July 19, 2021
The Growth Formula Not in My Book
Now please don’t tell anyone (!), but this post contains THE top-secret formula to Ramping Your Brand. OK, that was sad clickbait. But there’s a serious point I want to share today
The PGS Blog
July 16, 2021
Why the Transition to a B2C Business is Hard But Critical
So many founders, early on, get sucked into what I would call a distributor first mentality, all hail the distributor. And that is because it’s often the only way into many of the retailers that you have available to you in your local area, and
July 14, 2021
Why Public Firm Alumni Make Bad Start-Up Employees
General Mills just laid off thousands of folks, hundreds in their corporate HQ. This will continue among public CPG firms as these companies are still overstaffed in many functions, especially marketing. And despite the pandemic surge, they’ve returned to stagnancy. This Wall Street tale doesn’t concern
July 12, 2021
Working with Experts in Your Industry
If you have investors on board, you’ve already heard them suggest this or that ‘industry expert.’ Usually, they’re referring to a business generalist, an industry savant whom they know well and who can offer general strategic guidance. These ‘experts’ are not agencies in that they don’t
July 9, 2021
My Team Eats Your Lone Wolf For Dinner
This is for those out there who are just starting out and are trying to do it alone. I think you’re
July 7, 2021
The Best Shrinking Show on Earth
Anyone go to Sweets and Snacks? 6,000 did. Amazing. But there were only 450 booths. I bet 3,000 of those attendees were desperate service providers sucking wind. I’ve been to this show twice before, and they had at least twice that number typically. But here’s an
July 5, 2021
You’re a Geek. Your Consumers Aren’t. Deal with it.
Most CPG innovators and founders are geeks of some sort. It doesn’t matter if the geekiness was professional or amateurish or a committee of both. The point is that you isolated a problem, a gap in your category, and you filled it. Or…you simply are
July 2, 2021
Founders, Be Investable
I often come across founders griping about attracting investors. Often, they haven’t spent much time networking at all. They’ve spent more time thinking about their working capital problem. But, more importantly, many founders simply don’t come off as investable. At all. This is because they don’t
June 30, 2021
Do Your Investors Have the Right Time Horizon?
On a webinar hosted by Gary Hirshberg in May, Wayne WU of VMG Partners pointed to a common problem before the pandemic. “[Brands chasing a pre-determined exit] are generally not the best brands to invest in because … they haven’t focused on surprising and delighting consumers.
June 28, 2021
Top 3 Ways to Defend Your Brand From Copycats
Last week, Business Insider allowed me the opportunity to warn newbies that BigCo is absolutely scanning startup land continuously for ideas they can easily copy, even reverse engineer at a low technical expense. Technical expense? Say what? Ah, that’s the point I’m trying to make. BigCo is