game with trade shows a little bit later.Well, again, thank you so much, Scout, let's start with you.I'm dying to know.You know, first of all, what goals did you set for Expo?And did you achieve them now that we're a few months out?Our number one goal is to be memorable at Expo, which is so much easier said than done.I think all of us know that this is, I mean, the space in general is incredibly crowded.And so when you walk onto that floor and it's like every booth has a tote bag and every booth has a, you know, built out production and every, I mean, we were in hot product section, but you go into some of those larger halls and you're like, wow, even more space doesn't help you necessarily be more memorable.I think more granularly, you know, we definitely set goals around setting up retailer meetings.We set goals around delivering samples.We set goals around just even as a team, how we wanted to show up.And I would say we definitely hit all of those.I think the ROI piece of the equation is something that I will have to tally up still in months to come, because I know we'll talk a lot about cost of trade shows.But that's the one piece where I think we'll probably need more than two months to be able to measure what returns came out of the show.Well, since you mentioned it, let's certainly talk about cost.You can't calculate the return if you don't know what the investment is.What if you don't mind me asking, what was the total cost for you at Expo West?Before travel, it was around $65,000.I broke this out in the LinkedIn post a little bit, but there's a significant cost to that.I think about 40,000 of that was just in booth production alone.Then of course, since it was our first time actually having a booth, we had some discount fees for the exhibiting space that you pay natural products.Then the other add-ons, so merch, product, gosh, the setup and breakdown fees were really sneaky.I remember seeing there was like a $7,000 charge to have a hand wash station at the booth, and all the other electric setup, all of that.It was like, holy cow, little surprises kept popping up along the way.Because the Expo team doesn't help you with setup or breakdown, do they?No, I think you can pay.They have labor that you can pay for through them, but it's definitely something that you have to figure out on your own.Yeah, and then luckily for us on the travel piece, because that can really add up too.I mean, our team is based in LA for the most part.So we were driving back and forth every day from LA to Anaheim, but hotels, I mean, I heard of somebody who booked a hotel and it was like $1,300 a night because it just gets so bananas there.So that definitely wasn't a huge part of the equation for us, but I know it can really add up for teams that aren't LA based.Well, I've certainly never been in a hotel in Anaheim that was worth $1,300.So that's really egregious.Well, thanks for breaking all of that down for us.Will you plan on doing Expo West again next year?Well, this is the craziest part of the whole experience, which is they're asking you to sign up.I think it's the Thursday of the show.They're like, okay, do you want your booth for next year?And there's a long line to sign up.So you basically have to make that decision on the spot.I don't know if you all saw, but there was the Belgian Boys tote bag that went bananas on social media around Expo.Obviously, I had a post kind of breaking it down cost wise that went viral on LinkedIn.And I feel like the amplification and eyeballs and press opportunities and inbounds that even come in through some of that amplification becomes this lesson in it's not just what happens at the show, right?It's how you turn it into a bigger story and a bigger part of your brand and your marketing story.But yes, we are signed up for next year.We definitely got caught up in all of the excitement from the show.And I think we'll get into it more, but I'm definitely seeing a lot of value coming out of Expo West.I think Troy, the first thing he said when he joined our pre-interview call was that De Soi had the most memorable booth at the show.What did you do to create that, to create the goal that you had of being memorable?Well, we definitely were looking at Saws' booth from last year as a reference point because we wanted to, I think, I'm sure I won't speak for Troy, but it was really about transporting somebody into a world.What does the world of De Soi look like?Some of the earliest iterations were the team came and they're like, hey, what do you think about?It was like a bar.I'm like, oh, that's not interesting enough.That's not a strong enough story.Then they started to go down this Cafe De Soi.Our brand has certainly French DNA in the name.It was really about what does it look like and feel like to be sitting at a Parisian Cafe and how do we through aspects of our brand that are really powerful, which is our color blocking and our colors, bring all of those things together.I would say just some of that uniqueness around not just taking what you already have on your packaging and turning that into a booth, but really focused on how do we transport somebody into an environment that feels like the brand.It sounds like you were able to create an atmosphere that was engaging for the attendees, for them to come and interact with you.What was it about your exhibit that you think was able to achieve that?Oh, yeah.I'm like, maybe I'll ask Troy what he thought.He thinks it was memorable.I mean, it was quite a production, I will say.Like I mentioned in the intro call, it was just, you're right.It was like teleporting to a different universe and like the medium of experience is De Soi's product, right?And so I think it amplifies the trial.It amplifies like the understanding and learning about and becoming immersed in the brand.And it's not forgettable.I mean, I think what Scout, you all did so well, was that you were almost able to control the narrative.Like you became part of the narrative.Buyers, I'm sure, went home and spoke about De Soi.You know, the media wrote about De Soi.I think being a part of the memorable expo recap is something that only a production, like what you all had done, can achieve.And so it just, end to end was the experience.Like it was every element of, you know, visually being able to see and step into a Parisian cafe.And also then, you know, that lifting the experience of actually sampling and trialing product and not forgetting it, right?So something about the entire production, end to end, was it was just special.And you could tell it was well thought out.It wasn't pieced together.It had been meticulously planned, right?And that was clear to, I think, everybody who walked by your booth and who experienced it.I do just love this mutual admiration society so much.We're going to have to go toe to toe every year from here on out, Scout.Troy, let's hear from you and Sauz.So that your team ended up walking Expo West this year, but clearly had an amazing exhibit last year.Tell us a little bit about that.Yeah, you know, I would say, you know, this year, primary goals were really to spot trends, to study booth tactics.We felt like it was a low pressure networking opportunity to potentially support building long term relationships and really reconnecting with industry friends.I think we used it as a chance as well to capture content, to engage with brands that we've never engaged with.You know, we had Sauz costumes that our marketing team were wearing, Sauz jars that were running around the show.And I felt like, you know, timing was for us, you know, we were in a phase this year of really refining the business, refining ops, polishing brand positioning.We weren't launching new SKUs.It didn't feel like we needed or had the opportunity to make Expo a brand moment with a new SKU, with a new launch.And so I felt like walking for us made the most sense this year to focus on these high impact conversations without the demands of really managing a booth.And yeah, I think like I mentioned, the tough part was experiencing the FOMO of seeing a booth like Scout's and seeing the excitement from everybody engaging with the De Soi team.But at the same time, there's a lot of value.I think we achieved our goals and we walked away with new contacts that we hadn't had prior.And we did, yeah, I think it gave us a unique perspective in refining our vision for Saws' next phase of growth.And I will say, I mean, we'll be back next year for sure.It sounds like attending a show like Expo West might not only be about the retailer deals, but it sounds like there's also a team-building component to it as well.Totally.I think so.And I think uniquely, it was one thing.And given we've gone back to back in our first year exhibiting and our second year walking, I think the difference was, you know, the first year felt like it was always, it was stressful, right?Putting on and ensuring that you're executing on a booth and operating a booth and cooking pasta and serving, it's not easy and it becomes incredibly stressful with the team.It was definitely a breath of fresh air to be able to walk the show, to get to know my team even better.I think as a new brand, we had two new employees, two new team members at the show who, I don't often, we're a remote team, I don't often get to spend too much time with them in person.And so really getting to know them, creating content, just enjoying our time, meeting new people, sampling product.It's definitely an amazing team building opportunity.And I think, you know, operating a booth, you get to learn a lot about your team when it's stressful.But I think you really get to enjoy your team when things are easy and you kind of get to step back and enjoy the show.So it's, I would say it's an amazing, on both ends, whether you're exhibiting or you're just walking, getting the team together in person, at least for us in a remote environment, is second to none.It's so much fun.And will you be exhibiting in 2026 or walking?We will.We'll be exhibiting.We just signed a booth.We're excited.I think what we missed and kind of like I touched on is being a part of that narrative.I think building awareness and establishing credibility, more so like you'd mentioned than just buyer meetings and looking to win new accounts.I think like what Scout had mentioned, the value is almost immeasurable.It's not about orders.It's about momentum.It's about visibility and its relationship building that you really don't otherwise get to experience.Excellent.Actually, in one last question, do you lose any points by not signing up the year after you've exhibited?Is that how it works?You lose preference.The existing exhibitors have preference on location.Transparently, with rising costs to exhibit, I think there's more available space than ever.I think a lot of brands are being priced out in many ways.But I remember last year, actually, and the year prior, when we looked, it was near impossible to find space.This year, it was a little bit easier for us, but we don't have any preference given we didn't exhibit last year.So we did have to wait in line, and we were in the back of the line.We decided late that we wanted to exhibit, and there was nothing left in Hot Products, so we had pretty much a bad booth location somewhere else, and we were betting on getting off of the move list.And it's a little bit like game theory where you have to prioritize.You're only going to get one option if you get off the move list.You can't say no to it and wait for something else.So that's why we ended up with a larger booth size than probably would have been ideal for our budget, because we were like, well, we think we have a better chance if we go a little bit bigger and we can afford it even if it's a stretch.So there's just also a little bit of dynamics around, even if you can't get the best booths, usually the natural products team is really helpful and like, hey, something will open up, but advising you on how to make it successful.I actually have a question about that if that's okay.Do you guys have to submit your booth designs to get a location assigned?No.No.Okay, because I know and I can talk a little bit about this, but sometimes if you gave this grand concept that is so memorable, I was wondering if that helped you get moved even more.Sarah, is that something that you've seen in beauty before where you have to show what you're going to do?Yes, definitely.That's more on the trade side of a lot of the trade shows in beauty are more retailer driven.So for example, Alta will have their own FLC Field Leadership Conference.That's a huge trade show.Or Sephora has a General Managers Conference.There's also Beauty Advisor Trainings.And you basically build out these trade show booths, but for an internal group.Still thousands of people, but that's kind of what happens in beauty.There's also customer facing trade shows such as BeautyCon or Sephora.Alor, Best of Beauty had one as well.And yeah, I remember in our retailer market meeting, this is back in the L'Oreal days, you would have to have your booth pitch before you'd even be allowed to say, okay, we'll give you a spot in this trade show.And the costs that are associated with the retailer shows where you're talking to their teams, what are the costs like for those opportunities?Definitely the booth build out cost.Because I haven't been at these in a few over five years, I do not specifically remember like a location cost, but there's definitely, you were talking about labor earlier, usually at, especially in Las Vegas, for example, there's like unions where you have to use the hotel's labor, which is usually higher than if you did your own.So lots of red tape, I would say, but I don't have the specific cost from those shows unfortunately.But I definitely remember spending similar to what Scout was saying on build outs, for sure.For something like the ALTA show that you were talking about, who attends those?Is it any employee of ALTA?It's typically their field leadership team.So like management of different regions and zones of many, many stores.So, and ALTA has thousands of doors.So it's whoever is kind of like account directors or store managers at a higher level.And then definitely the C-suite team, all of the corporate team.And then it's the brands who are working the booth as well as usually the C-suite of the beauty brands themselves.We talked a little bit about how you and Homecourt don't exhibit at Expo West.Certainly, they have a kind of a greener cleaning products section and Homecourt would certainly fit all of those guidelines.But you choose not to exhibit there.Can you tell us why is that?We did go to Expo West's events in 2023.So we launched in 2022 right before Expo.Wasn't even on our radar.2023, we had heard about Expo West.And at that time, we were still mostly in the home category of cleaning.Surface spray was our number one skew, but hand wash, which is technically in body, was becoming our number one skew.We did get invited to an event that was a private event for celebrity founded brands to network and have meetings with buyers.So we said, oh, absolutely, we'll go to that.We drove down, my team member and I drove down to Anaheim.We had a 15-minute fireside chats with about five buyers in specialty grocery.We didn't really think it was the right fit for the Homecourt brand, but we were like, why not take the meetings?One meeting did turn into something.We actually are at Plum Market on an end cap in, I think, at least three of their doors, and that's like a specialty luxury grocer in the Midwest.We're doing really well in terms of independent accounts.They're in our top five for sure.But as the brand evolved, we're definitely focused more on positioning ourselves as a fragrance and beauty brand.We are in Nordstrom right now in the beauty department.We're at Blue Mercury, which is a specialty beauty store, and we will likely be expanding to an Ulta or Sephora in the future.Grocery, well, we love our Plum Market team.We have a beautiful presentation and it's a point of discovery.I don't see us necessarily going deeper in the grocery channel, which is why we wouldn't put all of our eggs in the Expo West basket.But I like to say the phrase fish in a barrel.Expo West, Anaheim in general, it's fish in a barrel during that Expo week.So I remember not only did I meet with the buyers, but I also ran into a bunch of consumer investors who were down there, said, hello, we went to the Google's after party, which was like the epic celebration of Expo.I saw other founders, other suppliers that I work with, like loved to network and interact.And I think it's smart no matter what industry you're in.If you're in Southern California and you can, like Scout said, you can drive home to LA that night, you might as well go to Anaheim that week and see who you bump into.You mentioned celebrity founders, certainly an aspect of Homecourt.And I'd be curious to hear from you and Scout, how do you decide when to leverage the visibility of someone like Courtney Cox or Katy Perry at a show like Expo West or at other trade facing shows?How do you decide when it makes sense to bring them on and when it doesn't?Scout, I'll let you start because you did exhibit.Yeah, I'd say it's actually not that dissimilar to how Sarah was describing her decision around Expo West.We're a non-alcoholic beverage product, but we're served in an alcohol setting.Our first couple of years at Expo, and this is part of the reason we waited until 2025 to actually exhibit was a lot of our buyers, our wine and spirits buyers who weren't going to Expo West because there's no alcohol at the show.Coming back to the Katy part of the conversation, I think there's a ton of value, of course, and have Katy on the floor, generate more of that buzz, create more of that story, get people, attract people, and be the thing that people are talking about.But really where the rubber meets the road is how can we get buyers even more excited about the brand and be able to set up meetings and convert those meetings into distribution.For us, it's really always been about who of our buyers are going to be at the show, how do we make sure that if Katie comes and she's here for a few hours, that both the time can be spent with buyers as well as being by the booth and having that kind of press moment.And so I'd say we were on the fence about it for 2025 and ended up being like, well, let's just do the exhibiting thing this year, get those meetings ourselves, and then think about it again for 2026.So I think a lot has changed in the category in terms of, I mean, for instance, like our Sprouts Buyers, we chatted with and met with at the show, and those are the Wine and Spirits Buyers who were there walking the floor.So now I do feel like the audience is there.And so it's just about, again, like creating that moment to make sure that you get all the bang for your buck when Katie's time is just so valuable.Does it make a difference to buyers when you have Katie Perry sitting there?It makes a difference to everyone.The star power, the charisma.Oh my gosh, we had her, yeah, we had her do a surprise jump on a Zoom with a buyer and she was wearing these cool rock star sunglasses.And it was just, it was truly seeing the buyer be starstruck.And I'm sure Sarah, you've seen this too, but it's like, you just can't underestimate that excitement and connection that you get to create with the brand through moments like that.Yeah, I agree.And I think it's great to just continue to leverage the celebrity really strategically.So like, I bet that the, and my assumption would be like that Zoom was probably even more impactful than if thousands of people met her at the exhibit.So I think like it's, I think that the truth is, and I know, because Scout and I are friends, so we talk about this a lot, like Katie and Courtney are both super involved in our brands and our products.They're really passionate about it.Courtney literally will prove our packaging artwork and move our logo up and down a millimeter.Like she's truly involved.So, and we really like for our partners to see that side of her.So, but for us, that definitely means more intimate moments, one-on-ones.We actually, another thing we did, kind of similar but a little different, there's a summit called the WWD Beauty CEO Summit in Miami every other year.It's like Expo West, but without a trade show, I guess, in the sense that it's just like all CEOs and investors and retailers from beauty companies coming together for a summit.And we took the time, Courtney and I attended, Courtney spoke, and then we did private meetings or semi-private meetings at like the hotel bar with a bunch of buyers and that made a big impact.So, I think these celebrities, our celebrity partners are door openers and like it's from because Scout and I also have amazing products that keep the customers coming back in high quality products.I don't think we need to lead with the celebrity.It doesn't matter, you know, what the celebrity status is.If the product itself isn't good, it's not going to work.Well, that was so interesting.Thanks for that.Troy, are you expecting to pay about the same as Scout for next year's Expo?I know she said that she, you know, you probably got a bigger booth than you had wanted.Is it about the same?Yeah, you know, I will say our first booth, which was a 10 by 10, cost us about $35,000.And we expect to do a 20-foot booth next year.And we budgeted just about what Scout, actually, a little bit more than what Scout had spent, to be honest.So, you know, it's definitely a tough one to swallow, especially as a young brand, right?As a new brand, it's never easy.But again, and, you know, Scout, I'd be interested to hear, and we can, of course, talk more about it.But it sounds like you feel it was entirely worth it, right?And that's my hope.So we'll see.Yeah.I mean, someone said to me once, which I don't think is always good advice, but that you have to spend money to make money.And I think there's, I think there's like a timing component to this.Like Troy, you hit on that earlier, where you were like, we didn't have a new product.We're refining the brand.You know, we're not doing a launch.Like, it's, it's really about, like, a moment in your life.And like, again, we had, we had two years where we walked the floor and did, like, a little itty bitty stand at our broker's booths for, you know, we spent $5,000 on that, just to be able to be at the show and tell people, hey, come try our newest flavor.And so I always think that I'm like, it's like a moment in time.And you just think about, okay, for us again, whether it's like, be memorable at the show, get the retail buyer meeting set up.Same thing as you, Troy, where it's also like, you want to meet other brands because collaborations come out of that and you get that FaceTime.And I feel like everybody's all about partnerships and the value that that can create.So yeah, I definitely feel like it was worthwhile and that's why we put the money down for next year.I think all of us felt like we'd wished we'd exhibited, right?Walking was great.We had a lot of fun, but it was missing that magic.Like that something about exhibiting, just it's so memorable.It's such an amazing moment as a brand.We had so much fun year one exhibiting and we felt like there was tons of buzz.Everybody was talking about the booth after the show.In Cameron's pants.Yeah, exactly.I know.I've got to wear those.I think we didn't regret walking and skipping out on a booth, but I think if we had exhibited, I wouldn't have regretted that either.And that's why we're going back next year, right?Well, I didn't intend for this to be an advertisement for Expo West, but if you're listening, call me up.I don't know.Hopefully, maybe we'll get a better booth location now.Yeah, right.We're like, where's our second timer discounts?I have another question, if that's okay.I was curious, what percent or how big of your marketing budget for the year are trade shows?Is it like a third?Is it a 10%?And what else in your worlds do you spend marketing on?I mean, this is the biggest trade show expense.The other trade shows that we participate in are primarily distributor shows, which as Melissa and Troy, we were talking about the other day, Table Talk.You actually don't want to do a big production for it, which Troy was telling us he made the mistake of, and I'll let him tell that story.I think we end up spending, again, travel and everything, including shipping materials, like $5,000 for those shows.Maybe we do, with Keihi this year, we're doing two, we did one UNFI show.You just want to make sure you have enough distribution centers actually opened up for those to make them worthwhile.But it ends up not being like, okay, so call out $15,000.So maybe it's about $100,000 a year on trade shows.It's not a huge percentage of everything else that we're spending on.K-media, stuff like that.Yeah, for us, we do a ton of liquid to lips activations and making sure that the product's out there.So even just in the month of dry January for us, I think we spent nearly $20,000 in just getting product into people's hands, which was a lot of money for us to spend on that.So Scout, for any folks who aren't familiar, the distributor tabletop shows or shows put on by the distributor, the UNFIs and the CAHES of the world, and they have the retailers that are serviced from their distributors, and it's more of a tabletop, a very minimal exhibit, and you're actually writing deals on the floor.Scout, what are the other trade shows or trade-focused events that you have lined up for the rest of the year, and how do you decide what those should be?So we, I think we only have one more trade show actually lined up for this year, which is the CAHES show in June in Chicago, and that's really their winter show.And we have, we have, last year, we launched our first limited time flavor, St.Moritz Mule, which is obviously like very holiday winter focused Moscow Mule.And that will be a big push for us and just getting placements for that at that show.We did the CAHES show and UNFI show earlier this year, and we actually also did bar and restaurant in Vegas for the first time.So we, because we go through both, again, routes to market in both the alcohol world and the non-alcoholic world, we've kind of tested both waters.I'd say we've found in general that the distributor shows are worthwhile.Again, as I mentioned before, you want to make sure that you have product in DCs to make it worthwhile.But we also will have a bunch of this is this is a little bit newer to me, but we have a big partnership with Southern Glaciers that just launched or is in the process of launching right now.There are 28, 29 states that we're in with them.For every state, there's going to be a million tabletop shows that we have to choose from.That will be more as we go and as we see which states are the biggest priorities for us and what our team schedule looks like.It's really about, again, what's the cost of participating?What, for those, what revenue do you think you can generate coming out of it?And what kind of deal flow do you think you can get?And sometimes, and this is probably more so in the case, I would say, of our Southern Partnership, you want to show up to show them that you're showing up, right?We are investing in this partnership and we're going to spend the money to be there and we're going to have somebody from the team there.And it's a show of muscle and force.And how did you decide to exhibit at the Chicago Cahee Show versus any of the other regions?That one was because we'd done it before and we, honestly, we made a lot of money from the show.We sold a lot of product.And I think that's the biggest thing, right?Is like, a bar and restaurant wasn't so productive for us earlier this year in Vegas.And so we look at that and we're like, hey, we won't do that next year, right?Like, we're going to wait until somebody gives us a reason and tells us, oh, that show was amazing for me.You really need to do it.Whereas if we have a lot of success and we did the show last year and we're like, great, we're going to run that one back again.Sarah, what events do you have lined up for Homecourt for the coming year?We are going to be doing a pop up in New York City in October, which we're really excited about.It's going to be our first like build out.That's just our own.Typically, we've done pop ups and events before in someone else's space, but this will be our own space.So in general, we're a fragrance driven brand.We're primarily D2C.Last year, 90% of my sales were digital between D2C and Amazon.So we have a lot of opportunity to showcase our brand in real life.And we have seen when we open points of discovery, whether it's a pop up event or like an independent boutique, the plum markets for end caps, for example, we see a halo effect on D2C.In Iowa, where I have three boutiques about two hours apart from each other, I saw triple the traffic and sales from the state of Iowa on my D2C site after opening.So really excited for an IRL lift on my D2C site after these events.And then I think too, just I was thinking about memorable and how you really, it's about driving sales like Scout and Troy said, but I know at L'Oreal when I would do these shows, I would be really focused on the earned media value and the social aspect of it.So metrics, other metrics I'm gonna be tracking besides sales are going to be social followers, social engagement, how many people are posting.I know again, at my booths back in the day, we were all about what's the photo moment in the booth.We actually, Victor and Rolf had launched a collection called Magic.It's unfortunately discontinued, but we had a levitating booth where you could like take a photo that looks like you're floating in the middle of the air and all of our perfume bottles, there was this cool magnet.Maybe you guys can steal this for your booths if you want.Using magnets, the bottles were floating and spinning in the air.So it was very magical booth, but I'm excited to just to, I mean, that's not my Homecourt brand, but I'm just excited to get creative again and think about how we want to express our brand in real life.When does that pop up again in New York?Going to be in October between the 15th and the 20th.Very exciting.I feel like that is the, I mean, Sarah, just to build on that, that is the most fun part of brand building, is the physical manifestation of your brand.Yeah.And we actually don't get to do it that often, because it's really expensive, right?Like to build out production, to have, I mean, De Soi, if we're doing events, it'll be like, okay, well, we'll bring it cooler.We have a little bar that we'll set up.But yeah, having somebody to be able to like step into the world of Homecourt, I'm going to need to plan a trip to New York to see it.Yeah, I'll see you there.Troy, I'm fully expecting at next year's Expo to see levitating spinning bottles.I'm excited to measure ROI and it's a lot of fun writing deals on the floor.But we'll see.I mean, given I think there's a little bit of existing FOMO from missing Expo West that is a little bit enticing to end up at Fancy Foods in New York.But we'll see.Definitely the Chicago show in June.For those tabletop shows, I do think the strategy that goes in to figuring out which ones to go to is interesting.So why are you choosing Chicago?And do you tend to choose tabletop shows based on, you have the DCs in that area open, but you know you could fill them in a lot more?How do you decide that?We do have most of, in the Midwest at least, we have those DCs open with Cahee.What's interesting is, we just launched Chainwide with Whole Foods.And so I think that catalyzes interest, and Whole Foods is serviced by UNIFI for us.But I think it catalyzes interest with both from Cahee to fill volume out of those DCs, and existing accounts neighboring their local Whole Foods in seeing product, and I think wanting to add it to their assortments.I think the way we've been fortunate that the way our brand presents itself with bright, exciting colors in retail is hard to miss, especially in a category that we think is really dominated by these old Italian tan label brands.They're great, great brands, but we just do stick out in the best way possible in our set.And so I think there's, as we continue to gain distribution in that region, which it's a key region in our category, there's huge opportunity with Kehi to fill volume out of those DCs.So that's my hope.We'll see what happens.We had a really successful show last year, and it was a bit embarrassing like Scout had alluded to.We brought our Expo West booth to the Kehi Tabletop Show.It was my first distributor show I'd ever been to, so I didn't know what I was doing, and I just assumed that everybody brought their booths.It was terribly embarrassing.We showed up as if we were showing up to Expo West, and everybody else had banners and tables.I'll have a banner and table this year, but my hope is that it'll be more successful than it was last year, given we definitely do have far greater brand awareness in the region than we had a year ago.Well, it sounds like you achieved that all-important goal of being memorable, so congratulations.In the worst way, I think it was so, I was so nervous.I just had a question for Troy with the booth.Didn't that make you stand out more at the tabletop?It did, but it just everyone was looking at us, kind of like, what is going on?They're like, who are these new guys?Yeah.Guys who clearly did not know what, you know.It was amazing and it definitely was a conversation starter.And again, I was telling Scott and Melissa yesterday or two days ago that we, I think, generated, I think we've done more in sales at that show last year than the entire previous month or month and a half.It was a huge show for us.So we'll see what happens this year and maybe it was definitely a net positive, bringing that big...Well, also props to you for recycling and reusing because I think it's definitely in the beauty world, we would think about, oh my God, that's all this investment and you just throw it away after.So that levitating booth that we did, we ended up using it three times.So I think, and I definitely want for Homecourt's pop-up, I want to make sure we can continue to reuse it because sustainability is an important part of our brand.And I think that was my natural instinct was like, yeah, we're going to, we just spent all this money on this booth.Of course, and then I got the freight bill, I got the shipping bill and was like, oh my, we're sending this across the country again.Yeah, cost-benefit analysis.I totally agree with you.And that as much use as we can get out of that existing booth and recycling not only materials, but dollars.Yeah, well, Troy, it certainly sounds like you achieved the goal of being memorable.So, excellent job on that.Thank you so much, all of you, Troy from Sauz, Sarah and Scout, two very, very memorable brands.And I'm so excited to see how you grow those brands with your founders.Thank you so much, Sarah from Homecourt and Scout from De Soi.It was a great conversation.I appreciate all of you joining.And to everybody out there in the audience, thanks so much for tuning in.And make sure that you head over to nombase.com and we'll see you next time.That concludes another episode of The Nombase Podcast.Many thanks to Nate Brescia, our recording engineer, Ryan Galang, our live stream coordinator, and Josh Pratt, our podcast editor.If you enjoyed the show, please leave us a review and follow us on your listening platform of choice.Want to be part of a live recording?Register at nombase.com/podcast to join the conversation.You can also watch and listen to past episodes on nombase.com, and don't forget to join our Nombase Slack at slack.bevnet.com for company updates, industry networking, and community discussions.See you next time.
