About Sweet Loren’s: Sweet Loren’s delicious baked goods — which are non-GMO, and gluten- and dairy-free — have landed the brand on the Inc. 5000 list of fastest-growing private companies every year since 2019.
In 2024, Sweet Loren’s Sales Director Kyle Watts secured a major win for the brand: Approval from three major U.S. GPOs in rapid succession. This was an incredible opportunity to expand into new locations, including colleges and universities. But as a long-time foodservice sales pro, he knew it came with a big catch.
“Anyone who says foodservice sales [is straightforward] is completely wrong,” says Watts.
Like so many salespeople working for smaller brands, Watts was handcuffed by the realities of the distributor model. Sweet Loren’s didn’t have a national account, so he developed a hub and spoke approach to selling as a creative workaround to connecting with new prospects who’d be able to access their products.
Targeting operators in regions where Sweet Loren’s already had an account cleared the distribution hurdle. But solving this initial problem simply introduced a new one. How do you find those relevant operators?
Watts depended on a manual research and outreach process he describes as “truly depressing.” He’d scour Google and online directories for operators to pitch, poring through their menus to assess fit and checking websites and LinkedIn hoping to find the right contact person. The approach demanded 10 hours weekly and yielded an average of four responses.
“I don’t see any full-time employee doing that at scale to drive a business forward,” he says. So he sought an alternative: A local broker. Unfortunately, most brokers charge small brands hefty retainers on top of commissions, making it a cost-prohibitive option.
Never one to settle for inefficiency, Watts sought an alternative to the time-intensive data hunt. His search led him to First Bite, which he knew at first glance held great promise.
“Once I saw the data set, the contact request,” he says, “that was when I was like, ‘Okay, this is actually the real deal.’”
In his first day using First Bite, Watts transformed his workflow immediately.
With First Bite’s comprehensive data set of foodservice operators, Watts now identifies ideal restaurants and schools in his target geographies in minutes. First Bite sources contact information for decision-makers at those operators, and Watts quickly loads everything into his email tool.
That prospecting process that used to take 10 hours each week? Watts can now send a personalized email campaign to hundreds of contacts in about five to 10 minutes. And the new process is infinitely replicable; Watts now has a “rinse and repeat” framework for prospecting that requires about an hour of his time per month.
“These are not wins I would have been able to achieve without First Bite” -Kyle
First 90 Days (Jan 1 to March 31)
Outreach
Results
Perhaps even more vital than current results is what Watts sees as the tool’s long-term potential. “All these other ideas are bubbling up,” he says. “The way the data set can be used when you apply it to where you’re at in your growth phase? There’s no limit to your creativity.”
And as an experienced foodservice sales professional, Watts sees the value First Bite can deliver for anyone in his shoes. “You can always draw out the plan,” he says, “But it’s so hard to then execute it… First Bite is a tool to actually execute that strategy.”
First Bite empowers foodservice sales teams of all stripes to drive better results with less time, money, and effort. How sweet is that?
Reach out today to schedule a demo.
