Imagine being able to whip up your own signature nut butter flavors in your kitchen. That's how Jaime Foster built Georgia Grinders; with a dream - and her grandfather's recipe for almond butter.
On this episode, Jaime shares her story and the challenges she's encountered creating a food company that reflects her own values of health, wellness, and bringing people together through food.
If you thought all nuts were created equal, then prepare to have your mind blown. You'll better understand the process behind the food we consume. And you'll better understand why Georgia Grinders prides itself on quality and transparency over mass production and profit.
It's not all about nut butter in this episode. We also get to explore the world of butter (yes, the regular kind.)
With a combination of science and culinary passion, Jaime explains how butter and nut butters enhance our meals and our health.
=================================
Connect with Georgia Grinders
Chances are, you wouldn't be listening to this podcast if you didn't need to change your life and get healthier.
So take action right now. Book a call with Dr. Ovadia's team.
One small step in the right direction is all it takes to get started.
How to connect with Stay Off My Operating Table:
Twitter:
Learn more:
Theme Song : Rage Against
Written & Performed by Logan Gritton & Colin Gailey
(c) 2016 Mercury Retro Recordings
Imagine being able to whip up your own signature nut butter flavors in your kitchen. That's how Jaime Foster built Georgia Grinders; with a dream - and her grandfather's recipe for almond butter.
On this episode, Jaime shares her story and the challenges she's encountered creating a food company that reflects her own values of health, wellness, and bringing people together through food.
If you thought all nuts were created equal, then prepare to have your mind blown. You'll better understand the process behind the food we consume. And you'll better understand why Georgia Grinders prides itself on quality and transparency over mass production and profit.
It's not all about nut butter in this episode. We also get to explore the world of butter (yes, the regular kind.)
With a combination of science and culinary passion, Jaime explains how butter and nut butters enhance our meals and our health.
=================================
Connect with Georgia Grinders
Chances are, you wouldn't be listening to this podcast if you didn't need to change your life and get healthier.
So take action right now. Book a call with Dr. Ovadia's team.
One small step in the right direction is all it takes to get started.
How to connect with Stay Off My Operating Table:
Twitter:
Learn more:
Theme Song : Rage Against
Written & Performed by Logan Gritton & Colin Gailey
(c) 2016 Mercury Retro Recordings
And we are live. It's the Stay Off my Operating Table podcast. As you have heard, Dr Philip Ovedia, I'm Jack Heald and we're joined today by I know for a fact this is the first nut manufacturer. That doesn't sound right, Phil. I'm smearing this all over the concrete. Introduce our guest.
Speaker 2:Great, really excited to have Jamie Foster with us today. Jamie is the owner of Georgia Grinders. That is a nut and nut butter company.
Speaker 2:Nut butter that's the word I was looking for, but excited to have her on to really talk about some. You know what it really goes into, what goes into making healthy food and you know what it takes, and then want to hear some about how she got into that and how is it kind of coalesced with her interest in health. So with that I'm going to turn it over to Jamie to give us a little bit of her backstory. Tell us kind of what got you to where you are today, jamie.
Speaker 3:First of all, thank you guys so much for including me on the podcast this afternoon. I'm excited to tell you guys a little bit more about my story and talk about Georgia Grinders and how we got started. But for those of you that don't know, georgia Grinders is a premium manufacturer of nut butters. We're based in Atlanta, georgia, and that's where all the nutty magic happens. We do all of the roasting, grinding and processing in a facility that we own and operate. We are meticulous when it comes to sourcing our raw materials and don't ever add sugars or oils to the production process, so that we can offer consumers the cleanest nut butters available with the most delicious taste ever.
Speaker 1:Well, our friend Charles Mayfield is the one who turned us on to you and Charles has got a little different kind of manufacturing product. So if he thinks you're okay, we think you're okay.
Speaker 3:Yeah, charles is a great guy. We actually have had him in there helping out behind the scenes so that he could translate it to his business too, but he's been a great resource and a tremendous amount of help to our business too.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and for anyone that wants to go into the back catalog there, charles was a guest quite a while back now, and Charles has the Faro skincare line that we love so much. So I guess let's start off by what. How did you get into the nut butter business?
Speaker 3:That's a good question, and one that the story seems to evolve constantly. But the reality is I've always been passionate about healthy food, healthy lifestyles. I was in medical sales when I graduated from college and, after I had my second child, realized that I no longer wanted to be on the road traveling from doctor's office to doctor's office, and my husband and I kept looking about looking at different opportunities for us to buy business and start businesses, and somehow we kept coming back to food, because that's what we enjoy, we love cooking, we love entertaining, and food is something that brings people of all cultures together to celebrate. And when we were trying to determine exactly what it is we wanted to launch, we wanted to have something meaningful that essentially was a tribute to something important to us, and we kept coming back to this recipe for almond butter that my grandfather started making in the 70s.
Speaker 3:My grandfather was predisposed to cardiovascular disease. Both of his brothers died in their early 50s and essentially, he told the doctors that he wasn't going to follow their protocol because he didn't see any value in what it did for his brothers that died early, and he started looking at just diet and lifestyle and took a very innovative approach to health and wellness, ended up living to be 97, but as a child growing up in the 70s eating his almond butter. Of course, in my tiny little brain that's all that my grandpa did was make almond butter and ship it all over to his kids and grandkids. So fast forward to 2012,. Georgia Grinders was launched as a tribute to my grandfather and his recipe towards almond butter, but really to honor his legacy and his innovation towards health and wellness.
Speaker 1:Did he get to see it?
Speaker 3:He absolutely did get to see it and that was something that was so special as he took a lot of time just explaining the research and all the love that went into playing around with different varieties and grades of nuts, the roasting process, the grinding process.
Speaker 3:He taught us how to make it in three pound batches. At the time that was the largest batch he had ever made and he got to see us turn it into a business, got to see it for about three or four years before he passed and actually we had him on the trade show floor at Expo West in California one year. We still hold his little badge that says recipe creator that he wore when he was wheeled into the trade show in his wheelchair by my father. So definitely a special memory. And as I continued to learn more about my grandfather and his journey with health and wellness and functional medicine, it's just tremendously impacted my life too, and it's even become more full circle to be able to share his story with consumers nowadays that are looking to make a change with their diet and lifestyle and food.
Speaker 2:Well, yeah, that's awesome. One of the things that I don't think I've ever bought up here on the podcast is my dad was a business owner, entrepreneur, and one of the businesses he owned while I was growing up was a nut company and they made nut butters as well, and they made natural nut butters. And I remember one of the things that was striking to me and peanut butter, even before my dad owned the nut company, was a very prominent food item in our house and the difference between the store bought typical peanut butter and the natural peanut butter that we would get, especially when you went to the factory and got it straight out of the machine. They were two totally different food products. So maybe talk a little bit about nut butters, and nut butters, I think, can be somewhat controversial as to whether or not they're good for your health, and I think, like lots of things, that may come down to well, what type of nut butter are you actually consuming?
Speaker 3:Yeah, you're absolutely correct. All nut butters are not created equal. There's hundreds of different types and varieties available and it really comes down to the sourcing of the ingredients, what else is added into it, where they're actually being manufactured and the overall processing. But at Georgia Grinders we're focused on very clean, simple nut butters. You're never going to find additional oils or sugars into it. Being a small company and vertically integrated, we take great pride in the sourcing of the nut, so go to great lengths to have personal relationships with our farmers to understand exactly what takes place on the farms, how everything's being harvested and then eventually stored. Once the nuts come to us, they're roasted immediately. Each nut has its own roasting temperature for the ideal robust flavor. It also helps to release the essential oils to maximize the flavor too. Can I back up here? Oh sure, okay, I didn't know.
Speaker 1:I've got a million questions, but you're doing it Okay.
Speaker 3:So you know every nut's going to have a different variety or a different quality of flavor or moisture content and it really has to do with the quality. At the end of the day. We do not source chopped or pieces. You're going to most people think it's kind of bizarre that we're grinding these big, full, whole nuts, but at the end of the day it does make a difference in the end product. What we're sourcing is higher in moisture, higher in oils and flavor, and I always like to compare it to the analogy of when you go into a store and you see nuts in the hopper and you're grinding your nut butter's fresh, but it doesn't have quite the same flavor as what's being produced at Georgia Grinders. And I always tell people or ask them you know well, let's look at the almonds that are, or the peanuts or whatever it is, they're grinding fresh at the stores. Let's take a look and see what these nuts look like and you know if you you look at it, they're chopped, they're pieces.
Speaker 3:A lot of debris is in it and no one knows how long these nuts are have been sitting in the hopper. No one knows, you know how long they've actually been available. And so by the time you grind it, a lot of times they're excessively dry, they don't necessarily have the moisture content and it turns into a big, chalky, hard block. And that's because of the lower quality of the nuts that's in these hoppers. That is also true with a lot of other brands. They're using lower, inferior quality nuts and oftentimes they're having to add the additional oils, the additional sweeteners, to really mask the inferior quality of nut that they start with. And so at Georgia grinders, when we're going through the process again, maximizing the quality of the nuts ideal roasting temperature, grinding process all of it allows us not to have to go back in and add additional oils or sugars or flavor profile additions.
Speaker 1:Well that you've said that several times and it kind of begs the question do other folks do that?
Speaker 3:Absolutely. I don't want to reference any brand names specifically, but you'll see a lot of additional oils added into nut butters and when I say nut butters, I'm speaking peanut, almond, cashew, hazelnut, pecan, all types of different varieties of nut butters. But you will see a lot of additional oils added to the production process, for example, palm oil, coconut oil, and not that any of these are necessarily bad for you. I know we all have our opinions on the different oils, but it's just not needed. Nuts should be full of high quality oils already and, when properly harvested and stored, no need to add the additional oils to the nut butters.
Speaker 1:I didn't realize that. I just assumed that the oils. I can remember when my kids were little, a long time ago, we got into Laura Scutter's natural peanut butter and it was just such an ordeal because the butter and the oil would separate and you'd have to grind it all up to get it to spread. Otherwise it was just this mess and I just assumed that the oil was added because it had to be. Is that true for some kind of nuts and not others? Some varieties of nuts, not others, I mean.
Speaker 3:Well, not necessarily. The oil separation is not necessarily a bad thing. It's actually a visual reference that consumers can see that emulsifiers have not been added to keep everything in formation. The problem, in my opinion, is when you use a lower quality nut with lower moisture content, the oil separates much quicker and rises to the top. And then you're left with this hard, chunky block at the bottom, making it very difficult to stir, whereas if you start with a higher quality nut, higher moisture content, it doesn't separate as quickly. And then what does rise to the top? There's still plenty available at the bottom so that you can easily stir everything back into formation. But I always tell consumers it's not a bad thing to see oil separation. It allows you to visually confirm that there haven't necessarily been emulsifiers added to it and when properly stirred the natural oils in our case we add some natural sea salt to the production process. It allows it to mix back in uniformly.
Speaker 1:So it's just nuts and salt.
Speaker 3:In our products. Yes, well, it's primarily the nut and a touch of sea salt. Of course, with our salt-free varieties we don't add sea salt to it. Yes, that's absolutely correct. But, speaking for other brands, they're oftentimes other flavors added to it to mask the lower quality of the nut, possibly inferior flavor, and then to just add some sweeteners to enhance it overall.
Speaker 2:Well, yeah, that was going to be the question that I was going to ask is why do most nut butters, when you go to the supermarket and look at them, most of them have sugar added in some form and just kind of get your thoughts on why that is?
Speaker 3:There's a lot of different reasons. I do think the consumers tend to, over the years, prefer sweeter foods, and that's when some of our older traditional brands came out. They were hydrogenated oils added to peanuts and then sugar. That was probably third on the list of what was in there and that was a lot of what consumers demanded at the time, and I think as more and more natural nut butters were introduced, you do have some that are calling 100% the nuts, but in my experience and when we were launching that back in 2012, many consumers had this opinion that natural nut butters were just disgusting, chalky dry, had no flavor, and I truly believe that has to do with the quality of nuts that were initially sourced Again, lower moisture content, less flavor. They'd been exposed to air, the oxidation process had started, and so adding a sweetener helped to mask some of the inferior flavor of the nut sourced.
Speaker 1:I love walnuts and I understand what you're saying. When a walnut has been sitting out too long, it's just it's not good for anything other than the trash can. So you had to have had a tremendously steep learning curve when you first got into, when you went from making almond butter in your kitchen to turning it into a full-blown manufacturing process. Talk about some of the lessons learned along the way.
Speaker 3:Gosh, I would say we're still learning new lessons every single day. But the reality is, when you're converting any type of a food product from home-based equipment to commercial equipment and scaling, there's a lot of challenges that come into place. So, specifically for nut butters and again we started off producing only almond butter initially, converting from this home little countertop grinder to this massive couple thousand pound grinder just the heat conducted and generated from these grinders was causing the proteins to bind, for everything to clump up and just turn into this big messy paste, and so that was something we definitely weren't anticipating and, having graduated from the University of Georgia, the College of Ag, they've been an extremely valuable resource to me and my business and helping us unveil some of the challenges that we experienced initially and still today. And in talking to a nut expert, he knew immediately what was going on and informed us that the proteins were binding from the almonds as a result of too much heat being generated from the grinder. So he gave us some tips and tricks and then, of course, taking it from a manufacturing standpoint, we found ways to cool the grinder quicker and to process the nut butters through it quicker.
Speaker 3:But that's just one specific example where I never in a million years thought we'd be dealing with proteins binding due to excessive heat generation that we weren't used to on home equipment. You know also, you know I don't know about your kitchen, but mine has a. You know it's a small convection oven and when you bake something at 350 degrees for 20 minutes that's not necessarily the same as in these large commercial convection ovens that rotate constantly. And so definitely, adjusting the roasting time and tinkering with roasting temperatures and time and, you know, layering racks of almonds just a lot of finesse and a lot of time to figure out the best way possible. But, with all of that being said, they were great lessons in how we can essentially look at a nut and we can tell you if it's been over roasted by a minute or under a minute and ultimately how it's going to grind into that butter. And so really, through all the mistakes that we made, has allowed us to hone and refine our product production process today.
Speaker 1:So what's the? I've actually got two questions here, or my understanding is a peanut is not actually a nut, it's a legume, and the question that arises is roasting different for a legume than it is for a nut? And then a larger question around roasting what is the purpose of roasting the nuts? Why are we not just taking raw nuts? And why isn't it just preference Right? Grind it over, they could make it butter.
Speaker 3:Yeah, those are both great questions. So yes, peanuts are legumes. They are not actually nuts grown on trees. A lot of people don't realize that they grow under the ground. And you know peanuts, they've received kind of a bad wrap over the years with mold and toxicity and E coli. And for us, with peanuts, you're not gonna find raw peanuts because they have to have a double kill step for FDA standards. They purely for food safety reasons.
Speaker 3:When you look at tree nuts, so think almonds, cashews, pecans, hazelnuts, et cetera. All of those are grown on a tree. They grown on a tree have shells and, based on the nut and the variety, they vary in what the FDA requires as a kill step. So, for example, raw almonds are not technically raw. In the United States They've all undergone some form of pasteurization as an initial kill step and what we purchase have actually been steam pasteurized. So there's a little life left in those suckers when they were to be sprouted and planted. We have not had success with raw almond butter in a large capacity and so we do slow roast them. It helps to release some of the essential oils, give it a robust flavor and then it makes it easier for us to grind when we used to make raw almond butter. Essentially it was just clogging the grinder and we were left with a mess. So for our business we have not been able to have a 100% raw almond butter.
Speaker 1:So it changes the flavor to roast it a little bit, oh yes, so all nuts are gonna have a different flavor after roasting.
Speaker 3:All of our nuts have been slow roasted Just to release the essential oils, give it a unique flavor. But if anything, I would say they're under roasted compared to what you'll find if you're looking for just roasted almonds to purchase at the grocery store. Those have a typically a much stronger flavor, more robust, typically have been roasted in oil and so ultimately the end product changes.
Speaker 1:Roasted in oil.
Speaker 3:A lot of them are yes, so you know. That's what's so important. Consumers don't understand all of the different processes and behind the scenes and what goes on. I think more and more consumers are comfortable reading ingredients now and labels, but many of the roasted nuts out there have been roasted in oil, especially peanuts.
Speaker 2:And so why don't you use peanuts? Why don't you sell peanut butter? Obviously, it's not popular Nut butter.
Speaker 3:Oh yeah, we have a peanut butter line.
Speaker 2:Oh, okay.
Speaker 3:Yes, we have a conventional and an organic peanut butter line at Georgia Grinders and proudly source all of our peanuts from the great state of Georgia, where we're located, and in fact we partnered with the Georgia Organic Peanut Association and Georgia Organics to bring the very first organic peanut butter that was actually organically grown, organically processed and then manufactured at an organic processing facility to market.
Speaker 3:Being the peanut capital of the world, Georgia, the farmers in Georgia were not incentivized to grow organic peanuts and through grants we were able to partner with some underserved farmers in rural Georgia to bring the first organic crop to market and Georgia Grinders got to make it into the nut butter.
Speaker 1:You mentioned three different steps that are organically grown, organically processed and something else. How does that differ? How does that differ from what we're typically seeing on our grocery shelves?
Speaker 3:Yeah, organics is very confusing in the certifications that go along with it, and again, I'll be honest with you, I wasn't aware that there were so many steps in the process either until Founding Georgia Grinders and then even when we started with the organic peanut butter a few years ago.
Speaker 3:But essentially it all starts at the farm how these nuts are being grown, and are the farmers certified organic or the field certified organic, and have they actually paid for the organic certification?
Speaker 3:If all of that is a guess, then they can claim that they have organic peanuts. The next step is for the organic peanuts to then be processed and shelled, but it can't just be at a normal processing and shelling facility. It's one that has to then be certified as an organic processor and sheller, and even though many of the same processes are taking place at organic shellers versus conventional, they can't claim to be organic until the certification and the fees are paid. And then the last step in this process is, in our case, for Georgia Grinders to be the organic certified nut butter manufacturer, and so we had to go through the organic certification as well, so that we can then make the claim that our product is organic, even though we buy organic peanuts, and they've been processed at an organic processor and sheller. So there's three steps, three additional fees and ultimately it's the consumer that's having to pay the elevated price on the shelf.
Speaker 2:And the theoretic benefit I guess you could say, or at least the process that's different between an organic product and a non-organic product, is that there's been at least less chemicals applied to that product.
Speaker 3:Theoretically, yes, but that's as you guys know. That's not always the case. There might be some farmers out there that are practicing as organically as possible. They just haven't had, they might not have, the financial means to go through the organic certification process. So it's important that consumers understand the sourcing and the behind the scenes of what goes into their food and demand answers.
Speaker 1:Well, sometimes we don't even know the questions to ask, though.
Speaker 3:Absolutely, and that's a challenge, and it's again something that I've learned as we're taking steps further into this industry, trying to figure out how to survive. And does it make sense to have all these additional certifications? And the answer is yes, it does, because I think it helps consumers to understand it. But many of them you're right don't know what questions to ask. They don't know that many of the peanuts, for example, and their peanut butter, might be grown in China, versus the United States too, and so we take great pride in being able to label our jars Georgia grown peanuts. But, again, the average consumer might not know where else the peanuts are coming from and not necessarily knowing the questions to ask so that they can make better choices for themselves and their families.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, so you started with almonds. Almonds California, that's correct.
Speaker 3:So we started with almond butter back in 2012, and all of our almonds are steam pasteurized from California, where about 80 percent of the world's almonds are grown.
Speaker 1:And then how long did it take you to go to the next nut and what was that? And what I'm after here is I did a little bit of research on Georgia grinders and saw just a little bit about all the places you get your nuts from. I'm fascinated to hear how you managed to end up doing all that.
Speaker 3:We were in business for about a year, 2012 to 2013. And just your typical new business startup. Every single problem we could have encountered happened. The Honey Bee Colony Collapse Disorder was taking place. The almond crop essentially had doubled in price. The drought in California contributed to this as well, and we thought, oh my gosh, now what are we going to do? We've invested all of this money into equipment, a manufacturing facility. Things are going really well with our almond butter and, if anything, it was just a huge opportunity for us to look into our backyard at the great state of Georgia and start experimenting with peanuts and pecans. We were not going to be able to remain in business with our cost of goods doubling in the first year, and it was a solid lesson in diversifying your portfolio and not having all of your eggs in one basket. And so what was a feel for experience turned into a true blessing as we began experimenting and creating other nut butters.
Speaker 1:Is the process essentially the same nut to nut? I'm assuming there's some minor variations.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I mean there was definitely a lot of ramp up time and experimenting with the different types and varieties of peanuts and pecans.
Speaker 3:And then, of course, the roasting process varies from peanut to peanut and pecan to pecan. And almonds don't roast the same as peanuts and peanuts don't roast the same as pecans. So there was a learning curve associated with the roasting process. But, understanding how nut butter should flow through the grinders and what we were looking for in an end product, we were able to go through the R&D process pretty quickly and new products were born. So that's when we launched a creamy and crunchy this was conventional peanut butter at the time and then our pecan butter, which is definitely one of my favorites, but it was cool, thank you. And at that time we were still educating people on what in the world almond butter was, and so imagine trying to educate consumers on pecan butter. It was funny and exciting at the same time because it was so well received and, being true, georgia grown products and manufactured in Georgia very well received at farmers markets around Whole Foods and some other markets I'm going to ask you a little inside baseball question.
Speaker 1:I'll give you the background so you understand where it's coming from. I grew up in Oklahoma. Lots of pecans there. When school in Texas was there until I was in my mid 30s, I had a native pecan in my front yard in Texas. Native pecans are awful, terrible nuts. I learned over the years that there's good pecans and there's awful pecans. So I'm going to ask what variety of pecan makes the best pecan butter and can you do anything with natives?
Speaker 3:Well, from our experience I know what it's like when you have one bad pecan in the whole batch. It'll ruin it, that's for sure. Just very bitter, ranted taste that ruins everything, but we actually experimented with all types of pecans but ended up with the Elliott pecan, if you're familiar with that.
Speaker 1:No, I don't know that one.
Speaker 3:It's bold, it's robust, it's got a buttery flavor with a subtle sweetness, a higher oil content, but when lightly roasted and ground it creates liquid gold. That is for sure.
Speaker 1:Is that native to Georgia?
Speaker 3:It's a variety that's grown in Georgia. We source them all from fifth generation farmers, but I do believe they're grown outside of Georgia too. We just focus primarily on all nuts grown in Georgia and source, if available, from Georgia.
Speaker 1:Okay, tell us what other nuts you're sourcing from Georgia and let's go on outside.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so all of our peanuts so the conventional and the organic peanuts come from Georgia. Our Elliott pecans are from a fifth generation farmer in Fort Valley, Georgia. As I mentioned previously, all of our almonds are steam pasteurized from California, and then we have a cashew butter and a hazelnut butter, and all cashews are grown in Southeast Asia tropical regions. And then our hazelnuts are from Italy and Turkey.
Speaker 1:Now, how in the world did you connect with Italy and Turkey for hazelnuts? That sounds like a good story.
Speaker 3:Well, it started off with a love for Nutella as a child but, of course, was wanting to find a healthier way to make a hazelnut butter. And we were in Italy a couple of years ago, in Tuscany, and went to the markets. We went to a lot of cooking classes where they would take you to the farmers markets and shop, and I just kept seeing hazelnuts over and over and over, and that is actually where the idea was born on our trip from Italy. So, of course, we had to buy different varieties, and some are blanched, some are not, some are whole, some are pieces, some are finely chopped and ultimately we found that the blanched hazelnuts made the best nut butters. And then, of course, fine-tuning the roasting process, grinding and adding a touch of sea salt. It gave us a healthy version of Nutella, but without the chocolate and the sugar, that we are in the R&D process for a hazelnut butter that will have cacao powder and a little bit of coconut in it. That's pretty divine.
Speaker 1:That raises a question that occurred to me as we were discussing roasting. Two of my absolute favorite things in the world are beans that are roasted Cocoa and coffee. Any plan to move in that direction?
Speaker 3:I like the way you think. I don't believe we will be able to launch a nut butter made from cocoa beans, but there are some espresso beans that make great additions to nut butters, but not solely as a ground. I haven't had any luck with getting them to grind on our equipment.
Speaker 1:Espresso in a nut butter.
Speaker 3:Tell me more. Yeah, so it's still in the R&D phase, that's okay. I dream about nut butters, and this is what I do is come up with different flavors and test them and see what's going to resonate with consumers For some of our seasonal flavors that we do. The espresso works really well with almonds, with a little bit of honey and a little bit of cinnamon and vanilla.
Speaker 2:It sounds like Jack is volunteering for your taste testing. Certainly, nuts are a prominent part of low-carb keto diets that many of our listeners are on. I find that there's a lot of controversy around different nuts and how healthy they are. Some of this certainly has to do with the different oil contents, especially the polyunsaturated linoleic acid different contents between nuts. I'd love to get your thoughts, from a nutritional standpoint, as to whether or not there is a significant difference between the nuts, and maybe even a little bit of a ranking, if you are so inclined.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I get asked that question a lot and I know that consumers have so many different preferences when it comes to diet and lifestyle, whether it's keto, paleo, plant based. I think, at the end of the day, people are looking for nutrient dense, clean ingredients. So I always steer clear of advising people on what's the healthiest, because what might work for you doesn't work for me. We all have different sensitivities and allergies. What some can tolerate Almonds, others can't. While some can tolerate peanuts, others can't.
Speaker 3:All tree nuts are not created equal either, so I do feel that consumers actually they need to listen to their body and see how their body reacts when eating different nuts.
Speaker 3:I do believe that all can agree that nuts are a healthy source of dietary fat. I think there was a lot of misconception about nuts in general being a great source of protein, but they're actually just a great source of fats. They're essential for giving your body energy and supporting cellular function and protecting your organs and helping to keep your body warm. So, with that being said, I think it has to be the consumer's choice how they feel when they eat them, for them to truly understand how they've been grown, how they've been processed and manufactured, because not all peanuts are created equal, not all almonds are created equal, and it's important to understand the nutritional profiles of each. So that probably didn't answer your question, though I do like to steer clear and I don't want to ever debate on what's healthy and what's not, because when eaten in moderation and when you listen to your body, I think we can all identify what nuts are best for us.
Speaker 2:And so maybe expanding out a little bit. You know, on a general sense, the food industry and I'm going to say rightfully so gets criticized by myself and others for putting you know, business interest, profit margins ahead of the health of their consumers. And so I'd love to hear from you, you know, and I know your company, I certainly would say, is different than that, and you do seem to have an emphasis on health and an interest in health. So how do you balance that, you know, the health aspects and the health supporting aspects of the food that you're producing and selling, versus the business interest of just being able to sell more food?
Speaker 3:Yeah, I mean, I think we, you know we're privately owned and operated, we're a small family business, so we do oversee every step in the production process, from sourcing to, you know, to grinding to jarring. Everything's made in small batches. It just gives us a little bit more flexibility to control what our consumers are receiving on the shelf. We're very small. We have full control over every decision that takes place and we're not adhering to, you know, shareholders and I would, at the end of the day, rather have a healthy product that I can stand behind a hundred percent, the quality, the transparency of the sourcing it's. It's a product that I put my name all over, I eat it daily, share it with my friends and family, then to have it on the shelves of every single store around the country.
Speaker 3:I do think the larger you get, the more control you do lose. And you know we can all say that we're dedicated to transparent, quality sourcing. But the reality is, you know, the the nuts are going to vary from farm to farm, from year to year, from broker to broker, from distributor to distributor, and my experience thus far, trying to mass produce something, it it takes away ultimately the quality and transparency it's, you know. It's why a lot of consumers don't know that some of their peanut butters that they're purchasing may have peanuts that were grown in China, where there's been no control or regulations over over what was in the ground in the harvest.
Speaker 1:What a lovely thought.
Speaker 3:But you know, I, I love to be able to share the story from ground to grind at Georgia grinders, and if that means that we're going to remain small and privately owned for the rest of our, our career in the nut butter industry, I, I, I want to go to bed with a clean, conscious at night and know that our consumers do have the best of the best.
Speaker 1:Talk about, and I realize you may not be able to, but I'm curious what kind of volume are we talking about? And I'm thinking about jars, truckloads. I mean, how much stuff do you make? How many you know what's? Are you buying train loads of empty jars and shipping out train loads of full jars? How big is this factory? What's? What are we talking about here in terms of scale?
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:So we're in about 11 years old.
Speaker 3:So right now we are in about 14,000 square feet in Shambly, georgia, and the reality is we do not make nut butters just to produce and warehouse inventory. All of our nut butters are ground fresh as purchase orders come in. Our products can be. Our products can be found, you know, nationally at Kroger, the fresh market, regionally at Whole Foods, the fresh market stores, sprouts, regionally in the Southeast Publix. So we've got a lot of solid distribution.
Speaker 3:Of course, with e-commerce on the rise and, of course, covid changing the way consumers shop, especially for specialty food products, or the e-commerce side of our business is booming as well. But my point in all of this we don't just produce nut butters to warehouse until purchase orders come in and that way, ultimately, the consumers have the freshest product available once it hits the shelves. Whatever somebody orders online, it's typically going to have been made within the past month or so and anytime a distributor comes, you know who does pick up in the truckload. It's all been made specifically to fill that purchase order which is going on. You know the specific shelves of the store that ordered it.
Speaker 1:That's pretty freaking cool. I would have never guessed that. I would assume that when you reach a certain level where you're distributing nationally, you're just stuck where okay, we just got to crank it out and hope it gets bought, but you're actually making it as it's purchased.
Speaker 3:That is correct and that was our commitment to all of these retailers that selected to work with us is you know it's going to have as close to a 365 day shelf life, but of course, by the time it's produced, palletized, you wait for the truck to come and get it. It arrives in their warehouse. You've lost about 20 days, but it is as close to a year shelf life as possible by the time the consumer gets it on the shelves. You know that was one of our challenges initially when starting Georgia grinders is do we invest into manufacturing or do we choose to work with a co-packer? And being a small company, we were not able to make sense of the minimum shifts that a co-packer would require of us.
Speaker 3:So, for example, if I had asked somebody to make us, you know, almond butter at the time, they would have required a full day shift, which then would have yielded, you know, thousands and thousands of jars, multiple pallets on end, with nobody to sell them to. And yes, we could have sold them off easily within the year. But consumers and distributors don't want product with a two-year shelf I'm sorry with a two-month shelf life remaining, and so making the decision to invest into manufacturing allows us to have control on what we're producing and the freshness. But don't get me wrong, there's days where it's extremely chaotic as we're trying to get large purchase orders out the door. And then seasonality of course kicks in and there's some slower times and you know we're looking for some things to do.
Speaker 1:I was going to ask you what is the seasonality in the nut business?
Speaker 3:You know it's changed significantly since 2012 when we started I think 2013 nut butters were one of the fastest growing food categories in specialty foods and it's still been an education process. But I, for the most part, we're pretty steady year round Some of our time. We typically have a slump in July. Of course. The holidays are busy and then the new year's extremely busy, with new year's resolutions and people trying to eat cleaner and incorporates, you know, different foods into their diets, but for the most part, we're pretty consistent with summer slump.
Speaker 1:What about? When do nuts ripen? When do they come to maturity? Does that is that throughout the year?
Speaker 3:It's throughout the year depending on, and then you know you've got harvest and then that predicts the crop for the following year. So you're always purchasing well in advance of the crop actually being available.
Speaker 1:I was going to ask you if you're involved in futures purchasing there.
Speaker 3:Yeah, we are. We have some contract pricing. We also do a lot of spot purchasing too. You know, being small, we don't have a significant amount of cash flow to you know. You know, really, to estimate the volume that we're going to need for the entire year?
Speaker 1:I could imagine.
Speaker 2:What's something that's been surprising to you about getting into the food industry? What's like, maybe, something that people who aren't in this industry never really would have even thought about. That's been pretty surprising to you.
Speaker 3:This is a tough one and I have to be very careful on how I phrase this. I think, at the end of the day, consumers are demanding premium products. Now, larger grocery chains are looking to expand their portfolio of natural and organic products. However, it's not always easy for the smaller manufacturers, like Georgia grinders, to compete with the larger ones, because we're not always in a position to be giving free product to every single store.
Speaker 3:There's this concept called free fills at the retail level. Basically, what that means is, if you know, grocery store X, that has a thousand stores throughout the country, wants to bring in two of our products, let's say almond butter and cashew butter, then they are going to ask us to give each store a free case of almond butter and cashew butter. If you do the math roughly, let's just keep it simple $10 a jar, a thousand stores, 12 units per case. It's a huge investment on the front end for manufacturers and we're not in a position to say yes, that's just bad business, and that's made it extremely challenging, though I will say with the retailers that we're in, many of them are extremely supportive of small businesses and the change that we're trying to make, and we have never had to offer free fills to be a part of the shelves.
Speaker 3:Another challenge for smaller manufacturers too is that we're asked to pay slotting fees, and it might be $5,000 per product to be on the shelf, and before you're even on the shelf, you're in the hole. What I like to say this is an analogy my husband and I like to joke about. If we want to go shop at a grocery store new grocery store we should have the ability to walk in and say we're going to test out your store today, but before we do so, do you mind if we just fill your cart? We want to make sure we actually like the products we're bringing home. If we like them, then we might be back to buy them, and essentially that's what we're faced with. We don't know that our products we know our products are going to sell because they taste great. However, to invest $100,000 essentially to appear on a shelf with not one unit being sold, it just doesn't make business sense and ultimately, it's the consumers that are being penalized because the prices are being raised significantly.
Speaker 1:Well, that gets to the mark. Oh, I'm sorry, go ahead, phil.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, I was just going to say that's kind of interesting, because then you start thinking about is the supermarket? Are they more concerned about what the consumer is buying, or are they more concerned about the fees that they can get from companies to place their products in the supermarket? I would say most people don't think about the fact that when you walk into the supermarket, you're not the only consumer. I guess You're not the only target market for that supermarket.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's correct. It's frustrating because you can have a really great product that sells all day long, but if you're not in a position to pay slotting fees, pay, provide free fills and then, if you're not in a position to be running quarterly promotions and pay to be in their circulars, they don't necessarily want you, and I hear that a lot. We have to go through what's called category review. It's not better category review. It takes place once a year at the various retailers and you go through your presentation and that's a question every time. We require free fills, are you able to provide them? I check no every time. What are your quarterly promotional budgets? And it's tough. It's a tough, challenging side of the industry to be on, that's for sure, which is why we're extremely excited about e-commerce and the transition for consumers to go directly to the manufacturers and purchase.
Speaker 1:That was a huge difference.
Speaker 3:Well it does. And again, people are so used to shopping at the grocery stores and if they don't see their special brand there, well then they automatically switch to another one. But I do think you're finding more brand loyalty today, and if people can't find it on their shelves at their favorite grocery store, then they'll go to alternative resources and look elsewhere or purchase online.
Speaker 1:Well, I was going to ask you about marketing and promotion. You started from scratch with this nut butter business. How did you get your first foothold in regional and national chains?
Speaker 3:Yeah, so some of the best advice that I was given when we first started was to get your product in the mouth of as many people as possible. So day one. So we started in March of 2012. I had applied to some local farmers markets in the Atlanta area that are extremely supportive of our values and our mission and we were accepted and just started sampling away and people. The feedback was great. It gave me the confidence to be able to just walk directly into Whole Foods the regional office and drop off samples and get the process started there.
Speaker 3:I have to say that Whole Foods was extremely supportive of Georgia grinders and they rolled us out onto their shelves for some local stores within the first six months of us being in business. And then back to the advice I was given let everyone taste it. I signed up for as many demos as possible at Whole Foods to sample our product, to talk about it, to talk about the quality and the transparent sourcing, to talk about different ways to use it. I mean, still at that point I was educating people on what almond butter even was, and it's just out there talking to people. And then the numbers were proven at Whole Foods. They expanded us into other stores and eventually we became a regional supplier for Whole Foods in the Southeast and the Florida regions. Same thing with the fresh market. A lot of these larger retailers have local programs and so I looked into all of those and tried to get Georgia grinders into as many of the local programs and that eventually helped us to get into national distribution with their stores.
Speaker 1:Well, I think this is the point where we say tell folks how they can get a hold of some of this. And seriously, this is probably I'm trying to think. Have we had anybody on the show that I am going to be more excited about saying folks, here's the website. I can't think of anybody off the top of my head, it's mostly medicine and training programs. This is food, man.
Speaker 3:So this is food, and it's the world's best nut butters and food is medicine, so I encourage everyone to go to georgagrinderscom. You can read more about our story, the different products that we make. We have a lot of great recipes so we can get consumers to think outside of the jar, and I'd love to be able to provide your listeners with a discount code for 20% off today.
Speaker 1:Oh, fire away. We'll make sure it shows up in the show notes.
Speaker 2:Put that in the show notes.
Speaker 3:Okay, what is? What's a code that you guys typically use for discounts?
Speaker 2:I fix hearts.
Speaker 3:Okay, let's do. I fix hearts 20 and that will be for 20% off site-wide All caps. I fix hearts.
Speaker 1:We are buying some nut butter.
Speaker 2:Sounds good. Well, yeah, this has been a great discussion, really insightful, you know, I think, a different aspect of being healthy. We talk about the importance of food as a pillar of health, obviously, but I don't think we really know enough about what goes into making good, healthy food, and so thank you for adding your insight to this and hope people have found it useful, and probably some people that are quite hungry for some nut butter now. So All right.
Speaker 1:So that discount code is ifixhearts20 at Georgia grind. That's right, georgagrinderscom.
Speaker 3:That's correct.
Speaker 1:Very good. Well, jamie Foster, thanks for being with us today. I'm definitely the next as soon as we hang up, I'm ordering some butter. That just sounds fantastic. Phil, let's get some more of this. This is way more fun than the guys who sell pills.
Speaker 2:Not that there's anything wrong with the pills, but For the guys that are trying not to sell pills.
Speaker 1:For the guys that are trying not to, for the guys we have on, but yeah. All right Well for Jamie Foster and Dr Philip Ovedia. This has been the Stay Off my Operating Table podcast. Thanks for joining us and we'll talk to you next time.