ECRM

Kind Patches won the 1st Place Drug Store News Buyers Choice Award at ECRM's Vitamin, Weight Management & Sports Nutrition Session for its unique way of delivering wellness to consumers via their skin! The natural health and beauty company makes transdermal patches to deliver product directly into the user's bloodstream with a steady release for up to eight hours. Unlike traditional capsules and pills, this bypasses the digestive system, and eliminates the need for by products, fillers, artificial colors. The four patches highlighted at the session were: - SLEEP (one of the brand's top sellers) - FOCUS (something very important at ECRM Sessions!) - ENERGY (to keep you going throughout the day) - PERIOD (for soothing menstrual issues) In the video with ECRM's Joseph Tarnowski, Raelene Jordan takes us through each of these products and shows off their unique packaging and delivery mechanisms, and Joe took advantage of the Focus and Energy patches to help with the many videos he recorded at the session! Kind Patches was one of the RangeMe Discovery Hub brands -- all RangeMe subscribers get discounted rates for their first ECRM Session Discovery Hub registration (Buyers Choice Award not included -- you have to earn that! ??) ECRM's GLP-1, Weight Management, Nutrition, and Vitamin Session will be held February 11 to 13 in Rosemont, Ill. For more details, click the link in the comments! #health #wellness #vitamins #supplements #retail #ecrmrangeme Judy A. Craig C. Sarah Davidson

Congratulations to Eco Bandage and Greener Living Products for winning the Drug Store News Buyers Choice Awards at ECRM's Health Care Session! Both products were selected from dozens of entries submitted by participating suppliers and displayed in the hospitality area of the session. Attending buyers evaluated each entry and cast their votes based on product packaging and innovation. Eco Bandage's liquid bandage products use a proprietary color dispersion technology, which allows the bandage to blend seamlessly with various skin tones while maintaining flexibility. Unlike traditional bandages that can become rigid and uncomfortable, Eco Bandage remains flexible and skin-like, even on joints, ensuring that the bandage stays in place to provide continuous protection without compromising comfort. Greener Living Product's Just Bite Me is a balm made with beeswax, coconut oil, baking soda, lemongrass oil, and wintergreen oil and conveniently packaged in a stick. It can be spot-applied to insect bites for fast relief of itching. You can find both brands on RangeMe! Check out the article below for more details! And you can watch Joseph Tarnowski's interview with Eco Bandage's Kiowa and Andrew Kavovit in the comments below! ECRM’s 2025 Health Care Session will be held July 14 to 16 in Dallas.?We have a link to that session in the comments below as well! #healthcare #cpg #retail #health #ecrmrangeme Sarah Davidson Judy A. Craig C.

Buyers from European retailers and distributors are meeting with brands from around the world at ECRM's European Health & Wellness, Personal Care, and Baby & Toddler Sessions this week in Copenhagen, Denmark! The Sessions included a fireside chat during which Walmart's Paula Ryan and Mary Walker shared advice on what it takes to do business with the global retailer. And of course, there are hundreds of private, prescheduled meetings between buyers and brands taking place across the three sessions. Here's a little snippet of what's happening! One more full day of meetings to go! #wellness #personalcare #cpg #retail #europe #ecrmrangeme Wayne Bennett Clayton Kilkenny Liz L. Ylenia Nasca Anne-Laure B. Alexandra Vladescu Margit M. Umair A. Denisse A. Tosca A. Y.

While nutritional supplements are not evaluated by the FDA, there are plenty of regulations around these products that impact their sales at retail. Buyers and brands discussed these regs during a roundtable at ECRM's Vitamin, Weight Management & Sports Nutrition Session moderated by Heather Weidt of WholeFoods Magazine. In this interview with ECRM's Joseph Tarnowski, Heather recaps some key points of discussion from roundtable participants. Here are some of takeaways: Age restrictions: Some states mandate that you must be 18 or over to purchase sports nutrition and weight management supplements, which can hurt sales as it adds another step in the purchasing process -- such as the need for a parent to purchase the supplements for a teen athlete, for example, or having to verify age online before purchasing. Mandatory Ingredient Listing: Supplement manufacturers must provide detailed info on the ingredients on the packaging, which can be very expensive for brands. These include a Supplement Facts panel, Other Ingredients list, and Allergen declarations. FSAs/HSAs: Currently Congress is trying to get a bill passed that would enable supplements to be included in FSAs and HSAs. This can be helpful for driving increased sales of some products. For example, a retail pharmacy that fills a GLP-1 prescription could also make recommendations for complementary supplements that are covered by these flexible spending accounts. Watch the full video interview below! Next year's GLP-1, Weight Management, Vitamin & Nutrition Session will be held February 11-13 in Rosemont, Ill. Click the link in the comments for more information and to register! #supplements #wellness #weightmanagement #ecrmrangeme Judy A. Sarah Davidson Craig C.

Check out the latest findings on what foods consumers are eating and how they are eating them in Joseph Tarnowski's recent interview with Datassential's Renee Lee Wege: https://lnkd.in/eHHFKnAs The interview covers a range of topics from Datassential's Midyear Trends Report, including: - Post-pandemic dining-out - The impact of wellness on consumer food choices - How consumers are eating differently in the face of rising costs and inflation - Trending diets, foods & flavors The blog also includes the full video interview with Renee! Don't forget - ECRM's Foodservice Sessions are happening later this month. To register, click on the link in the comments! #food #dining #foodservice #retail #ecrmrangeme -

What's next for the adult beverage market? To answer that question, Joseph Tarnowski sat with NielsenIQ's Kaleigh Theriault at ECRM's On & Off Premise Adult Beverage Session to learn what brands and retailers can expect over the next year in the segment. Here's a quick recap: BEER: With dollar volume declines due to inflationary impacts, the end of the year will see more promotions and subsidization at retail to drive traffic to the store. WINE: Declines in the value and high-end segments means that the sweet spot of $20 should be a target for retailers and brands -- this is ideal for holiday gifting and dinner parties. SPIRITS: Premiumization is thriving here, with 60% of dollar sales coming from premium, super premium and ultra premium spirits. There is also a shift toward RTDs, and innovation across segments, such as whiskey aged in wine barrels. Celebrity owned or promoted spirits have taken off and will continue to grow, as they are a way for consumers to get a taste of the celebrity lifestyle without having to buy a yacht. ?? RTDs: This segment has grown so much it's now viewed as a category on its own, with 11% of adult beverage sales. Spirit-based RTDs continue to grow, however, there is a danger of "flavor fatigue." Expect new innovations around flavor to address this, such as hot honey and spicy watermelon. Watch the video below for more insights! #beer #wine #spirits #foodservice #hospitality #restaurants #retail #cocktails #ecrmrangeme Alessandra Andrade Balerini Marc S Santos Meg Major Amanda Tomsik Sarah Davidson

While GLP-1s are all the buzz among consumers, shoppers at Florida's Nutrition Smart stores are seeking natural alternatives that can deliver similar weight loss results -- without the risk of side effects, according to Category Manager Joe Geier, who spoke with Joseph Tarnowski at ECRM's recent Vitamin, Weight Management & Sports Nutrition Session. Nutrition Smart offers natural foods and supplements and caters to a market of wellness oriented 40- to 65-year-olds, primarily women, as well as some younger gym crowds. In addition to avoiding potential side effects, many of these shoppers are looking to avoid prescriptions altogether, preferring to find clean and natural solutions. For weight loss, these include glucose-control supplements like berberine and sucontrol, along with specific dietary changes they address on the food side of the store. Most are looking for cleaner ingredients as well. Geier notes that social media has had a huge impact on shoppers' purchasing decisions, and many will come to him with screenshots from wellness influencers posts or podcasts that discuss specific nutritional supplements, and he tries to follow many of these influencers to try and stay ahead of the trends. Check out the video interview below to learn more about what Geier is seeing among his shoppers, as well as some interesting finds he discovered at the session! ECRM's GLP-1, Weight Management, Nutrition, and Vitamin Session will be held February 11-13, 2025, in Rosemont, Ill., and will have a big focus on GLP-1s. For more information or to register,?click the link in the comments below or contact Judy A.! #vitamins #supplements #wellness #retail #ecrmrangeme Sarah Davidson Craig C. Andrea K.

We've covered a lot of unique brand origin stories here at ECRM, but this is the first time we're come across a brand that was conceived around a dining room table at a safe house in a war zone. Sam Lerman comes from a military background. After serving in the Air Force in Afghanistan, he continued to work in the defense industry working military acquisitions for some U.S. programs. When Russia invaded Ukraine, he wanted to help the Ukranian people and worked with a small team as a volunteer advisor in 2022 to help bring in much-needed supplies. Over time he fell in love with the country, its culture, its people. He lived in a safe house, and in the evenings, they would sit together at the large dining room table and drink some wine and vodka that some of the local team members would bring in. He fell in those with those, too, but couldn't find them in the U.S. So, he and one of the Ukrainian team members decided to launch an importing business to make that happen. SpyrtWorldwide was born. Among the wines they import is the Shabo brand, which was founded in 1822 by Swiss settlers in te Ukraine. It's served all over the world, and the premium versions can be found in Michelin-starred restaurants. Hetman is one of the vodka brands they are importing. and is from the historic vodka-producing area of Lviv, where the art of distilling has thrived since 1782. Proceeds from sales of all the products go to Invictus Global Response, a nonprofit that sends U.S. explosive ordinance veterans to the Ukraine to remove land mines from liberated towns, as well as train Ukrainian troops on mine removal (Ukraine us the most heavily mined country in the world, according to Sam). In this video interview with Joseph Tarnowski at ECRM's On & Off Premise Adult Beverage Session, Sam shares details about the origin and walks us through the brands he was showcasing at the session. Already he's landed distributors for two states and is in discussions with several major retail establishments about getting on the shelves in their stores! #wine #spirits #adultbeverage #ukraine #imports #ecrmrangeme Amanda Tomsik Sarah Davidson

East Coast Port closures causing supply chain issues for your retail operation? ECRM's category-specific Sessions can help you fill your bench with suppliers you can tap into when disruptions like this occur!

Once again, ECRM & Food and Beverage Magazine hosted the Grand Tasting at the On & Off Premise Adult Beverage Session! During the reception, participants sampled beer, wine and spirits from dozens of brands and cast their votes for their favorites in each category -- while having a ton of fun in the process, as you'll see in the video below! The winners were: BEST BEER: Alaska Craft Distributing BEST WINE: Franzese Wines BEST SPIRIT: ROKiT Drinks MOST INNOVATIVE: MAD TASTY You'll learn more about each winner in an upcoming issue of Food& Beverage Magazine! #beer #wine #spirits #cocktails #foodservice #retail #ecrmrangeme Amanda Tomsik Sarah Davidson Samvel Hakobyan Michael Franzese Johanna DeJoria Michael Politz Lauren Kane