Creating Success During Challenging Times: Business Growth Amid A Pandemic

By: Ross Lipari, Chief Sales Officer, Egglife Foods, Inc.

When starting my journey at Egglife Foods in January 2020, I knew this brand had the ability to fundamentally flip the wrap category on its head and pull off something truly special. The opportunity to work at a start-up alongside my former colleague, David Kroll as CEO, and build a brand from scratch was challenging, but something our team was ready to take on together. The one challenge that we did not foresee, however, was a global pandemic on the horizon.?

As we approach the two-year anniversary of the pandemic, I’ve reflected on how the Egglife team never once let it get in the way of our ultimate goal. Many brands and companies faced similar challenges, but one thing that separated us from the rest was our perseverance.?

Building Something Bigger

Launching a new CPG product is difficult during ‘normal times’ and egglife egg white wraps launched right when the pandemic began. Going from distribution in zero stores to over 10,000 in just two years can be attributed to three things:

1. The Product: The exceptional nature of the egglife egg white wraps and the innovation behind our product is unmatched. It is a wrap that is perfect for anyone with any lifestyle and results in our consumers being hungry for more.
2. Category and Shopper Performance: Retailers value suppliers and products that drive value for their categories, delivering incremental revenue and margin through innovative, shopper-motivating products and programs. From the earliest Chicago test market days to national distribution, egglife’s truly innovative nature and strong velocities have delivered not only some of the highest incrementality numbers of any new item, but also some of the highest consumer repeat purchase percentages. We humbly shared our exceptional category, SKU and shopper performance data, and retailers aggressively made space for egglife across their Dairy & Bread Categories.
3. Focused, Personal Partnership Building: An unrivaled product, supported by superior performance, enabled us to begin our growth journey. We activated the ‘sun and planet’ model across National, Regional, Natural and Lighthouse Independent Partners — reaching out strictly to retailers that were a bullseye fit with our core egglife consumer and that were leaders in their respective geography first. On top of that, with a new, innovative product in a nascent category, Egglife determined it was essential to own business development front-to-back instead of leveraging outside sales support. In turn, this allowed us to develop direct relationships and own the egglife narrative personally with retailers. This approach has proven to be our ‘secret sauce’, helping us stand apart from many better-for-you start-up brands, and resulting in special partnerships with????Aldi, Walmart, Target, Amazon Fresh, Kroger, Meijer, Sprouts, Central Market and Festival Foods.

The Importance of Relationships?

From the start, I made it clear to the team that we would not let Egglife’s goals and aspirations be constrained by the pandemic. Delayed and cancelled category resets along with Retailer focus on necessary, everyday products vs. innovation served as a catalyst to bring egglife to partners across the US. Working against headwinds such as delayed and cancelled category resets along with retailers focused on necessary, everyday products vs. new innovation, the pandemic forced new ways of working. In a world where all business development meetings were remote, the team focused on the fundamentals, understanding and appreciating the unique needs of our partners. Listening to our partners and learning them forged trust before any selling began. As a result, in one or two short zooms, we were able to align on egglife as a compelling solution for their specific category needs and inspire retailers to get creative and carve egglife into their shelf sets.

Leveraging Your Brand’s Compelling Story

With the pandemic resulting in a near overnight halt of consumers visiting grocery stores in person, egglife had to make a strong case to still get placed onto shelves. We thought outside the box and told the special story behind Egglife Foods — from our incredible founder to our unique product that was unlocking new eating occasions for countless consumers. As a result, retailers quickly wanted to be part of our story and took a bet on us.

Thinking Back

As I reflected on Egglife’s extensive growth, our challenges and successes, these few points came to mind as what helped us navigate the unexpected:

• Attitude is everything: Insulate yourself and your team. Stay focused on the objectives you want to achieve and stay positive when it comes to both results and challenges.
• New ideas and innovations matter: Start-up or global CPG company, pandemic or not, when you have a big idea, you must manifest that in an innovative way and drive growth for your customers.
• Listening is essential: People like to buy things, they don't like to be sold. Dedicating your time to listening will result in long lasting relationships — both with customers and businesses.?

The pandemic has certainly presented many challenges, but even two years in, our team has never used it as an excuse. I am proud of the partnerships and relationships we’ve been able to build remotely and in short order, and the trust and credibility we’ve made and gained. We’ve made promises and have kept them, and I look forward to continuing to do so this year and beyond.