Retail Strategy: How Emerging Brands Secure Retail Shelf Space

[00:00:02]all right we can go ahead and get started so Mark and Shannon over to you guys um would love a quick intro from you guys and um we'll let you take it away all right well thanks for having us Peter I appreciate it uh so hi everyone if you haven't met me before in one of the previous calls I'm Mark Santos um I work at the neelon company I've been here for uh almost 18 years now um completely dedicated to helping emerging Brands like yourself um get a foothold in the marketplace uh very passionate about that and um that is the reason I stuck around for so long because I I want to see you get into uh a store and I'm not as so much interested in trying to help craft sell another pallet of mac and cheese so that's why uh I'm still in the space trying to help you out all and um got a whole team of people behind me to try and help you out too so when the time is right let's make sure that we connect awesome Shannon hi um I'm Shannon Herer and I'm the category manager for the wellness department at Metropolitan Market um that includes uh supplements as well as body care um I've been here for just going on three years now um we've grown our Wellness Department from an aisle into a destination which is really exciting um and I guess that's part of what we're going to talk about here today is is how we get products um into the department but how we keep them successful and what partnership really looks like and um yeah here to answer all the questions that's great so that's what I was thinking about um when we were brainstorming with Peter and I I don't know maybe two months ago now I thought wouldn't it be great to have someone like Shannon Join one of these calls and talk about uh how you can get into the store um if you're only direct a consumer right now and what it takes to stay there so I think that's the general direction we're going to today but I'll start off by saying um 18 years ago the first client that I ever had um she had been a lawyer and was just completely disenfranchised with it wanted to jump and get into something she was passionate about so she made some really good granola and uh walked a bag of it into her local store and said to the store manager I would love to be on your store shelf like what does it take and so she she found out pretty quickly that um you just don't go walking in the stores you know your local store and hope that the store manager pick you up so I think that was like the the Genesis of this conversation today so so Shannon if you were there talking to that individual that had walked in and said hey I want to get onto your store shelf how would you have directed them from that point um I mean I guess the I would probably keep it pretty General but I would just direct them to the category manager that probably you know it's serial granola um got them in touch that way and then it kind of depended if they had more questions from there but if somebody walks in with a Ziploc of granola it's going to be a very different conversation than If somebody walks in with a bag that has a UPC on it so um I mean I I feel like the people we're talking to today probably have upcs so um a higher level conversation um from there yeah gotcha so if it was somebody that was in your particular category um let's say we might have somebody on the call like that today that is in your category and they're interested in getting into Metropolitan how would you direct those those type of people um I mean the first thing that we really do is um you know have them obviously send us what we call a sell sheet right I want to see the product I want to see where price points are I want to see what your case packs look like um are you in distribution are you direct right what are those options there um I want to see ingredients right that's really important to me and I'm pretty sure it is for my colleagues as well especially uh how the market is these days um and people paying attention to what's in their products um I feel like ingredients are left out a lot um I would probably start there and usually it's um if I'm interested I ask for samples right I I really like to try everything that I bring in it's super important whether I'm trying it or I'm giving it to a colleague to try and give me feedback or a family member or um team members in the store um these are real people right that are out there in shopping and I want to know what did you think about the packaging did it speak to you uh you know what do you think about the price point what do you think about the ingredients how did it taste what was the texture how did you use it right did you understand uh what it was for when I handed it to you or did we have to did I have to explain it to you right did we have to have a conversation about it that's also super important um so we definitely start there with the live samples after that um and then if I have questions right I go back um to whoever the contact was I usually have a lot of questions um sometimes it's about packaging um you know recently I had a hydration brand that approached me and I just wasn't getting it you know right off the bat it didn't it just wasn't speaking to me you know what's different what's different about this and so I reached back out and said you know I didn't really enjoy the experience um but am I using it wrong and I I was right and so it wasn't super clear to me and so they were able to clarify that for me and then my feedback was well we need to talk about your packaging then because if I don't understand and this is what I do all day long right and I've been in this industry forever um and I'm highly educated in in this world then your average customer who's just walking by staring out shelf they're really not going to get it right um and so that brand actually took the feedback um seriously and they re they're redoing packaging right we talked we had like a a really awesome aome like hourlong call and we really just pulled it apart um and talked about um you know some unused real estate on the front of their packaging uh they had a QR code that's great but you're going to lose a lot of customers who are maybe 40 and above right who also have a lot of money in their pocket and are looking to to spend it uh they don't know what to do with a QR code right so there's there's an a disconnect right there so you need to shout it at the front of your package so we talked a lot about packaging um and then I mean it just it's like snowballs from there right if the packaging is right if the price Point's right then we start talking Partnerships we start looking at um you know what what's margin you know looking like do you are you prepared for promotions are you prepared to partner um with fees and ads and different promotional vehicles and um a lot of times that's a big conversation not a lot of brands are ready for that right away so yeah that was my experience with my my first client too you know obviously she did she didn't have a UPC code I did have to send her over to gs1 to get that set up and then you know of course packaging was an issue I don't think it was a ziplock bag but it it wasn't much more than that um so when you're would you say that those those handful of topics that you just St you started there are like the most common that you just have to get out of the way in the beginning when you're meeting a new brand that wants to get into Metropolitan yeah I would say those are those are the standard ones um a lot has to do with um sometimes you get stuck on like case packs right or is there a free shipping minimum um you a lot of the structure isn't always there uh they're trying to sell me what they would sell to a distributor right and like we order in 36s and I was like yeah that's not going to work with my stores right that's that's that's how you're selling to a distrib uh if we're going to go direct it has to make sense for me right like um there are a lot of retailers out there that have gone to distribution only which I think it's kind of unfortunate because a lot of small Brands aren't ready for that right they're not ready to pay those fees and uh it can be really expensive and um complicated to work with a distributor especially right out the gate so um I like to keep it open to direct um but it's got to make sense so I need a free shipping minimum that makes sense I need case pack that make sense um I think we had mentioned like freef fill right are people ready for freef fill you know does everybody know what that is it's free product right um on to get yourself on on shelf it's kind of like um it kind of helps pay for the labor right to get old product off and get the new product on so not everybody's ready for that um and then and then yeah promotions there's a lot of conversation around promotions and that you have to spend some money um to get things going and that's really um really mandatory right like it's just not going to organically happen I mean sometimes it does but that's not really a great plan for success and we don't want to just leave it to chance like oh I hope somebody sees it on the shelf so you really want to get in front of people's faces you want to get offshelf or check stands um in an ad in some other vehicles that we have like a savings book um but you've got to be ready to take those stops and spend some money um to get that traction and get that repurchase rate and get um into people's hands demos also um are back up and running um since Co has chilled out a little bit um it's critical if you have that type of product for people to have that either you know taste experience or sensory experience um without demos uh it's it's really hard sometimes just depending on the price point to get uh the first purchase so demos definitely as well yeah and and I'll say this for every audience question yeah so just bouncing off of that Shannon um we have a couple questions here related to to freef fill and opening offers that sort of thing so I'm gonna kind of combine both of them into one but um for folks that are new of the space could you just kind of help describe what freef Phill is why retailers um ask for that what the purpose is and then the second part part of the question is if you're a new brand what are some Fair expectations in terms of discounts promos prefill expectations Etc to get in the door and not just be in the door but also move off the shelf as well yeah I mean I'll just kind of speak to me I know that grocery Frozen and dairy is a little bit different um so free fill is free product on either we usually call it first case or first order for each skew for each location so it's a one time it's like a slotting fee but you're just taking it off the invoice of actual product instead of paying a fee um what that really does on our end is it takes the product that's going away off the shelf and gets yours on the Shelf so without freef fill we don't have room right the freef fill is what makes the room for the new product um and if you're not willing to offer a free fill it's really it's just much more difficult um because people are beating down the door right to be on the Shelf that's that's what you know the game that we're playing here so um I would say it's super important for grocery Frozen and dairy it's usually one case free right so whether it be a case of six or 12 or four whatever it is um for wellness it's a little bit different a lot of items come in eaches so I do what's called 3 plus three which means uh I pay for three and you give me three for free or 50% off six if it comes in or a case is 50% off so um because our price points are a lot higher usually over in Wellness so it's just seems like a more fair option over there um there is some negotiation depending on the brand and that's kind of just uh discussion by discussion right one-offs here and there um it all also depends I think on how interested am I in the product how excited am I how small are you um what kind of partnership are we developing um what other um promotions are you going to be participating in so just that strong partnership and seeing that we're both in this together really helps in that negotiation piece um if you're trying to do maybe two plus two right we do that a lot too um sometimes it's like okay we can do 30% off the first three it just kind of depends so but three plus three is my standard um that that I'm looking for um and then you had said what other um like discounts like that we're looking for in promotions what's what's call it like a good plan for a brand that's coming to you to kind of already kind of have in mind in terms of promo plan discount depth that sort of thing so I would say bare minimum what we're looking for is one promotion per quarter um and and I I would say I'm looking at especially in this day and age and and how the economy is I'm looking at 25% off um is is kind of really the bare minimum I we used to be able to get away with 20% but it's not really speaking to people the same anymore I really am not seeing the velocity that I used to see um I really like 30% I see the most turns on 30% it's the most oomph um Brands usually get the most success with 30 and above um of course I love to see a BOGO a buy one get one free that's always fantastic um you know the higher the discount that we can get um and I will say I pass my discount on to the customer um some departments and some other retailers they hold back a percentage and that's just how they do their that's how they do their structure and um that's definitely something that you want to ask upfront is if they pass it all on to the customer so you guys kind of know where your money is going going I think that's important um I try to be as upfront as I can about where fuse are going um and so for me that's also negotiation piece is if you're small but you're really out there to win it and I believe in your product and you're willing to give me a higher discount to the customer and I will negotiate on fees like ad fees and savings book fees um because I just want the brand to be successful so um I would say quarterly 25% though is is definitely bare minimum and um you probably want to be ready to invest in demos uh when you are on promotion during those uh whatever time frame in the quarter um in Wellness the I like to see month-long promotions as well um ads are usually two weeks long so grocery Frozen and dairy sometimes you can get away with a twoe promotion um but in Wellness I like to see 30 days uh as the length so great yeah we have more questions rolling in but we'll pepper them in throughout so I was just going to make a comment that I want everybody to know this is what Shannon's talking about is not unique to Metropolitan either this is industrywide and it varies from retailer to retailer depending on what their individual agendas might be so she mentioned another term there that was about slotting fees so that is another way that they um charge they will charge you in order to get the product off the shelf you know they got to change the labels they got to have the kid out there putting up the new labels and then loading up your product too so that's all part of this game as well so one question along those lines Shannon that again kind of reverts back to my my first customer situation was she thought she could just walk into the store and maybe be on shelf in like a week's time but in a modern situation like we're dealing with today um when someone finally gets your attention let's say that's let's count that as day one on average how long does it take for the product to then actually make it to the Shelf if they do everything right it's like chef's kiss amazing um um I'm going to say it really depends um we have category reviews which are um we have a calendar that we share with our vendors on our vendor um portal link and it tells you which month we're reviewing which categories um we give you deadlines for when your paperwork is due um and then usually let's say so let's say you present outside of category review I mean it could be anywhere from one month to four months it just kind of depends on what else is going on what else whe what other projects we have going on are We opening a store are we remodeling a store how big is my current like you know slotted category review um during category review if you get in right on time or a little bit earlier right there it's uh 90 days usually until the reset happens and that's when we pull the old product and put all the new products slotted in um and seasonality too I have lot of seasonal products and it happens a lot faster because I don't want to miss a window right so but I I would say um yeah I would say anywhere between one month and and four months is probably what you want to be ready for gotcha so not overnight defin no there's a lot a lot of work that goes into and I think too that um you know part of my job as a category manager specifically for wellness is um you know I I create a program right a plan for the stores to follow and in order for these plans to get put together it takes a lot of time um they have to have a heads up right the whole execution piece for them um so even four weeks is a pretty fast turnaround to get it to happen the right way Goa so once once a brand gets on shelf with you in your in your category what are what are your basic expectations for them throughout the duration of their time in store uh once they're on shelf um I really like engaged Brands right like I like to hear from my Brands when when Brands just great I got on the shelf and they disappear I get really worried right you can't just set it and forget it you have to be really active um I like to see inore support I think that's really best case scenario I know that not all brands have local um reps or Brokers but I think that's probably something that you're going to want to be ready for especially as you grow um calling the stores is great if you don't have local reps um but just being really engaged with me checking on the brand checking on movement right I can share movement with you um and a lot of times I I'm not keeping always the closest eye right especially after a huge category review I I wait till my 90 days and I see what's going on just depending um so if you're asking for movement it gets me looking at stuff and then you're you're more likely to get feedback like oh hey that's not really going the direction that we want here's what I think we should do right and then we can start that conversation of next steps better steps um hey I know that you had um turned in that contract for 25% I think we should really move it to 30% you know do do you think that we can do that um and so I think that that engagement piece is um is just crucial to success because you never know right if it's going to take off the way that we had planned um yeah that's yeah perfect do you wantan you want to funnel a question Peter do you want me to keep going all right yeah let's do it so um you know we had a question around how uh you can funnel information back to a brand that may not selected for a review um is it normal to provide feedback to Brands what's a great way for a brand who may not be selected to approach that conversation I think you know often times Brands say hear crickets or they just get a no response but um how can Brands kind of capitalize on that opportunity to continue moving forward and make it a learning opportunity yeah I would say I hear often it's that um they don't get feedback and I love to give feedback but sometimes we get really busy as category managers we just have a million things being thrown at us at once so I would say if you don't get feedback and I just say say hey thanks you know we're going to pass but please make sure that you know you submit again in the future if you want feedback I would ask for it uh you're not always going to get it it depends on who your category manager is and just what their their personality and style is but if somebody comes back and says hey would you mind just sharing what you know what it was then I'll stop and I'll take a couple minutes and I'll share if I haven't already given the feedback um if it's a brand that like I said like I'm interested in I think there's something there but there's something missing then you know I initiate that conversation and say like hey can we talk about this um because I want to see how willing they are to you know how open they are to change and discussion and future um or saying like hey well I know that you just bought like 10,000 units or 100,000 units of this current packaging when you're getting down to the bottom and you're looking at you know redoing it could you reach out again you know because because I'm definitely interested um but yeah I would ask for it I I mean I know that it's hard to get feedback um so there just will be a lot of crickets I think so when you do get feedback um I would definitely take it to heart for sure um and yeah ask I would ask for the conversation right if if that's really important to you um and see where you go from there speaking from the sales side being on the other side of the desk from Shannon I will say you don't get a lot done if you don't ask so so definitely ask I I've gotten some great feedback but um never would have received it had I not had you know the opportunity to ask for that after a decline um I'm just going to add real quick for folks that are asking questions um Shannon has provided a a document that's gonna guide guide everyone through hey if you do want to get in touch with Metropolitan Market and Shannon specifically here's some of the required info expectations the right way to go about it included in that is some of the answers to some of the questions we're seeing around you know specific expectations on margin trade expectations those sort of things so just in in lie of that that kind of keeping that in mind we're going to prioritize questions that are a little bit more holistic in nature that may not be answered by that document um and if we have time to kind of cover some of the other more specific ones later we can certainly get into them but just know that if I'm not answering a question or not asking a question here um keep an eye out for the email that we're going to send after the session um either this afternoon or tomorrow that will include a link to that document that may answer some of these outstanding questions as well so I when when we set this up and we were talking you know last month and I was most curious to hear um some of your insights about the best things that you've seen brands do um when they're getting on the shelf and then staying on it and then some of the the the no no like the oh just cringeworthy thing so I wonder if you wouldn't mind sharing a couple of both so that we can help them be better and avoid some of those pitfalls yeah um I think you know we covered it a little bit but just the brands that are super engaged they're always checking in with can you give me you know um a followup from the promotion that we just launched with right how did it go did it meet you know they're asking me to meet your expectations is there something better that we could do um and I think um brands that pivot very quickly um that are able to be flexible with their plans um especially if things aren't going well or if they are going well if something worked really well beyond their expectations well let's keep that momentum going right and I think um sometimes Brands will say oh sweet that worked we're good we're set right we don't even have to touch B for three months um so I think it's just the brands that are hyper Vigilant um and you know treat every shelf they're on like it's gold right because every shelf matters and um each Community right matters um because you have a different Shopper at each store at each neighborhood at each city um so you never want to lose that momentum that you've gained right Traction in in a certain store retailer um pitfalls a big one that I see is when a brand starts making Headway and they drop their broker they think oh good we got there we got through all the the hard you know the red tape we got on all the shelves want to be at we don't need the Reps anymore and I'm always like I used I come from that world you know um between being a buyer and here again I was a rep for a very long time and um it just pains me because as a category manager the level of store support that I see that matters it's a lot right having a local brokerage that is building that relationship when you're too busy right you're busy talking to somebody else you're talking to Whole Foods or on or whoever it is so your attention is pulled elsewhere so you need somebody with local roots who's going to be popping in oh did the promo tags not go up well shoot they're going to email me and say hey Shannon why aren't tags up and I'll be like oh let me check with POS um so you want someone who's keeping tabs on everything and you know if you are a brand founder you're out there trying to make big leaps right so you're not able to micromanage at the store level and see if tags are up in every single metk market location um you know are you able to see oh this store hasn't ordered in the last 3 weeks that's not on par with the sales I see that's interesting do you guys need an order let me pop in can I write an order can you approve it is your person out with covid that's been happening a lot and so the brands that have local people on the ground they can do that they can fill the shelf right and so keeping that momentum going um so I think just yeah making sure that there's somebody with local roots is super important um what else um I also see sometimes Brands where things are a little rough and so they say hey we're going to cancel our promotions and I'm always like oo that's going to make it rougher I don't think that's going to make it easier for you um I think it's more I would rather have the conversation of okay times are hard for us we need to kind of rest strategize what's the most bang for our buck right hey Shannon here's what we do do have what do you think we should do should we consolidate should we pull these and do the savings book instead should we pull the savings book and do more tprs um and I like having that conversation because I'm probably the best person to tell you where you're going to get the most bang for your buck at Metropolitan Market in my department um so I like to have that opportunity and instead of just at the end I'm like whoa that didn't work out and then it's sad right because they end up getting discon continued an offshelf when there might have been a plan to get out of that um so again I mean I guess for me it's it's a lot about communication a lot about communication because it's always about planning and strategizing for both sides yeah that's what I'm always trying to tell our clients as well that you know this when you're starting to work with retailers and category buyers like this is a true partnership this isn't like you said before a set it and forget it type of situation you know you are both there to to please a consumer of a product and give them the best product they can get for the money and it's important that to keep those lines of communication open which kind of leads me into this next topic which really is about maybe maybe we could started out by saying from a percentage standpoint how much of the planning um do you expect to come from the brands versus you pushing to them to say I want this much promotion or I want you to do a demo versus them bringing it to you and saying hey Shannon this is what we've got for you I think it kind of depends um how new the brand is right to retail if this is their first rodeo I'm more than happy to hold their hand on the way through it but once we've gone through the process and I've let you know the expectations and I've laid it out and they've helped you get there then I would hope that they're on top of it themselves um you know it's it can get frustrated when you have a brand that's been around for a while um and they're not you know they're not responding to my emails you know reaching out like I'll do broad emails out and say hey guys here's a program that I'm working on I think this going to be really successful for all the brands participate here's the details here's what I'm offering here's what I would like you to come to the table with here's the deadline for um you guys to submit um you know for how you want to participate let's have a conversation right and I'll put that out to everybody on my vendor contact list and then you have big brands that it's crickets and it kills me because I'm like you know it doesn't matter how long you've been around um there's always something new there's always something fresh and if you're not continuing to participate it's not going to work out you know some of the biggest National brands that are huge with us they participate in everything they reply yes to all my asks how you know how much how B what which page and I know that you know some smaller Brands will say well that's about money but it's not always because again we can have that conversation it doesn't have to always be Deep Pockets I just want to see the motivation I want to see that you guys are interested in succeeding um and how you can push the brand to the next level um yeah gotcha there's P there's just 10 minutes left do we have more questions that you want to get mixed in from the crowd or should I just do yeah well let's let's I might stealing your thunder a little bit here but there's a couple questions in here around um Shannon like how how you look at your category and what data you want to see from Brands whether that's survey data of their own consumers demographic data um panel data point of sale data so I guess that might be stealing some of Mark Thunder here with some of the questions but I'd love for you to chat a little bit about what's the data that you're looking at where are you getting that but also what what data do you want to see from brands espe especially maybe firsttime brands that may not have a lot of time in Market they may not have a lot of point of sale data what are you looking for from those Brands as well um so yeah I I guess it depends on where they're starting from if they're starting from scratch and they're not even direct to Consumer they're just starting out Fresh then I just go on gut right I go on gut feeling I go on um past maybe similar items or flavor profiles or scent profiles or price points and we just kind of go from there we'll talk talk it through um um if they have been online then I definitely want their rankings from online um sales it doesn't always translate but it gives me like I said like a good starting point um to see what we're working with um if you have already been in other retail doors I like to see National and Regional data if that's something that you guys have um because again I like to get a feel because California and Washington not always the same Shopper right um same with Washington Oregon right I like to get as hypers specific as we can I always ask what other retailers are you in what's rankings there right like what's the top sellers there um it's kind of just whatever you have I want to see it right whatever the data is that you can get me um so just throw it at me and say hey here's what we have what would you like to see or I've attached it all you know and then I can view it as I want um we have a data team over here it's a new team for us and you know we just partnered with with Neilon IQ um to get a lot of a lot of data um that we're still working on um so yeah I mean I'll kind of take what they can get just depends on what they can get their hands on really good good segue to to plug neelon because neon's also partner with start of CVG and if you're a brand in the community if you haven't already you can log in to Biser through the startup cpg link and get a a couple free reports which can be very useful in some of these conversations the other thing I would point out is you know buyers like Shannon are looking at neelon data whether you're bringing it to them or not and it's important for you to make sure that you're communicating with neelen to make sure that your products are accurately categorized represented in the system um so whether or not you are at a point where you want to be buying that data it's important I think for you to be working with neelen to make sure that if you're on shelf somewhere that data is being accurately represented because if you're growing you want to be discoverable by buyers um in that data you want you want to be kind of being surfaced um in the data that they're looking at um I I'll bounce off that question if it's it's okay to ask um you know what are good metrics for Success that you're looking at when you're looking at pulling Products off the shelf to make room for others um is that is there always a bottom perform that you're eager to get rid of or often times are they there a lot of mediocre performers and you're looking to to add something that's more strategic based on incrementality or um a new offering that might be a little bit more unique how how are you thinking about your category in that in that regard it's kind of all of the above and it depends on the category um sometimes I'll go to do a review and I'll be like there's no bottom dog here okay so and then I'll be looking at what's new what's new and exciting um is there something more exciting than I already have um do I have a lot of similar items right if I if I get rid of these two but I still have these two options is it going to be good enough for my customer does that make room for something new and fresh um but yeah I mean you know the easy way is like wow these are just underperforming by Leaps and Bounds um I will look at um those items within its own brand as well as against the category and and competing it items as well and so sometimes it's a full brand gone sometimes it is more just chity picking within and saying um and this is where the partnership comes in too is hey I want you to know these three items are really underperforming we've given it a really good go and it's just not it's not working um do you have anything new coming right is there anything fresh uh do we need to fix the mix do we have the wrong skew assortment here did did I choose these four but these other two suddenly bump up because who knows what happened um so I like to give Brands an opportunity um instead of losing shelf space to fix the Shelf space if you will so that's an opportunity as well um yeah uh what else um yeah I would just say yeah redundancies underperformers um and then yeah just what's fresh and new right like let's just mix it up or the whole categories under performing um do I need to cut the category down you know does another category need to grow exponentially with with space um and then yeah it's it's just making those decisions from there based on space as well so you're not always just stuck with I've got two feet sometimes you've got more so absolutely yeah um just as a as a note we do have the time until 3 o'clock I believe Pacific Time Shannon is that still good for you yeah got we've got plenty time to get through some more questions so if you have questions outstanding feel free to throw them in um I've got one more then I'll kick it back over to Mark I'm sure you've got a bunch more Mark um but you know we see this question quite often in the startup cpg slack Community uh but what are some good ways for brands in the community to engage with category managers if they're from a new or smaller brand we often seen see range me mentioned do is that a way that you use to discover products do you do much product Discovery or is it more of on a basis of who's coming to you actively um and what is a good way what's the right you know way to reach out to buyers for the first time assuming that information is not easily accessible on the website because I will say you going to annoy buyers if there's obvious information on the website around how to submit and it's not followed so with that in mind all of that in mind what are what are good ways for Brands to stand out and engage with with category managers and buyers um are tools that you'd recommend are there is there a way a language that you'd recommend um I mean I've used Range me here and there I think it's it's a little bit less strong for my for my department and the quality that I'm looking for specific to Metropolitan Market right for my customer um but I know that a lot of those um those sites are growing and I do I do go on them and I do look around um I'm always on the hunt I do this 247 whether I'm at work or not I'm always looking at product um I'm reading articles um you know looking at uh trade magazines online you know trade things um I'm going to other retailers I'm on Instagram um I'm on social media I'm asking my friends what they're using um I'm just always digging around um but yeah I mean you know I always see stuff that's um new to me just from people submitting so on our website we do have a link um that says you know are you looking to contact or to get your product right in our store and there's a link it goes um it will find its way to the right category manager absolutely um and I would tell people there's a form to fill out and if you actually fill it out it gives us a lot more information to go off of sometimes people just put like their email address and I'm like I don't know what you're selling me right I don't have time to go digging around so those forums just come directly to us um you know please put your website if it's on there because I'll go dig around and see what's what I'll read reviews right from customers um yeah um we don't love it when samples are sent without a conversation first we get mountains of samples that are already uh what we would call like approved samples um so as as great as samples are um I would still say Reach Out start the conversation and make sure the category manager is interested we don't want to waste your time your money your product your shipping um if if we're not ready for it or uh if we're not interested or it's just not going to be a fit for the store so um you know definitely make sure that there's um a level of interest there for that sorry was there another part to that I think that's great Shannon I'm curious you know like along those lines about how you're identifying products like to what extent do you or other buyers at Metropolitan use trade shows like traditional either walking um like inperson shows I know Co has been a damp around that but then you know there's also ecrm which is partnered with range me who have an in-person version of what rang me does online to what extent do you use any of those vehicles um I would say that as a company with category managers we use those a lot um you know I don't usually attend a lot of those shows because they're not really as specific to my department um I tend to go to a bit more Indie shows like um like this this weekend I'll be flying out to LA to go to a clean Beauty Summit right um so a little bit outside the norm there um but yeah I would say the majority of my colleagues they they do ecrm they do the UNFI shows they do um we do some online um shows I'm going to tell you they're difficult the online shows um are very kind of hard to navigate and um they haven't been as successful as I think um we would all hope them to be um so I'm hoping Hing that yes we're getting back in person Expo West and Expo East absolutely super important um I know it costs a lot of money um so it's definitely an investment something that you have to plan for but um I live for those shows right we have a lot of amazing conversations meet a lot of amazing Brands there's even you know brands that are just walking around outside introducing themselves you know met some awesome people that way um it's so yes I would say that if you can invest in some trade shows right do your homework make sure that it's really you know like-minded people attending because there's a lot of different shows um but I definitely think they're worth it yeah yeah and if you are considering either of the Expos anybody you've got to plan well in advance yes you know when I was attending maybe 10 12 years ago I remember the sidewalk might have had one or two tents on it outside and now I mean it's just lined you know and they're they're spilling the show spills over into the adjacent hotel ballrooms I mean it's like for for us it's we treat it like the Super Bowl of the year really because it's so there's so many um decision makers there yeah yeah I'm gonna shamelessly plug as well we will have a big event at Expo East neelen is going to be the proud title sponsor of that event as well so we will be releasing more information on that in the coming weeks uh but keep an eye out for that it's going to be Thursday night of Expo it's going be a ton of fun um and a great way to just get together as a community but potentially Shannon you're invited maybe even meet folks like Shannon um and we you know Expo is a huge Focus for the industry huge Focus for our community uh we'll have opportunities similar to what we did at Expo West if you went to the event to highlight some of the earlier stage brands that are really hustling who may not have a booth uh we're going to have a backpack Brands exhibit at the event as well um so keep an eye out for all the information it'll come in the next couple weeks but certainly an event not to miss yeah I saw that comment pop up real quick at the bottom there and I'll just address it quickly and say that you know there's as Shannon mentioned there's a lot of different trade show types and so you want to make sure that you are matching up what your product who you know what it is who it is and in the consumers you're going after with the type of trade show that you go to so you know Expo East and Expo West are very uh natural and uh healthc conscious type of shows so um that also kind of circles back to what she was saying about your packaging to make sure that if you've got that going on you want to highlight that and and really call it out because if I remember the stat R CH I think the consumer has less than seven seconds to make a decision when they're standing there looking at your product and and you've got to help sell it and that's what Shannon wants to see too and Expo any a trade show is another Avenue for you to do that sort of thing as well yeah and I would say those trade shows too um they're they're a great way to start that dialogue right you get a lot of eyes on and a lot of feedback right there right at your booth as well and side note I I mean having gone to it for so long I've seen um Brands go to the show Just In Search of acquisition to be honest with you you know the bigger folks are walking around looking to see who they're going to snap up because it's the latest new trend and they they're looking for that acquisition so there's there's a lot of things going on there mark do you have any other top M questions I've got a couple we can continue to run through no go for it I mean I I do want to shamelessly pitch all the free data I have available to help these Brands um at the end but yeah ex okay great well real quick before we get to that let's um so we didn't plan this but Shannon we got a question about what makes a good cell sheet and the question included a link to a sample sell sheet now this isn't um one that I don't I don't think this would be in your category because it's a snack product but if you're open to I can still give you feedback it'd be fun to to throw up the the sample um cell sheet that's here it's like shark tank with a category yeah and get get your feedback on it in in the moment um and things that I think would be helpful to kind of highlight would be you know obviously what what's good if there's anything bad about it you know what what could be improved and then for you what kind of makes the an ideal sell sheet something that's a leave behind whether it's something that's geared toward you or the store associates um what is it that you want to see in a Cell sheet from a brand yeah so yeah it looks like so I can definitely see case packs um I will tell you that I I I like having a UPC uh for each item um I definitely um I sorry it's a little hard to see so forgive me but um I like to see wholesale pricing on there um um I I want to have everything in one sheet right um if you're selling it to me and it's and I come from this world sell sheet it should all be right there I want to be able to go back like oh yeah I just saw those or I'm thinking about it and I want it all right there so I know that right this one's packed it's got the nutrition fact which is great it's got the the master case packs which I like um but I definitely I want some wholesale pricing on yeah I want UPC and wholesale pricing as well yeah um I would say to depending on if you're in distribution um adding in your distributor codes as well um sometimes depending on what we're doing I know some and my colleagues too will just go into like our portal and we'll look at our own pricing right um because we get volume pricing um so that's another way for us to to just get a lot of information up front and sometimes that leads to interest or not interest right right awesome I'll make a quick comment on this too also from a characteristic standpoint you can see that this is gluten-free non-GMO vegan straight away and and those are all attributes that we collect from your packaging and report back out in the information so that's important for a bunch of reasons but the number one way is it makes it easy for someone like Shannon to pull up our data and she can pull something like let's say she's looking to add a vegan product to her line she can pull category data and say I just want to look at all vegan products and then she can go evaluate their performance in in a matter of minutes to see who's shining like a star and so she could consider bringing that on into Metropolitan awesome segue to talk about the data that's available I Mark I'll let you kind of take it away on that but I will say just as a user of neilen advisor um data the data that I've been able to acquired through them has been tremendously impactful for both how I manage my business with the retailers how I think about my promo plan how the the effectiveness of that how I think about my pitch to folks like Shannon um as well as how I think about you know the Innovation strategy for the brand and where we need to go so I'll plug that as a user it's a great experience especially the soft Landing you get through some of the free reports available through startup cpg um the neelon team is exceptionally helpful as well well and I'll let Mark kind of talk about what's available yeah so I think I I want to start by level setting about the way that this used to be it used to there used to be a database and you could pull some Excel numbers out and then you had a bunch of numbers in front of you had to make heads or tails of and with all the different hats that you're all wearing it makes it difficult to carve out that time to do that because you've got a million other things that are that are seemingly more important but a year ago we created an everyday analytics type of platform that is extremely easy to use it is meant for someone who's never touched Data before so it's not complicated and you know that's I think that's what Peter was Al alluding to but also I would want to make sure that everybody understands that you're not out there to just have to go with alone either you know I've got a team of 40 plus people who are all sitting here clamoring to help you because they have that same passion that I do right they want to see your products get on shelf and for you to live your dreams and and expand and meet all the goals that you set forth and so we while viser is meant to be a platform that has all this information and you can it answers very easy questions like if I wanted to gain more distribution what would be the best store for me to go to you can click two buttons and that that platform will tell you um it answer it builds um what we call stories so while it will produce raw data for you you can get a category review out of it and it's it will cover everything from what that category looks like like where it's growing how it's growing who the major players are um it can focus on your brand versus competitive Brands it's 10 slides long very easy to read and better the best thing about it is you don't have to put it together it's already there you choose your category you choose your market and click a couple buttons and uh within about two minutes time you'll have a full category review so you know my Shameless plug here is that this is not how it used to be for those of you who have been around a while and for those of you that might have heard how it is I want you to know that it's all very easy to use and it's meant to be intuitive and there's there's a resource center in there so if you have a question you can go there it has a chat bot that starts out as a complete fake person but within two clicks you can get to a real person that works on my team in less than two minutes typically between eight and five um and then of course there's there's me there's the phone number we're all here to help you and I really mean that I want you all to know like the whole goal of my exist and my team's existence is to help you and so please take that help because we through startup cpg we are offering free data um beyond the free data we have an opportunity to just do Project based work so let's say that that you are interested in getting into Metropolitan Market for about,000 give or take we can pull one report out of it that's specific to Metropolitan Market on your exact category that you're trying to get into we can show you all of the competitors all of their price points how much they're selling it on promotion when they sell it on promotion what's the price point I mean just like a myriad of information that Shannon would love for you to have so you're that much more informed about the category when you show up in front of her right so we can do Project based work all the way up to full access and I will leave it by saying that it's never been more affordable we have changed completely changed the pricing structure and and the best example that I can put across is when I was working with that brand 18 years ago she wanted to see what the total United States looked like for granola every single store we tracked to get a sense of if I gained 1% market share how much how many millions of dollars would I make right well 18 years ago that report cost $4,000 for just one Excel spreadsheet that she had to analyze and make heads or tails of right well now with Biser and the tiered pricing that we have if you are just getting into the market and you're in a tier one you can get everything you could possibly need ongoing access to all retailers not just Metropol like we're sitting here with Shannon for as little as maybe $800 a month so when you get to the point where you're starting to gain Traction in the marketplace you're going to find that you need to have this information in order to help you and I want you to know that what I'm doing is not selling $100,000 packages um you know the whole goal of US changing the strategy is to to try and help you and we want to grow with you and I'm going to put my money where mouth this so reach on out to us we really do want to help awesome thanks Mark and thanks Shannon again for the time today um if you are registered which you had to be in order to attend you're going to get an email uh tomorrow probably tomorrow morning um with just kind of a recap of what we talked about today but also links to everything that we're talking about here um I'm going to drop the link to Biser one more time in the chat to everyone as well as Mark's contact information Mark hopefully that's okay um of course and please don't hesitate to reach out to them um I will say I've definitely taken Market as word that it's uh they're there to help and I've certainly maybe stressed that a little too much sometimes but their entire team is super helpful and very very eager to help any of the brands that um are in startup cpg so you'll get an email with more information on that you'll get an email that email will also include some of the information Shannon has shared around best practices and how to engage with her team specifically um and if you have more questions jump into the slack uh throw your questions in the sales Channel or any of the other relevant channels and we'll do our best to make sure that they get answered um thank you guys so much for the time you're welcome thank Youk you us the platform thanks Shannon yeah thanks thanks guys bye bye