Gift biz unwrapped episode 79.
Most things we did,
we did well,
but this is when we just felt that we could be
great. Hi,
this is John Lee,
Dumas of entrepreneur on fire,
and you're listening to the gift of biz unwrapped,
and now it's time to light it up.
Welcome to gift Bez on wrapped your source for industry specific
insights and advice to develop and grow your business.
And now here's your host,
Sue Mona height.
Hi there.
I'm Sue and welcome back to the gift biz unwrapped podcast,
whether you own a brick and mortar store sell online or
are just getting started,
you'll discover new insight to gain traction and to grow your
business. And today I have joining us David Polis of celebrations,
fun food,
factory celebrations,
fun food factory is a family owned and operated business established
in 1990.
For the last seven years,
they have been a wholesale manufacturer of a popcorn part of
their business model is that they don't sell directly to the
general public this way.
They aren't competing with their retail partners,
Dave places,
a high value on customer service and product quality and all
popcorn is made to order to ensure freshness.
And I can tell you from tasting their popcorn,
that it is dull.
Delicious. I am so glad to have you on the show.
Thank you so much for joining me,
Dave. Thanks for having me.
I'd like to get started by having our listeners understand a
little bit about you in a creative way.
And that is by having you describe your ideal motivational candle.
So if you were to share with us what color it
would be and what the quote would be,
what would we be seeing on your candle?
Well, I guess the candle would be red and I'm not
sure this is a Colt or a saying,
but something that I kind of believe in is,
is that you don't worry about things that you cannot fix
Because so much energy goes into trying to overcome or handle
something when you have no control over it.
I think that's really important for all of us in business.
Yeah. So most things we don't have control over.
So just focus and spend your energies on the things that
you can control,
right? Yeah.
Perfect. Something that we can all remember,
gift biz listeners,
let's go back and talk about how celebrations fund food factory
started. Well,
we kind of started way back doing school fundraisings.
We did school carnivals,
the order takers that kids go to your door and bother
you with and holiday shops in the schools and doing the
carnivals. We had a lot of destined equipment,
snow cones,
lush, cotton,
candy popcorn,
which all came from gold metal company in Cincinnati.
Over a period of time,
we had so much equipment.
We became a dealer and in the process became a dealer
that we sold to jam golden gourmet,
which manufactured a caramel corn that we manufacture now.
And the lady had some health problems and we walked business
no eight years ago.
And over the period of time,
we sold off the order takers in this,
the holiday shops.
And then about four years ago,
we decided that caramel corn was going to be our sole
focus. And all we do now is of corn,
Caramel, corn,
and cheese popcorn.
I know because it's my favorite of yours,
Cheese popcorn,
the fruit flavored glazes caramels and the,
with nuts,
without nuts with any flavor you would like All versions of,
as we were talking about in your intro,
the gourmet popcorn.
Correct. And what was the reason why you narrow down to
just one product Or I guess several reasons.
One is that we found that the caramel corn was probably
our best chance of being great at there's a book good
to great.
And you know,
there's a lot of people that do things that you're good
at because that's what you always did.
And most things we did,
we did well.
Well, this is when we just felt that we could be
great at.
So that's why we kept doing the caramel corns.
I really liked that.
You say that because it might to some of our listeners
sound counter-intuitive because in some ways you think,
well, you know,
you have more products,
you're going to be more successful because there's more choices,
but we continually hear as entrepreneurs,
this whole idea of niching down and having one really good
thing that you can do really well.
And that's what you did.
But you did this way before people were talking about,
Well, that came from the good to great book,
which is written probably 20 some years ago that compared the
14 large companies and their consideration of a great company was
that you weren't great.
One year,
you have your whole bet great quality for a span of
15 years.
So grade is really a hard thing to do.
It's not like,
Oh, we're great.
We had the best year ever.
You look back for 15 years or for 15 years,
it's a hard concept to do.
Do you think that's why?
So often you see businesses come up and they start and
they look like they've got a great concept.
And then three years down the road,
they're closing their doors.
Oh, there's whole lot of things.
You know,
you have a great concept,
but almost before you have a great concept,
you have to have the right people on the bus.
If you don't have the right people going with you and
working with you,
even a great concept,
won't succeed.
Oh, that's interesting.
Talk to us a little bit about that.
What are you seeing in terms of,
what do you need to do to make sure that you're
getting the right people?
Boy, that is really rough.
He had,
everybody has to have the same vision,
the same passion for what you do.
Even our hourly people understand that caramel corn is what we
do and everything has to be right.
And that's probably the hardest thing of all is getting the
right people on the bus.
So do you first,
when you're interviewing people,
are you hiring for certain personality traits,
dedication, and commitment,
that type of thing,
or what do you look for to figure out if they're
going to be a good fit for you?
Well, personality traits and they fit with us also.
It's just their dedication,
no matter what job you have before the job you have.
Now, if it was a job,
you hated you,
you still need the dedication and the willingness to do your
job. I mean,
every job is perfect.
There's a lot of jobs I don't like,
but I'm doing,
because I'm dedicated to making caramel corn,
although this isn't what I like.
I'm still going to do it the best that I can,
whatever portion of the job that happens to me.
And so you talk a little bit about the culture and
that everybody understands the vision of the business.
The vision is your product is caramel,
corn. Do you have regular meetings with all your employees?
Or how do you make sure to instill that message and
the understanding of where the business is going and keeping everyone
motivated? We are still rather small.
So we're pretty much a hands-on business.
So myself or Cathy,
my wife,
or one of us,
we are always working with the people.
So, you know,
we do have regular meetings,
but they see us do it every day.
You know,
they do,
as you do.
So if we keep the attitude and everything positive,
they understand the quality we expect.
It seems to fall fairly.
And it's a good point there too,
because the culture of the business starts from the top.
So you and Kathy are involved in the business and just
the attitude that you have,
where, where you were saying,
you know,
it's not my favorite thing to make the caramel corn,
but still you're doing it.
Just the attitude and the commitment then funnels down to all
your employees.
For sure.
Right? So let's talk about how you are different from other
people in that is,
I mean,
I saw you and Kathy recently at a trade show,
which is how we started talking and I tasted your popcorn.
I actually have it here now in my office.
And you're so proud and committed.
And I saw when both of you were speaking,
just the idea that you make it to order.
So in other words,
there is not popcorn sitting there waiting for people.
Remember it's not direct to the public.
So it's businesses calling in,
but they're not just pulling it off the shelf and putting
it in boxes.
They are making it based on orders that are coming in.
So a little bit more cumbersome in terms of the product
fulfillment, David,
but how did you come upon the idea that this is
what you were going to do Caramel corn to begin with?
It has a six month shelf life.
So it has a fairly long shelf life,
but you know,
everybody, particularly small businesses are worried about turnover and their product
to stay fresh.
And that was just our thought from the beginning was that
our product is gourmet.
You probably won't find it a heavier coated product in the
industry, our product,
we stay away from artificial flavors as much as we can
to keep things natural and make sure it's the most squirmy
there is on the market.
So to do that,
we thought that the freshest was as important as how gourmet
the product is.
So everything,
as you said,
is made to order,
we get customers that order one case at a time,
we have customers order hundreds of cases at a time,
but still they're all made to order.
Got it.
And so how do you get the out I've noticed as
I was asking you for information for the show,
you don't do a lot of social media,
which in a way makes a lot of sense because you
aren't directly to the consumer and social media might confuse everybody.
You might get lots of calls that,
you know,
you're not going to fulfill the product,
but how do you get your message out?
And how do you attract new business?
Our primary method is trade shows where we met you.
We do very well at keeping business.
You know,
like any business,
it's much easier to keep a customer.
It is to get a new one.
So once we get a customer,
we want to make sure that we keep them as long
as they're selling caramel corn,
then the trade show is the best route to go.
And there's some thumb networking we do with people we're small
and probably on that end of the scale,
not the best we're best at making caramel corn,
our sales approach.
Probably not as good as their caramel corn.
So you let the product speak for itself.
Yeah, that sounds good.
What do you do?
Are there any tips that you would give for people who
are working trade shows?
What are you seeing if that is your single most visible
spot it's got to work for you.
It's got to pull in customers.
What do you see as any tips that you would have
in terms of helping people in the booth or just working
trade shows overall,
We're not very pushy.
We don't push our product people.
They go by,
but it's really important to engage people say hello to them.
How are they doing?
I mean,
we have conversations with people at shows that we've been to
film since we started eight years ago,
we talked to every time,
but have not yet bought a product from us,
but it's just important to engage people.
Then if they do want to see your product,
they'll talk to you.
But if you just sit in your booth and hopes,
it will come to talk to you.
It's not going to happen.
What do you say about sampling?
Oh, it's 100% necessary trade show.
Many years ago,
not many,
maybe four.
We went to and we always give out stuff like cups
with samples of all the different flavors we used to sample
three or four and people would have them,
but there was another caramel corn company that sent out a
bag, like maybe an eight ounce bag.
They gave everybody a bag of caramel,
corn, and people were concerned that isn't that gonna hurt you.
But everybody came by with that bag.
And pretty much I just showed them the color of ours,
the coding,
ours, and,
you know,
sample ours.
They just looked at what was in the bag.
And you can tell just by comparing to that,
there wasn't any comparison.
So, So were they giving bags in that sampling?
I believe so.
Everybody just got a bag and,
and, and you know,
you want to taste it.
You want to see it.
And then when you do taste and see you and make
sure you're showing your absolute best product.
Sure. I asked you that because I have been to a
number of shows and it seems so crazy to me where
people will be showing the product and not giving samples.
Glad you told that story because there is a perfect example
of the same thing,
but you bring up another point too,
which is specially I think for consumable products that it has
to look delicious.
Like you just want to get your hands on it and
taste it.
Yes. Correct.
You always see people say that they're good give away,
or they give this away.
But if you're giving something away,
you don't give something away because you haven't left over.
You make it special to give away.
So you're always giving away your best product.
He absolutely can.
Right. And so of course you make it because everything's always
fresh. You make it special then for the show,
bring it to the show.
And then you do have samples because I got someone I
was coming home in the bags too,
right? Yeah.
We always have samples in the bags.
And then in the little souffle cups for people that tastes
while they're there,
we do a lot of shows that are chocolate based,
most of our shelves.
So we also learn over a period of time,
look at your samples and where you're going,
what you want to take.
We take all the samples,
but we particularly take heavier on the savory,
the cheeses because when people have been through a hundred booths
of chocolate,
they no longer want something sweet.
They want something savory just for a different taste.
Oh, good point.
You blend it to the show,
but then you also consider the customer's experience as they're going
through because you're right.
We were just at four gift business listeners.
We were just at the national gourmet candy show in Atlantic
city. And boy,
is there a lot of chocolate there?
It's a dangerous show to be at.
There are quite a few samples.
Not everyone was sampling.
They are either.
I might add.
Wonderful. So really good tips from David in terms of working
shows, make sure that you are out and interacting with people
who are coming by your booth,
make sure your product makes sense for the show that you're
at. So if you do have multiple products,
make sure that you're understanding the customer's experience and sampling is
all important for sure.
Okay. I want to jump over now and talk about a
time when maybe you've had some challenges in the business,
something hasn't gone exactly the way you'd want.
And I like to use this example as a learning for
our listeners.
So can you bring us somewhere in the course of business,
where there were some struggles for you and how you overcame
them? There's a lot of struggles needed saving.
Self-important ongoing struggle that comes and goes.
We are regulated by the FDA,
the food and drug administration.
And this is a very important process because it's very important
to keep the food supply chain sake and we update and
we do whatever.
When we started,
they just went through an update.
So there was a lot of things to do,
but they just came out with FISMA,
the food safety modernization act.
And they came out with about a year ago.
I went to classes last week.
It took a year for the FDA to put out a
book of guidelines of how to enforce the new regulations.
So this is a three-year operation to get everybody up to
this new act for a big business,
they have a person or a group of people that control
everything for a small business like celebrations.
It's a major undertaking it's to the point where every process
you do now is tracked.
Every process is written down.
It's written down between allergens.
When you wash always done,
you always clean equipment between allergens.
You always wash your hands and you go in out of
the room.
But every process now has to be tracked.
And for a small business,
this is just a major undertaking.
And that's what we're in now.
But on the other hand,
when the consumer gets your product,
they're always sure that you don't have cross-contamination allergens.
You don't have micro organisms or anything else.
So it is a very important process,
but it is probably over the years,
one of the most difficult ones to handle And you get
announcements or whatever,
when things are changing,
of course,
the big one.
Now this food safety modernization act,
you have three years,
you said to implement it,
to get it into your business.
We're down to about two now.
So we've got two more years.
It took them a year to figure out the guidelines of
how to implement it.
We're a bigger company,
such as general mills would have their own people designing the
implementation where smaller companies can't afford to do that.
So you wait until the FDA people give you a gun.
So good for consumers,
of course,
somewhat challenging for you guys and especially smaller businesses.
I'm sure,
I guess this is a great reason to have a smaller
number of products then too,
for you,
Of course,
the bigger your skews are as far as ingredients,
the higher it gets to be.
And as far as the great thing about the food safety
act is everything.
Now, you know,
we have our food safety here,
but we get sugar in.
You get all their certifications.
So all our product is now tracked back from when it
came out the ground to when we get it for food
safety. So when we get it,
we're assured by the manufacturer,
the grower,
whoever of the safety,
and then we continue on with our safety.
So it's really good for the consumer.
When they get a product it's been carefully inspected from one,
it popped out of the ground until they received Through the
whole chain.
Yes. And that's good to know from a consumer standpoint,
let's talk about your,
your whole customer base now,
our businesses.
So your retail partners is what you call them.
You're attracting new retail partners from trade shows primarily,
and then you're continuing to stay in communication with them in
some shape or form.
But how else are you making sure that you ensure because
the whole key for you is going to be repetitive business
reorders, Correct?
We do follow up with customers after they receive product to
make sure that that they're happy,
particularly new customers.
I mean,
we have customers that we had since we bought the business
and there's some of the men you talk about their kids,
their grandkids now.
So yeah,
it's really important just to build a relationship with everybody.
And if they know they have an issue,
they can call a nice story is,
you know,
we manufacture all the different flavors,
but we had a person that ate our product at a
retail level.
They have four restaurants in Toledo and their Hungarian restaurants.
And he called up one day.
He said,
you know,
I got your product at the farmer's market or wherever it
was. And he said,
can you make pick up flavored popcorn?
And we said,
well, we think so.
So he brought us some samples of his Hungarian style,
sweet and spicy pickle.
We found a flavor manufacturer.
We got a pickle from,
we had some spicy.
So we worked in probably 10 different batches to,
we found one that tasted like his pickles.
Since then we had made a chili cheese to matches chili
flavor, and we do an Apple dumpling to match on his
desserts. And this is all from follow up and the man
coming from any retail product.
But what's really,
really cool about the story is it's a market.
We never really thought of,
he came to us saying,
can you match this product?
No, I can make a spicy pickle popcorn and never sell
a bag of it.
He puts it in all his restaurants next to his pickles
and they buy a jar of pickles and a bag of
popcorn. The next time they come in,
they still have pickles left,
but ate the popcorn.
So they buy another bag of popcorn.
And it was just an interesting thing,
how all worked through to the,
to the whole retail line that this gentleman came back to
us and how it worked through that a little different market
than they were used to that we really never thought of
before. Right.
That is really interesting.
So when you're doing that,
so you're devoting time then to figuring out a recipe that
is then just for him,
is that an exclusive recipe than just for him?
The pickle one is just for him,
his chili cheese.
We had a chili cheese with the chili spice that we
use, but his chili cheese,
this is chili spice.
So that's history.
I'm also in the Apple dumpling.
I mean,
we don't make it in our line.
It's really not that special,
but it's just for him.
Also, When someone comes to you,
do you have a minimum order that they have to purchase?
No, it's just the CA everything is a case to keep
our gourmet quality,
one batch where you're on small batch machines,
many of them,
but small batch machines in one batch is basically one case.
And that is how we keep the freshest.
When you order one case,
it's one batch,
we baggy shit and it was shipped to you and in
Chicago. And you know,
your product is two days old.
Oh, that's crazy.
And it's delicious.
We did break into one of those bags,
sorry. Well,
no prompts.
So, you know,
we'll try to make a product for anyone now.
Hopefully there's some reasonable sales involved afterwards,
but you,
you know,
if you don't try it,
you don't know.
So if somebody was listening to the show right now,
and these shows now are evergreen.
So this might even be a year from now who knows,
but if someone's listening to the show and they're like,
boy, you know,
we have a restaurant similar to what you were just talking
about. The story you were just talking about,
they could call you up and talk about a special flavor
that they might be interested in having in their shop.
Maybe it's even,
they're known for cherries.
They're a town that's known for cherries.
You would work with them in terms of customizing a product.
Certainly we do.
We do do some cherry things for people.
We do some Wilder,
flavorings. We have a customer.
All they sell in their store is lavender items.
Everything has to have lavender in it.
We do a caramel corn with lavender flavor,
not necessarily my favorite.
It sells really well in lavender country.
For sure.
All right.
Gift biz listeners is a perfect example now of how to
customize your product for different areas,
different venues,
different neighborhoods,
you know,
whatever it might be in terms of cities and what they're
known for.
So think about this and how this might relate to your
product. Are there different things that you could be doing to
attract more business because you're making it super custom,
really great story.
Thank you so much with that.
Let's move now,
David, into the reflection section,
this is a look at you specifically and what types of
things you're doing with your day and a little bit about
you and how you've been successful.
Is there one natural trait that you've always had that you
call upon regularly in your business life?
I guess it's just me and Kathy,
or I guess we are both high energy people.
A friend of ours has a small business.
It's really a cottage business and nothing they need to live
off of.
And it's just,
you know,
they said,
why didn't you work after dinner?
Why do you do this?
I, so you go home after dinner and you go to
the gym or you watch TV.
There's 24 hours in a day and I sleep six or
eight. So what I do with the other 16 are up
to me and I do like to go off vacation and
enjoy things.
But some days the other 16 hours may be work,
which is a terrible thing to say.
And I like to keep it eight,
10 hours a day.
But if necessary,
if they have 16 hours of work,
it's 16 hours of work.
The joys of being self-employed Well,
it's true.
You get to steer the ship.
So, you know,
if you get to do what you enjoy doing and what
you've created yourself,
even though you've already said,
you don't like doing the carbo corn production.
There's a lot of other stuff that goes along with the
business as well.
So it's just a high energy level,
I think is one of the attributes that keep us going.
And what tool do you use regularly to keep productive or
to try and create some type of balance?
Well, back to my candle,
don't worry about things that you can't fix.
You can spend a whole lot of your life worrying about
things that you will never solve.
So that's just that mindset.
Keep your energy and your focus going on,
things that you can control and effect.
Correct. And you may have already alluded to this.
What book have you read that you think our listeners could
find value in?
You're self employed.
It's good to great.
I mean,
it's good for your personal life.
It's good for your business life.
I mean,
it was probably 20 years ago with the comparison of different
businesses, but I probably read it four times every couple of
years, I pull it out and read it again because there's
just so many things like the right people on the bus.
And it's just so many things in there that will just
hit something you're doing right then and say,
maybe I should do this different.
So it's a good book to read and read over and
over. And if I recall correctly,
cause I've read that book as well.
They give a lot of live examples of big businesses,
ones that have done well and ones that haven't and why
correct. Give biz listeners just as you're listening to the podcast
today, you can also listen to audio books with ease.
And I know that good to great is on audible because
that's how I read it.
I've teamed up with audible for you to get an audio
book just like this for free.
If you haven't done so already,
all you need to do is go to gift biz,
book.com and make a selection that's gift biz,
book.com and gift biz listeners.
You know,
you can go to the show notes page.
I will have information so that you can see celebrations fund
food factory if you're a business.
Okay? So not just a consumer,
but if you're a business and are interested in what Dave
has to offer,
then you can absolutely get in touch with him.
So go ahead and connect up with the show notes page.
And I think the best thing for people,
Dave, who are listening while they're walking,
while they're cleaning up their shops,
et cetera,
would be to go to your website,
correct? Yes.
People today seem to like the website.
I personally like to talk to people but busy people.
Yeah. I would use the website.
Okay. And I love that you said that reach out and
give Dave a call.
I think that's what you're saying,
right? Yes.
Super. Finally,
Dave, I'd like to present you with a virtual gift.
It's a magical box containing unlimited possibilities for your future.
So this is your dream or your goal of almost unreachable
Heights that you would wish to obtain.
Please accept this gift and open it in our presence.
What is inside your box?
Oh goodness.
There's a lot of things I could think of.
Let's keep it very simple.
And what I like to be would always be able to
see the good in whatever situation I'm in.
And there are a lot of things that happen in the
things that happen to us recently that you just don't understand
why, but you need always to be able.
And I wish I could always be able to see the
good in every situation Always stay positive and always stay on
that side of the fence if you will.
Yes. Thank you so much,
Dave. I really appreciate,
you know,
I knew that I wanted to talk to you when I
saw you and Kathy at the booth and please give my
best to Kathy.
When you see her,
she's probably right next to you or in the room somewhere
right now.
I don't know She is.
She's drinking your coffee,
which I'm not,
but she is.
All right.
Well, hi to Kathy.
Thank you so much,
really some great information that you've shared.
I love the fact that you niched down the product so
much and are seeing such great success.
Anyone who's in business,
who does not already carry gourmet popcorn and thinks they should.
I give it a personal recommendation,
continued success to you.
I'm thinking I'll see you at another trade show real soon.
And may your candle always burn bright?
Where are you in your business building journey,
whether you're just starting out or already running a business and
you want to know your set up for success.
Find out by taking the gift biz quiz,
access the quiz from your computer at bit dot L Y
slash a gift biz quiz or from your phone like texting
gift biz quiz to four four,
two, two,
two. Thanks for listening and be sure to join us for
the next episode.
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