Jonas:
Yes, in fact only four percent of groceries are
purchased online. In the next few years it could get as
high as ten percent.
Mark:
Jonas, when you first started working at
Blue
Diamond
, I gave you the challenge of making Amazon
a top five customer in five years. How are we doing on
that
?
Jonas:
Well, three years ago Amazon was our 86th
biggest customer; two years ago they were number 38.
Today, Amazon is our 12th biggest customer! We are
on the right track to making this challenge a reality!
Mark:
That’s tremendous progress. How did you do it
?
Jonas:
As you know, today our eCommerce team is
a robust team of ONE (me) and this growth would be
not be possible without some help. Every functional
group has played a key role in growing Amazon to
what it is today, from IT to finance, marketing to supply
chain, warehousing to manufacturing. In fact, in fiscal
year 2018 we sold $8.3 million worth of
Blue Diamond
almonds on Amazon. That is three times as many as we
did last year.
Mark:
eCommerce is changing rapidly. What sorts of
innovations should we expect
?
Jonas:
Looking to the future of eCommerce, we are
always preparing for what is coming next: delivery to
you in 30 minutes or less, unmanned delivery vehicles,
grocery delivery by air from drones, and ordering just
with your voice.
Mark:
I bet our grower-owners never would have
imagined that one day their almonds would be
delivered by drone
.
Jonas, thank you for bringing your
talents to
Blue Diamond
! You do not need to be an
e-commerce expert to help us grow sales on Amazon.
Order a
Blue Diamond
product, then write a positive
review. Whether that is as a grower-owner, team
member or friend of our
Blue Diamond
family; your
perspective is powerful. On Amazon, positive reviews
are the best advertising!
Kristen Arakaki, Brand
Manager, Nut Thins
and Culinary Products
Mark:
Ten years ago,
our North American
Retail business was
fortunate to hire a
young marketer who
subsequently contributed
to the incredible growth of
Almond Breeze
, snack
nuts and, most recently, Nut Thins. Kristen, as a
Blue
Diamond
veteran, how has our business changed
?
Kristen:
In that 10 years’ of growth that you just
described, Mark, a lot has changed. Our group is
roughly 10 times the people, and we have experienced
10 times the sales. Despite all these changes, we still
have that entrepreneurial, roll-up-our sleeves, can-do
attitude. I frequently tell people, I have a love affair!
I love growing brands just as all of our farmers love
growing almonds. It’s a great feeling to love what you
do, but what really helps is having delicious products
that people – even famous people – can easily fall in
love with. My latest love affair started three years ago
when I took over responsibility of the Nut Thins cracker
brand. I have really fallen in love with growing this
particular brand – not just because it’s delicious – but
it’s really helped us to be more innovative.
Mark:
Our grower-owners will appreciate that even
though you had a smaller brand with a smaller budget,
you were still able to make a big impact!
Kristen:
One example of this is our work on celebrity
partnerships, which was truly quite intimidating at first.
We have never worked with huge celebrities prior
to this year and it is quite risky to work with them as
they have their own voice and personalities while
we’re trying to drive home our own brand message.
Essentially, we had to be strategic. Given our strong
female consumer target for Nut Thins, we strategically
selected strong female celebrities, who are not only
successful and beautiful on the inside and outside, they
are also very kind and wonderful to work with.
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