How to Brace for a Potential Economic Downturn With Jeff Grogg, Founder and Managing Director of JPG Resources and Founder and President of Snackwerks
Jeff Grogg is the Founder and Managing Director of JPG Resources and the Founder and President of Snackwerks. Previously, he was a member of the executive team responsible for growing the Kashi cereal brand from $25 million to $750 million within nine years. He founded JPG Resources to help build businesses across the food industry. JPG works to provide a vision for and manage smaller, growing businesses and help larger companies rediscover their inner innovators.
Here’s a glimpse of what you’ll learn:
Jeff Grogg explains the inspiration for launching JPG Resources
How Jeff envisions the company’s future growth and where he wants to take it
The lessons learned and pivots made during the pandemic
JPG’s strategy for attracting new clients
A case where Jeff provided valuable and effective guidance to a client
What is the biggest challenge JPG faces?
What you’ll learn in this episode:
In times when there is an economic downturn on the heels of a potential recession, people tighten their belts. We give up some wants and take austerity measures, especially when we see job cuts being made. When there’s a lot of uncertainty, how does it affect the food industry, and how fast do things normalize?
As a career strategist and serial entrepreneur in the food space, Jeff Grogg says the healthy food industry normalizes at a different pace than other industries when we’re in the current financial climate. People value their health and food choices, so they often sacrifice other indulgences and prioritize money spent on their diets and well-being. What should health food companies be doing in this economic environment, and how can they prepare in case of a recession?
On this episode of From Persona to Personal, Roger Hurni sits down with Jeff Grogg, Founder and Managing Director of JPG Resources and Founder and President of Snackwerks, to discuss practical ways his companies prepare for adverse changes in the economy. Jeff shares the lessons JPG learned during the pandemic, how it pivoted, what organizational growth looks like, how JPG attracts new clients, and more. Don’t miss it!
Resources mentioned in this episode:
This episode’s sponsor:
Today’s episode is brought to you by Off Madison Ave. At Off Madison Ave, we create meaningful moments of brand trust and influence how people interact and engage with brands.
There is a science behind tapping into your audiences’ desires and motivation. After all, if you’re not changing your audiences’ behaviors, you can’t truly unlock all of your brand’s potential.
The proven models and methods of Behavior Design is the strategic foundation for your brands’ success.
Episode Transcript
Intro 0:02
This is From Persona to Personal podcast. Today's episode is brought to you by Off Madison Ave. Off Madison Ave creates meaningful moments of brand trust and influences how people interact and engage with brands. The science behind their approach taps into your audience's motivations and desires. After all, if you're not changing your audience's behaviors, you can't truly unlock all of your brand's potential. Now, let's get started with the show.
Roger Hurni 0:35
Hello, everyone, I am Roger Hurni, the host of From Persona to Personal where I get to speak with top leaders changing customer behaviors that they can propel their brands forward for get to today's guest. This episode is brought to you by Off Madison Ave. At Off Madison Ave, we use behavioral science to create meaningful moments of brand trust which influences how people interact and engage with companies. Our behavioral approach taps in your audience's motivation and prompts them to shift behavior. And if you're not changing your audience's behaviors, you truly can't unlock all of your brand's potential. These proven behavioral models and methods are the strategic foundation for your brand success. Visit offmadisonave.com to learn more. Very excited today to have with me, Jeff Grogg. He is currently the founder and managing director at jpg plus he is the founder and president of Snackwerks. Both are headquartered in Battle Creek, Michigan, which he is calling in from today. He was also previously an r&d lead and a member of the executive team responsible for growing Kashi cereal from 25 or Kashi as a brand from 25 million to 750 in 9 years. Personal Brand favorite of mine. And Jeff uses his knowledge and expertise to support equitable success for all natural for everyone in the natural food space, and to help empower clients and connections to achieve their goals and build better food. Welcome to the show, Jeff.
Jeff Grogg 2:03
Thank you appreciate you having me on.
Roger Hurni 2:07
All right. What did I fumbled here and there a little bit anything I screwed up with your bio and corrections?
Jeff Grogg 2:12
No, no, that's generally good. Love the industry and the chance to work with so many different companies inside it.
Roger Hurni 2:21
Alright, well, you are in a space that I near that is near and dear to my heart. As a vegetarian, there's just a lot of out there that in the natural food space that I really enjoy. So I'm looking very much forward to today's conversation. Everyone listening is not going to really understand JPG because it's it's the background kind of company. So let's start there. Tell us a little bit more about like, why you started JPG and what that value proposition is within the space?
Jeff Grogg 2:53
Sure. Well, we recognize that for for decades and more certainly 50 years, people have been looking outside their companies for inspiration and for just, you know, extra hands or different thinking to get things started and to drive innovation forward. And you know, I worked with a number of outside agencies in my time at Kellogg and Kashi. And what I chose to leave, I felt like there was an opportunity to serve the industry a little bit differently with consulting group that was a little bit more business focused and outcome focused, seeing the big picture alongside clients as opposed to just doing pieces of work for them. And so that's really what inspired me to to launch JPG.
Roger Hurni 3:36
Nice so how does Snackwerks that into that JPG Strategy? Or is it this entirely separate entity? And business plan thing that nothing to do with one another?
Jeff Grogg 3:48
Yeah, it is largely separate as a fully separate legal entity and the teams are all different. So aside from me, there they are two totally separate entities with different purposes. So Snackwerks is a contract manufacturer, sort of small to mid-scale and specialty cookies and granolas and other baked goods, long shelf life baked goods. And he also runs on a very different track than JPG does.
Roger Hurni 4:16
Okay, well, he's, I, everyone, and myself included understand the distinction. I know we're gonna focus on JPG today. I'm curious like it's been around now for a bit of time you got it going? What is growth look like? And where are you hoping to take JPG?
Jeff Grogg 4:32
Yeah, we're in our 14th year now. So it's been exciting to get that far along. I didn't really have that much of a plan when I started and just sort of kept answering the bell when, when somebody would ring and, and here we are. We now have 70 people. We have about 25 in Michigan. We have seven in New York and an office and food development studio there. And, you know, we see continued developments this year, we're launching a talent platform where in addition to hiring us to do projects, teams or companies can hire individuals through our talent program suit to extend their teams through fractional or interim resources. So that's certainly one of the areas that we see growth in this in this year.
Roger Hurni 5:23
It sounds like a lot of entrepreneurs. It sounds like you have a plan now, even if you didn't have one. But I think that comes along with entrepreneurs. I know when I started my first company, I would joke that it started on VC. And everyone would be like, what venture capital firm like Visa card? I had an mtbc card. Yeah, I started it on all. Well, it sounds like you're on a good trajectory. You said you're 914 years old, correct? Yeah. All right. So you have the thing up and running. And then things seem to be going well, and then boom, pandemic, what happened during that time with your organization and, and what lessons were learned?
Jeff Grogg 6:05
Yeah, it was kind of a crazy time, obviously, for everybody. I think for service providers, you know, q2, of 2020. As you look back, and you go, nothing happened to note, nobody did anything for about three months there. And then, you know, we found after that, that people sort of came back to different behaviors, but rather normalized in a lot of ways in the sense that people still needed help, and it was mostly the same kind of work. So we tightened our belt during that period, we're certainly it helps us focus on are there things we're doing that are maybe not high value? Or are there things that are too speculative, and it's good for companies to go through that, that real good look at your business every once in a while. And, and honestly, it prepared us for what we're doing now, again, in this kind of market is making sure that we have programs and, and projects and offerings that deliver short-term value in when things are uncertain. And, you know, people are less likely to be thinking five years out and more likely to be thinking about five months to, to next year.
Roger Hurni 7:14
You know, I'd like to dig a little deeper into that, because I think there's probably some good lessons there. I, I know when I speak with a lot of entrepreneurs or companies, particularly in the b2c space, they will talk about consumer behavior in terms of buying habits and restaurant habits, purchasing food, and grocery stores. And that definitely have changed because of the pandemic. But what most people don't calculate is how much restaurants and everyone in the food industry had to change and pivot as well. And you're right, he the first 6090 days, everyone was catatonic and, okay, this is something we've never had to deal with before and what do we do? But then everybody started to pivot, high-end restaurants were like, Alright, how do we have some kind of curbside pickup? You know, you know, QSR is probably the easiest to pivot. What did you do? Are there anything you can tell me about specifically that you did to support those shifting behaviors of your customers? Were owning those businesses, manufacturing those natural foods? How did you? How did you support them? Maybe with some specific details?
Jeff Grogg 8:20
Yeah, I think what it brought to the forefront is the need to have more sophisticated conversations at times. And instead of a common search, being Hey, who will make this thing for me? The conversation became a little bit more about where do we need to invest to get access to this. So for example, there was never a shortage of flour. Despite all the talk about shortage of flour, there was a shortage of bagging capability, right? And so there was no shortage of flour. And in 150 pound bags, or in bulk semi truckloads, there was a shortage of flour at two and five pounds on the grocery store shelf. And so you'll see now there's a lot more flour that's in stand-up pouches, similar with meats and other things that there was the supply was out there, it just wasn't in the right pipes. So we had to repipe things and we had to get creative on finding some food service operators who were in the trenches, a yellow who were, their business was damaged, they were desperate for business. They just needed a different packaging or some different, you know, different connections to be able to serve as the, the retail industry. So I think there's a lot of what we're able to do was, was coach brands and coach the manufacturing side, out of meat in the middle to you know, create more flexibility in the food system that had been kind of hard piped in a lot of ways and we helped, you know, some of that moving things around internally.
Roger Hurni 9:51
It sounds like a really interesting challenge to help one entity out you almost have to change the behavior of another entity in order to meet those plies have actually, I was credited, just a crazy time I lived a little bit in Russia. And I remember the shells during the pandemic being empty, certain shells being empty. So it's like, Oh, my God, I haven't seen this since Moscow is just Yeah. Like, we're the richest nation in the world, like, why can't we get stuff from point A to point B? I just, I didn't get it? Well, at least you're one of the people trying to solve that problem, which is, which is appreciated. Are you? Are you looking at any issues now that I mean, I don't know, if we're gonna have a recession, people are recessions coming and then you know, the sky is falling, and other people are like, adds me a blip? Is there anything you're doing now to prepare for that, just in case the worst happens?
Jeff Grogg 10:50
Yeah, I mean, I think it comes back to that discipline of, are you doing the most important things? Are you distracted by things that are expensive, that maybe aren't the most important things? You know, so we're working with our clients on also, you know, a lot of people through this inflationary period, they're still getting prices that maybe have come back down. So, you know, we just see some type of stick, the question needs to be asked about, are you by Have you gone back to your suppliers and driven price back down in certain categories? So there's still inflation in certain areas, there's also been normalizing and other areas. So ingredient by ingredient, if you're not asking the question, you're probably paying too much. So simple things like that clawing back on,f on, on costs that have gone up. So you know, freight has normalized, it's still not great, but it's way better than it was. Whether it's international or domestic trucking freight. You know, if you're paying the same price as a year ago, you likely overpaying and in most circumstances, so a lot of it is, you know, reminding people to get back to basics. And also similar to the things that happened during the pandemic. Do you have too many skews? Where can you get leaner? Where can you gain efficiency? And are you focused on servicing the market on your top skews, and prioritizing them over your over your lesser skews? And, again, not all those disciplines of running a good solid business? I am, being focused on the main, the main things that matter.
Roger Hurni 12:27
Good advice. Very good advice. I don't think a lot of people think about before something happened shifting their skews to here are the most popular items here are the most profitable items. Here are the staples. What can we get rid of and still maintain our numbers where people place a high value on those affordable luxuries in the natural foods base? Right. It's, it's an interesting case study in how human behavior pivots ever so slightly of those little things. We've seen and talked a bit. Go ahead. Oh, no, you go.
Jeff Grogg 13:06
Well, we've seen in the, in the past, if you go back to 2008 910. And then you look again, you know, what's happened so far now is, you know, the initial thing is the initial reaction from people as everybody tightens up, everybody, you know, gives up some things and moves toward austerity, especially in an environment where there's job cuts, and so forth. And there's a lot of uncertainty. And certainly in the, in the emerging brands market, the investors are clutching their wallets right now. So there's a lot less money out there. So, you know, our response to that, though, is there's normally there's usually a normalization. And if you look back, you know, till the last recession, the first year that organic hammered, but then it recovered pretty quickly. As people said, well, I want to take care of my health, and food, ultimately, that trade off to get what I want. Whether it's indulgence or health is not that big, I may not buy a car this year, I can still eat well or eat healthy. So we do find that the food industry maybe normalizes in a different way than some of the other industries.
Roger Hurni 14:14
Make sense. Make sense? I'm getting curious now that I get a good understanding of how your business operates and channels couple challenges in the past that you've faced. How do your clients hear about you? Do you do you do some sort of sales outreach, marketing outreach or word of mouth? How does that look for you?
Jeff Grogg 14:33
You know, it used to be almost all word of mouth, it's still certainly the majority is referral and repeats. But we've, again, back to COVID. There wasn't a lot of meeting with people face to face. So we started doing some digital marketing and putting more effort into other channels of customer acquisition, or client acquisition for us. So I you know, we're still probably only 20% that finds us through some other means than a direct referral. But we felt like that was necessary, you know, with 70 families that are dependent on us, we want to make sure we're doing the work of providing a stable situation here too. So we work hard to make sure that we're available to the industry and that people know who we are what we can do.
Roger Hurni 15:19
You know, you said, how people rely on you. The customer experience, whether it's on the b2b side, or the b2c side, is really critical for building a company building a brand. With the new dawn and 14 years, is there is that one client success story that you're super proud of? Where it's like, yeah, this person was in a bind, or we really helped propel this company forward. Is there, is there one that comes to mind?
Jeff Grogg 15:52
Yeah, I mean, there's a bunch of that come to mind, actually. But I mean, one that's easy to tell, and that that people can relate to is the story of caulipower. You know, we worked with Gail, who was the founder there from before launch, and, you know, helped her from starting up through launching our first product managing or contract manufacturing, so touched their business in a lot of different ways. But also, like, really came alongside her as a partner in the business. Not a financial partner, like it's her business, but we really helped her think through difficult times and difficult choices. And think through all the things that come out, you as a founder, you just don't expect in the food industry, the level of complexity in this industry is shocking to people who start up a food company, you know, distributors, brokers, chargebacks, all the all the things that happen that you have no idea, you know, so I think our team was really effective in helping her navigate all of that, and navigate taking on investment and so forth. So that's one we're proud of, and just a great relationship with a wonderful founder, and you know, somebody who ran their brand rapidly $200 million. You know, that was a fun ride.
Roger Hurni 17:06
I mean, to point something out, I try to be the translator here, for a lot of the people that listen in a C suite to the show. But your business doesn't run on the tactical execution. I know that you do that. And that's great. But the value is that advice. It sounds like the value is I know people overuse the term partnership. But it really is that there really isn't a probably a better word, where you're helping these businesses grow through Strategy, which is far more valuable to them. And yes, you're going to execute on that. And that's sort of table stakes. But is that the real value behind your business? Because that's what it sounds like to me.
Jeff Grogg 17:48
Yeah, I mean, you have to have both sides to end up with value, right. So you have to have a great idea, you have to have something that actually works in the marketplace. And you have to have a business concept that supports that. And we often find a lot of people with really interesting ideas, but they don't really have a way to make it into a business. So helping them turn their idea and their, their, their energy into a real business concept is a big piece of what we do. And then the execution flows out of that. And you know, we want to execute with excellence, we want to help them build a team that can execute that way. But yeah, that middle piece of making your idea, a real business proposition is a big deal. And that was, again, back to why I started jpg. I felt like that was the missing piece that consultant showed up and they could help you on the front end, or they could help you with certain problems. But there wasn't a lot of thinking about the real business outcome that needs to happen here to be successful in market.
Roger Hurni 18:48
Yeah, it's a good it's a really good point. Because regardless of the industry, helping somebody get an idea off the ground and making it into a reality is freaking hard. And and, and there's not a lot of people out there that do that. Well, and, man, if I had a nickel for every time somebody asked me from family to business associates to like, I have this idea for, you know, a new kind of eraser, like how do I make that a reality? Yeah, yeah. It's great that you do that, though. That's, like I said, that's where I wanted to point that out to everyone listening, because that is really, that's really the value. I mean, that's, that's truly where the rubber meets the road.
Jeff Grogg 19:29
Well, and as part of that, I mean, we talk a tremendous amount of people out of doing their, their business idea. You know, we turned down a lot of business because we, when we talk to them about is not really a business, it's a hobby that's about to become a very expensive hobby, you know, and that's that that's the outcome they're coming to us for. So there is a lot of that front end, especially with if somebody is truly a startup wants to be an entrepreneur, where they're converting from farmers market to retell? You know, that's where we have to step in with some real education and experience and, and help them figure out if that's really a leap they want to make or not. But sound. Yeah, we we end up talking ourselves out of a lot of work each year by by doing that piece of it that really assessing if they have what it takes to be successful.
Roger Hurni 20:19
Yeah, but really good companies are here to help. I mean, I tell them all the time. Yeah, I'm here to help you. Hopefully, I can help you. But I'm here to see if I can help you. And even if that means we don't make money, I mean, the last thing you want to do, I'm sure is, is help a company fail faster.
Jeff Grogg 20:36
Right? Yeah. And fail bigger, it's worse, I'd much rather than either not do it at all, or stay at the level they're successful event, they go out and they lose a quarter of a million dollars on a lark, you know, like, or they get in so deep that it can be really damaging to people. So it is one of the most important things that we do is help help people say no, if they should say no.
Roger Hurni 20:58
Yeah, I had that happen to me once. client needed that sort of advice, and I gave it to them and showed them how it didn't work. And the response was, I wish I would have met you $350,000 ago. Exactly. Not comfortable. Well, sounding things are wonderful. I love how you're positioning the company, and love how the advice you're giving to your clients. Whether you make money or not, I think is wonderful. What keeps you up at night? Now I'd like what's, what's happening now, that is your biggest challenge that you're facing?
Jeff Grogg 21:32
You know these last few years have been just this continual stream of uncertainty. You know, that's why it's so hard to know how to behave and and how to advise and so forth. And that really leads back to, you got to build something resilient. And so no matter what it is, if it's a brand, if it's a fund, if it's another consultant, so that you know, we work with a lot of others in the space. That's really what I think about is if the unexpected happens tomorrow or next week, you know, are we prepared for that our clients prepared for that? How do you how do you work through the unexpected yo, during a Natural Products Expo is the biggest show in the industry, the fountain of endless optimism, you know, SBB collapsed during the middle of that show. And you know, there was a lot of brands and funds and others who could have been who were impacted, but could have been impacted a lot worse. That leads back to that. Here's one more level of are we prepared to survive? Anything that might be thrown at us? And so that's where my head goes these days all the time is what's the resilience that you need to build into? To be able to take that next plug?
Roger Hurni 22:43
Good, good advice? Let me think the other side of that question, what's what are you most excited about? What's putting a smile on your face every day that you look forward to?
Jeff Grogg 22:52
Well, I mean, these times are also what what breeds opportunity, you know, there's always somebody that's pulling back, there's always somebody that's leaving ground open, that they would have covered otherwise, there's gonna be a lot of companies go out of business this year, frankly, there's, you know, the way investors are behaving, but they probably were gonna fail eventually, anyway, the majority of them, so maybe it's good, and maybe it'll create renewal, that they'll come back with a better stronger idea, or they'll join somebody else. Because entrepreneurs, you know, they tend to, they tend to bounce back in one way or another, the true ones. So I'm optimistic there's going to be even better talent available, and there's going to be the ideas that are best in and companies that are best are going to be even more well funded and well run and employing better talent. So, you know, as with anything, time of challenge, 10 salutely to some level of renewal. So I'm looking forward to that.
Roger Hurni 23:52
Yeah, it definitely it definitely flushes out the people that don't have strong companies don't have strong products. And, and naturally, I think everybody's better off for it. At that point.
Jeff Grogg 24:05
You the companies that are left are going to be more resilient, they're going to be better and have more opportunities. So I do think there's a little bit of strengthening of the herd that remains is going to be a stronger, better herd.
Roger Hurni 24:18
Absolutely, absolutely. You've been really wonderful with your time. I have just one last question. I end all of my shows with this question. Because when it comes to advice, you know, a lot of times what you don't do is more important than what you do. And so I'm curious as to what is the worst advice you've ever gotten?
Jeff Grogg 24:40
That's a great question. And I don't go I don't hang on to stuff like that. I just forget it if I don't think it's or a bone track of worse advice.
Roger Hurni 24:50
But even that's an answer. I mean, a lot of times we're we're told stuff and we we blow it off because it's like why would I do that?
Jeff Grogg 24:59
You know, yeah, Uh, you know, I think that there's a lot, I will say this, there's a lot of really bad advice out there, right now on social media on LinkedIn, you know, founders that have been at it for a year telling other people how to do it, you know, so I see a lot of really bad advice right now, from people who think they've accomplished something who, like they're still so early in the journey. They haven't signed devices and given to me, but I feel like we try and counter that a little bit. As you know, you need to go deeper, you need to get somebody who's actually done more, who's more where you aspire to land, on your journey, the further down your journey, I guess, because a lot of times when we think we're killing it, and I've certainly been there, you think you're think you're killing it in the short term? And then you realize that, oh, that track was totally wrong. So I think it's really as much as anything, I would say, the worst advice is my only listening to one voice or only listening to somebody who's two steps ahead of you. You know, they're gonna hit that wall, almost like that same time you do. So you got to get broader and deeper than that.
Roger Hurni 26:05
Yeah, I think that's great. And, you know, I know with my own companies, you know, the first eight years, I messed up more things than I can count. So I would have probably been the worst person to take advice from during Yeah. Thank you, again, so much for being on the show. I had been speaking with Jeff Grogg, he's the founder of both JPG and Snackwerks, which maybe I need to get him back on the show for that interview. Jeff, where can people learn more about you and your companies?
Jeff Grogg 26:33
Sure. JPG is jpgresources.com, Snackwerks and Snackwerks. Spelled w-e-r-k-s, also snackwerks.com. And, you know, my profiles on LinkedIn.
Roger Hurni 26:46
Wonderful. Jeff, again, thank you so much. I am Roger Hurni, the host of From Persona to Personal and we will see you next time.
Outro 26:56
Thanks for listening to From Persona to Personal, the podcast that takes a closer look into how organizations personalize their marketing. We'll see you again next time and be sure to click Subscribe to get future episodes.
