Nurtured with Nature

0:00Ani Widham:Welcome to the Emerging Brands podcast. Sharing the stories behind brands you'll want to shop next. I'm your host, Kelly Bennett. I am a New York City-based brand strategist for CPG Food and Beverage Brands. In each episode, I'll take you behind the scenes of founders that are building better-for-you products and bringing them to market. it. Also, I talk to brand builders, retailers, industry experts, and tastemakers who help bring those cool products to your shopping cart. You will hear stories of real-life founders, their launch strategies, and practical advice you could use to grow your own brand or simply discover what's next on shelf.

0:42Ani Widham:And the best part is you could shop all the brands featured on the show. This podcast is brought to you by Glimpse. Glimpse is an AI powered deduction management tool that disputes and recovers invalid deductions, winning brands, thousands of dollars and hundreds of hours back to founders so that they can focus on what really matters most. If you're a brand selling in retail, go to tryglimpse.com backslash trial for 30 days free and let them know I sent you. Now let's dive into the new episode. Hi everyone. Welcome back to a new episode of Emerging Brands Podcast with Kelly Bennett. I love bringing on founders who are currently in the trenches of building an emerging CPG, food, beverage, some lifestyle founders, some beauty founders.

1:40Ani Widham:And today's founder is very much in this growing category that I'm personally obsessed with. It's bringing real ingredients to the frozen section. I've been so fascinated with the freezer section and how it's really reinventing itself as a go-to for highly qualified or quality ingredients, I should say. And I am really excited to dive into the world of frozen pancakes today. So I have Ani Woodham. She is the founder of Nurtured with Nature. Ani, I'm so happy to have you on the show. Thank you. It's great to be here. You're so welcome. Like I said, I'm really fascinated by the freezer section. I've been following it from a research perspective, also starting to work with some clients in the freezer section.

2:34Ani Widham:And I would love to first hear how the idea for your product first came to be. What were you doing? What was happening? And can you walk us through what was that white space you saw in the market? it? Sure. So I've really always been interested in health and nutrition, but it wasn't until I was returning to work from maternity leave around the same time that my daughter was starting to eat real food that I realized how hard it was to feed a family healthy breakfast and get everyone out the door on time. So these pancakes were something that I had started making actually before I had kids really as like fuel for long runs or workouts.

3:16And they're a little bit annoying to make in the mornings because you're mashing bananas, you're shredding zucchini, you're mixing the eggs. And so when I had kids, I started to make them in batches and freeze them and then just heat them up in the morning in one minute and get everyone where they needed to be. And so I was actually on a family trip with my siblings sort of discussing some different business ideas. And I think I was pushing like a cookie made out of lentils on my brothers at the time. And it probably didn't taste that great. So one of my brothers was, I think he said, like, why don't you just make those pancakes that you're always giving to the kids?

3:56And, you know, you mentioned a lot with Frozen and how the space is evolving. I was really hesitant to do something in frozen at first, because there is so many, there's so much operationally that goes into getting a frozen product from your kitchen through distribution to the stores. And there's a lot of added expenses with that. But I also knew that freezing is really the healthiest way to preserve food without having to add sugar or other preservatives. so I just said you know what this is what I believe is the right product and the right way to get families a quick healthy meal so let me go for it so that's really how I started so what was

4:38Ani Widham:your career professionally before starting the brand yes so um I usually say I started my career in tech but actually my first job was I was a page at CBS News so if you've ever seen 30 Rock I was the Kenneth working on the morning show and ultimately left that to go into financial tech. And I worked on different climate technology issues, some climate regulation, and then developing technology tools for investors to integrate climate risk into their investment strategy. So I was really focused on sustainability, which is something that I carried forward into my food products. But then for about 15 years, I was in the tech space building technology products.

5:29Ani Widham:What an interesting through line. I mean, starting with media, which is a whole other beast, and then tech, environmentalism, and how that is now connected to food. It actually all makes sense if you take a step back. You do need to consider all those elements when starting a brand. So what made you then make a shift to say, okay, I'm going to do something now totally different, CPG, food and beverage, frozen, you know, like that, check, check, check. What was the thing that really just pushed you over to want to take that leap? So I had at one point, I went to a business school program, and I was doing Saturday business school classes.

6:20And I took an entrepreneurial course, where you got pretty close to actually launching a new business. And so I realized that, like, okay, this actually is something that if you just break it down into small pieces, you, you can do it and you can start your own business. I felt that in tech, even though I was doing all this product development and product creation, I still, this was before all of the vibe coding tools, but I still felt like I couldn't actually build a tech product myself. I would always need an engineer. Whereas food was something that I could tinker with myself for very low cost, just in my kitchen at home with ingredients that I had in my pantry.

7:00And so it was something that I could iterate and tinker and really perfect a product before I had to put in any investment or work on bringing it to the market. So that's why I really moved into the food space.

7:12Ani Widham:Cool. And something that I found really interesting is before we were hitting record, you were saying how you launched with OneSkew and OneFlavor and also that you recently became organic certified. and now that you have a good steady consistent foundation for your business now you're looking to scale after three years which is a cool approach to share on the show because we usually hear the you know grow at all cost doesn't don't look at how it's going to happen just put as much as you can out into the market. So I appreciate that you took that more restraint approach for sustainable growth. But I would love to first break down the the initiative of going in a market with one skew.

8:08Ani Widham:Like what was your thought behind that? I know that you're going to be launching a second skew probably right around the time this airs. But I would love to hear your thought process of starting with one and now feeling ready to launch a new flavor? Yeah, no, that's a great question. And it's something that I think differs from, as you pointed out, a lot of how brands launched today. I will start by saying like, I'm still a bootstrapped brand and I haven't quit my day job. So that's given to me a little bit of freedom to take things slower because I haven't taken outside capital. So I'm not, I don't have the investor pressure to really expand quickly.

8:48And we can talk more about that decision and strategy, but I felt like I wanted to make sure that I got the product and my production and the financials in a right, a good place before I was willing to expand. Because ultimately if your financials are not in a strong place. You're just paying people your own money to take your product. So I didn't want to give them more product to take when I didn't have the scale with the financials done. And I did get pushback from really some retailers, because if you think about the grocery aisle and when you open a grocery door, the only way that you can market within the store is to have more products.

9:31So the more space you take up on the shelf, that is like an advertisement for your brand. So there is some hindrance to a product in frozen only having one product because a customer has to see your one product in a sea of the whole frozen aisle. But I just felt like I couldn't afford really to expand before I was ready. And so that's why I did make that choice. But I do have, when I was pitching to grocery stores, really one of the first questions they would ask is what other flavors do you have? Or can we take more flavors? Because they know that products do sell better if customers see a bigger brand.

10:08But that was just a sacrifice I had to make until I was ready.

10:12Ani Widham:Totally. And thank you for sharing that transparently because I know so many founders struggle with that of, yes, if you want to be in grocery stores, you're going to need more than one SKU. However, to get it off the ground and make sure that you are building something that is scalable. Sometimes you have to start with one, even if it means being in the local, the independents, the specialty stores. I know you were in pop-up a few rotations to really get that traction, feedback, see what's working, then being able to launch to larger retailers. And that's something that I learned actually from tech product development.

10:55We call it like an agile process where you're developing, you're getting feedback, you're iterating. So I launched with what in tech we would call an MVP, a minimal viable product. So what is the smallest thing you can do that actually solves a real problem? So for me, launching more flavors wasn't going to necessarily solve a different problem. I wanted to just get, I knew that my product was going to really fill a gap in the market and solve a problem for a lot of families. So I was confident that having one SKU, I could still gain market share because it wasn't just a Me Too brand or a slightly healthier version than something else out there.

11:36It didn't exist yet. So I felt confident with one SKU because it was so different that I could make an impact.

11:42Ani Widham:Cool. And then you just became organic certified. Would you mind walking us through that process? Because again, this is something that I talked to so many emerging founders of, if it's worth it, What does it really cost? What's the pros and cons? Do you launch with it? Do you do it later on? And I would just love to hear how you approached it. Yeah. So I have always used only organic products because that was something I felt like keeping the chemicals out of my products when you're giving them, especially to young children as a founding principle for our brand. And what there are a lot of rules on what you can and can't say about organic with your product.

12:26And what I was told by the state when they came out to give me my approvals was that you can list up to four ingredients as organic on the front of your package before you get your certification. So I would list that at first. So for the first three years, I would just, my product only has four ingredients. So I could list them all as organic on the front, but I was missing that seal that customers really look for. So they had to really be reading my packaging to understand that it was organic. And if it's a customer that's has, you know, is looking for that in the market, they're looking for those seals.

13:02And I heard from a few larger grocery stores that they really saw a difference in sales when customers recognize that seal. So I felt like, again, after three years, when I am now moving from the independent stores to some chains that it was time for me to make that investment. And I found there were two different ways I could have gone about this. One was getting the certification myself, which is, you know, multi-month process, probably like four to six months to allow for my brand to have the certification. The route that I actually went was convincing my co-packer to get their certification.

13:41You know, I sort of convinced them this is the growing market. This is, they're a startup co-packer. So they didn't have it yet, but they had the capability to do it. And so they saw that they could take more clients if they got this. And so they went through the process and now I pay them a fee to have my certification. And that's a unique situation to me, but it was ended up being essentially the same cost and just a lot easier for me.

14:10Ani Widham:No, I'm so glad that you pointed that out because, again, it's one of the things that a lot of early stage founders don't even realize that that is a way of getting the certification is through your command. So I'm really glad that you just emphasized that point. And something that you said earlier as far as being bootstrapped, what helped you feel like, OK, this is worthwhile investment? Was it the fact that it could open more retail doors, that you saw that there was data behind that sales have increased with brands once they became certified, even though you have it listed as organic? I would just love to hear more about making that investment worth it, in your opinion.

14:57Yeah, so definitely, again, coming from the text and data space, I always want to know what the data is behind these claims. So the grocery store tells me they see higher sales, I did dig in and really confirm that there are typically higher sales for that organic label. But then I also just thought about how do we shop? If you are walking down the aisle, in particular, if you're trying something new, it's a one to two second decision to try it. And if you have to really read a lot of text to figure that out, then you're probably going to skip over it versus if you see that iconic USDA organic sign, then you're more likely to pick up the product and try something new.

15:38Ani Widham:And also to your point with retailers being more open, And that's also been a strategy too of if you have the certification, it does help open more doors, especially if you're targeting the natural distributors and the better for you space. It is a way to help open retail doors. Yes. Yeah. And again, I heard from multiple retailers, just them questioning like, why don't you have it yet? Why don't you have it? And so now I can go back to them and saying like, hey, I got it. And it's just one less thing that sort of would make them say no to me. Yes. We want to get that list really short. Absolutely.

16:17Ani Widham:So now going into the rest of the year, we just finished Q1, which felt like a year in itself, but it was only one quarter. Now going into the rest of the year, you're going to have the certified organic on your packaging. You're launching now to you'll have two flavors. What is the trajectory of the brand now from this new place? Yeah. So I just got back from Expo West, as I'm sure a lot of your listeners perhaps have as well. It was my first time out there and I didn't have a booth. My product was being displayed in another booth. So I still got to make so many great connections and there's a larger distributor and two larger chain stores that I'm now in great discussions with.

17:05So I'm hoping within the next quarter or two, I will be able to launch in some of those larger stores. And really all of that was just me scouring the floors of Expo West. I went in with like three people I really wanted to meet and I wouldn't end the day until I found them. And it's been great follow up, like slow, but good follow up conversations from there.

17:27Ani Widham:What helped you approach them? Because if you're walking the floor, you know who you want to meet, Like how did you just start the conversation or just get your product on their radar, especially at Expo when it's every brand in the better for you space? Like what really helped your brand stand out? So, again, because I didn't have a booth, I was like part of this other booth, but I didn't have like all of my branding out there. So I clipped my – and it's frozen, so I actually didn't even have product out there. I just had my packaging. I clipped my packaging to my Expo West badge and I would just fold it in front of people.

18:08And I had like two taglines that I was alternating between and seeing what stuck. You know, one of them was like, these pancakes have only four ingredients or we have a 90 on yucca. And if you look, I don't know if you've used the yucca app before, but to scan products, to understand the score. Pretty much the entire frozen breakfast category is below a score of 30. So 90 really stands out. And it's something that these buyers now realize, hey, my top customers, the ones who are spending the most money are scanning products. And that's a new way that people think about buying and selling. But that would grab their attention.

18:49And you just need 20 seconds for them to say like, okay, fine, email me. Um, so it wasn't like I was having very long buyer conversations there. Um, I was just like getting the contact and making one impression and then the follow-up.

19:03Ani Widham:Very cool. What are you most excited about for the future of your brand? Um, I think that you, we're at this time where even though there's just like crazy stuff going on all over the country and the world, where I think in the food space, at least there is a lot of momentum behind recognizable ingredients. And consumers outside of those specialty health food stores are now really caring about the ingredients in their product. And they're saying no to a lot of things that they previously just blindly purchased. So they're looking for alternatives and I'm there and I'm ready for them. And coming out of Expo West, I really didn't see anyone else that I felt like was doing something very similar to me.

19:51So I'm excited about these new relationships and just that the consumer sentiment is really turning right now on processed ingredients and I'm ready for them.

20:01Ani Widham:Yes, you are ready for them. And I love how you literally, you got your organic certification, you got two flavors, you have the new contacts and like you're ready to hit the ground running. And you did all that foundational work. So the last question I have for you is for a founder who's in the really, really early days, similar to who I work with, they have a product idea, but they have not maybe even gone into product formulation yet. They're just thinking about how they want to create their brand to really stand out in the market. what piece of advice would you share with them now three years in that maybe you wish you knew sooner or something that you came into starting the brand that you found really helpful?

20:48Ani Widham:I would love to hear your insight. Sure. Yeah. Something that I came in doing that I found very helpful is really the mentality that you just need to get some sort of product in the market to start getting feedback. So just make samples in your home kitchen. You know, there's obviously when you're selling products, you need a commercial kitchen, but if you're giving away free samples, make it at home if you can, and just give it out to as many people as you can, whether that's at your book club or a school event or something, just start giving your product out so you can get little tidbits of feedback.

21:24And, or just even understand specifically what type of customer you're going to have. I think you can do all the planning and research and testing that you can in the kitchen, but until you actually get the product out there, that's when you can really start to grow. And that's when it feels real and exciting. So don't be afraid just to get something out there, even if it's not perfect. And then the other bit of advice that I wish I had learned sooner because it just caused a lot of sort of anxiety over the three years, but it's okay to take it slow. Um, you know, for a long time, I was really frantic and worried that someone else was going to come up with this idea.

22:03And I think if you have a truly unique product and idea, or maybe something that's challenging or, um, is just a little bit creative, then trust that there's a reason no one else has done this before. It's because it's your great idea and it's okay to take it slow, not rush into things and grow the product that way rather than like rushing out with so much spend on branding and marketing. It doesn't have to be done that way.

22:30Ani Widham:Great piece of advice. Well, thank you so much. Last, last question. Where can people shop your frozen pancakes? So thank you for asking on that. We are available throughout like Connecticut, New York and Pennsylvania. So we're primarily in independent grocery stores. A few of the chains that we're in are De Chico's and Carluzzi's. We're in Palmer's and Walter Stewart's. On our website, if you find us on Instagram, we list all the 20 locations where we're available. And hopefully more coming soon. I was going to say, and much more coming soon. Congratulations. Thank you again for sharing the behind the scenes of the really early days of building a brand and your insight and advice.

23:16Ani Widham:I really appreciate it. So congratulations too. Thanks. You're welcome. Thank you everyone for listening to this episode and I'll see you on the next. Bye. This episode was brought to you by Glimpse. As we know, building a brand is not as sexy and glamorous as it looks on social media at times. A lot of those unsexy problems come into play when brands start to scale in retail distribution. Founders are always incredibly excited to see their products on shelves at major retail chains, but they don't realize all the hard work that starts to begin. Retailers and distributors are known for their processes of deducting amounts from invoices.

24:04Ani Widham:Most of the time, those are totally valid. Promos, slotting fees, free fills, and all the things that brands agree to to be part of the retail experience. But sometimes those deductions are invalid, costing brands thousands to millions in fees. Actually finding those needles in the haystack though and fighting to win back lost revenue, it's a costly, manual, and time-consuming issue. And that's where Glimpse comes in. Glimpse is an AI-powered deduction management tool that disputes and recovers invalid deductions, winning brands thousands of dollars and hundreds of hours back to founders so that they can focus on what really matters most, scaling their businesses.

24:57Ani Widham:With a team of in-house deduction experts who come from some of the most successful and profitable CPG companies and custom built AI with 100 % accuracy and precision. You'll recover money that you never should have had leaked in the first place. If you're a brand selling in retail, go to tryglimpse.com backslash trial for 30 days free and let them know I sent you. Thank you again for listening to this episode of the Emerging Brands Podcast. It really means so much to me that you listen to this show, share it with your friends and support it. If you are a CPG food and beverage founder and you're ready to launch a brand people want to shop, head to withkellybennett.com for the details.