When everyone wants to know where their food comes from, and you tell them
QA & Reputation Management in the era of transparency
4-min read
When you let consumers in on things inside your operations like who you source from, it builds trust. But providing a lot of info also means answering for things that come up, good and bad.
The terrible horrible story about prominent dairy Alexandre Family Farms last week could be devastating if you aren’t ready to deal with supplier transparency.
You never know if a story is going to be damaging to your brand. But hoping that consumers miss the news, see through false allegations, or plain don’t care and don’t engage, is not a good strategy.
If you’re going to spotlight your sources of supply, make sure you’ve got:
Confidence in your QA practices
A relationship with your (main) suppliers
A PR plan
A great example of best practices comes from Serenity Kids who responded to my outreach after I posted about the Alexandre story. If you’re not familiar with this baby food company — here’s a quick read —
Joe Carr, President and co-founder of Serenity Kids with his wife Serenity, answered these questions:
How does your company do quality assurance when bringing on a new supplier?
Sourcing has always been incredibly important to us. At Serenity Kids, we believe healthy food comes from healthy animals which come from healthy ecosystems. We hand-select the farms that produce our meats and vegetables, and personally visit them ourselves to ensure they meet our humane and regenerative standards.
All our animal farms must be verified grass fed, pasture raised, or free range, and follow an elaborate list of farming practices including those that regenerate the planet.
We have a rigorous quality assurance program to ensure that individual ingredients meet our high quality requirements and that the supplier is aligned with our brand standards. Our approach involves several key steps that include, but are not limited to:
Vendor qualification process: Vendors with limited or lacking food safety systems or, who have been non-responsive on the inquiry to the information, may result in a food safety audit.
Supplier evaluation which includes certification checks to confirm the product is up to our standards (regenerative, organic, humane, fair-trade, kosher, etc.)
On-site auditing and/or 3rd party audit
Sampling and testing of ingredients to confirm viability
Review of the vendor’s food safety records
Heavy metal testing (historic testing, current supply testing, and future lots)
Quality agreements with the suppliers that mainly focus on agreed upon heavy metal limits with the supplier for our specific needs
Other appropriate risk-based verification
(Remember this is baby food, therefore the heavy metal testing). Notice, they don’t rely on the paperwork, but actually go visit the farm. Here’s their testimonial on getting to know the farm —
Anything to note on your personal visit(s) to Alexandre Family Farm?
The first thing that comes to mind when thinking of our trip to Alexandre Family Farm is just the word, serene. Aptly, because our company is Serenity Kids.
Our A2 Whole Milk Toddler formula was actually born out of anger. Serenity struggled with latching, milk supply, sleepless nights, postpartum anxiety, and a lot of mom-guilt. When she realized that she would need to supplement, she was shocked at how bad the formula options were. Serenity was really driven to create a better option, but was really afraid she’d never be able to source milk of the quality she’d want to use. I can’t even begin to tell you the huge feeling of relief it was when we found Alexandre Family Farm, learned about their farming practices, and tested the nutritional profile of their milk. Serenity finally felt good about launching a formula because Alexandre’s A2 grass fed whole milk was regeneratively raised, contains the A2 beta-casein protein (easier for bodies to digest), and was so nutrient dense we didn’t have to add as many fortifications.
But even more than finding the perfect ingredient, meeting the entire Alexandre family and knowing that they’re truly good people was huge! They hosted a large contingent of our team, and showed us their entire farm including the cows in the pasture, the baby chicks, the portable chicken coops, and the milking process. We witnessed them host hundreds of children for the Bucket Calf Program where the Alexandres’ voluntarily pass along their wealth of agricultural knowledge to the community and allow children to connect with the animals that provide the food they enjoy. Della and I tried raw milk straight from a cow and Stephanie even cooked us all a delicious pork shoulder stew! Our team sat around the table with Stephanie & Blake, their children, and grandchildren, as friends and partners who truly have a united mission for bringing good and nutritious food to the world.
Having been to many farms and watched my grandparents with their animals, I can tell you that the accusations of systemic neglect and abuse at Alexandre Family Farm are false and misleading. Alexandre Family Farm has an open door policy for anyone wishing to learn more about their operations.
How do you handle reputation management when news about a supplier breaks?
Because of our rigorous quality assurance program, Serenity Kids is proud to transparently highlight the farms where we source many of our key ingredients. This does come with added risk when allegations come out about their practices.
When it comes to reputation management, so much of it is around context and making the decision on when to escalate, how to respond to consumers; and ultimately, does the situation violate our brand standards.
In this case, Serenity Kids couldn’t be more proud to partner with Alexandre Family Farm. Serenity and I know Stephanie & Blake personally and have seen first-hand how they far surpass all animal welfare standards and honor the planet through their regenerative agriculture practices. Indeed, they were the first dairy farm in America to be certified regenerative
Thank you to Serenity Kids for these statements and for the valuable lesson.
All my best,
Jennifer
Foxtrot got Outfoxed - Eater
Outfox Hospitality — the combined venture of [Foxtrot and Dom’s] Chicago-based entities — is filing for Chapter 7 bankruptcy, according to Substack newsletter Snaxshot.
This note on the Armitage location. I am sad about this. I remember when they opened this location. Employees said things were weird on Monday. Then Tuesday, bam. More coverage to come; will probably develop into a too-big-too-fast story.