Smood Sweets

0:00Oliver Sindlev: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.

0:42Oliver Sindlev: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. One of my favorite topics on this podcast is speaking to founders who are starting brands that really tap into nostalgia, but with new better for you, cleaner ingredients, innovation, and just a fresh approach to things that we all know, love, and grew up with.

1:45Oliver Sindlev:Today, I have the co-founder of Smooth Sweets, Oliver and Fred, and we're going to have a look behind the scenes of how they just launched in Target, how they are taking nostalgia into candy, but with a really sweet, cool, better for you product. And so Fred and Oliver, I'm so happy to have you on the podcast.

2:09Frederic Naayem:Thank you for having us.

2:11Oliver Sindlev:You're so welcome. I am going to jump right into it. Oliver, what was the idea, what was the white space you saw in the candy aisle that really started planting the seed for the brand?

2:27Frederic Naayem:I would say, you know, Fred and I, we've been in the industry for a while and we have been looking at the candy category. We felt it was quite sleepy for a while. It hasn't really evolved for a while. Not a lot of innovation happening. And that basically led us to spark a lot of thoughts like, you know, why is that? You know, should someone do something about it? And, you know, we see all these consumers wanting better ingredients and they want better ingredients without sacrificing on the indulgence part. And so that kind of led us to really like, you know, dig deeper into this. And we were like asking ourselves, what if candy started with whole fruit?

3:09Frederic Naayem:Like we don't see any whole fruit in the candy aisle at retail level or online. So and the people who have introduced whole fruit recently, maybe in other categories, had seen amazing success. so like for us like we really wanted to kind of start experimenting with different whole foods that could potentially mimic that traditional candy experience you know and the first thing that kind of came to mind was dates because they have that chewy gummy like center um so so like you're already checking one box there and we're like but how could we evolve this to really uh have that fun nostalgic uh flavor experience as well and we were like fred and i were going back and forth what are candies that we like ourselves um that we could potentially lean into and skittles came to mind like you know that chewy inside crunchy outside you know was was just so nostalgic and something that we've loved for ages so we're like okay let's get to work try to kind of cool

4:08Oliver Sindlev:So I know that you both have backgrounds in CPG and in food, but what was the thing that made you want to push through and get to the other side of actually founding a brand and doing all the hard work of taking this idea, making it into something real? Fred, I would love to hear just what was that motivation for you?

4:33Frederic Naayem:Yeah, for sure. I mean, you know, Oliver and I, we've been in CPG for over a decade and within the food and beverage category. So the way we initially met was actually through friends. We got connected. They were, you know, telling us we work in the same industry. We should, you know, socialize. And for a couple of months, Oliver and I had been going back and forth, talking about the industry, the different projects we were working on. and Oliver actually came to me with the idea of candy dates and he pitched it to me on the phone so I couldn't look at anything I couldn't taste anything but it was so interesting like the idea of eating a date that tasted like candy and he was like just like think about it close your eyes you have something it's chewy it's sweet but it tastes like candy I was like okay I've been doing a lot of consulting with a lot of different brands.

5:30Frederic Naayem:I had my beverage company before. I was like, this is actually innovative. You know, we're kind of leaning away from a high protein, low calorie plays on staples. And we're really trying to bring something to market that doesn't exist. So that's really what pulled me in. And after we started doing some formulation and trying it myself, you know, I was like, holy shit, like we got it. We got it. Yeah. Sorry for swearing. No, it's okay. You know, and to me, like personally, that's what excites me is to do something different that's not in the market that hasn't been done before and bringing it to people and knowing that we're really just bridging that gap of healthy and indulgence.

6:14Oliver Sindlev:And you mentioned that you had founded a beverage brand before. So you've been in the founder seat prior. What made you want to get back into it? Because usually someone is a founder, they did it. They're like, okay, I checked that box. But to get back into it, was it really the innovation or the idea? Okay. So that was the thing that got you.

6:36Frederic Naayem:For sure. Like there's a lot of pain in, you know, being a founder and, you know, dedicating your life to starting a business from scratch. So for me, it has to be a very compelling story to go all in on it. And this is what really pulled me into it, doing something that hasn't been done before, that I believe there is demand for, and that's in that better for you space. So we're really bringing something healthy to people.

7:04Oliver Sindlev:Very cool. So for Oliver, I know your background is in marketing, sales. how did you see this brand connecting and resonating with consumers? Because you also have to shift their perception of where a date could show up or why a date is a good idea for the inside of their candy. Obviously, dates are having a moment. I've had a few date brands on the podcast. I'm a huge fan myself. But what was that point of view that you had going into it of of how this brand world was going to come together.

7:40Frederic Naayem:It's funny. One of the first things you just mentioned now was where does these dates exist? And like, it's, it was a question we received from the industry quite, quite a bit in the beginning because they were asking us, okay, are you guys going into the dried fruit section produce or are you going into the candy set? And we were like, damn, like, you know, can't you, can't, isn't our packaging telling enough? But, but yeah, like and we still hear it today like from some uh retail buyers that we are connecting with like they're still asking but we have been very aligned with target from day one that you know this does belong in candy we want to bring whole fruit to the candy aisle um that is basically like our main differentiating point and um but you know from a from a whole sales and marketing and positioning standpoint like we we wanted this to be a bridge between natural and mass you know we see that a A lot of natural consumers are gravitating and implementing dates in their daily regimens.

8:38Frederic Naayem:But we have seen stats on dates becoming more and more of a household staple, like going from niche to household staple over the years. Some states more than others in the U.S., but we believe that this has the legs to go into the masses. And we are now seeing it with Target. Target is a mass retailer. We're doing quite well with them. And it's really creating a big inbound of interest from retailers, other retailers. Oh, I'm sure.

9:07Oliver Sindlev:I'm sure that's getting attention. So from the consumer side, what have you been hearing from the early adopters of being curious about trying a candy date? What's catching their attention of why they want to try it? What are some of the early feedback that you're hearing? And so a lot of people have never had them combined like that.

9:33Frederic Naayem:You know, they've had dates for their own. Some people have not even heard of dates, but like we're winning them over. And like they will probably never have a regular date again after trying hours if that's the first introduction to dates. But, you know, we're definitely getting a lot of questions and people are intrigued because we have a very fun, playful, nostalgic looking packaging and design brand feel. So that is like, you know, what wins people over first. also what fred and i we went uh hours and hours and hours on uh looking into like how can we build that connection with the traditional candy legacy candy that people have consumed for years for example we have sour watermelon flavor like what is that iconic sour watermelon flavor that people have been having since childhood the sour patch kids right so like you know could we take a render that looks like that one and put it on our packaging so people build that connection um But, but no, yeah, it, when you, when you're launching something innovative and new, there will always be education needed, you know, in the beginning.

10:35Frederic Naayem:And let me just add, my favorite thing is being at the trade show and seeing people try it for the first time because it's never what they anticipated to be. It's so much fun. And what I'd say is you really just got to try it for yourself to get a feel for it.

10:55Oliver Sindlev:And I know that the sour watermelon is your top selling SKU. So obviously this is resonating with people of understanding or looking for a flavor profile that they're familiar with, but doing or having that experience is in a totally new format, which is cool.

11:12Frederic Naayem:It's super cool. I love it.

11:14Oliver Sindlev:Yeah, Oliver, you mentioned Target. I would love to hear how did that happen? I know that you went to retail first over, say, D2C. what caught the attention of target to take a chance on a new emerging brand? Yeah.

11:32Frederic Naayem:So first of all, I would like to say that, you know, even before we landed target, we, uh, always wanted to be retail first, have that approach.

11:40Oliver Sindlev:Got it.

11:40Frederic Naayem:You know, Fred and I, we have had, as you know, have been involved in other brands before and we felt like we have a pretty decent understanding or playbook on how to, uh, um, how to go about retail. We had good relationships there that we could leverage. But yeah, Target came about in the most odd way. We had just gotten some samples that we liked from our formulator. We wanted to sign up for sweets and snacks to kind of get the direct feedback from the industry if people were liking it, if there was a future here. And we signed up. We weren't quite sure if that was a good idea or not because we were definitely not ready with a retail product or to take any orders in.

12:22Frederic Naayem:but that ended up being the best decision we ever did. We sampled more than a thousand samples in those three days in Indianapolis last year in May. And Target came by our booth four times with more and more people from their teams. And they were in our inboxes before we left the show saying, you got to launch with us.

12:39Oliver Sindlev:That's incredible. So they wanted you to launch with Target.

12:44Frederic Naayem:With them. After trying it. We talked to them at the show and we said, listen, this is not ready yet. We're thinking about launching in Q3 or Q4. And they're like, do that with us, please. We like this product a lot.

12:56Oliver Sindlev:That is a really cool story. Okay, so Fred, when you got that inbound email, I'm sure being the ops person on the team, you're like, okay, how do we make this happen, right? Because the marketing people, we are the big vision. We know how to get people excited. But then we always need that ops person to like bring us back down and say, okay, this is how we're actually going to launch it. So what did that look like of getting ready for such a big launch right out of the gate?

13:30Frederic Naayem:So step one was to push the launch date because it was just, no, it was like they wanted the product, they wanted it ASAP and we wanted to please them, right? So, you know, we don't want to jeopardize the relationship. We want to make sure that, you know, when we do deliver it, That the product is, you know, at a place that we're confident and proud to put out there. So there is that, right? There is doing benchtop samples and then there's doing large scale production and making sure that, you know, the quality is where it needs to be. You know, it's a lot. We're in a way lucky that we had a scaled phase in with Target, meaning we went from first 300 stores to then 2 ,000 stores.

14:19Frederic Naayem:And so what I'd suggest other founders do is make sure you get some trial runs in with your co-men at the beginning. Make sure they get dialed in. They understand how to work with your product, how to make it that you're happy with your ingredient suppliers. Everything's coming out the way that you like it. And then really press the go button. Go do the large-scale production. Things are going to go wrong. Plan for that. Um, and the last piece of advice I have for, for, for a large scale, um, rollout is, you know, make sure you have a good understanding of your cashflow, uh, because, you know, working capital is really important and it's not necessarily something a lot of people think about at the beginning, but it can put you in a really tight situation.

15:10Frederic Naayem:If all your money is like tied into product and you have to wait, you know, for the sales to hit. So, you know, getting all of that planned out is really important. And, you know, I'm lucky that, you know, Oliver and I have had experience doing that before. So we were able to plan accordingly.

15:30Oliver Sindlev:Which is huge that you had that insight prior. So that's a, I like that piece of the story too, of leveraging any and all back experience that you've had and being able to confidently say yes to an email like that and then be able to deliver on it. Oliver, is there any other advice you would share with a founder in the really early stages that has a big vision that is wants to go all in and has their eyes on target as, you know, a dream retailer from the marketing sales? Also, you touched upon educating consumers, trying something different, any piece of advice you would share with them early on that could help them lay a really solid foundation?

16:16Frederic Naayem:Yeah, I would say, and it's probably easier for me as a CEO or marketing guy, you know, but move fast because as we talked about earlier, we weren't ready to go to sweets and snacks, but look what came out of it. We were also just at Expo West. We were not ready for that either. And we were actually planning on not going. But we said, wait, it's a Super Bowl of trade shows. We have to go. And we saw so much success. So even though that you don't feel quite ready, the product's not perfect, or you have so many things happening, a trade show for us has always been a good idea. Because only good things come out of it.

16:55Oliver Sindlev:That's a really good shout out to trade shows also in our space. I mean, that's a great example of the power of showing up. even if it's not quote unquote perfect yet, how that can lead into a big opportunity to jump on. So last question is where to shop the product. I know it's at Target, but is there anywhere else you would like us to send people to to shop?

17:22Frederic Naayem:Oh, that's a lot of things we could announce soon, but not yet. You know, now it's a month or so since we came out of Expo West, we were in talks with some very, very exciting retailers. Cool. We'll have to do a part two.

17:37Oliver Sindlev:We'll have to do a part two. Amazing. But they can look for the product at your local Target?

17:44Frederic Naayem:We're in all Targets. You can order online at Target.com or via our website, SmoothSweets.com.

17:51Oliver Sindlev:Amazing. Well, congratulations on you both. What a cool story that has transpired in a relatively short period of time, a year from that first trade show. So huge congrats. Everyone go check them out at Target and I'll see you all on the next episode. Bye. Thank you so much. 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.

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19:38Oliver Sindlev: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.