It helps that we have the MN State Fair to sell our product at now but we are looking for more.
In 2008 we took the step of getting our product manufactured from a blending company. This gives our product much more consistency. Not saying anything bad about employers of ours of recent years but teenagers measuring with the 1/4 cup and making up 500 bags is not quite as consistent as a machine blending the product. When mixing 3 of the ingredients which are all white and you are there talking with friends, laughing and having a good time...next thing you know...oh wait? Did I already put salt in that bag? The machine doesn't have any friends and simply does its job, thus much more consistent and accurate.
The blending company made up 1,000 consumer packages for us and also larger bags for us to use at the Fair. From a cost standpoint it was about a break even for us. After paying labor for what we called batter night, pizza and soda for the employees and the product itself, it turned out to be close enough in cost to have the blending company produce it for us.
This in itself was not an easy task. Many vendors we spoke to wanted to know how many lbs of batter we were talking about. 3800. This is like a spoonful of sand at a sand dune and many of the vendors did not want to deal with us. We happened to get lucky through an introduction from my cousin's wife with one food blending company. It just so happened our contact from this company also had a booth at the MN State Fair. This common ground helped us get in and they have done very well for us.
But what about the box? Our box as you can see is nothing like what you would find at the local grocery store or bait shop. This is the next step in the process for us.
We then came across from an old friend something called PDMA. Through discussion we found out there was interest to have the Pickle Guys present our story at a future PDMA meeting. What is PDMA you say? It is a Professional Association made up of people from many different companies who work with product development. Some may be in engineering, marketing, product placement, etc etc.
Talk about a fit. We met with the Director and the Program Manager of PDMA and they seem very interested in having us present. The date is set for Mid March.
We will be sharing the Pickle Story, the trials, the errors, the beginning, middle and future goals, including our desire to market our batter. At the suggestion of the PDMA group they mentioned we could then break the group (30-50 people) up into small groups and each group may discuss one of the next steps in what they would do with our product. After this short recess bring the large group back together and share the outcome.
Some of the break out sessions could include questions such as what would you do with the box design? What market would you try and introduce this too? Is there even a market for this? The list goes on.
I am excited by this. I think not only will we get some great ideas out of this we may also make some great contacts in the industry. Many of the suggestions came from the gals from the PDMA itself as we wanted to make sure it was a fit for what they typically meet on. It sounds like this is right up their alley.
We are also checking into the possibility of there being a kitchen at the meeting location which if that is the case we may make some pickles for them to enjoy.
The next chapter in our book. The Box.
i. introduction
ii. the idea
iii. the guys
iv. the county fair
v. the state fair
vi. the lines
vii. the customers
viii. the batter
ix. the blending
x. the box
~ Jeffery
