Winning Pitches with RangeMe & ECRM

NIQ’s Katie Hazlett shares the top product innovation trends that are driving growth in beauty, health, and wellness categories in this interview with ECRM’s Joseph Tarnowski, recorded on location at ECRM’s Personal Care, Health Car,e and Baby & Infant Sessions.  She takes a deep dive into three product innovation trends in particular: Brands that are viral on social media, brands that focus o...

ECRM's On & Off Premise Adult Beverage Session featured a special fireside chat with former mob boss Michael Franzese. During the discussion, hosted by Joseph Tarnowski, Michael shared his experience in organized crime, his redemption and positive transformation, and how he has applied the hard lessons he has learned along the way to growing his new brand, Franzese Wines.   Among the topi...

Nik Hall is the Co-Founder and former CEO of VitaFive, a supplement brand that saw tremendous growth at retail and on Amazon before its very successful acquisition by a major CPG company. Now, as CEO of REViVE Marketing Partners, he helps emerging brands scale up on Amazon.  In this interview with ECRM's Joseph Tarnowski, Nik shares key insights emerging brands need to know about growing thei...

Here's why the follow-up skills of Troy Potteiger, Director of Sales for Bones Coffee Company, lead to success on the shelf, according to Shawn Holmes at Hot Spot Convenience Stores, who added the brand's RTDs to its lineup earlier this year:   “From our first meeting back in July 2023, he made it a point to stay connected without ever being pushy — striking that rare balance between pro...

As consumer palates evolve and cultural diversity continues to shape the grocery landscape, the demand for authentic, flavorful, and globally inspired foods continues to grow. In this interview, Diana Sheehan, Founder of PDG Insights, explores the opportunity for retailers and brands to invest in Asian, Hispanic, and other global cuisines—not just as a trend, but as a long-term growth strategy.  A...

When you take feedback from your buyer meetings and incorporate it into your product development, good things happen -- as in major retail deals.    Nikki Parmar, Owner of Bodyform, knows this firsthand. When she goes into a buyer meeting, she is not only looking to secure distribution for her brand's line of feminine care products; she’s also seeking out valuable intel on how she can adapt h...

While Nicobi Foods may seem like an overnight success with its recent deals that include Walmart, Wakefern, and Ahold USA, it's really just the culmination of a journey that began many years ago -- and A LOT of hard, grinding work.    In his recent interview with ECRM's Joseph Tarnowski, Co-Founder Obi Linton shared his journey from Baltimore detective to an owner and operator of a resta...

To truly understand a buyer's needs, you need to ask a lot of questions. Detailed questions. Strategic questions. And then, you need to listen. Listen MUCH MORE than you speak. The result: You'll be armed with the information you need to direct you on the path to closing a deal.  Argires Snacks' George Argires is a case in point. For years, he was having trouble landing deals at ECR...

2025 Core-Mark Curated Winner & RangeMe Premium subscriber Unite Food is looking to shake up the protein bar aisle with globally-inspired flavors and natural ingredients. In this podcast, Founder & CEO Clara Paye shares her journey from Managing Director of a major plumbing manufacturer to launching a food brand with distribution at leading retailers like Target, Sprouts, H-E-B, and Meijer...

Moderation and convenience are shaping the way consumers buy adult beverages – both those they consume at home as well as those consumed at bars, restaurants, and hospitality venues. In this episode, NIQ’s Director of Beverage Alcohol Thought Leadership, Kaleigh Theriault, shares how these trends are impacting sales of wine, beer, spirits, and RTDs and where the opportunities lie within each of th...

Beauty brand Mudita Earth landed deals with Natural Grocers, Meijer and KeHE Distributors from buyer introductions made at ECRM Sessions. However, each of these retailers initially said “no” to the brand’s Co-Founder Pooja Chopra. In this interview, Chopra shares how she turned each of these “NOs” into a resounding “YES” via listening to the buyers’ needs, then adjusting her products, packaging an...

Sisters Jordan Catapano and Jocelyn Dunn are truly examples of how persistence and tenacity can pay off for brand owners. Over the past decade, they went from bartenders to authors to owners of a bartending business, then became CPG brand owners with the launch of a line of cocktail mixers called This Girl Walks Into a Bar.  Then earlier this year they lost the bartending business to the Los Angel...

Managing the Growth of CPG Teams: Founders Share Their Stories Cosset, Global Beauty Care and Okay Pure Naturals each started with only two or three people, and over the years have grown their companies to dozens of team members. This growth comes with several challenges, such as deciding which roles to fill first, finding the right hires, grooming future leadership, and handing off the reins of c...

How CPG Supplier Mekor 10Xed its Business by Listening Closely to Retail Buyers When Mekor Corp. first participated in ECRM Sessions, they were selling just a line of functional teas with distribution of just a few thousand doors. Now its distribution is more than ten times that and has expanded to include products like supplements, cookies, aloe vera drinks, and spices.  Sapan Nainani attributes...

How Casey's 1st Innovation Summit led to 19 New Product Finds Last August, Casey's teamed up with RangeMe and ECRM to launch its first-ever Innovation Summit in an effort to discover new brands that would attract a broader array of customers to its stores. The convenience store chain, which operates more than 2,900 stores across 19 Midwestern states, discovered 19 new brands from the Sum...

What's in a Name? A Lot, if You Ask Yes Honey Founder Heather Mincer Nobody wants to enter “naked chicks” into their browser search while they are on their work computer. But that’s what people had to do to find the honey-sweetened sodas and drizzlers created by Yes Honey Founder Heather Mincer, when her company was originally called Naked Chicks Pasture.  When you know the brand’s origin, th...

Beauty Brand Skin Centrick Shows that 1+1=3 When it Comes to ECRM & RangeMe Skin Centrick’s Founder & CEO, Chithra Kannan, is a perfect example of a brand owner who understands the power of leveraging both ECRM and RangeMe to engage with the buyer community, and because of this, the brand is already on a trajectory of success rarely seen in a consumer packaged goods startup.  Launched only...