830 Brad Neumann: Co-Founder & Co-CEO of Saint James Iced Tea

26:00Kara Goldin:This episode of the Kara Golden Show is brought to you by LinkedIn Hiring Pro. Hi, Kara here. For small businesses, every hire matters, but so does your time. I felt that pressure firsthand. You know, a bad hire isn't just frustrating, it's expensive in time, money, and team morale. And yet hiring the right person can feel like a full-time job on top of everything else you're already doing. Sifting through applications, trying to spot the real standouts, second-guessing decisions, it can get overwhelming fast. That's why having a way to save time without sacrificing quality isn't just nice to have, it's critical.

26:44Kara Goldin:Luckily, LinkedIn Hiring Pro is built for that reality. It's your hiring partner designed to help you hire with confidence by surfacing only the right candidates without turning hiring into another full-time job. Posting a job isn't always the hard part. It's finding, connecting with, and screening the right candidates. Hiring Pro streamlines the entire process from drafting your job to shortlisting candidates and conducting AI powered interviews for initial screenings. Their updated conversational interface lets you describe what you need in plain language, no recruiter jargon needed. Nearly 60 % of hires find a candidate to interview within a week.

27:26Kara Goldin:With Hiring Pro, you spend less time searching and more time connecting with the right talent. Join the 2.7 million small businesses using LinkedIn to hire. Get started by posting your job for free at linkedin.com slash Kara Golden. Terms and conditions apply. That's wild. I did not know that. That's such a great story. So speaking of stories, how important do you think in building the brand are stories, right? And the kind of the backstory, obviously, you have to have a great product and a great tasting product and team and all of those things. But stories, what would you say about that as it relates to brand building?

28:11Yeah, I think, you know, storytelling is a really important part of the pitch always. You know, obviously, when you're building a brand, you've got hundreds of stories, you got hundreds of late nights, early mornings, things that you thought were going to happen that didn't happen or things that you didn't think were going to happen that happened that, you know, the 23rd hour. but you know what's really been interesting for us is we always pitch this product as everything that the rest of the industry is not doing and what I mean by that is I think you've seen a lot of things in the industry over the years with the better for you and emerging brands but there's also a increased focus on functionality right everyone has an angle whether it's a prebiotic or a protein or milk thistle or ashwagandha or this and that.

29:02And our pitch has been very simple. We're none of that. We are just good quality, clean iced tea. We import the highest quality organic tea leaves from the Assam region of India. We fresh through them here. We flavor it. We bottle it. We make it. There's nothing added. There's no synthetic. There's no this, no that. In some ways, the simplicity of our product is the biggest angle that we have in our pitch. So we're not trying to sell some overarching functionality that may or may not actually be impacting the product.

29:38Kara Goldin:This episode of the Kara Golden Show is brought to you by LinkedIn Hiring Pro. Hi, Kara here. For small businesses, every hire matters, but so does your time. I felt that pressure firsthand. You know, a bad hire isn't just frustrating, it's expensive in time, money, and team morale. And yet hiring the right person can feel like a full-time job on top of everything else you're already doing. Sifting through applications, trying to spot the real standouts, second-guessing decisions, it can get overwhelming fast. That's why having a way to save time without sacrificing quality isn't just nice to have, it's critical.

30:22Kara Goldin:Luckily, LinkedIn Hiring Pro is built for that reality. It's your hiring partner designed to help you hire with confidence by surfacing only the right candidates without turning hiring into another full-time job. Posting a job isn't always the hard part. It's finding, connecting with, and screening the right candidates. Hiring Pro streamlines the entire process from drafting your job to shortlisting candidates and conducting AI-powered interviews for initial screenings. Their updated conversational interface lets you describe what you need in plain language, no recruiter jargon needed. Nearly 60 % of hires find a candidate to interview within a week.

31:05Kara Goldin:With Hiring Pro, you spend less time searching and more time connecting with the right talent. Join the 2.7 million small businesses using LinkedIn to hire. Get started by posting your job for free at linkedin.com slash Kara Golden. Terms and conditions apply. I love it. But I think also storytelling comes in, we really lean on John, right? I mean, we're so lucky to learn from him and his experience and his tutelage and his relationships. and, you know, he built brands in a time where, you know, these billion-dollar brands were not exactly an everyday thing like they tend to be as of late, right?

31:45So, you know, he's got a lot more war stories than we do, but obviously the credibility and the experience has been second to none, and it's just been really great to kind of work with him while growing this brand.

31:57Kara Goldin:So how many SKUs did you guys actually launch with then? So we started with four SKUs. We launched with four green tea SKUs. We have since discontinued one of those flavors. And within about our first six to eight months, like everyone else, you start to get consumer feedback, customer feedback. People were asking for a sugar-free option or this flavor or that flavor. So our first four flavors were all green tea skews. And our green tea line is differentiated because it has four grams of organic cane sugar and 20 or 25 calories. Historically, iced teas are 30 plus grams of sugar, 100 plus calories, not the healthiest category, right?

32:39And so we, you know, have a big point of differentiation with those skews. And then we started to get the request for a zero sugar line or, you know, other flavors. So it was only about a year in where we launched our black tea line and our black tea is zero sugar, zero calorie. Right. So that's how we started to differentiate. And for a very long time, we had three green teas, three black teas. and it was a mix of like new, unique, exciting flavors like mango, passion fruit, pineapple, mango, blood orange and hibiscus. But then we also felt the need to kind of give the consumer the traditional or historical flavors that they expect from iced tea.

33:19So we came out with a lemon, a raspberry, a mango, you know, those flavors that you've come to know and love when you think of iced tea. So we've got a really solid offering now with over seven skews in the market.

33:32Kara Goldin:I love it. And what is the number one one for you all? It depends who you ask. And I know obviously I'm biased because I work so much on the innovation on the flavor side. My favorite is always the newest one that we come out with. But peach and passion fruit is our number one seller because it's also been around since we started. Our raspberry is killer. our classic mango has quickly become our number one most described flavor on Amazon and then our pineapple mango does really well also but we've got a couple new flavors coming out later this year I'm drinking one right now which is our half and half iced tea lemonade which I think is our new best flavor and I'm excited to bring you to market that's a good one that's a really really good one so very Very, very exciting.

34:27Kara Goldin:So when you think about beverage overall, you've been in it, you get it, you launch with different distributors. And when you think about how fast you expand across the U.S., is there a formula that maybe you think about? I remember early on when we were first launching hint we were launching in the bay area where we live and we actually got a phone call from uh new york and from a big distributor out in new york who asked us to come and launch and we always talk about how that was like our vietnam to some extent because we had no idea how big new york was we were like yes we made it right and then all of a sudden you have to put people and marketing and all of the stuff.

35:19Kara Goldin:And so we sort of eventually grew into it, but it was an expensive lesson for sure to launch without really nailing the Bay Area first. But what has been your experience? My experience is you spend a lot of time working on the strategy and a tenth of the time throwing it out the door. What I will say is we had a very similar mindset when launching St. James. So the first thing we did was a proof of concept down in South Florida. That's where the company is based out of Boca Raton. We put it in about 350 independents, gifted all the product just to see how it would do. Within our first three weeks, we had a 78 % reorder rate.

36:03And that's when we knew, all right, we think we have something here. So then when we started to actually launch the brand in retail, we focused on two markets, LA and New York, because that's where my partner and I, where we had most of our relationships. And that's also where we hired, you know, our first first view headcount to help really manage the business. So it started out very small, you know, the Bristol farms of the world and, and kind of other, you know, small regional grocery and the rate of sale kept getting better and better. And then we felt like we were ready to expand. You know, it's funny when you talk about scaling, you tend to hear the same five or six things over and over again from other entrepreneurs who have done it.

36:51And for whatever reason, it's very hard to listen. And I remember, you know, within our first year, we got the opportunity to go into Walmart. And everyone says, don't go too fast, don't go too fast. But when Walmart calls, how do we say no? And, you know, it was a big learning experience for us because we went into, you know, over a thousand Walmarts. Unfortunately, they were spread out all over the country. We didn't really understand what execution and support was going to look like. And it was one of those things where we had to make the decision to pull out of Walmart because after that, it was about six months, they wanted to expand us to more stores.

37:30and we said, listen, we're frankly not ready, right? I mean, there are opportunities that come and it's the perfect fit. And then sometimes there are opportunities that aren't. And you fast forward to three years later and now we're going into a few thousand more Walmarts and excited to kind of build up the channel now that we've gotten our legs from under us. But when we first started 100%, it was two or three markets go deep, really deep focus and control the controllables and then start to slowly expand from there, right? Even when you start to talk about national retailers like Kroger and Safeway, we're not asking for a national launch off the bat, right?

38:09Give us a few regions, a few banners, let us show you what we could do and then slowly expand.

38:16Kara Goldin:I totally, totally agree. So you've done some pretty awesome high-profile brand partnerships with that little show, White Lotus. and juicy couture. I loved that, what I saw of it on social. Really, really cool. How do you think about partnerships? And especially when you're a brand that is, you know, new, but also maybe not new. Like, what do you think about partnerships? And is it worth it, right? And at what point is it not worth it? Right. It's a great question. And it's funny, this is probably the most common question that I get from France outside of our industry. What's the ROI for this?

39:03What's the ROI for that? And I think what it comes down to is you have to have an idea of what you're trying to get out of that partnership, right? Is it a retail-focused partnership? Is it a buzzy brand awareness partnership? Is it an eyeballs partnership? All of these things kind of play a different role in the selection of different opportunities. What I will say, going back to, again, us focusing on brand from day one, I think my director of partnerships might have been my second or third hire when we launched St. James. So we knew from day one, right, we need to get cans in hands. We want to be in front of our consumers.

39:44We want to be where they are. And we saw the value in partnerships and events very, very early on. when you look at some of the brand collaborations that you just mentioned for us it's been a key part of our strategy because you know better than anyone right when you're walking down an aisle and there's 500 options on the shelf you've got a split second to try and get someone's attention so if there's something that you can do to help make your brand stand out a little more than the guy next to you why not right just making sure that it's the right product fit. It's the right brand fit. And one thing that we're working on is, you know, when these collaborations make sense for us, really focusing on a call to action with the drive to retail, right?

40:30Like our Juicy Couture collaboration, it happened actually very naturally. We recently brought on a new creative director and she always would talk about our brand as like fun, juicy, colorful, bright, etc. And we kept using the word juicy. And at the same time, you started to see a rise in nostalgia brands from Y2K. Juicy Couture was really having a moment. So we reached out to them. We did a partnership. We launched Juicy Peach, a co-branded bottle with kind of bedazzled bottles and all that. And we launched it nationwide in Target. So I think putting the resources and the time and the plan behind something that maybe doesn't have a retail fit is a slippery slope.

41:15So for us, it's always making sure that we have a home for it and that we can kind of naturally fit it into our portfolio and our offering. Same thing with the White Lotus. You know, White Lotus was our first big collab where we officialized T of season three. So we worked with Warner Brothers and HBO, and we're very lucky to build a robust marketing plan behind that. Not only putting it in over 10 ,000 stores, but we had watch parties. We had events with HBO. We had influencer viewing parties in some of our core cities. So really making sure that we're building 360 plans around all the things that we're doing.

41:58But that would be my one big takeaway is anything you can do to catch more attention when someone's walking down that aisle and making sure that that product has a place at retail.

42:09Kara Goldin:Yeah, totally. I always call it borrowing equity, especially, you know, right. And if you can partner, especially if you're whether you're a little brand or maybe you're a brand that feels like they want to get into certain audiences or, you know, figure out what those brands are that you can partner with. And again, like do it in a way that is a win-win as well, because it doesn't make sense at, you know, crazy dollars probably, unless you can actually activate this in retail as you all are doing too. So velocity is really the name of the game. And you talked about spins and, but like, how fast do you have to get these turns?

43:03Kara Goldin:Like you talked about Target and what's your take on, you know, how fast do you have to make sure that it's moving? You also talked about Walmart and how you pulled back and now you're going back in. But when you look at that world out there, velocity is probably a newer term maybe to somebody who hasn't studied entrepreneurship, but it's an important one, right? It's the most important. That's what the retailers hold you to the fire of. Yeah. Yeah, totally. And really, it's the way that you actually expand on the shelf, too. And stay on the shelf. But that's the name of the game. So I'd love to hear your perspective on that, knowing what you know with all the different brands you've worked with.

43:56Yeah, I think, listen, this is why our industry is so challenging, right? You have to focus on building a brand and marketing. But if there's no connectivity to the shelf, it's just not going to happen. Because like you said, the retailers are not going to continue to even give you that shelf space. And they're certainly not going to let you expand it, right? Most retailers won't even let you think about displays or, you know, additional points of distribution until you hit a threshold. So when we first launched, we launched in a Tetra pack. It was a 16.9 ounce Tetra pack, recycled cardboard. Sustainability has always been one of our three most important pillars of the brand.

44:38So we launched in Tetra. And for us, our threshold is typically somewhere between about five or seven units per store per week. And when we first launched, Tetra was doing just about that. And as we started to get into the end of our first year, it got better and better, closer to 9 to 12 units per store per week, right? A case a week. About a year and a half ago, we transitioned the brand into the new packaging, into the aluminum box. And the aluminum transition has completely transformed our business. Almost immediately, our velocities just about tripled. They went about three to three and a half X, which caused a whole slew of problems that we can talk about or not talk about on the forecasting and demand planning side.

45:29But rate of sale has always been our number one goal, right? So you want to get on the shelf as fast as you can, but you want to get off the shelf even faster. So again, as the brand has gotten bigger and bigger, a lot of our marketing dollars are shifting away from, let's call it brand awareness, and more to driving trial and conversion at point of sale. So the budgets are just shifting, right? Like I said, when we first started, it was brand, brand, brand. Now, how do we focus on getting the product off the shelf? And I think that's something that our team has done an incredible job at. you know, are, like I said, as the number one fastest growing in both dollars and units for two years straight, we've got, I want to say our average velocity at Albertsons nationwide is 48 units per store per week.

46:22And we have over 350 stores that are averaging 200 units per store per week. So again, it's the main takeaway is always make sure there's that direct connectivity between everything you're doing on the brand side to how that's going to translate into retail.

46:40Kara Goldin:So, so interesting. So you're scaling this business super quickly. What's the biggest challenge that you see in scaling the brand? Obviously, demand for, you know, all of that. But I mean, it's kind of like careful what you wish for, right? It's when you get those bumps, it sounds great, But it's also it's it can be hard. Can you talk about that? A hundred percent. And I can give you a perfect example because it just happened to me yesterday. So one of the biggest challenges in scaling is people. Right. You need to find good people. You need to hire and train good people. Trust good people. Right.

47:23The larger you get, you can't have your eyes on each and everything. you know about a year and a half ago we had nine full-time employees so we all wore a lot of hats we're pushing 50 now right so that changes a lot in terms of roles and responsibilities and it literally it just happened yesterday I was looking at one of our slack channels and you know everyone's sharing wins at retail etc and I see a name pop up and it's the first time since we launched this brand that it was someone that I didn't know. I interviewed every single employee that we hired up until, I don't know, let's say employee number 38.

48:04I wrote everyone's offer letters. I did their onboarding, et cetera. And we've just grown so fast lately. I hated the fact that there was someone on our team that I didn't have a relationship with. So I literally, I shot him a text over the weekend. We had a 30-minute call yesterday. I just want to introduce myself, get to know him, learn about him, his family, where he lives. So I think that's one of the biggest things just for me as a leader, as someone who has grown a team, is managing this scale and maintaining that, I think, the amazing culture that we're building at St. James stays where it is.

48:42In three years and almost 50 employees, we've had two employees leave the company. One was on their terms and one was it just wasn't the right fit, right? So retention has been incredible for us. I think we've done a really good job at attracting talent, which I know you're familiar with personally. But that's definitely a big, big kind of concern and call out for me, making sure that we still have this culture of, you know, no hierarchy, right? Anyone picks up the call, calls anyone, whatever they need. I mean, I'm still unloading storage units down the road. I'm still doing demos on the weekend with my daughter sometimes.

49:27And that's the one thing that kind of hit me out of nowhere when I realized that there were people on the team that I didn't know and it just didn't sit right with me.

49:37Kara Goldin:Yeah. No, I know. It's a somewhat awful feeling, actually, that first time when that starts to happen. And it's kind of like having a stranger in your house to some extent too. So I love that it's frankly easier now over the last few years to be able to connect with people. And we had a philosophy inside of Hint where you should reach out to people once a quarter and actually ask them what they do. And because we would have all these divisions too where people were not all doing the same thing. They weren't all in the sales team versus the marketing team versus the direct-to-consumer or operations or finance team.

50:29Kara Goldin:And then I found that just by forcing people to some extent to pick out somebody that you have no idea what they do and kind of chat a little bit, you also get an appreciation for all the spokes in the wheel, right? That that's so much better. And then hopefully you'll meet them live and you guys can talk a little bit more. But I think it's really, really important. So last question, we're heading into summer. Summer is so, so key for, especially for the beverage industry. What are you most excited about as you are killing it out there with such an amazing team, an amazing product? But what's next for St.

51:18Kara Goldin:James? We've got a couple things coming down the pipe that we're really excited. Like I said, the half and half flavor, we have been working on this for over a year. And it's such a core flavor for the iced tea category. We think ours is incredible. We sampled it at Expo OS and had an incredible feedback. so we're that's going to be our hero skew this summer it's hitting the market in april and that'll kind of be our our brand focus and hero skew towards the end of the summer we have our first let's call it a lime extension that is iced tea adjacent so we are expanding the offering and again it's still you know a little top secret so i can't fully discuss it but it's going to be the first time that we move beyond iced tea and we're building an incredible plan around this line of product and i think building a really really great meshing of of what that line is going to do to complement but also differentiate to our iced tea offerings um but like you said summer is you know it's our super bowl right it's it's peak selling season we are very fortunate now that We're essentially nationwide and also in Canada.

52:30So there's no excuses that you have in Q1 or Q4 where it's bad weather or you've got rain or it's cold. Everyone's even in the summer. And when you get hot, you like to drink iced tea. So we've got a lot of new retailers coming on board with May and June resets, which is going to be a big opportunity for summer. we've got some really big experiential and brand collaborations coming out this summer around specific skews and partnerships we obviously have you know festival season coming in over the next 60 days 90 days which we play you know a big hand in just continuing to bring our brand to life you know like i said we've we've done a a pretty good job at creating this brand that people want to be associated with.

53:20And I think the summer just offers more opportunities to hit different use occasions and different utilities that sometimes otherwise get hidden a little bit based on Q4 being focused on holiday. Q1 is a lot of new year resolution, et cetera. But that summer and back to school time period, that's where our whole year and our whole business really thrives. and we like I said we've got you know over 7 ,000 stores additional coming on board in the next 60 days and we've got some really really large nationwide programming with some of our key retailers happening in July and August that we're excited to support.

54:00Kara Goldin:I love it well for everyone listening be sure to check out St. James iced tea if you have not tasted it you must must must and Brad you are just killing it so I'm so proud of you and the whole team you guys are doing an excellent job and for everybody listening for the first time like I said find it get it follow them on social lots of good things are coming yeah from St. James so Brad Newman co-founder and co-CEO of St. James. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thanks again for listening to the Kara Golden Show. If you would, please give us a review and feel free to share this podcast with others who would benefit.

54:50Kara Goldin:And of course, feel free to subscribe so you don't miss a single episode of our podcast. Just a reminder that I can be found on all platforms at Kara Golden. I would love to hear from you too. So feel free to DM me. And if you want to hear more about my journey, I hope you will have a listen or pick up a copy of my Wall Street Journal bestselling book, Undaunted, where I share more about my journey, including founding and building. Hint, we are here every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Thanks for listening and goodbye for now.