Ep #204 Why You Want to Be Holiday Ready Now with Jordan Buckner

Jordan Buckner, founder of Tea Squares, FoodBevy and Joyful Co, a curated gift boxing company and I, as a former Marketing Team Leader at Whole Foods Market, nows a thing or two about retail. He and I have an awesome conversation about why holiday planning starts in the summer (or earlier) and how to craft a great roadmap for success. 

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Transcript

Sari  
It's that time of year again when I put on a ridiculously hot and very ugly Christmas sweater and I tell you that it is time to start your holiday planning. Now. Yes, it's July. Yes, it's very hot outside, but we need to get into the frame of mind of the holidays to do this work, to set ourselves up for a really successful, fun and profitable holiday season. And I am so excited to bring back the super popular Holiday Ready Bootcamp for a second year, and this year, it's bigger and better than ever, including Zach's Buckler, who you heard on a previous podcast, talking about lead ads. He's coming to do a live holiday specific lead ad class for us, as well as Umai will be back to talk about their Black Friday Cyber Monday tool kit and help us understand what are the trends that are coming up this year, and I have some all new content planned around pricing strategies and promotions that are scientifically backed so we know that they actually work. I know it sounds crazy to start your holiday planning now, but I promise you, when I was in Whole Foods Market, I had my holiday plan done by mid July, because if you don't, what happens is you're stressed, you're overwhelmed, you're constantly on urgent mode and missing opportunities, and it's just a mess, and it's not fun. And then the holidays get a bad reputation because you are in retail, because you are selling products. And that's not the way it has to be. This bootcamp is fun and engaging, and it's going to force you to "come and do this work". You're going to have more accountability because you've made an investment, and we're going to get your plan done so you know exactly what you are planning to do, breaking it down into step by step, and really understanding the Who's that you need to bring in and the things that you need to go start doing now. Early Bird sales are happening right now. Early Bird pricing ends on July 22nd so take action. Go get in this boot camp. There's only 30 tickets available. I like to keep it small enough that we can have conversations and really make sure you feel like your plan is dialed in. Go to foodbizsuccess.com/holidayready, all one word. I'll also put it into the show notes of all of the podcasts here, go and get that workshop. Make this commitment to yourself that I'm going to have the best holiday season ever. 

Sari  
Welcome back to the podcast. I am so glad you are here and I don't have it, but I should be like ringing a Santa Bell and saying, Hohoho, Merry Christmas. And for those of you watching on YouTube, you will notice that I am wearing my latest ugly holiday sweater. I got it last year for our annual party, and I really like this one. It's got black kitty cats on it, and I got my Santa hat on, and I cranked up the air conditioning right before getting on Zoom to record this, because it's going to be like 98 degrees here in Denver, and putting it on a hot holiday sweater is not my idea of fun, and I'm not going to last very long. So let's jump into the intro, and then I'm excited to have you listen to this episode all about getting ready for the holidays. So you guys know that every July, for last few years, I put on a holiday sweater and sweat for you and do silly things to remind you that the holiday planning for your holiday season starts now. When I was at Whole Foods Market, I had my retail plan done in July, and in fact, for many people in different levels of their business, you might actually be doing your holiday planning in February or March, depending on your business. So it's really important that we get ahead of these things. But I know that most of you who are watching or listening don't know this. You've never been in retail, and you don't realize like, oh, I need to do this now, instead of scrambling and, you know, missing out on opportunities, and being urgent and overwhelmed and stressed and hating the holidays. This is why the holidays get such a bad reputation when you're in retail, because oftentimes, because we procrastinate, we forget, then we're paying extra fees for rush things, we're missing out on things, and it's just no fun, right? Nobody likes to be around you when you are up at 2am writing your holiday emails to go out for Black Friday, right? That's not a fun way to spend your Thanksgiving. So what I offer is the Holiday Ready Bootcamp, and that is going to be taking place in 2024 on August 5, 6, and 7, and I'm making an executive decision. So early bird pricing was actually supposed to end on Sunday. I'm going to extend it through the end of this week, so you will have until Friday, July 26th to get holiday early bird pricing for the boot camp. So don't put this off. Go to foodbizsuccess.com/holidayready, and you'll be able to get that signed up for that bootcamp if there's still tickets left, because I only offer 30 seats. So you don't want to put this off. We have some incredible bonuses, some incredible guests coming, and you will leave feeling confident that you have a plan and you know exactly what you've decided because so much of the time we're just in the indecision and we don't know what's the right answer, and of course, so then we end up procrastinating, and we don't do our due diligence, and then we're in urgent mode and rushed and not very nice people to be around. So today's podcast, I'm actually bringing back last year's bonus episode with Jordan Buckner. And for those of you guys who don't know Jordan, he is the founder of a membership similar to mine, called Food Bevy. And instead of competing against each other, we love to collaborate, and we really are into coopertition. And so I appreciate what a great supporter he's been a mine and vice versa, but, you know, he had a product and did some really great things with it. Learned a lot, now he helps food business founders, and so he and I have a great conversation in this podcast about being holiday ready and the importance of it. And it's a really, it's a great like back and forth style conversation. So without further ado, I will jump into that. I will get out of this hot hat, I'm already sweating. I hope you guys can take, it's so hot. So going to get out of this holiday sweater and let you guys listen to or watch the video of Jordan and I having this conversation. And I hope you feel inspired and ready to go get your holiday plan done. Come join us in the boot camp this year, and you can get this boot camp anytime of the year, which I highly recommend. It's so good for all of your holidays, right? You can use all of those, not just for the Black Friday, Cyber Monday, or Christmas or Thanksgiving or like, whatever your holiday is. Maybe your holiday for some people, it's not until January, right? You're more of the like, better for you product. Like, we don't make good Christmas gifts, but we make really great like, our holiday is January, getting back into shape, or whatever it is, or February, right? Like, there's so many holidays that this, the tools and the way that I teach you, the framework I teach you on how to get this stuff done can be used for any holiday. All right. Without further ado, here's my conversation with Jordan Buckner!

Sari  
Welcome to your Food Business Success. This podcast is for early stage entrepreneurs in the packaged food industry ready to finally turn that delicious idea into reality. I'm your host, Sari Kimbell, I have guided hundreds of food brand founders to success as an industry expert and business coach, and it's got to be fun. In this podcast, I share with you mindset tools to become a true entrepreneur and run your business like a boss, interviews with industry experts to help you understand the business you are actually in, and food founder journey so you can learn what worked and didn't work and not feel so alone in your own journey. Now, let's jump in! All right, everybody. Welcome to a special bonus episode. I very last minute, reached out to Jordan Buckner of Food Bevy, and said, hey, can we have a conversation about holidays and getting ready for the holidays? And he was like, yeah, let's do it. So welcome Jordan to the podcast!

Jordan  
Thank you. And of course, I'm like, holiday Sari, it's July. Why should I be thinking about the holidays already? I have a whole another six months to go?

Sari  
That's the problem, right? We're all in our consumer brain, our shopper brain, but we're not in our retail, I'm a brand brain. So that's why every year I have been putting on crazy holiday sweaters in the middle of July and cranking the AC up and taking photos and videos to try to remind people that holiday planning starts now. Why don't you tell people a little bit, just some quick background. You've already been on the podcast. I coach in your program, and we do a lot of stuff together, but just introduce yourself for people who maybe haven't listened to that one.

Jordan  
Definitely, well Sari as you know, I am on a mission to help founders grow their businesses from startups to scale and do that through Food Bevy, which is an online community for food and beverage founders. And I love helping founders think about the problems and the obstacles that they are currently facing or going to face in the future, and help them overcome that through various tools like building a community, doing mastermind workshops, doing group coaching, which you help lead, and all around just helping brands make this journey of building their companies a lot easier. And then as we also talk about, I previously ran my own CPG brand Tea Squares for six years, so I had a lot of experience to share from that. And then currently I also have another ecommerce brand, Joyful Co, which is a curated gift box where we create gifts for various holidays and occasions throughout the year.

Sari  
Awesome. So you have such a wealth of knowledge. And I just thought this will be a more engaging conversation than me just running through a list. And of course, if people want to get the full checklist, it's at foodbizsuccess.com/holiday. And I just thought it'd be fun to partner with you, because you have access and so many I mean, your community is amazing, and we'll put the link in the show notes for that. But I figured, like, let's do this together. 

Jordan  
I love this because I have been completely guilty myself of poorly planning for holidays from a business standpoint. And so I think this is awesome to get into what founders should be thinking about right now to make their lives easier. 

Sari  
When I was at Whole Foods Market as the marketing director, I was probably right about this time of year, was sitting in meetings at the regional office about our holiday plan, and I needed to have a full plan baked you know, it doesn't mean you execute everything, but you understand exactly what you're going to be doing for that season. What you know, in the case of the store, what decorations I needed, what end caps we were going to do, what new product launches, all that good stuff. And so by August, I was like, ready to go, and feeling confident. But we all know what usually happens for founders is it's like, I'll get to it, I'll get to it, I'll get to it. And then what end of September, October. Often it's Halloween, and you're like, crap. 

Jordan  
Can I just say, like, how I think surprising that is for a lot of founders who are going through it for the first time. Because, at least for me, right? Like, I was running my business, maybe, like, a month out. And really, like week by week being so reactionary. And when I sat down for planning sessions with Tea Squares, we may think about like, yeah, we should plan to do things for holidays and Black Friday, but didn't have a strict kind of plan on how to actually execute that or fully think it out, and to know that retailers are thinking about and planning holidays six months plus in advance, or even you're in advance, like it's mind blowing for a lot of founders. You're like, I don't know if I'm going to be around in a year. Oh, like a year old. Like, how do I think that far ahead? And so I'd love to hear what you think in terms of like what founders need to do to be successful.

Sari  
Yeah. Well I think what happens unfortunately, is, then, you know, if we think about, you know, I do coaching in in your program. Think about the model, if you're, you know, the circumstance is just holidays. Let's take Black Friday, right? Big holiday. That's one that many brands want to engage in. But if you wait until you're button up against some deadlines, and now you're feeling as stressed and emergency and then you're frustrated and beating up on yourself. It's like the actions you're taking are so not in alignment with what you're trying to create, which is more sales, right? And so if we can be the CEO of our business now and pause and say, I know I got all this other stuff going on, but let me take I mean, it doesn't have to take that long, maybe a half a day, to really think about your plan and what do you want to do, and then you're going to be so much more ahead of the game. You're going to be thinking about partnerships and opportunities, and you're not going to be paying like last minute emergency fees and missing out, you know. 

Jordan  
Well, and I think it really starts with understanding, like, what are your goals for the holidays and what you want to get out of it? So that's really clear what the point of all this really is. So you have a clear understanding of like, oh, this is actually important for my business, or maybe in some cases, just a little less important, right? Depending on what your products are. And so I think that's really key to kind of start with those top level goals that you can really be aligned in your team on what you're going to be doing. 

Sari  
There are brands that, I have a couple brands, they're like, my holiday really isn't until January. Like, I'm more of the New Year's resolution kind of thing, and that's great, but still get ahead of it, right? Maybe Black Friday is not your main thing. So the checklist I give people breaks it down into a couple of categories, and you have expertise in a couple of them, but the checklist is really about wholesale. So I'm selling into retailer and then that direct to consumer, which is oftentimes online, through various channels, and then also markets, right? And that's what I love, right? That's my jam. But I think that holiday markets can be such a great way to improve your cash flow, get things going. So looking for Fall holiday pop ups and farmers markets that might be in your area. 

Jordan  
I think that's awesome. So I know you talked through like, what you do for wholesale, direct to consumer e commerce, and I love some of these other things that a lot of founders don't really think about. So at Tea Squares of one of our top holiday partners was a curated gift box service. And they, I think, in like December, like they usually put an appeal, there's like $25,000 of product, which was huge for us, and this was able to negate the drop in sales that we had from just like our DTC business only energy bars. And so fewer people are looking for energy bars during like the holiday times. But by being part of this gift box service, they allowed us to see actually an increase in revenue for that month instead of a decline, because we had this partnership. And so I love things like that.

Sari  
Yeah. I love that example. Let's just take that a little bit further, because those partnerships probably start long before October, right? You have to be having those conversations, those companies working out gift baskets. And I work with a gal in Fuel, Maggie, and she puts together Fuel boxes for us, and she has her own gift boxing with Dos Margaritas Salsa, little shout out to her. But you know, we're talking about that now, because then we need all this lead time, right? Like they have to work it out and get all the pricing, and they got to get all the commitments, and then you get the PO and then you have to provide product long before those boxes ever go out, right? 

Jordan  
Completely. And so I think those relationships happen, like early in the year. And so start thinking about that now. As you mentioned, start reaching out to those gifting companies, see what they are, because a lot of times, I'll tell you, having to curate a gift box, it's about people being top of mind to say, hey, that's a really unique product. 

Sari  
And did you work with a co packer for Tea Squares? Or were you making them yourself?

Jordan  
The most part, we made them ourselves. There's a whole other story about going back and forth.

Sari  
Well, either way, however, like, product has to be made. So either you got to start planning ahead for, then you got to buy ingredients well before, right? If you back it all the way up, you're like, I need to get product to them by end of October. I got to book time in my kitchen. I need to make sure I have help. If that's what you're going to have, I need to make sure I have ingredients and packaging. Oh, the packaging company takes six weeks, right? So we back it all the way up, and we're basically in July.

Jordan  
Yeah. So here's one of my questions for you, when thinking about retail and planning around holidays like, what can brands really start to do to think how their brands might show up in the retailers that they're selling in? 

Sari  
I think it's important to think about trends and where you can fit in to that sort of holiday scheme. Whether you're gifty, you know, are you a great giftable or are you part of that holiday meal? I mean, you know, Whole Foods Market, Thanksgiving was our number one holiday, with Christmas and New Year's being kind of the latter ones. I mean, they were still big, but you know that those foodie holidays, right? So do you fit into that keto baking set that they're maybe focused on, because that's a trend, or do you fit into that specialty department with their chocolates and their, you know, fun little gift things that they put together.

Sari  
I love that. What are some of the things that you can do, though, like, can you reach out to the buyers there and just say, like, hey, like, is it asking them, like, hey, we love to participate, what opportunities do you have? What kind of work? 

Sari  
I mean, I think you know, earlier the better if you want to kind of bounce ideas around. But because think about it, you know, if you're like, oh, let's go ahead and do a four pack of our chocolates, now we got to think about packaging, and we got to think about other things. We're going to get the product in the system and, you know, or if you want to do an exclusive flavor that's just for that store, or something like that. So the earlier, the better on those conversations. But certainly, right now you could reach out to your buyers at any of your stores and say, hey, I'm getting ahead of the holidays. And here's some ideas I have. I want to be a great partner. And, like I said, it's top of mind, right? I'm like, oh, they want to be a partner. I love that, right? And so all of a sudden I'm thinking about, well, let's see. I have this display that I want to make sure, you know, I have this and this. And I'm like, that's a great, a great partnership, you know. I'm glad they reached out, and it's good to think about what could you offer some incentives to stores ahead of time to get those early POs, those purchase orders, so that you can start kind of knowing how to plan. I think that's the hardest thing is like, well, how much do I make? But you can get commitments pretty early in the summer and say, hey, you know, let's decide, and then put some purchase orders together. And then, that way, you can actually be working with your co packer or buying, you know, the ingredients that you need ahead of time to be ready.

Jordan  
One thing that I've been really inspired by is, if you're on LinkedIn and the CPG community there, there's a lot of great merchandisers who are building these awesome displays for different brands. And while they have their own kind of company sets right, a lot of times, these retailers are ordering, sometimes 50-100 cases of product to build these displays. But even if you're just a small team, there might be opportunities to say, like, hey, we are perfect for X, Y and Z holiday. And we'll even come in and you and the founders and friends and like, build a display for you to help with. And with building that display, the retailer will actually buy dozens of cases extra, and those are deals coming in the door. And so by adding that little like, we'll actually come into the store and help work with you and the team to do it, because we know you might be shorter man hours or one hours, that can make a big difference.

Sari  
Oh my gosh. Again, that's just being a great partner and realizing, like, I know we all love to like trash on all the stores right now and everything that's going on, but you know, the buyers are in a tough spot too, like they're getting squeezed and, you know, they just don't have as much time as they used to, the marketing folks, the buying folks. So anything you can do to give them time back and make their lives easier, also get your promotions in well in advance. You know, as soon as you possibly can think through, you know, what are the right times? You know, are you a Thanksgiving holiday thing, or are you a Christmas thing? Are you a, you know, New Year's resolution thing? But get your promos in early and then also, can you get your demos scheduled in early, right? Yeah, because the last thing you want is, like, again October, where you're like, I really want to be in the store the week of Thanksgiving, and they're like, sorry. You know, it's full, it's taken. That's where you miss out on opportunities, for sure. Anything else to add about wholesale, thoughts that you've seen work?

Sari  
Yeah, I think it's really understanding, just like, what you're committing to, and if you want to go all in there, holiday or not, because it can be a big, a lot of time and planning there. I guess the last thing on that quickly is, what about creating, like, holiday specific flavors for retailer like that can be a big investment. What happens if you don't sell them?

Sari  
Yeah, yeah. I mean, I have a couple clients who do have holiday flavors. And so again, the sooner you can get them out to buyers potential, you know, especially like gift shop. And this isn't just, like, a Whole Foods or Natural Groceries. Think about gift shops as well. But you want to, like, really leverage those relationships that hopefully you've spent time building. You know, it's the like, don't just show up on my email, like in October, like, have you been nurturing the relationship ahead of time? And that way, when you're like, oh, we have this peppermint flavor now, or this, you know, apple spice, or whatever it is, it's like, okay, sure, yeah, I'll take a chance with that. But the more you can get pre commitments ahead of time, that way you don't go to all in and then having a multi channel strategy. So can you, you know, have other outlets so that, if you don't sell as much as you thought in one area, can you run it on ecommerce, or Amazon, or something like that? Yeah, such a good. There's so much to think about. And I just, you know, I have a spice co packer that I refer people to a lot, and he's, you know, we just had a conversation. He's like, yep, remember August, I start filling up, right? Again, everything backs out. So you're like, oh, well, I need all my containers. I need my ingredients. I need my labels. I need and so this is definitely the time to be working on that holiday plan. So let's talk a little bit about e commerce, because there are some similar overlaps, certainly around production and things like that, but I think that's more of a like when it's wholesale, you're dealing with the retail buyer and getting commitments ahead of time and what they want, whereas e commerce, you're directing the ship. It's all up to you, for better or for worse.

Jordan  
Yeah. And I think the thing I see brands at the early stage teetering on is like, for Black Friday through holidays, like, do I discount my product? Am I even like making money? Is it a loss leader to get new customers in the door? Like, how should they even be thinking about, like, the strategy behind what I do for those events?

Sari  
Yeah, well, first I think again, just like with the buyers don't show up in November on their email doorstep with like, hey, remember us. Like, hopefully you've been nurturing your email list ahead of time, and it's good to even ramp it up a little bit in like September and October, just reminding people who you are, what's special about you, not necessarily selling like not necessarily a lot of promotions, but you know, kind of like becoming a friend again. Hi. Remember us. We're cool. You subscribe to our email list, or you bought from us at some point. So we're just kind of putting, you know, we're getting back into your awareness. 

Jordan  
I think that's huge, because every advertising avenue is incredibly expensive around the holidays, because you're not even competing with other brands of your size, but all the major players. And so as much as you can leverage your email list to sell, it'll drastically reduce those costs. Imagine if some people are spending $25 to acquire a new customer around that time on Black Friday. And what if instead, you gave a $20 customer discount to your existing customer on the email list, right? You would have spent that money anyway to acquire a new customer, but now you're able to use that to discount to your current customers, and so really getting some more than like, as you mentioned, building your email list early, so then you have to spend less on paid advertising than you might have otherwise.

Sari  
So good. And I'm actually an August, so I am a huge fan of lead ads. I don't know. Are you familiar with lead ads? Okay, so I love them so much, and I've been using them personally, and they've been working really well. And then I have some clients who I've trained, and so we're going to be doing that's our, one of our calls in my group in August will be how to do lead ads. And I have a brand who is getting leads at 31 cents, qualified leads each. Now they're getting them on their list now, right in the summer. And imagine if you keep, you know, 31 cents a lead, now you start nurturing them with those emails as you crescendo up the holidays. And like you said, now you've only spent 31 cents. You can give bigger discounts, or you don't have to give this as much, you know. You just keep more money because you're not trying to compete with everybody else.

Jordan  
No, I love that. I think, as you mentioned, as well, like building those relationships early and then putting those seeds of ideas in their minds, of like, hey, this is a great giftable item. Or if you're putting together those, like, special gift collections, then people start to think like, you know, I probably should start thinking about holiday gifts. I'm really bad at it, but this could be a great gift for my so and so, before they start making plans and going out and finding other gifts. 

Sari  
Yeah. It just kind of warms them up. And that way, when you know, you know how many emails you get around Black Friday, it's like, and I look at them more as like, sport, because that's I'm just always curious, but I know you'll be like, I hate all the emails I get. But if you've already warmed them up and they're like, kind of like you already, then they're more like, oh, it's okay. I'm going to delete all those other people who I'm just now hearing from. We have all this emotion at our emails. And remember, you know you're going to have to I know people are like, oh, I emailed them once. I'm like, yeah, okay, but they have a million other emails. So, you know, don't assume people saw that one email like be willing to email them more. And in the Holiday Bootcamp that I'm running in August, I'll have my amazing email gal, Jane Hamill, come and talk about the right amount of emails to send and what to send, and help people clarify that. But it is email is, you got to go get the email leads elsewhere, like on Google or Meta, Facebook, whatever. But then you own them, and they're your customer, and you got to do the work in email.

Jordan  
I think a lot of things that founders make mistake of as well is once they acquire those customers, especially around those big acquisition periods of the holidays, a lot of them founders aren't doing a lot enough to nurture them and getting that second order. So if someone's finding your brand for the first time, they're trying it out, they're unsure how it's going to work. They're not going to fall in love the very first time. It usually takes two to four purchases to start building something as a routine in their lives. And so what are you doing to get them coming back a second and a third time so that they continue to purchase with you? And if you can focus on that, you know, increasing that three month. I was talking about three month lifetime value of customers, so getting them come back as much as possible during a three month period, they can start building that habit of using your brand throughout their their lives, and maintain that kind of purchase frequency throughout the year.

Sari  
I love that. So any other e commerce tips? I do want to talk about your gifting. You have your own e commerce. So, you know, I'm curious, because we were talking about earlier, like have you already planned out your holiday packages? 


Jordan  
Yeah, for Joyful Co, we have already planned out our holiday assortment so those are set. I'm not taking any new ones right now for this year, and it's really to start getting ordering in to get everything set. We're building out our marketing now to really make sure we're hitting on those key periods. And so all that planning is happening now as well. 

Sari  
And so any other like things, I guess, what should people consider like down the road, or if they were going to work with somebody else? And I always love it. I mean, you don't necessarily have to work with somebody like you who's curating, but you could actually do a small partnership with some other brands that you guys could work it out where each of you is hosting this, like, cool bundle of you know, some partnered brands that work together.

Jordan  
Yeah, I think there's a big missed opportunity in terms of creating giftable package collections, right? Like a lot of brands will just sell their same case of six of their products or a single product. And just frankly, a lot of consumers aren't looking for that at the the time of the year, either they're looking for something nice for themselves or for family members or for friends, and so as much as you can do the gifting work for them, then it's a great way of getting your product into more hands. As you mentioned, there's great partnerships that you can do with a similar brand or a complimentary brand that you know or founder friends and say, hey, let's create this curated gift box, and then someone can take the lead. You put together a budget, how you want to promote it, and really just start giving that out to your audiences, either in like, a paid way, or in just through your own email list. So you're creating those curations from the beginning. 

Sari  
And again, all those things take time, because if you think about, like, what I'm like a ninja project manager. So it's one of those things, like, it comes so naturally to me, but I've realized, like, oh, not everybody's brain thinks this way. So let's just back it out. So, like, you want to be live by, let's say, you know, November 1. So you need photos ahead of time. You need all the marketing copy. You need, you know, all the pricing and everything up on the website. You need packaging well in advance. Like photos, you know, you might need to get three, four weeks in advance, and then somebody's got to take the lead on it. And like, these things just take a lot more time than we think they will. And what people usually do is, like, either they have to say no to things because there's just no way, or they're then running around really, really stressed out, and it's not a good experience for anybody. 

Jordan  
No, it's so true. And I think two pieces of advice that I would give is one, as you mentioned, think about that timeline and actually put on your calendar, like, block out a three hour block or four hour block or one hour block, and say, hey, plan for this event and have kind of key follow ups throughout that time period is the first thing. And I think the second is, I usually recommend for founders to like, either like, go all in to doing it and promoting it, or don't worry about it this year. Like, if you don't have time to think about because you're launching other things, like, don't have do it and just put them together, like a bad offer, because you're going to spend more time creating something like bad with little impact, and then just be frustrated by the results. So either kind of plan and commit to go all in and doing something a certain level, or just worry about it the next year. You don't have to do everything. There's a lot going on as a founder, and so you don't want to over stress yourself with/ things like this.

Sari  
Yeah. And the more you can do the planning now you can decide ahead of time and to go back to what we said the very beginning, like what are your goals for the holidays and and we always overestimate what we can do in a short amount of time. And I would say even, like five months, basically is a short amount of time, or four months whatever, till whatever your holidays are. But we always overestimate. And so know that ahead of time, make decisions. I'm going to do these three things, and these are my priorities, and I want to grow sales in this category by X amount, and then keep a list, right? I think everybody wants to do everything all the time, but keep a parking lot list. Have a note on your phone or something that you just keep that list of, like, maybe that's a next year thing, right? It's okay if you miss the boat on this time, or it's a good idea, but it's just not in your plan. Like, as CEOs, we have to constrain and we just can't do everything all at once, but put it on your list, then you can revisit it for next year, next summer, when I find a new holiday sweater. They're reminding you that it's time to plan for the holidays in July, right? Yeah, keep a list from previous years and think back to what you wish you would have done last year, right? Or what you wish you could have done better or what you didn't like or didn't work.

Jordan  
Yeah, completely.

Sari  
Oh my gosh. So I think those are some really great holiday tips. Anything else you thought of you want to make sure we add?

Jordan  
No, that's pretty much it. I think after listening to this episode, give yourself a couple hours to plan out what your ideal holiday will look like. Where you want to focus and we don't want to focus is equally important, as you just said, to know what you want to and start working on that plan today. 

Sari  
And I'm also on a mission. I mean, I want you to grow your sales, but I'm on a mission for you to actually, this sounds crazy, Jordan, but enjoy your holidays. What if you actually could enjoy Thanksgiving and all your emails were done and everything was worked out ahead of time, and you were just like, yeah, it's all on automatic. It's fine. I'm not getting, you know, pulled away by my phone. Like, what if you actually enjoyed your own holiday season and you were making money? So that's, I'm on a mission.

Jordan  
Like, that's something that's so foreign to founders.

Sari  
It is possible, but it starts now. So you can go get the checklist. We'll put the link in the show notes. And for the holiday boot camp, there's information on that page. And we're we are doing something special for food Bevy members, which you got to be in the Slack channel to go learn about it. But be sure to check that out, because if you have trouble forcing yourself to make that time, then, like, use strategic accountability and go sign up for the boot camp, and then you'll make the time, and I will force you. And it doesn't have to be that much. It's just like, you just need to create time and just sit down and do it.

Jordan  
Love that. 

Sari  
Thanks for joining me. It was fun little chat, and I think it'll be really helpful. Well, I'll put on my Santa hat one last time. There we go. Holiday Season.

Jordan  
I'll need to get for the next one in my ugly holiday sweater.

Sari  
All right, we're going to see who can have the ugliest sweater next year. All right, thanks, Jordan. Appreciate your time. All right. That was so much fun. I'm so glad you were able to tune into our conversation about getting holiday ready with Jordan Buckner, I really appreciate him for doing that last minute with me last year, and just a reminder to go get your ticket. Go get your seat. I am extending early bird pricing, my executive decision through July 26, you'll see all the information when you go to foodbizsuccess.com/holidayready and until next time, have an amazing week!

Sari  
The smartest thing you can do as an entrepreneur is to invest in a who to help you with the how to speed up your journey and help you skip the line.When you are ready for more support and accountability to finally get this thing done, you can work with me in two ways. Get me all to yourself with one on one business coaching. Or join Food Business Success, which includes membership inside Fuel our community of food business founders, that includes monthly live group coaching calls and so much more. It's one of my favorite places to hang out, and I would love to see you there. Go to foodbizsuccess.com to start your journey towards your own Food Business Success.