How to Get Your Product Sold in the Supermarket: Aisle Trials Winner Revealed

When we started Aisle Trials last year in order to help during the pandemic, we created a series to cultivate and promote local Delaware food entrepreneurs. We wanted to support local food brands to potentially carry in our Kenny Family ShopRites and help showcase them to the Delaware community. In the process, we discovered varying levels of “shelf-readiness”: were these brands ready to be sold in the supermarket or not? Some local entrepreneurs presented amazing food creations, but they were lacking the proper business structure, packaging and labeling, kitchen access or product distribution, to be ready to be sold in our stores. Others who were more prepared had the clear advantage.

In the first season of Aisle Trials we selected 6AM Run as our winner, and they are available in select Kenny Family ShopRites now. We chose them because they had the right mix of quality product, distribution and marketing and were shelf-ready. Similarly, the winners we chose for Season 2 also had this right combination of quality product, packaging and readiness. There are a few important progression stages we look for when carrying any product in our stores. If you’ve ever wondered what it takes to have a product sold in the supermarkets, here are the main things we are looking for in a new item, product line or brand to place on the shelves.

Stick around to the end of the article to watch our Aisle Trials judges deliberate and choose our winner of the second season of Aisle Trials. (Or you can skip ahead and watch the final episode on the Aisle Trials Youtube right here.)

 Product Quality and Ingredient Sourcing

First and foremost, is the product viable? How does it taste? Use trial and error and friends and family to hone in the product you’re going to sell, to find that thing you’re passionate about that you want to deliver to the community as a food entrepreneur. Maybe even use blind taste-tasting.

Do you have a steady supplier with a steady cost for your ingredients? Many a product begins with high aspirations of using the most expensive, rare ingredients, but when reality sets in regarding feasibility and price, tradeoffs are made. Does your product maintain its superior quality when you attempt to conform the ingredient costing to a rational price point?

Everything begins with the product quality itself. If we don’t like the item or don’t think our shoppers will like it, we are going to pass. So if you commit to a product you’re passionate about and have developed to a certain level of standard and quality, we are going to be interested in checking you out.

Branding, Labeling & Packaging

For many of us, we eat with our eyes, and shopping in the grocery store is no different. It’s important for the brands and products we carry to have consistent, quality packaging, labeling and branding. Our shoppers expect quality, so show them that visually in how your brand is packaged and presented to the customer. We really look at where people are with their branding and how the product is presented, packaged and labeled.

Packaging is not easy! Is your packaging durable, modern and transportable? Are you cool compliant? Allergen-notice compliant? We deal with it every day. We are constantly debating in our business, in prepared food and areas like the bakery on topics like: You can go simple and cheap or elaborate and expensive. Functional or cute and artsy. There’s so many methods and you can make tradeoffs for environmental concerns, appearance concerns, cost concerns, etc.

Business Plan, Financing & Insurance

Plenty of new food entrepreneurs have amazing ideas or family recipes that taste absolutely delicious, but the taste is only half the battle. How are you taking that product and scaling it to becoming a legitimate business? Is the company formalized? Do you have an LLC or Corporation?

Do you have a business plan on paper? The business plan should take into account how it is you’re going to be consistently delivering what your brand promises. Do you have the resources, financial liquidity and available access to credit if needed and personal time to commit to the business plan? Many of startup entrepreneurs have day jobs so budgeting time and resources is crucial on top of the financials.

Do you have or are you prepared to acquire product liability insurance? This is an essential cost of doing business in any commercial establishment.

Production is very important here too: is your company capable of handling the production levels required to be sold in stores?

Food Nutrition Information & Kitchen Access

Everyone’s favorite topic: food safety requires accurate labeling for nutrition information and having a properly certified kitchen with practices that are industry standard. These requirements are not easy to do. Product production standards, accurate nutrition descriptions and proper allergen information are crucial to having your product sold in the supermarket. Is all of your food information accurate and do you have the resources to scale production maintaining 100% certainty your product will not deviate?

When we started Aisle trials we realized within the Delaware start-up ecosystem there is the need for reliable certified industry kitchens for providing at-scale food production and proper food labs for providing nutrition facts. There is a real issue with access, and it is something we are looking into with potential local partners to increase access and affordability.

Your local small business association and chamber of commerce have many resources available to develop business plans and provide access to micro-grants, small loan financing and referrals to insurance brokers.

Marketing & Distribution

As if that wasn’t enough, what is your product’s marketing plan? We are here to support local entrepreneurs, but we also want to see a clear vision for the product’s future and growth. Are you being sold in other stores? Do you sell online? Are you on social media? What is your company’s marketing plan? Have you developed a public relations strategy? Sampling, discounts and coupons? There are a variety of in-store level opportunities to consider.  Who are your direct competitors and how will you differentiate?

Logistics and transportation must be considered into the business model. How are you going to get the product to either a warehouse distributor or individual stores on a timely, repetitive basis. How does this factor into the cost of goods? Are you going to use a broker?

Aisle Trials Winner Revealed

As we conclude our second season of Aisle Trials, we are excited to announce this round’s winner who will receive the opportunity to have their brand sold in our Kenny Family Supermarkets of Delaware. But this season was special: we actually have two winners thanks to one of our very special judges. Watch the final episode of this season of Aisle Trial to find out below: