Blink:

First there was speed dating, then speed networking and now speed pitching complete with an open mic.

Read On:

The Rabobank Group, a leading global financial services company specializing in food and agribusiness, sponsors FoodBytes!, an event that connects investors with innovators (a.k.a. startups).  I just received an email that their next event is March 1^st in San Francisco.  The event kicks off with an opening reception (2 to 3 PM) and ends with a closing reception (5:30 to 7:30 PM).  In between, entrepreneur wannabees have signed up for 3.5 or 1.5-minute pitches.  This year FoodBytes! is experimenting with 60-second open mic pitches.  At the conclusion of the pitches, a panel of judges will select several companies for rewards.

I reviewed the list of startups.  Interesting/innovative companies – robotic work carts that assist produce pickers in the field, plant-based products, technology that will improve supply chain, snacks, etc.  All the companies will give it their best shot speed pitching to get on investors’ radar screens.

I apologize for sounding judgmental, but I do not buy into the concept of speed pitching.  Being a 32-year veteran of the food business (two major CPG companies and my own marketing company), I cannot accept how people can communicate the viability of their start-up in 3.5 minutes or less.  Did each startup properly conduct their due diligence (a business assessment complete with a S.W.O.T. analysis), identify their point of market differentiation, write an all-inclusive business plan that includes time tables, a detailed marketing budget, etc.  Food and agribusiness is already a crowded, competitive playing field.  Any start-up looking to enter, should slow down and do their homework.

Do you have 60 seconds?  I have a great new snack concept to pitch.

Blink:

“The less of routine, the more life.”  Amos Bronson Alcott (Philosopher/Teacher)

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Does this routine sound familiar?  You get up, race to get ready for work, commute, eat a breakfast snack with your Starbucks coffee before your first meeting because you skipped breakfast, meetings, meetings, meetings, etc.  Lunch at your desk.  Reverse commute, stop at the gym because you subscribe to a healthy lifestyle, stop at the grocery store to pick up some staples (e.g., toilet paper, Diet Coke, a box of Kind bars, etc.), plus something to nuke for dinner.  Once you arrive at home you check your social platforms, watch a special on Netflix while you eat your reheated dinner, engage with your significant other who just got home from their daily routine, before one more round of exercise (stretching) and then crash.

Spontaneity: The condition of being spontaneous; perform or experience a sudden impulse or inclination without premeditation or external stimulus.

Spontaneity!  Try it!  Live a little!

Blink:

Breakfast at Tiffany’s is no longer a movie fairytale, it has become a reality.

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Tiffany & Co. the luxury jeweler, in an attempt to stimulate sales by targeting/attracting Millennials, opened the Blue Box Café at its flagship store in New York City.  The fourth floor was wholly renovated at the end of 2017, incorporating the company’s classic robin-egg blue motif in the café, plus a luxury home and accessories section, as well as a baby boutique.  Breakfast starts at $29.  Their menu also includes a prix fixe lunch with seasonal items and “Tiffany Tea” complete with Bellocq teas paired with a selection of finger sandwiches and bakery items.

The company’s objective was to create a modern luxury experience.  “The space is experimental and experiential, a window into the new Tiffany,” according to Reed Krakoff, their CAO (Chief Artistic Officer).  “Millennials are seeking experiences rather than “stuff.”  I comprehend Mr. Krakoff’s experiment given Millennials are constantly seeking “instagrammable” experiences due to their FOMO (fear of missing out) anxiety.  However, I question whether Tiffany’s fourth floor experiment will succeed:

• How many Millennials even know who Audrey Hepburn was or have seen the movie “Breakfast at Tiffany’s” unless they hung out one night with their grandparents and watched the movie on TCM.
• Sales data indicates this demographic group likes to shop online, but they also tend to make most of their purchases offline according to the Summer 2017 report released by CouponFollow. The report indicated females are buying more fashion items, males more hard goods.  CouponFollow also revealed that a majority of Millennials follow brands on at least one social media platform in order to get discounts.  Two-thirds will switch brands if offered a discount of 30% or more.  Therefore, once Millennials finish their Tiffany meals, will they actually wonder into the store and buy anything?  Or will Tiffany’s have to begin discounting their luxury items (e.g., engagement rings)?

Do you think Millennials will be lured to experience Tiffany’s fairytale $29 breakfast?

Blink:

Food & beverage companies are being pressured to make public accountable disclosures about where their products were harvested, manufactured and distributed for sale.  Eventually Blockchain technology will be utilized to assist in this process.  Introducing Block Bird’s, the world’s first transparent chicken.

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New food and beverage products were on display earlier this week at the 2018 Winter Fancy Food Show in San Francisco.  One innovative concept was a hi-tech grocery store called The Future Market, a pop-up store that featured six futuristic products.  One product that piqued my interest, was Block Bird chicken sourced from several Midwestern small farms.  Verified by Blockchain technology, the entire journey of their chickens to the grocery store is documented and visible on the front label of their packages.  Block Bird’s label includes hatchery (egg) information, starting weight, ending weight, the type of feeds consumed, as well as the health and handling of each bird.

Being in the food business, I respect how today’s consumers are more knowledgeable about the food and beverages they consume, thus demanding label transparency.  However, at what point is the complete and total transparency overload provided by food & beverage companies TMI for consumers to fully grasp?

TMI Thought: “Everyone gets so much information all day long they lose their common sense.” – Gertrude Stein (American Writer)  

Blink:

Congratulations Dan Barber, winner of SMARTKETING’s eighth Gretzky award.

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Back in 2010 I started an annual tradition of awarding a company or individual for peak performance, the Gretzky award for “skating to where the puck is going to be.”  The sixth and seventh Gretzky awards, were two companies making this planet a better place, LeanPath and Lotus Foods respectively.  In light of the fact I am extremely concerned about collapsing ecosystems on our planet, I am awarding renown chef, long time farm-to-table advocate, Dan Barber a Gretzky award for his forward thinking as it relates to future food and farming.

I wrote about Dan last August, specifically wastED Pop-Ups, his restaurant concept of dishes composed entirely of ingredients usually considered waste to be discarded.  His latest mission is to change farm-to-table cuisine.  Instead of center-of-plate entrées consisting of a protein, preferably grass-fed, entrées should be great tasting vegetables topped with a seasoning or a sauce of meat.  He advocates that chefs have a responsibility to form a relationship with their farmers, thus know where every ingredient comes from.  In addition, they need to better understand the numerous combinations/origins of global food.  Long-term it will be better for our ecosystems.

I highly recommend carving out some time to watch Dan Barber’s classic TED talk How I fell in love with a fish to better understand he is a planetary ecosystem leader skating to where the puck is going to be.  Congratulations Dan!

Blink:

Last week I pointed out the need to deviate from the norm to advance progress.  Sometimes creative innovation is a byproduct of deviating from the norm.  Renown modern choreographer Twyla Tharp’s classic The Creative Habit offers remarkable wisdom about creative innovation.

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Tharp believes that creativity is not just a result of challenging the status quo and deviating from the norm, but rather an act of defiance.  She stresses the need for creative people to question accepted truths and principles.  Don’t always conform to the established rules.  Do things differently!  Furthermore, in the creative process according to Tharp, there has to be an act of destruction or abandonment.  Consequently, something has to be cast aside to make way for the new.

Can you subscribe to doing things differently?  If so, creative innovation will follow.

Blink:

“Without deviation from the norm, progress is not possible.”  Frank Zappa

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Early morning Christmas Eve day I went to Macy’s to buy a duffel bag.  The store was completely dead despite all the discounted merchandise.  I was surprised given all the positive holiday sales forecasts I had read.  However, I was aware that a significant amount of growth was going to be a result of increased online sales versus a year ago (approximately 18%).  Bottom-line: I was experiencing the overall inertia of retail brick & mortar.  Reminded me of a line I once read in Fast Company magazine: equilibrium, status quo is the precursor to stagnation.

Deviation (noun): The action of departing from an established course or accepted standard.

Are you prepared to deviate from the norm in 2018?

Blink:

Slang – cool, def, bomb, kwel, awesome, boss.  What defines a cool person?

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To me, New York Times columnist David Brooks said it best this past year: “The cool person is stoical, emotionally controlled, never eager or needy, but instead mysterious, detached and self-possessed.  The cool person is gracefully competent at something, but doesn’t need the world’s applause to know his worth.  That’s because the cool person has found his or her own unique and authentic way of living with nonchalant intensity.”

Are you cool?

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Blink:

I have posted numerous times about food waste, the last titled Good Thinking.  Beyond food, the global challenge is Zero Waste, a visionary philosophy – the redesign of sustainable resources.  All products are reused.  The most recent Zero Waste innovation I learned about is Feel Iceland.

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Founder & CEO, Hrönn Margrét Magnúsdóttir observed how her father-in-law, a fisherman of Viking decent, utilized his catch from the ocean.  She was amazed how much of the fish byproducts were thrown away.  Her mission was born; she was determined to create more value for the fish caught by Iceland’s fisherman.  Via research, along with other ingredients from the waters surrounding Iceland, she created a line of food supplements and skin care products that would make people feel good.  Two examples:

• A collagen powder made from Icelandic fish skin and amino acids that helps conserve the youthfulness (elasticity) of skin. Just mix the powder into your favorite smoothies, tea or the beverage of your choice.
• An anti-aging skin serum made with a high concentration of marine enzymes and Feel Iceland’s collagen powder.

Feel Iceland, an innovative example of utilizing the precious sustainable resources of our planet.

Blink:

In my 2011 post titled The Missing App – The Personal Touch, I questioned whether society had lost its personal touch.  However, I still believe there are exceptions to the norm.  Amtrak employee, Kevin Marshall is one of those people who practices the value of the personal touch.

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Recently Mom and I went to Washington D.C.  We decided to take Amtrak versus experiencing the parking lot on I-495 (the Capital Beltway) and taking out a loan to pay for hotel parking in DuPont Circle.  On the way back to Philadelphia, when I went up to the counter to purchase our tickets, Kevin Marshall the ticket counter customer service specialist, after viewing my Mom’s ID (age 97), said wait a minute.  Unsolicited, he put on a jacket, stepped out from behind the counter, got a wheel chair and wheeled my Mom onto our train directly to her seat.  Over the top – the personal touch!

When was the last time you experienced an over the top customer service experience?