the Joshua Schall Audio Experience

Did y’all really think the party was over for Celsius Holdings after the PepsiCo deal? Come on man! Celsius Holdings (NASDAQ: CELH) hit another record quarterly revenue ($188 million - up 98% YoY) and represented its 17th consecutive quarter of sequential growth for the energy drinks brand. While Celsius energy drinks saw massive growth in convenience stores, mass retailers like Walmart, the club...

Will revamping SlimFast and BSN be the answer to solving the struggles of both Glanbia Performance Nutrition brands? Glanbia Performance Nutrition had 2022 Q3 revenue growth of 13.7% YoY on a constant currency basis from strong pricing increases. They also benefitted from the mid-2021 acquisition of LevlUp, a gamer (esports) nutrition brand. Glanbia Performance Nutrition is one of two wholly-owned...

On August 27, 2018, Sharon Leite officially took over the role of CEO at The Vitamin Shoppe. How has she done in my opinion? Firstly, I'll transport us back in time, so we can get a sense of what was happening at The Vitamin Shoppe when we took over the job. The peak revenue and store count era was in 2016, but cracks quickly began to show at The Vitamin Shoppe (and GNC), as they struggled to comp...

Even with the gut health revolution in full swing across the CPG industry, most consumers still have a knowledge gap, but that might actually end up creating a double-edged sword effect on categorical growth. Gut health has become such a well-known trend within the food, beverage, and supplement CPG categories…bringing with it tons of new market growth and product development. (Note: I’ll cover so...

I figured out the secret behind Quest Nutrition’s product innovation strategy and let’s just say they could easily be a headlining DJ at some of the biggest music festivals in the world. In this latest episode, I'll utilize the 2022 Q4 Simply Good Foods Company (NASDAQ: SMPL) earnings report, earnings call, and supplemental presentations that were filed on 10/21/2022 as the backdrop to provide bro...

Pivotal is an interview-style segment that tackles topics in consumer packaged goods (CPG) and fast moving consumer goods (FMCG) from the business leaders that live it EVERY DAY! Many of you might know that I worked at MusclePharm in the early 2010s. This was during a time when that sports nutrition brand had literally caught lightning in a bottle. Either you had that big obnoxiously bright lime g...

Bang Energy just filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy…which likely makes you feel a certain type of way, but I’m here to sidestep any of that emotional BS and explain what’s really going on at the empire that Jack Owoc built. So, my assumption is that the Bang Energy bankruptcy is causing such an outcry of commentary because of the combination of either (1) you like/dislike Bang Energy CEO Jack Owoc (2...

We all know that the energy drinks market has been crazy these last few years. What if I told you though that I’ve got some mega merger speculation, that if it comes to fruition, would take things up a million notches on the craziness scale? What business highlights in the energy drink market have made things crazy? While the Keurig Dr Pepper (KDP) announcement that it had entered a strategic part...

This week, I attended the National Association of Convenience Stores (NACS) Show 2022 in Las Vegas. While my main purpose was to meet with old and new CPG industry friends, I did notice a handful of convenience store CPG trends that I wanted to share with you. These trends include: (1) technology and electrification of vehicles is disrupting convenience retailing (2) energy drinks passing of the g...

After three years of basically nothing…can I get 'Things that Baffle Me' for $1000 Alex? I know any event before 2020 feels like a generation ago so maybe you forget that The Hershey Company acquired ONE Brands (maker of the ONE bar) in August 2019 for $397 million. To get yourself back in that late-summer of 2019 blissful mindset even deeper, just a week earlier than the Hershey and ONE Brands ne...

Remember the good ole’ days when health experts predicting an upcoming bad cold and flu season was the biggest worry to our immune health? Because of recency bias, it’s likely hard for most of us to detach the rise in consciousness around immune health from the last 2.5 years. Surprisingly though, if you look back to consumer health surveys from late-2019, immune system support was still a top pri...

I proclaimed something about MyProtein last year, but will overlooking a core brand positioning element end up making me look wrong? On September 15, 2022, THG (formerly known as The Hut Group) updated the public markets by releasing its 2022 first half earnings report. I’ll be utilizing that financial information, along with the earnings call commentary and any relevant publicly disclosed informa...

The fourth-largest beverage brand in the U.S. market, Gatorade, is launching an energy drink, which is cool, but I’m more interested in what the Fast Twitch product announcement means to entire sports nutrition portfolio strategy at the beverage CPG giant PepsiCo (NASDAQ: PEP). That being said, I do run through all the Gatorade Fast Twitch product details (e.g. formula and packaging), along with w...

Sleep matters A LOT. Sleep is truly an interdisciplinary aspect of our health. Yet, if I was tasked to describe in one word the current state of sleep in America, I would use lackluster. Why? A recent Gallup poll showed that around 84 million Americans would describe their sleep the previous night as “fair” or “poor” but also 55% report that getting good sleep is a “major priority.” This is partly...

What the heck is going on at Laird Superfood (NYSE: LSF)? At one point in February 2021, the company had a market capitalization of almost a half a billion dollars but is now getting takeover offers at 95% less. At it's core, Laird Superfood is still perfectly positioned inside the CPG triangle of better for you, plant-based, and functional. That being said, category competitiveness was always goi...

Am I the only one that thinks the music is about to stop again during the energy drinks version of the musical chairs game? Last week, you might have seen a pair of Bloomberg article headlines that said Keurig Dr Pepper (KDP) was in talks to acquire the owner of Bang Energy and then quickly another that denied that M&A rumor. Either way, it brought back memories of my KDP prediction video from...

Pivotal is an interview-style segment that tackles topics in consumer packaged goods (CPG) and fast moving consumer goods (FMCG) from the business leaders that live it EVERY DAY! If you’re an OG consumer of my content, you might recognize this episode’s guest. That’s because he was also the guest on Pivotal episode number one way back in August 2018. While repeating guests won’t be commonplace, I...

Is Glanbia the bellwether for the supplement industry or will things change in the second half of 2022? Glanbia Performance Nutrition had 2022 H1 revenue growth of 14.9% YoY on a constant currency basis from strong pricing increases. They also benefitted from the mid-2021 acquisition of LevlUp, a gamer (esports) nutrition brand. Glanbia Performance Nutrition is one of two wholly-owned segments of...

Did you know that the specialty supplement retailer GNC had a venture investing platform? This is broadly known as corporate venture capital. It’s essentially a practice where a large corporate entity takes an equity stake in a small but innovative or specialist company with the objective of gaining a specific competitive advantage. As an alternative to traditional acquisitions, companies are maki...

The haters are coming out of the woodwork after the PepsiCo and Celsius Holdings deal, but can’t we all be collegial and appreciate just how impressive its growth story has been? Celsius Holdings (NASDAQ: CELH) hit another record quarterly revenue ($154 million - up 137% YoY) and represented its 16th consecutive quarter of sequential growth for the energy drinks brand. While Celsius energy drinks...

Did Netflix just create an ‘in real life” entertainment CPG go-to-market playbook? While I appreciated the expansiveness, sharper storylines, amazing cinematography, and darker nature of Season 4 like most other fans of Stranger Things, the CPG industry strategist in me couldn’t help but notice something else…Surfer Boy Pizza. This was a fake pizza restaurant chain that had a reoccurring theme thr...

Will Dymatize have enough power remaining in its growth story to make up for some predicted Premier Protein headwinds from a product recall? As I normally do with my performance update content of publicly-traded functional CPG brands, I will use the recently filled earnings report, earnings conference call, and any relevant publicly disclosed news, in this case it’s Bellring Brands (NYSE: BRBR) 20...

The Vitamin Shoppe is on pace to have it's highest topline revenue in the company's history. Yet, I would guess that most still haven’t fully grasped the results of massive multi-year turnaround plan at The Vitamin Shoppe. I know I probably sound like a broken record at this point, but it’s time to wake up people. Since The Vitamin Shoppe is shielded in the public markets by the Franchise Group ow...

It was just announced that PepsiCo (NASDAQ: PEP) entered into a long-term agreement to be the preferred global distribution partner for Celsius Holdings (NASDAQ: CELH). PepsiCo will also make a net cash investment of $550 million in exchange for 8.5% ownership of Celsius Holdings. With the Bang Energy deal coming to an abrupt end in June 2022, PepsiCo couldn’t risk falling behind in one of the fas...

Pivotal is an interview-style segment that tackles topics in consumer packaged goods (CPG) and fast moving consumer goods (FMCG) from the business leaders that live it EVERY DAY! My guest on this episode is a fellow Austintown Fitch High School alumnus that just happens to also be a beverage industry superstar. Chris Hunter shares how that Youngstown, OH upbringing shaped his brand building proces...