We’re feeling good about One Mighty Mill bagels. So, this week, we moved on to pretzels. (That photo is the collection I bought from all over Massachusetts and taste-tested.)
To get started, we did some good, old-fashion market research. It’s the same kind of research we’ve been doing from the beginning — back when we were trying to figure out if our idea made sense.
At the start of the OMM journey, we had to identify the business opportunity around making “wheat you can eat”. As I’ve already referenced in this blog, we did intense research online across the entire “whole grain” category. (I literally hit over 2,000 company websites to score each and identify our opportunity to differentiate.) Meanwhile, I also started visiting my local Whole Foods and striking up conversations with team members to try and validate the customer need for products made from local, fresh milled wheat and to find out the products that sold best.
It was pretty awkward. But, not as awkward as the time when I was loitering in my local grocery store and my wife walked up behind me. She was buying food for our family. I was trying to make friends with Whole Foods employees. It was not the best husband-and-wife interaction.
Anyway, after a few weeks and about 10 visits, I was able to befriend a couple of team members. They shared lots of good information and feedback. The most valuable was some rough sales volumes for tortillas, english muffins and bagels. Those numbers are like gold when you’re trying to convince yourself that a business idea can work.
Later, to determine our bagel flavors, we did the same kind of research (i.e. a combo of awkward, first-person interactions and comprehensive industry data). So, I spent a couple of days visiting every local cafe and bagel shop. I bought a bagel and then peppered the cashier with questions about best selling flavors and customer favorites. Meanwhile, my buddy who works in private equity provided Nielsen data for the leading bagel flavors sold at grocery over the last 5 years. Turns out, Nielsen’s numbers matched what those cashiers told me. Loud and clear, they said that people love Plain bagels. Despite the fact that I never order Plain, it is far and away the best seller. The clear cut second place winner was Everything. Interestingly, there was no consistent #3. We’re using it as an opportunity to be creative and to align with consumer trends. So, we’re going spicy and developing a Double Chile & Cheddar bagel.
This week, it’s all about pretzels. We’ve decided that they need to be petite, individually wrapped snacks that are portable and designed to be eaten on the go. The individual wrapping is going to be labor intensive. But, we think it’s critical for One Mighty Mill pretzels to be conducive to dropping into a kid’s lunchbox or replacing a snack like a KIND Bar or bag of chips. So, I started with the most elementary market research tactic of all. I googled: “pretzels near me”. Then, I spent a day tracking down every soft pretzel on the list. Like Will Farrell said in “Old School”, it was a “nice, little day” for a middle aged man to spend visiting bakeries all over greater Boston. I hit an Auntie Annie’s kiosk inside a train station, a few local bakeries, even a push cart in Faneuil Hall. Then, I went to Whole Foods, Star Market and Shaw’s to buy the rest. Last, we had to eat them to assess flavor, texture, size, packaging and everything else about the brand and product.
We’re just getting started. But, the next few weeks at One Mighty Mill will be dominated by all things pretzel.
I got next! 