Ag grants are not just for farmers
Poppi getting sued over gut health, will Kristen Bell make it happen?, you don't want to be Average Priced, and Big Food tightens belt
3-min read
Shout out to Wildway for donating a ton of their grain free granola snack packs to cancer infusion centers under my non profit, Positively Good Snacks. These granolas are SO GOOD, but that’s not all. Wildway is looking to invest directly with farmers transitioning to regenerative farming. They are specifically looking at a variety of California specialty crops, not just granola ingredients. If that’s you, get in touch with CEO Kyle here.
If you’d rather listen this week instead of read, I got you ⤵️
Poppi getting sued
This should come as no surprise, since brands making digestive health claims have been sued before. The largest false advertising suit ever against a food co was over digestive health, and settled for $35 million by US Activia® (Danone) in 2009. More recently, Good Belly settled $1.25m class action suit over allegations that added sugar in their products violate labeling rules around probiotic claims. The Poppi lawsuit is following that same tack.
Make sure you know FDA regulatory rules on labeling when making any health claim, even if your desired claim has no FDA mention, you must still support it with evidence that what you are saying is true and not misleading. Get regulatory help.
Ag grants are not just for farmers
Grant writers in the know say the USDA will be opening up new grants for ag, and just last month they awarded $300 million to create trade opportunities for farm exporters to break into new markets.
But ag grants are not just for farmers. Hummus brand Little Sesame was awarded $2.2m from the USDA to develop it’s buisness and further support organic chickpea farmers.
Food + ag grants are found at the federal level (USDA) at grants.gov, or at the state and municipal level, or thorough foundations like this one, connecting brands to farms. You’ll want to check grant portal websites regularly, as new opportunities will be coming up, or sign up to be alerted by newsletters like this one. Activities include cap ex, export marketing, regional systems, transitioning to organic and regenerative, and more. You’ll be surprised at what’s eligible for funding, so long as you qualify, which is the tricky part.
It helps to study past grant recipient descriptions under the program you seek to apply for, like here are the the 93 companies awarded grants worth $75m this year for organic market development.
If you’ve never written a grant, get a specialized food and ag grant writer to help you, here and here. If you can’t afford a grant writer, the USDA is opening 11 regional centers (and one tribal center) across the country to help small businesses learn how to apply for these grants.
Kristen Bell backs Michelle Obama’s kid beverage brand, PLEZi.
Let us pray.
Kristen Bell’s track record is not great — two of her brands Hello Bello and Happy Dance went under last year.
As Modern Retail explains, fatigue around celebrity and creator brands has set in.
I’ve seen where investors go in on a brand without even tasting the product just because it has a big name behind it. While celebs bring customers and cool vibes, if the products aren’t good, don’t solve a real problem, or if there’s not an experienced management team running the brand, it’s troubles ahead. Investors are scrutinizing these deals a lot more closely these days. Looks like PLEZi has former Tropicana CMO running things so I’m sure they’ll be fine.
You’re probably not safe being average priced in your category.
The food industry is trying to tell marketers that inflation worries are subsiding and everything is going to be OK. Not so fast. Your price positioning matters more in this economy that in did in the recession because people feel worse off. And that makes for funny grocery buying behavior.
The sentiment is, I’m going to treat myself a few times a week, so willing to pay whatever, but also, I can’t afford to waste food, so for every other eating occasion, people are seeking value in convenient foods that they know they are actually going to eat.
If you’re positioned in the middle, with competitors on either end, people aren’t thinking about you as much.
RELATIVE PRICING
How to position when purchasing power is down
The consideration set is now bar belled where you have the same shopper buying premium at one end and value at the other, and not a lot in between. The key is to position yourself clearly at one of the two ends, not in the middle. Pricing and channel strategies like dealing down or club rotations are a great way to play the value card if you find yourself in the middle.
Danone restructuring — finally
After selling off Horizon Organic and Wallaby in Q1 as part of Renew Danone, Danone is finally slimming down overhead and reducing redundancies by bringing acquired brands like Happy Family under core management (Happy Family sold to Danone 11 years ago). This, on the heels of Dan Magliocco being named as President, North America, brings their turnaround into full focus, and I expect their brands to be much more aggressive against competitors and private label later this year.
All my best,
Jennifer
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