Kiera Kehoe - Scaling a National Demo Program

On this episode, we're joined by Kiera Kehoe, Brand Manager at Smash Kitchen - the organic condiments and cooking oils brand co-founded by actor Glenn Powell.

Kiera previously built and ran Lift Off, a demo and merchandising agency covering roughly 40 states, and honed her brand management chops at cool brands like Zack's Mighty.

We dive into the real mechanics of building and running a demo program from the ground up. Kiera walks through how she thinks about budget allocation (sponsored search first, demos second), when brands should start demoing (three to four months after launch, not day one), and which categories see the best demo ROI - impulse-priced items like snacks and beverages versus low-margin singles where the math rarely works.

We get into how to find, hire, and motivate top brand ambassadors (referrals first, Facebook groups second), the case for starting with an agency before building in-house, and how to diligence demo agencies by asking where their strongest regions are. Kiera also talks candidly about the realities of scaling a national demo program, including why most brands eventually have to pull back on demo spend around the two-year mark as they move into conventional retail.

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Episode Highlights:

🛒 How Lift Off demo agency was born from Zack's Mighty
🎯 Two marketing buckets: like your brand vs. buy your product
💰 Budget priority: sponsored search first, demos second
📊 Metrics that matter (samples distributed, sales, reorders)
🍟 Demoing frozen products (the tater tot air fryer story)
🤝 Why ambassadors are your best source of store-level intel
🎨 Table setup details that actually drive traffic
📋 Reporting with Piñata and why feedback is everything
🔍 How to find great brand ambassadors (referrals and Facebook groups)
⚠️ Agency vs. in-house: when to make the switch
🚀 Scaling a national demo program with regional agencies
📈 The two-year compounding effect at Whole Foods
👀 The future of demos and co-demoing to cut costs

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Table of Contents:

00:00 – Intro
00:32 – How Lift Off demo agency started
03:08 – What a great demo actually accomplishes
04:08 – Biggest misconceptions about demos
05:14 – Common mistakes brands make with demos
06:47 – When demos make sense (and when they don't)
08:16 – Categories where demos work best
09:54 – Demoing frozen and cooked products
11:24 – Allocating marketing budget to demos
13:01 – Choosing which stores to demo at
13:45 – What a great demo setup looks like
15:17 – Reporting and tracking ROI with Piñata
16:06 – Metrics that matter during and after demos
18:10 – What makes a great brand ambassador
19:34 – How to motivate and incentivize ambassadors
20:53 – Where to find top brand ambassadors
22:13 – Agency vs. in-house demo teams
24:22 – How to diligence a demo agency
25:58 – In-store realities and what goes wrong
29:04 – Common consumer objections at demos
30:16 – Scaling a national demo program
32:04 – Core tools for running a demo program (Piñata, Gusto)
33:16 – The future of demos
34:25 – Wrap up

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Links:

Smash Kitchen – https://smashkitchen.com/
Follow Kiera on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/kieragk/
Follow Smash Kitchen on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/company/smash-kitchen/
Follow me on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/adam-martin-steinberg/

For help with CPG production design - packaging and label design, product renders, POS assets, retail media assets, quick-turn sales and marketing assets and all the other work that bogs down creative teams - check out https://www.kitprint.co/

Transcript

0:02

today we're speaking with kiara kehoe brand manager at smash kitchen the organic condiments and cooking oils brand co founded by after glenn powell who seems to be everywhere these days kira spent a few years honing her brand management chops at brands like zaxby's almighty and a number of other ones and also built a demo and merchandising agency along the way that covered i think forty ish states or so um so lots of lot of fun directions we can kind of take this excited to dive in i think as a former founder of a presizable demo agency definitely want to spend kind of a bulk of our time here just cause i think you know demos can have such a big impact on brands what kind of gap did you see lift off demos in the first place yeah so i i didn't really see a gap because there's so many agencies out there i think the biggest thing i saw was we built out a demo field team so we had a lot of our you know people in house um as part of our team and i saw the difference between you know having your own people versus having an agency and just you know when you we're investing in them and and and all of that but i know every brand doesn't have that you know ability and so you know as zax grew we kind of winded down you know very much like other brands you know when we initially launched demos were a big part of our strategy for a few years and then you know um the the goal right is to to grow and then pull back on some of those um spends and so um i had this awesome team uh you know for for great demos at at zax we were actually i was lucky we were working with some salsa brands because we were a tortilla chip company and so i had some some awesome you know connections that uh we had worked with and you know we would say hey you know if you guys kind of want to split the cost of demos you know our ba's ba's brand ambassador can sample both and so i was already in the cadence of working with other brands and and having our ambassadors you know work across multiple brands and you know obviously would give them reports and everything and we had one brand who actually was like you guys have sold better than any other agency and so it was a very like organic you know decision because we were winding down uh our you know program at zax and i had some of these brands um who were saying you know are you what are you guys doing are you doing more and so i started you know connecting them with our team and i was like alright i have something here and so you know lift off was born and you know started working with a few clients and you know all natural channel whole foods sprouts and it was great it you know it i i'm so passionate about demos i love it i love you know the people i love you know you know experience that i did where you're like okay i i spent money and i move units you know like this is something that i'm i'm seeing you know impact from a spend you know at the store level and so so yeah that's how it all started makes sense yeah in your mind actually accomplished beyond just selling a few more units than usual that day versus when someone's not doing a demo like i think there's a lot of other value that adds beyond that long term so yeah from just someone going to the store doing a demo you get shelf photos you get amazing feedback that's always the biggest thing that's always you know if i'm onboarding someone or or training someone new i'm like feedback is so important especially for small brands i'm like we read every line we read every detail and so all of my team's reports are always like very much in depth and it's it's amazing because you get you know direct quotes from shoppers at these stores and so yeah i'd say you know shelf photos feedback you know a great photo of the setup that you can bring to your next retailer meeting and say hey look how we're supporting you this is how much you know we're investing in you you know this is what we're bringing to your stores you know all of those are you know really important yeah totally the world of demos i would say the biggest misconception is that you know it's hard to track return on investment because you know can always figure out a way to to track store sales and i would say you know a lot of times it is a big marketing expense it's it's you know when you invest in demos you you have to invest pretty heavily because if you just do a few you're not really going to move the needle unless it's like a you know really really small chain and so you you do have to like lean in and invest and so i think you know from what i just said all those things that you get out of it and i want something i forgot was also the relationship that brand ambassadors are able to build with stores and store managers um you know it's it's a very worthwhile investment i think it's it's hard to stomach because uh you know it's it's a lot and and you have to do it and do it right but i think it's a it's very worthwhile first time founders make whether it's like none of the the you know uh brands that i worked with really did this but i know a lot of brand i speaking from with ambassadors i know kind of what they've been you know what they've dealt with with other brands and sometimes brands will say you know i only want demos on this day um you know at at this time it has to be a weekend it has to be at this time i always say you know let the ambassador tell you they are in these stores all the time for the most part unless you know they're new to the world and you're training them that's kind of different but a lot of you know the people that i've hired they've done this for a while and they have such good insight i always say listen to the ambassadors they'll tell you and they'll even and i think other times you know you'll give a store list to an agency right like you know these are the stores i wanna hit only these ones and you'll have ambassadors say hey i'll go to this but it's dead or you know like i'd much rather go to this one or the client tell at this one never buys like let's go to this one so i'd say you know lean on them as much as you can because they have so much insight they're the ones there and they can teach you a lot they don't even get asked like you know i know that's crazy i'm like you tell me yeah you know like you tell me what's going on you tell me you know and and they they have so much insight so it's it's worth talking to them and having them guide your strategy a little bit totally in terms of um kind of like when demos make sense and versus maybe when they they don't make sense from your kind of experience what stage should a brand start doing demos when is it too early i guess is maybe another way to put it yeah i think you know it should be a part of your initial strategy the first one to two years of launching i think too early i i always think you know you need to let a product get to shelf you need to make sure it's on shelf you need to you know give it a second to breathe get kind of your initial you know one to two to three months of data what stores are doing well you know where are we doing well figure out kind of you know your understand your product a little bit and then start investing in demos and whether you you know want to pump a region or you're you know pleasantly surprised the region is doing well and and you want to you know support it even more and see how how much more it can do i think you know within the first three to four months i think it's good to have a a demo strategy in place um cause again you right off the bat you're getting learnings you're getting boots on the ground you're getting pictures of you know your product in stores you have you know brand ambassadors it's not always the best text in the world but they're like hey this store hasn't ordered in two weeks or hey you know you know we're on the bottom shelf here but it's it's insights that you can take action on pretty quickly yeah totally there are not sure how many brands you worked with at lift off but are there any categories that you found where demos are be like almost mandatory versus not yeah it's it's such an interesting question one interesting thing is that most ambassadors that i've worked with over the years all um at some point have done liquor so it seems like that category i've never worked with a liquor brand or on a liquor brand but it seems like that category is a must so i'm like if that is ever in my future i feel like it's it i it's just crazy every resume i get you know it's a liquor brand so i'd say that category for sure it seems like when it comes to demoing you know i think it's difficult when you have an item that is really low price so you know a a granola bar or a drink you know it's it's nearly impossible to ever see a return on that yeah and so that's hard you know if it's a higher price item you know you can see a return you know you can generate a return per demo but yeah i think the the categories that do best it's kind of you know reverse of that are kind of the impulse items that aren't that expensive that you know people try and and you're like hey it's only you know it's only four ninety nine and and you know they don't really have to think too hard about it um whereas you know some of the the higher price stuff it it's a it's a little bit harder but then again you don't have to sell as much to to make up for it so you know i think ambassadors definitely enjoy more of the the impulse buy type brands yeah you know a snack a beverage how do you how do you think about or how did you i'm not sure if you work with any brand that on the shelf tables is the wrong word products that that were in the frozen aisle as an example or things that needed to be you know heated up uh it's like that probably significantly more challenging did you work with any brands there in those categories yeah i worked with one brand um they wanted to do tater tots and there was hesitation at first with the brand ambassador team they were like this is gonna affect you know where we're gonna be put up in the stores and if there's an outlet and i was like let's let's try it and it went really well we sent everyone an air fryer and uh they were like oh people actually want to come to the table they kind of smell it they yeah good you know the the outlet situation was good um and so that's the only cooking you know demo that i've done but you know i think i think it's it's always tough when you have to like ask more of of the ambassadors and i know you know it's throws them off a little bit but that one went well but i've never done you know i know some of my other my team has done demos for like rice brands and stuff some of like the package rice and so they have like slow cookers and and they're you know they do it you know they they they'll go to the back room and heat stuff up and bring it out and they have a heater on the table so yeah you know they make it work you know so if you get your kid over to the table and and they like it then the parent kind of has to buy it so totally it does work the early stages of a brand how should how do you recommend to like a founder how does they think about their their marketing budget when it comes to allocating budget to demos in early days versus other things like i always say and i don't know if this is right by any means but i always say you kind of have two two marketing buckets and and one of them has to be getting people to like your product and one of them has to be getting people to like your brand and so i look at you know the the meta and social and and content creation and you know experiential and out of home stuff as as that you know getting people to to buy into your brand and get to know you and then you know getting people to buy your product is kind of where demos would fall so yeah in terms of that i would rank demos second i would say first bucket should be online sponsored search like instacart sure you know walmart connect all of those because that's gonna be you know it mean you know you get great returns you have to be on there you have to be visible and then i would say demo secondary that's that's how i you know have built that getting people to buy your you know your shopper marketing budget you call it yeah makes sense but yeah i just i i always struggle ranking you know that with with you know the brand marketing cause they're they're so different yeah for sure as a brand like but they're still in those earlier stages where budgets are still you know pretty tight mm hmm how do you choose in terms of directing the brand ambassadors which stores to to prioritize or demo at first maybe it's just as simple as you know store sales like this one sells the most units so maybe can boost the most or maybe it's the ones that are the slowest moving how do you kind of think about prioritizing yeah i think if you're working on a you know a a small budget you go to the stores that are the best for you because you know you know you're gonna move even more product the reps probably know those stores and like those stores and you also know that they probably have inventory for you so i would start there cause i think there's always more you can pump out of good stores look like to you not like numbers wise so setups are so important and that's something it's it's fun like it's funny it's a different you know for every ambassador it's something that we drill so hard in training and we're like the setup is so important and you know pictures on pictures of this is what the setup should look like and some ambassadors are just like naturally their table is beautiful and they bring a plant from home and have it on the table and they thought to bring a garbage can to have next to the table and and they just you know have it down it's like you know just some people are just like that like you know their their room is always perfect and and others will send a picture of their table they're like how does it look and i'm like oh my gosh like not great let's you know reorganize so in um you know whenever they start and and i've kind of learned some tricks along the way when it comes to you know there's like some some stands on amazon that putting the product on just automatically makes the table look better you know the tablecloth having branding on the tablecloth is is great and you know sometimes if i see pictures i'm like hey go go get it iron you know we'll we'll cover it you know'cause that stuff is just important you know getting people to the table so that's something that is is is you never know what you're gonna get but you know we always always need a picture especially if someone's starting you know that that day or that week i'm like when you get to the store send me a picture of the setup let's make sure it's okay before beginning and then and when it comes to reporting obviously extremely important um you know whether we're doing it in house or or an agency and so i use i've used a software called pinata my whole for years now and um use it in house use it as an agency brand investors have to check in to the location so i can see they're checked in i can see when they check out it tracks their location and then you get to tailor the report so you know you get samples distributed you get shelf photos you get all of that feedback of course i love when i see like a paragraph of feedback i'm like amazing totally and yeah you know i give you know ambassadors i always say you know within two to three days have it done cause you're you're gonna forget but a lot of them take notes and stuff from a a metrics reporting roi standpoint what metrics matter most during a demo yeah i'd say you know i always track um samples distributed and sales and then in terms of kind of longer term you know if a rep in the feedback says hey you know we sold out the store ordered up like confirmation store reordered or you know every now and then get you know hey told the story that i'm gonna come back and and we got an end cap and so i think i think the one of the long term benefits for sure is that once you are in these stores um you know a handful of times they're gonna start ordering for you and that to me is a huge long term benefit they know you're coming back and most ambassadors are like hey i'm gonna come back you know this day that's next week make sure you have this and they order it because they know that they're gonna sell it brand that you've worked with where it was clearly the metrics don't necessarily indicate that haven't had a huge impact from like units sold or samples given out or something but you start to see it over time it just kind of adds up yeah it's something that you see over time and it's it comes from again being in the stores pretty frequently it's hard to do like a one off i mean a one off you'll most of the time see a bump but then it's gonna go back down and so it takes about a year so like two years to really at at the two year point a lot of times the ambassadors are like all these shoppers know me you know and it's and it's great and you know that way you know as you're innovating and launching new stuff they they know that they they know you they like it they're like okay you know i'm gonna what do you have today i'm gonna grab it but yeah we definitely saw you know with with whole foods specifically like the the stores that we were at you know pretty long term those were some of our top stores yeah because you're you're forming those relationships with the shoppers and so you know over time it clicks and and it's an inventory thing too you know stores will give you that extra facing because they're ordering up yep totally someone who cares and there are so many people who do and there's there's some people who don't but that's probably my favorite part of of working in the field marketing demo world there are so many people you know ambassadors who care so much and go the extra mile and they're like oh my gosh i found you know something expired or or the store hasn't ordered up i'm going back tomorrow and you know they they wanna succeed just as badly as you do that is it's like the best feeling because you know it it's similar to being on a team where you're like we're all in this together totally that's what makes a great ambassador you know you could always fix the table you could always fix uh you know the little things but you know that enthusiasm obviously shows when they're selling the product they feel they feel like they're you know a part of it and they are so yeah just i think i would say number one is enthusiasm and that's you know i've worked with so many people over the years where i'm like so shocked that you know how driven they are to sell and how you know we've had ambassadors being like oh my gosh like you know this store manager hasn't ordered up you know i'm i've called him every day this week i'm like you know and you know they're not they're not getting paid to do that but they just care yeah are there are there ways you like motivate and or the way you incentivize brand ambassadors actually truly care about the brand or is it just kind of an a either they just come in really caring a lot or they don't i think you know some do some who who have a background with other brands they are you know they they like being in this world and and you know they're excited about a new product so it's kind of it just like snaps initially others you know what what i've always done building like in house field teams is have you know a group chat with everyone and it's it's so fun like hearing you know having people send updates and you know what's working what's not and hey i tried this today it worked or i'm trying a new store today and so that i think i think it's really just making people feel you know a part of something and and they are you know their their boots on the ground for you and so i think i think you know telling them hey you know i have some reps on like hey your stores are the number one you know in in this state you know like and they're like oh my gosh sorry like i had no idea so i think and that goes for any job in any industry like you know if if you have people working for you i think telling them you know this is why we're doing this and and here's the impact you're having it creates motivation totally what's the best place or strategy to to find the best brand ambassadors and we're just where to find yeah we're where to find them yeah so initially we when we were building a team we had a field marketing manager like years ago he brought in a few people who he had worked with and from there it was kind of this like network that blew up it's it's very much a network and a lot of people i've hired over the years are recommendations you know sometimes i'm working with one you know woman in miami and she's like oh i met this great rap yesterday at fresh market doing a demo next to me i got her information like it seriously works like that and so i always love hiring from recommendations that's how i try to do you know like seventy five percent of my hiring and then other than that facebook groups that's you know yeah there's one for what time they're like brand ambassador demo facebook groups or you want you kind of go in facebook groups that are other groups you feel like those type of people would be good brand ambassadors there's there's just groups for you know different cities different states and depending if if i'm like oh you know i need someone in this market i'll join those and and post and then you get people reaching out and yeah that's that's how it goes that's how i've always done it yeah they're early but they're starting to hit the snowball is starting to roll fast and faster down the hill maybe it's just been you know the say it's like three co founders start of the brand it's just basically been them doing the demos and maybe tagging in their friends or you know wives or something here and there budgets are getting bigger but you know still somewhat limited why does it make sense to hire an agency like lift off or i don't know natural brokerage or something and why does it make sense to build out an internal demo team yeah i think an agency is early on you kind of just you know if it is you know a founder or just the co founders or you know two to to three to four employees that's the way to go like i said earlier it's hard to find really good agencies but you know that's kind of the way to to step into it and especially if you know a brand has been doing demos themselves which i always think you know is is a great thing because they're on the ground and and hearing what customers are saying then they can really train and and manage the agency closely and they know what's worked for them and they can really direct them so you know it takes a lot off when an agency is handling you know the scheduling the the payments the staffing all of that yeah but you know always make sure that you're getting on a training call you're monitoring that they know that you you know you're you're watching sales and so i think you know for the first few months to a year if if you have really limited resources it's the way to go and it's just about management and you kind of find the people within the agencies that are that are doing a really good job for you and ask them to do more demos um and then yeah i think you know it's it's it's kind of a natural thing if if it's something that's working for you then that's when you you take it internally because there's been proof of concept some brands you know it just might not work and so it's you know good to have that test before you are are hiring people totally yeah it makes sense for um that brand the brands i do hire an agency so that's kind of the way to go a lot of times what's the you said it's you know hard to find ones that are good what's the most effective way to to diligence these types of demo agencies in terms of quality of reps reporting channel capabilities that kind of stuff yeah i think understanding kind of upfront what their reporting looks like i think asking the agency what are your strongest regions so where are your strongest people you know they'll they'll tell you and um i i that's the way that i've always done it kind of said you know you tell me where where are your best people let's start there and then kind of go from there or just say hey where did you start like what were your first few regions those typically are some of their strongest that both all good questions on the agency side how many brands is too many for one brand ambassador to be you know reping before they can't really care about any of them cause there's just too many hmm i'm sure there's not there's not some wrong or right number but maybe it's like you know ballpark number yeah i know you know i know that a lot of ambassadors enjoy working with different brands cause they like switching it up and yeah um you know um i don't know maybe like like ten to twelve okay i don't know i and i would say just because it it might lead to like burnout you know just sure um some some investors are like i'll work seven days a week i'm like you gotta take a day off so yeah maybe like ten to twelve would be too many yeah um let's just kind of call it the in store reality in terms of how things just kind of play out you know certain retailers and certain situations what's the most common ways that demos can can go wrong and and how do you plan ahead to prevent the most common ways that they do go wrong i think the biggest thing is inventory especially when you're starting off and you know it's a pain to do but you have to call the stores you have to you know three days before two days before you know three days before call them hey order up two days before call them hey remember me like we're coming in yeah and then eventually that that is not an issue because you know you're there and and they know you and okay we're gonna you know you see them face to face hey you know order up i'm i'm coming so i'd say that's the biggest thing and and and sometimes a store is like hey i'm yeah sure i'm gonna order up and then you show up and there's only you know three or four units on the shelf and right you know the brand ambassador has has gone there and started to set up and so that's uh always a bummer yeah what does your playbook look like or how you recommend to brand ambassadors how to kind of deal with situations where they get you know when they just get to a store and whatever reason they're just super disengaged not really helpful and or maybe even hopefully doesn't happen too too frequently but ones that are actually like somewhat openly hostile to the brand ambassadors in terms of not being supportive and and in terms of them doing demos like store managers not being yeah store yeah i guess whoever yeah if store managers the most common person that would cause issues let's say them yeah i don't think i've really had that experience that's good i think yeah most our managers shout out to store managers i feel like most of them are always like excited uh to you know to have someone there you know if anything maybe they're annoyed at how much we call ahead sometimes to make sure they have product but no i i i think like pretty lucky that we haven't really had that happen that's great are there some pretty like generally kind of common differences between how demos play out in different ways you should approach them between the natural channel or like specialty channel versus mass like walmart and target in terms of how demos play out and how they should plan for them and how they should operationalize them i guess yeah i think um you know i think with smaller channel stores sorry with more natural channel chains or or retailers you kind of know that a certain percent of stores are gonna do a bulkier business it's kind of easier to pick those stores out and focus on those whereas you know bigger it's so hard to know you know it's like you know texas has as many walmart as you know like there are like whole foods almost like it's crazy and so i think it's just harder to figure out kind of where to go and and how to how to target stores that makes sense that makes a lot of sense what's the most common objections that like brand ambassadors get from consumers and how do you train them to rebut them or answer them or deal with those objections yeah it totally varies by product and it's so interesting and you know it's like there's always one ingredient that all of a sudden you know it's like it's like i feel like i i get exposure to the trends before i see them sometimes like in the headlines and stuff because people like oh all of a sudden people are avoiding this or they heard about this and so it totally varies by product and a lot of times you know i'll ask brands like do you have a one or two pager on on why and how we can explain and then you know price is always is is something you know more more so at you know some of the natural channel stores it it can be a barrier but i'd say you know there's ingredients and now you know with there are so many apps that people are like hey it's it's scanning on this app and i don't know why it's showing as a bad score and i had five people use this app today and so i'd say you know making sure you you kind of know where your products stand on those apps is important that's that's relevant too let's consider a brand for like demos that are really having a big impact they're the brand's growing pretty quickly how can a brand like most effectively scale national demo strategy whether it's partnering with you know one agency or multiple ones depending on region as they go from you know a handful of doors to you know five ten thousand plus doors just in terms of yeah i don't know we're recruiting if they're in themselves or sourcing multiple agencies and um yeah how they just kind of scale up to that you know multiple thousands of doors from a few while still maintaining same level of quality from a demo standpoint yeah yeah it gets it gets harder the bigger you scale for sure but um you know i i think it's what you said kind of a mix of agencies and i do think a lot of agencies are regional and so it's kind of finding those and working with those so sometimes your in house team covers an x amount and and we don't have anyone in in these new newer regions that we're in and so definitely a mix of more of the regional agencies yeah that makes sense where do demo programs like most commonly break as as they scale anything that's like really comes top of mind i think um you know i think after that like two year mark you kind of know you know where you stand as a brand a lot of you know your your reps have established probably really strong uh you know base level store sales you know most brands at that point have expanded nationally um or entering more conventional and and it's i think the spend is just too hard to keep up with it's just the reality yeah and so you know that's when you switch more into some of the online stuff and or more of the mass media stuff yeah i think that's when it kind of has to end yeah makes sense uh you mentioned pinata i'm definitely familiar with pinata other than that one any other kind of core tools that you found are super useful in terms of scaling up a demo agency or program to a pretty large scale yeah so i used a pinata for all reporting and then when i had an agency i used gusto for payroll really really easy i think those were the only two cool really like softwares that i use and then you know i again i'm lucky i've had so many great ambassadors who have you know stepped up and help me you know like florida specifically have some great you know team members down there and i'm and nice i'm like hey you know i'm i'm on boarding this new person can you just help them out or you know so i think you know kind of raising up some of your top people or you kind of know the people who you can kind of be like hey you know do you mind can i give you a few more hours will you help me out with this or will you help this person out and so you know it's really hard obviously when it's your team or or your company but i've definitely learned like leaning on you know people who are who are doing the work and and are willing to do more is is really beneficial totally yeah that's great looking into the future a bit you've been in this demo world for you know quite a while now you know pretty well based on what you've seen i'm not sure if things have changed you know dramatically over the past few years but any just based on what you know notable changes you think we might see in in the general kind of demo landscape over the next i don't know five seven years or so or do you think things are gonna pretty much kind of remain remain the same you know that's a good question i feel like we're gonna see more demos i feel like i'm seeing more and more brands investing in it i know like fish wife always talks about you know how it's been such a big part of their marketing strategy and i think also a lot of like co demos i think cutting costs you know that's what we did at zack's mighty kind of you know splitting the table and collaborating i think it's you know you still get you still get sales and and you're able to kind of pull back on cost a little bit but yeah yeah i i think a lot of brands are using it and and seeing the benefits of it so maybe more demos cool that makes sense that's i mean that'd be cool last question for you it's been awesome um beyond demos just you've been in the cpg world for quite a while at this point any outside of smash kitchen or ones you've worked for in the past any brands or just kind of trends in general across the cpg landscape that you've been kind of tracking closely lately or things that's gotten you particularly excited at all okay i wanna keep this question in but let me think about it for a second yeah take your time we'll cut out the dead the dead noise okay any trends there's so many trends hmm if you don't have any answer we can just skip this one too all good no worries okay wait give me a second i wanna answer it yeah no worries yeah i don't have anything good which is so crazy cause i always all good no worries get it out all good um what yeah this has been awesome here what's the if people are curious about learning more about demos i'm not sure if you wanna get bugged but what's the best place for people to to uh to follow along with you and everything you're working on at smash kitchen and everything else yeah connect with me on linkedin kira kiho and i'll always answer my dms awesome thanks cara this has been great appreciate the time that's the thanks so much adam so much fun yeah for sure alright especially brands are scaling first question what that made you want to start at my previous company zacks mighty and i also knew that there is a demand uh having brands have that same totally so there's so much that you can get is the biggest misconception people may have about the i think um yeah so i starts to scale into more doors you saw the payoff over time what makes a great demo rep brand ambassador you can you know