From maureenclancy.com, a blog about matters of taste

SAN FRANCISCO - BALSAMIC HONEY VINEGAR is, first off, not really balsamic vinegar, the best of which comes from Italy. Rather, this tasty product is made right here in the ‘US of A‘ by a  fifth-generation family of beekeepers. It’s made from pure honey in the style of balsamic vinegar which involves fermentation and aging in oak among other steps.
I tasted it plain and loved the hint of sweetness and the sassy tang. It’s very smooth, without the “catch” in the throat of other vinegars. It’s available on-line for about $12 (8.5 ounces) at HoneyRidgeFarms.com and at Amazon.com.

Online social media are cheap, effective ways to market small businesses

BY BRAD TALBUTT - The Idaho Statesman

“Chocolate is very complex,” says specialty food maker Donya Schweizer. She uses dark chocolate in her Donya Marie’s Beyond Chocolate line of gourmet foods.

With little money for marketing, Schweizer struggled to spread the word about her products.

But recently, she joined business giants like Dell computers, Hewlett-Packard and General Motors using the latest thing in marketing: online social networking. One step beyond e-mail, social media apply the power of the Internet to let people share and discuss personal and professional information with many people at once.

She now uses Facebook and Twitter to kickstart word-of-mouth about her chocolate-infused meat rubs, barbecue sauces and vinaigrettes.

“I have about 1,300 Twitter followers now,” Schweizer said. “Many of them have become important business contacts and good customers. It is an invaluable resource. Anything I want to know or need help with, all I have to do is send out a message on Twitter or Facebook and someone always responds. It saves me an enormous amount of time.”

Schweizer joined the Internet social world with the help of George Seybold, owner of Seybold Scientific, a Boise marketing company. Seybold and others involved in social-media marketing have an evangelical zeal for the field’s potential. They say social-media marketing combines the mythic effectiveness of word-of-mouth with the limitless power of the Internet to connect people.

Seybold is a marketing professional who creates social media strategies, among other services, including more traditional marketing campaigns. He helped Schweizer register for an account on Twitter and opened his network to her, telling his Twitter followers that she had an interesting business and they might want to follow her.

In addition to her Web site, donyamaries.com, Schweizer uses Facebook and Twitter daily. She sees social media as a business mixer that never ends.

“If there is an opportunity to pick up on a conversation, I will if I’m interested,” Schweizer said. “You just have to remember to use the same sense of courtesy and etiquette you would use if you were meeting people face-to-face.”

SOCIAL MEDIA ENCOURAGE RELATIONSHIPS

Former Donald Trump “apprentice” Troy McClain, of Meridian, hired Seybold to remake his marketing plan, including his Web site, to make optimal use of social media.

McClain garners speaking engagements around the country, but he wanted to raise his profile here in Idaho, Seybold said.

Seybold made online social media like Facebook, Linkedin and Twitter an integral part of McClain’s Web site.

“Troy’s old site functioned like a brochure,” Seybold said. “The Web isn’t just about selling anymore. It’s about creating meaningful conversations and relationships, because people buy from their friends more readily than from a stranger.”

McClain said he has booked enough work through his online networking efforts to carry him through 2009, including a job in Argentina.

“The only thing it cost me to land that job was time, and I did it from the comfort and safety of my laptop,” he said. “To get that job the old-fashioned way I’d have to get on a plane, fly to Argentina, and find the right person. What would that have cost me to do the old-fashioned way?”

Using social media can be an integral part of traditional marketing strategy, or it can be as simple as creating an account on Facebook and diving in. Facebook, Linkedin, Twitter, and Naymz are Web sites that allow people to connect and communicate with an expanding network of acquaintances. Either way, plan on investing more time than money. It takes a commitment to participate in a growing community and to gain the trust and respect of the people who use it.

COMBINE WITH TRADITIONAL MARKETING

“There are two ways to get the most out of social media,” said Brian Critchfield, co-founder of Boise’s Blue Line marketing company and owner of Navel Marketing in Meridian. “One is integration, and the other is monitoring.”

Social media marketing should be combined with traditional marketing strategies - using advertising and public relations effectively -so the message people get about you and your business is consistent.

It is easy to monitor multiple social media sites using an information aggregator like Google alerts or Twitter search, he said. They will update you with blogs, Web sites or posts of interest and send them to your e-mail account or a smart phone.

Like a growing number of people, Critchfield likes Twitter for this because of its 140-character limit on posts.

Brevity is golden with a network like Critchfield’s. He follows 426 people on Twitter alone. In addition he participates in large, active networks on Facebook, Linkedin and Naymz.

Critchfield says he manages it all by checking in on his Twitter feed three or four times a day for a few minutes at a time.

Registration on most social media sites is free, so for a small investment of time, anyone can use them.

Expert help will cost more. Critchfield said combined social and traditional marketing services will cost between $2,000 and $4,000 a month.

For that, you can expect your media will be managed for you - including correspondence and blog writing.

IT’S NOT ALL ABOUT BUSINESS

Jenn Harris may be the most zealous social media evangelizer in town. Harris leads social media marketing and sales at TSheets, a Meridian company that provides time and labor management applications online. While she’s talking about Twitter, her hands fly in animated excitement and her BlackBerry beeps frequently.

Harris, like Critchfield, is an alumnus of Blue Line.

Later, she was a new media specialist at MPC Computers before being laid off last fall. The Nampa computer maker went out of business at the end of December.

“Two minutes after I was laid off, I twittered,” she said. Her network of friends and associates responded so quickly that Harris had job interviews lined up within hours.

“It really is relationship building,” she said. “Pretend there are no phones or TV or Internet. What would you do? You’d go out and have coffee and create relationships with people. It is marketing 101 from 1902, with the power of the Internet.”

Harris has lots of stories about companies that have used social media successfully.

Dell turned around a negative customer-service reputation by asking customers what they thought about new products and what they would like to see in future offerings, she said. The responses saved Dell a fortune in research and development and changed perceptions about the company, she said.

All three marketing experts say the most effective use of social media is in combination with a traditional marketing strategy. Critchfield and Seybold provide a range of marketing services besides social media consulting.

“It really takes that traditional marketing background to integrate the two,” Harris said.

Seybold agrees, but he also thinks social media will soon be a part of every business person’s world.

“There are two ways I find opportunity for my business: online networking and getting out and meeting people,” Seybold said. “We don’t advertise. We don’t cold call. And we keep 14 people very busy. I’ve been in business here for 10 months, and I know 1,000 people in Boise who I’ve met through social media.

“How could I have done that 10 years ago?”

Contact Sell Gourmet to learn more on how Social Networking can improve your online presence.

HOUSTON - On a typical balmy October morning in Houston, Richard Mazza stepped off his Continental Airlines flight from Costa Rica and for the first time in five years he was back in the US.   “It’s good to be back in the states again and the first thing I want is a thick, juicy steak!” said the president of Coffees of Atenas R&J, S.A.  Even though he appreciates a thick porterhouse steak, his passion is his Costa Rican coffee.

Richard is on a mission to get his award winning coffee into the stores, coffee shops and on the lips of many a coffee lover as he knows he has something special to sell.  “We’ve got an excellent coffee that will stand up to anything on the market; I’ll cup our La Villa Diamante against most coffees on the market and win every time” says Mazza.  A self proclaimed perfectionist, Richard retired from the off-road professional racing circuit a few years ago in order to settle into the tropical tranquility of Costa Rica.  “Racing was such a thrill for me and it taught me many things in life and business; always look far enough up the road to see what’s coming your way but never look back!”  And that’s exactly what he has done with Coffees of Atenas as he charges ahead bringing with him nearly 1,210 Costa Rican micro farms who grow and cultivate the high mountain grown coffee in and around the town of Atenas which has a population of about 7,000 people, most of which are related in some fashion or another.

“I live in a very tight knit community which I love very much.  Many locals here have accepted me and our concept and I’m very proud to bring more attention to this area of Costa Rica; to bring more revenue in to sustain the lifestyle of many families who work in our Coopeatenas.  This Co-op of coffee farmers depends heavily on the sale of coffee to sustain the local economy and Richard takes to heart his responsibility to make his company thrive and prosper.  “We built a website and that did okay and we’ve done some advertising that has yet to pay off, so I decided to just get out and personally meet people in this industry and see what we can do to promote our brands” Mazza said.  The realization of selling direct to consumers through a website was not the entire solution, so Mazza reached out to the wholesale gourmet food community and came across wholesalegourmet.net, then things started to happen.

“I finally got somebody on the phone with some experience in the industry who could tell us what we needed to do and a plan to get it done!” Mazza exclaimed.  “I first spoke to Richard back in August when he called our office looking to list his coffee on our wholesale website” said Jerry Gabbert, president of Sell Gourmet, Inc.  “We were looking to partner with a premium coffee brand in the US and was interviewing roasters to be featured on our site when Coffees of Atenas fell in our lap…it was really a stroke of luck to find them.”

Jerry Gabbert (left) and Richard Mazza celebrate with a cup of La Villa Diamante at the Steamboat Steak House in Houston.

“It’s not every day a Central American coffee producer calls you on the phone looking to make a deal.  Our ears perked up when Richard told us about his plans for his business and wanted to know if we’d be interested in partnering with him to expand their reach into the US.  We definitely said ‘yes’!” said Gabbert.

After an initial consultation about their current sales strategies, it was determined that what Coffees of Atenas needed to do was penetrate the wholesale US market with a strong push to get their green coffee beans into several coffee brokerage houses where the brand could gain traction with roasters and other wholesale buying groups to gain momentum.  The next recommendation was to revamp their wholesale offerings into several pack sizes from selling 5 pounds of roasted coffee all the way to an entire pallet.  “We wanted to cover all of our bases to offer a competitive program that most any retail gourmet business could realize benefits to stocking and selling the Coffees of Atenas brands” said Gabbert.

Coffees of Atenas offers four varietals of roasted and green coffee beans for their wholesale and retail consumer clients.  The four beans follow:

Cafe Ateneo Fino SHB has a medium roast with a lighter body, a mild aroma with hints of caramel.

Cafe Villa Colonial Fino GHB is a high grown, Hard Bean (HB) Arabica displays balance between acidity and body. It is a medium roast with slightly fuller body, remarkable aroma and smooth chocolate notes.

Cafe Villa Diamante Fino SHB Especial is our award winning brand and was crowned Best Traditional Coffee in Costa Rica in 2006 by the Specialty Coffee Association of Costa Rica. Selected from the best SHB Arabica beans grown at the highest elevations this brand has a higher acidity balanced with a rich body and aroma. Award winning flavor that you can’t wait to taste.

Cafe La Villa Taza Suave HB Hard Bean (HB) Arabica is a favorite of locals and visitors.  It has a medium roast with a lighter body, a mild aroma with hints of caramel.  Previously reserved for consumption within Costa Rica, La Villa is now proudly offered worldwide by Coffees of Atenas.

While Richard was in Houston during a three day visit we visited a leading coffee broker in the area, Walker Coffee Trading.  We met with Jim Patton and Carl Walker and asked them to roast and cup the four varietals and they gave the La Villa Diamante an excellent rating and have shown strong interest to bring it into their green coffee offerings.

Coffees of Atenas sells their roasted and green bean coffee direct to the US wholesale trade and retail to consumers.  We are proud to have partnered with a coffee company who offers top quality coffee at reasonable prices.  We offer for sale all four brands in the followings pack sizes:

• 4 pack sampler (12oz of each varietal)
• 5lb bulk, 15lb bulk and 25lb bulk
• 40lb master case
• 540lb pallet

For more information about wholesale orders please contact us or visit us at our website.

ATLANTA - October 23, 2008

In a quest to bolster holiday sales this season, Andy Freeman, the proprietor of Cherries Divine, LLC, maker of  elegantly packaged long stemmed chocolate covered cherries went to the Internet to look for venues to sell both online and offline.

“We need to establish our brand with upscale retailers because we think we have a great product that has superior quality and taste and very attractive and festive packaging for the holidays, Valentines and corporate gifting” said owner Andy Freeman.  “We’re working with several national venues to get our message out to wholesale buyers and Sell Gourmet matched up perfectly with our mission.”

In a world of too many sweets and brands to choose from Cherries Divine with long stems intact, each colossal cherry is hand-coated in rich buttercream, a family recipe perfected through the years by Linda Freeman, Mother (and Mother-in-law) of owners.  Just one look at these cherries and they grab your attention with the long stem and drizzled chocolate swirl design on each candy.  Just one bite of these delectable delicacies will enrich your mouth with pure buttercream that goes into each handmade candy from Cherries Divine.  Freeman states they only use colossal cherries where their goal is to provide the absolute plumpest, sweetest cherries that they source from the Columbia River Gorge of the Pacific Northwest.  Freeman has no doubt about how people will accept their products, “We feel we have a winner with our product line and we’re set to prove this claim one satisfied customer at a time”.

“Everyday we receive requests to join our website from many companies from around the world, but few make an impact like Cherries Divine” said Jerry Gabbert, president of The Sell Gourmet Network.  Like any gourmet business, Sell Gourmet thrives on brands that offer unique and upscale packaging along with exceptional quality in taste and presentation and a great story to tell.  “Our business exists to help gourmet food companies market and expose their brands to wholesale buyers and consumers.  The more upscale and attractive a product looks, the easier it is for us to market and promote those brands.  Cherries Divine has the ‘total package’ and we’re very happy to have them onboard with us” stated Gabbert.

Cherries Divine makes three varieties of chocolate covered cherries: Simply Chocolate, Dark Decadence and Ivory Elegance.  There is even a combination of all three flavors deemed appropriately The Devine Medley! Cherries Divine also makes several custom logo Corporate Gift options to personalize and brand your company image with a superior quality product that your clients will cherish.

Companies can even give a truly unique treat at your next sales meeting or golf outing.  Whether you choose the traditional chocolate dipped cherries or their Fabulous Golf Ball shaped chocolate covered cherries, clients and employees are sure to be impressed with such a unique and delectable gift idea.

Caterer’s, wedding planners and brides will love planning for weddings, anniversaries, award ceremonies and other special occasions with their Black Tie Events and Black Tie Affair Tuxedo and White Wedding special party favor and gifts. Guests will go home happy with a special treat.

Gourmet News Editorial Retailers Holiday Update 2008

By Joanne Friedrick

In the dog days of summer, retailers have already been plotting their holiday strategies.  This year, of course, the sagging economy adds a wild card to those plans.  So what is a store owner to do?

According to Anne Obarski, executive director of Merchandise Concepts, a retail speaking and coaching service based in St. Charles, Missouri, the economy shouldn’t dictate how a retailer plans for the upcoming holidays.

“I don’t think it makes a difference what economy we are in now,” said Obarski.  “What retailers have to come to grips with is that customers have little loyalty as their shopping experience is global.  (Shoppers) have more options than they have ever had before.  Link that with the economy, and they will save gas and let their fingers do the shopping if we don’t give them a reason to come touch, taste and feel our products.”

James Hallman, owner and operator of The Hallman Company, a retail consultancy near Atlanta, said he is counseling clients to stay positive.  “You can’t control the economy, but you can focus on what you can control,” he pointed out, such as inventory levels, your marketing message and whether that message is reflected in how your store actually operates.  For example, if you profess to have superior customer service, will a customer experience that the moment they enter your store?

The economy will take its toll on marginal retailers, Hallman noted, but that can present opportunities for those who remain.  The question becomes whether your store will be a mere survivor-just getting by in tough times-or become a success.

Hallman said a savvy retailer is able to control the positive, emotional levels of its customers by tapping into one of four emotional triggers-pride, profit, pleasure and peace of mind.  For a specialty coffee shop, peace of mind for customers may be knowing that their favorite brand or flavor is always there, while pleasure is the ability to enjoy that special cup of coffee.

Pride and pleasure can also be related to a customer’s ability to be the first to find a new item, which makes inventory control a key factor in holiday planning.

Hallman said when times are tight, product mix and appropriateness is more important than sheer volume in a store.  He said inventories should be staggered so some new items are released early to accommodate fashion shoppers-those who want to be the first on the block to have a new, hot item.

To make store appear fuller, Obarski said retailers should tighten up their displays and focus on those areas that are the first ones a customer sees when he or she enters a store.

“The cleaner your store and inventory look, the easier it is for customers to shop,” she said.  “don’t confuse lots of inventory with increased sales.  If you really know your customer and buy for their needs and wants, it will be easier to merchandise in depth and not be spread out.”

Additionally, said Obarski, customers are likely to shop in person if the store offers an “experience”.

“Kitchen and gourmet stores have the perfect venue to offer something that addresses all the senses,” she said.

Hallman also cautioned specialty retailers to position themselves away from a low price model and play up the store’s uniqueness, experience and quality.

“Consumers want the highest quality, lowest price and best service,” acknowledged Hallman.  “But no retailer can consistently deliver all three.  You need to decide which one or two you really want to focus on.”

In preparing the store for the holidays, Obarski offered these suggestions:

• Focus and plan merchandising techniques around the highest turning items
• Thin your inventory by offering sales on those items that are poor performers
• Have employees shop the competition, whether online or in person, and have them pinpoint areas of improvement.  Extra training with specific performance expectations that are linked to rewards can help shape how employees deliver customer service
• Meet with all employees and let them know as much as you can about all the areas of the business, from expenses to planned sales to operational issues, so they feel ownership of the store and will work harder because they understand the big picture
• A mystery shopping program can also be used to test how well employees service customers before the busy shopping days occur.  If there are issues, there will be time to address them before the holiday rush.

Hallman also suggests the pre-holiday time is when store’s should get the customer lists in order for marketing programs via mail and email.

Once customers are in the store, it’s important to provide a high level of customer service, even on the busiest of days.

“As (store) leaders, managers must convey the importance of communication skills on the part of each and every employee,” said Obarski.  “No matter how busy someone gets, they need to make sure they either make eye contact, physical contact or verbal contact with customers.  Holiday season is the time to court that new customer so they continue to shop throughout the year.”

Although retailers may be feeling some angst about the upcoming season, Hallman said a dose of reality will put things into perspective.  “The economy is tough,” he acknowledged, “but it’s not the Great Depression.  We know things cost more and we have to prioritize spending, but the customer will still buy what they love from the places they love.  What retailers need to do is look at what people like about them and do everything they can to maintain that position.”

Joanne Friedrick is a freelance writer and editor in Portland, Maine.

Anne Obarski is the director of Merchandise Concepts in St. Charles, Missouri

James Hallman owns The Hallman Company in the metro Atlanta area