Specialty Food Magazine is the leading publication for retailers, manufacturers and foodservice professionals in the specialty food trade. It provides news, trends and business-building insights that help readers keep their businesses competitive.
Issue link: https://specialtyfoodmagazine.epubxp.com/i/691740
FROM THE PUBLISHER The First Step is to Ask SPECIALTY FOOD ASSOCIATION MEMBERS: Discuss this topic in the Solution Center on specialtyfood.com T wenty years ago, if you had a decent product and a little bit of chutzpah, you had a pretty good shot at bootstrapping a startup food business. You didn't need that much capital and you could learn the business as you went along. Chris Crocker Senior Vice President, Content & Media ccrocker@specialtyfood.com But that was when you could cobble together enough independent retail customers to build your business, and you could learn from your own mistakes. With small retailers, a minor issue was unlikely to turn a business on its ear. Today, with 82 percent of specialty food sales transacted through mainstream retailers, picking up larger customers becomes more necessary, and what once was a minor pothole on the road to building a viable enterprise has become an abyss that can consume you and your company. To rephrase the old ad- age about children, "When your customers are small, your problems are small. When they are big, your problems are big." Against that backdrop, small producers can feel very small and very alone in their businesses. Starting out, I imag- ine that many entrepreneurs share that sentiment. But feeling alone and being alone are decidedly different. You have to be independent to want to run your own business. You've pledged your home and your first-born to raise the funds you need to get up and running. You've beaten back the naysayers who said you were taking too big of a risk. So it's only that natural that you aren't eager to reveal that you don't know how to do everything you need to do. But no matter how unappealing it is to expose the gaps in your knowledge, it's far more dangerous to believe you should already have the answers. Too many compa- nies have been driven into the ground operating on mis- taken assumptions. That's why it is critical that you start asking questions. Fortunately, there is a way to draw on the collective wisdom of hundreds of specialty food entrepreneurs who have faced similar struggles to yours or are in the midst of navigating them. The Specialty Food Association's Online Solution Center is a professional forum for the specialty food industry. While participation is currently limited to SFA members, it hosts more than 800 individuals repre- senting more than 700 companies today. Discussions range from how many samples to bring to the Fancy Food Show, or where to find a remotely monitored cooler thermostat, to questions around co-packing versus manufacturing. If you post a question, you're likely to get a worth- while response from community members. If the commu- nity doesn't offer up a reasonable answer, the SFA team will do its level best to seek someone out who can help. As with many of the Association's offerings, the On- line Solution Center is backed by a number of industry experts who generously volunteer their help as a means of giving back to the industry. Even by asking a question, you're contributing to a growing base of information that can help others in the future. So go ahead: Ask your questions at community.spe- cialtyfood.com. If you'd rather ask privately, drop a note to membership@specialtyfood.com and we'll try to help. SUMMER 2016 5