2023 Kickoff Email

Hey ,

First off, Happy New Year!I'm really excited to kick off 2023 with you, because I have a good feeling about this year. Yes yes, even amidst the continuing supply-chain challenges, financial tightening, and e-commerce downtrend, there's still hope. A few weeks ago I surveyed the Foodbevy community to identify how I can best help this year.One of the biggest areas is in building community with other founders. Let's be real, this CPG journey can be a shit show, with highs and lows around every corner. Take for example the story of Modest Coffee who took a $200,000 loan to produce a large order for a natural channel distributor, just to have it returned. That's why I'm excited to launch our new Founder's Circle groups. The beta is launching next week with the full program kicking off in February. The goal is to provide a safe space for you to connect with other founders, ask questions, avoid mistakes others have experienced, and find new opportunities. If you're interested and haven't signed up yet you can join the Founders Circle waitlist here.When I was running my CPG brand TeaSquares, I had the opportunity to participate in various accelerator groups and build strong connections with other founders. I'm looking to recreate that founder-to-founder magic. One of my biggest stressors building TeaSquares was that I constantly felt behind. That I should've been selling in more stores, had higher e-commerce sales, and raised more investment. It's hard when you don't understand what it's really like behind the scenes of other companies. That's why I created the Annual State of the CPG Industry Survey, so you can see how other brands are growing with real numbers (company names redacted). This survey is designed to help you get an overview of the CPG Food and Beverage industry. You'll receive an in-depth report with an analysis of

• Average unit velocities per category

• Retail distribution

• E-commerce repeat rate

and so much more to help you plan for 2023. You can then use this data for retail meetings, investor pitches, and internal benchmarking.

To get access to the report, complete this 15min survey here: https://bit.ly/3hPS9qILastly, many of you know I also run GoodFoodBrands.com, an online marketplace for emerging brands. I've learned a ton running this business over the last few years and finally have found where we have Product Market Fit. This year I'm doubling down on our gifting customers and doing a complete brand redesign.I invite you to follow along my journey in coming up with our new name, creating our new branding, redesigning our website and packaging, and more. I'm sharing all the behind the scenes so that you can see my exact process and be inspired for yours.2023 is going to be a big year and I couldn't do it without you . I'm also here to help with any challenges that may come your way. So how are you feeling? What do you need help with? Reply to this email and let me know!

Jordan Buckner