How to Turn a 200-Year-Old Brand into a Challenger | Josh Daly (Grey Poupon)

How do you make a 200-year-old heritage brand behave like a modern challenger — without losing what made it famous?

In this episode of Makin Mighty: The Challenger Sessions, Simon Greenwood-Haigh speaks with Josh Daly, who helped take Grey Poupon from being “in the wilderness” to behaving like a brand with a clear point of view.

We get into:

• why Grey Poupon got delisted (and why that was actually useful context)
• how to spot duplication and pull away from the incumbent
• what was sacred (product quality, the jar) vs what had to change (tone, audience, comms)
• fast, scrappy insight gathering (farmers’ markets, real conversations)
• the tactics that moved the needle: a challenger campaign, relevant creators, merch, and smart use of data
• what Josh would do more of, less of, and avoid completely

If you’re trying to modernise a legacy brand or sharpen differentiation in a crowded category, this one will land.

Link:
 www.makinmighty.com

If you found this useful, please share it with someone building a food or drink brand who’d get value from it.

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And if you’ve got a question you’re wrestling with right now (brand, growth, retail, positioning) email it in. We’re collecting real questions from founders and we’ll use those to shape future episodes.

Thanks for listening. See you next time

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:15

You're listening to Making Mighty the Challenger Sessions. This is the show where we look at challengers, underdogs, and trying to get under the skin of what they do to make themselves successful. Today's episode, we're going to be talking to somebody I used to work with, Josh Daly, who took a heritage brand that was in obscurity out in trade and made it into a modern day challenger. We're going to get into the tactics he used, some of the things he did and didn't do that helped move the needle, and some of the lessons he learned along the way. So let's get into today's episode. It's going to be a good one. So we welcome uh Josh Daly to the pod. Thank you so much for coming, coming on, mate. Thanks for joining us, for sharing your experiences. Um before we before we kick off, would you just give me a kind of one two-minute intro to yourself and uh why why we're chatting today, really? Hi Simon.

SPEAKER_01 1:09

Yeah, thanks for thanks for having me. I've been uh listening to the pod over the last um few weeks and yeah, really enjoying the the content that you're doing. Uh my name's Josh. I've been in FMCG for the last probably sort of 10 years or so now, most of that time in in ABF, um, working in various different businesses from um sports nutrition and to well, more recently mustard, and uh and then that's where I'm at Simon. Uh and then I've moved on. I'm now working in uh pet food sector, um, which is uh yeah, this has been a fun change. But yeah, looking forward to to having a conversation about our uh our times back in uh back in ABF.

SPEAKER_00 1:47

Amazing, mate. Yeah, and I think really keen to get under you've worked for a lot of challenger brands of various different sizes, which you've said on this podcast before, challenger isn't a business size, it's more of a mentality, uh a tactic than it is um a business stage or size. And I think you've worked for quite a few challenger brands uh in your career. So when when you think of the word challenger, particularly in in FMCG and consumer package goods, what does it mean to you?

SPEAKER_01 2:16

Right, yeah, I mean, I think Challenger, when it comes like immediately when it comes to your mind, especially in food and think, we think of those kind of new brands that are doing something very different, um, you know, really sort of high growth um trajectory. But but I actually like I think kind of like like what you said, um challenges it's it's actually more of a mindset. It's about we're not the number one, or but we do want to challenge the kind of status quo. And it might not even having been an aspiration of being number one, you may want to kind of remain a challenger, but it's about uh yeah, like I guess it's about um wanting to be against the kind of the status quo. Uh and yeah, a lot of the brands we've I've I've kind of worked with in the past, that yeah, has big and small, that that has been the case. You can be all the way from one million to um multiple hundred millions and still and still be a challenger. So it's uh but it's it's definitely where the funds are, I think, in terms of um the FMCG.

SPEAKER_00 3:09

Yeah, 100%, 100%. And I think what I really want to get into is some of the work you did with uh with Grey Poupon um and the kind of renaissance that the uh the mustard brand has had over over recent times because it has been out of the wilderness a little bit. So when you think back to that, it's what could 12 months ago that you you you stopped working on Grey Poupon. But what was the what was the problem you were trying to solve and and where did you think the brand was stuck?

SPEAKER_01 3:40

Yeah, so again, yeah, going back, well, going back probably four or five years ago now when I when I kind of joined um joined your team. I think I think that I think two weeks before uh Chris at the time sort of said, Gimmick always, oh yeah, by the way, I've been delisted in Tesco. Um so you know that's that's always a great place to start. I actually think that's genuinely a better place to be in. I don't want to be the person who comes in and goes, oh yeah, we've just won all this stuff, you need to now defend it and go even more. So no, give me the yeah, give me the hard job for sure. Um so we had that was the kind of the context of starting. And I think that kind of really spoke to the problem that Gripon was having um as a brand, in that it had it hadn't really, it's been around for 200 years, but it was doing exactly the same thing and talking about, you know, the brands being spoken about the same way as our biggest competitor, similar product, not not quite as good, you know, maybe not quite as good quality. Um uh, but yeah, very similar product backed by Unilever, huge JBP spend, huge investment. Uh, and you just what you kind of realize is you're never gonna outdo them by doing what they do. So the the kind of challenge was how do we become or how do we do things differently to what um to what my the uh the kind of incumbent brand was doing. And you know, effectively Tesco were like, you know, they you know, we know in kind of SMCG that duplication is like top of the list for buyers, you know, get rid of duplication where possible. And if you looked at those two brands, you're like, well, they're they're doing the same thing, they're talking to the same consumers. I don't need both. Um so you know that's that's ultimately what happens. Uh and so the the challenge became, well, there's some things we definitely don't want to change, we can talk about that, but how how what things can we change to make sure they're very different products to the consumer? And that's that.

SPEAKER_00 5:37

I think that's where I'm at. I think the it's something I see quite often. Uh yes, you need to have confidence, you need to be fully focused, you need to be in your own lane, but that ability to pull yourself apart from competition, which is broadly, as you said, speaking to the same consumer, doing the same job is equally important, particularly when you're talking to a buyer as why shouldn't we be on shelf as well as or instead of? That's something that that I think quite often gets mixed, uh missed, sorry, and people become focused on well, I just need to talk my own game, but sometimes it is about pulling yourself away from competition. Um, and you mentioned there about the brand's 200 years old, and there were some things that you absolutely did want to change and some things you absolutely didn't. So kind of heritage of a 200-year-old brand versus relevance. How did you decide what was sacred and couldn't be touched? And what was the kind of we're gonna change these things because that's not make a difference?

SPEAKER_01 6:34

Yeah, it's I guess it's it's quite difficult, isn't it, when you've got a brand that's been around for so long to sort of come in and sort of say, you know, I want to change everything. Um because ultimately the if the brand's been around that long, there's a probably a good reason why. Uh and that's look, it's kind of what are the things that kind of make it famous. For me, they were kind of two real things that we just could not touch. Uh, first one was the product and the product quality. Like it is synonymous with high-quality premium mustard, and therefore, like changing anything to the recipe like that is was an absolute no-no. Um the second thing is the jar. Like the jar and like the the lid and the kind of French um like sticker on it are really kind of core brand assets. You know, if you you would go to someone on the street now and you sort of ask them, Do you do you know what growth for mustard is? And a lot of people would be like, I don't know what you're talking about. Um show them a picture of the jar and they go, Oh, yeah, I know that one. Yeah, my mama has that, or you know, I've got that in my cupboard. So, yeah, those were that's the kind of acid test of like, okay, we we absolutely can't change those things. Um, so that that in some ways that makes it easier because you're like, right, that's off cards, so let's focus on other stuff. And those kind of other things that we could do were we need the positioning needs to kind of be clear and move away from what my were doing. You know, they should you know it's a kind of traditional um product for kind of you know, from possibly kind of an older audience. Um, we sort of saw that as an opportunity to go actually you've got lots of foodie, younger foodies, more people scratch cooking when they're younger, huge opportunity to attract that audience. Uh, and that therefore means you need a kind of different tone, different comms, um, and and and different kind of off-bat comms as well to make to really kind of talk to that um consumer. So that was where we sort of decided we would we'd go all in on.

SPEAKER_00 8:31

Nice. Um and did you do anything to test any of those? So you said about going out into the street and and and asking people, did you do anything specific to test which attributes were were negotiable and which were non non-negotiable? Is any kind of data points you you took from that?

SPEAKER_01 8:47

Hard to say, like, did I go out and do a survey? Yeah, it was definitely a lot more um getting a kind of feel for things. I think one of the first things we did uh when I joined the role is just signed up to a couple of farmers markets, like in the Cotswolds or a couple of like food festivals, yeah. Really kind of small events, but you know, great, very cheap, quick opportunity to go and speak to people that buy your product. So I just rock up jars of mustard, here's a stand, and you know, you people come along and you have a conversation with people and you start to understand, you know, why do you pick that up? Why do you get this one versus the own label? Um, and and some of those things really start to come out. So it doesn't need to be really complicated. Um, you know, I think I think I think one of the farmers markets I sold about five jars. Um, it was a rainy day on uh in some tiny little village, but actually some of I actually got some of the best insights just from conversations with people in that that time. So uh it's yeah, those are kind of great opportunities to do that.

SPEAKER_00 9:45

And I think thinking about some of the some of the tactics then. Um, because obviously you you made some of the changes, you took some of the difficult decisions, and performance started to improve. Um, so what were the maybe you know, give us give us give us three tactics that made the biggest difference the fastest? What were the needle movers when you when you started to implement them?

SPEAKER_01 10:07

Yeah, and I and I think with all of these tactics like this, you know, we started to see uh performance improve and we started getting distribution wins, but yeah, this wasn't like an overnight thing, you know. As always with these things, it it takes time. Um, you've got to wait for those range review vindic windows and you know all that kind of forward planning. It does take time. Um but the I think one of the the first things we did was this kind of mustard revolution, we call it campaign, which was around how do we kind of take the inspiration of the French Revolution and apply that to what we're trying to do with the brands where you know we're against the establishment or the established mustard. Uh and actually at the time, you know, we were sort of brainstorming this and we saw uh some students at I think it's the Nash University of Art had submitted a comp like for a competition. They'd come up with this very similar concept and loads of visuals, and we were actually like this is this is great. Um so we yeah, we reached out to them and sort of said actually we'd love to use some of this work and actually hire you to kind of develop it a little bit further. Uh and they were obviously delighted to to make some beer money and um to to help us out in that way. So and actually get to work on a real brand out there. So that was a really, really useful. Um, I mean, I guess maybe it's luck, maybe it's uh you you make your own luck a little bit, but it was uh yeah, that was that was a really useful um start. So we we kind of rather than going out to an agency and getting loads of kind of creative done and you go through that whole process process, we had a kind of pretty much you know, 80% there um artwork that ready to go, and we just started using some of that with our kind of social media comms, off-pack comms. Um, so that that was kind of one that was a really kind of quick way um to start talking about the brand in a different way and showing up in a different way. The next thing was I think finding like finding the right partners, so and and content creators, like it would be very easy to sometimes you just go for like the the big reach creators, right? Because oh, that's gonna get me so much audience. But actually finding creators that are more relevant to your brand and more relevant to your audience will actually probably have a higher IOI because those people are more engaged and they're probably more likely to use your product. So finding people like we work with George Egg, um, who's a kind of great example, kind of comedian, food comedian, great fit for the brand in that attempts at like playful character, and did really well for us. And it was just kind of holding on to those. Um, and then one of the ones I was gonna say for I'll I was gonna say but is um we did merch, so we made some t-shirts, uh, which was a bit of a gamble. I think you were a bit skeptical at the time. Um, I was a bit like, oh I don't know, this is gonna work. Found a great designer on Everpress. He kind of recreated this uh t-shirt design for us, uh, and and they did really well. Like they're you know, you know, we were selling them on the website. Uh, we had people approaching us, we had like a like food places going, Oh, can we do a partnership with you? We'd love to get hold of the t-shirts. Um and it just became a way for the brand to kind of get out into the world other than on the shelf, um, which is you know, not many brands can kind of do that effectively. I mean, I think I've I was even at Glastonbury this year and I saw like two or three people wearing that t-shirt that I'd never met before, which was quite quite a nice moment. But um, yeah, those are kind of maybe like that last last one, the merch was a bit gimmicky, but you know, I think it it it worked really well. So you you've just got to kind of take it.

SPEAKER_00 13:38

Uh-oh.

SPEAKER_01 13:38

Um I think and if there's probably if I have one more, yeah. I'll have one one more. It's um we did actually use North Star data, and I was a little again, I was a bit apprehensive about using data because you know, you think, oh, is that that what the big boys do? You know, they just spend loads of money on data, and actually North Star, I mean it's gonna be a bit of a plug for them, but um kind of make it really accessible for kind of challenge brands. So it's it's really specific for what you need. It's not all the other stuff, and you're not paying for all the other stuff, you're just paying for kind of for what you need. And actually, when you do come to those buyer conversations, having data that backs up what you're saying is well, it you know, it's it's so it really helps your argument, it's really convincing, and it I think it demonstrates as a brand, as a business, that you're you know, you're gonna support this product or this brand um when it gets on shelf as well.

SPEAKER_00 14:28

And I think the so that'll be mine. The the the data point in particular we we disagreed on, but actually some of the some of the data points you've used, so going out to the farmer's market in the rain and getting real consumer feedback, using data points from North Star in a very pointed, as cost-effective as possible way to win. I mean, that was a change resistant, wasn't it? So they were yeah, they were potentially big business tactics, but used in a challenger way, which we can't get away from the fact that if they're a big business tactic, they're probably well thought through, well-founded, but it's how do you concentrate that down into what are the things I need, how can I do that as cheap as possible to make it as effective as possible. Um, so I think it's an important point to say it's easy to reject data and say, Well, I'm a small brand, so therefore I don't use it. If it's done in the right way, the ROI is definitely there. Uh, and and and North Star is a really good example of that. Um and thinking about kind of outsized effects, quite often some of the small things that you maybe don't think are gonna be the the the game changer at the time can have a big impact. Is there is the looking back one small change that you made that had a really outsized impact?

SPEAKER_01 15:46

I guess it's it's as always these things, it's hard to kind of put it on one. I think one internal kind of tool that we use to help with decision making that ultimately led to us kind of making a lot of these decisions was um kind of asking the question of anything we did around like is this um anti-Mai, as we would say. So like anti the competitor. Um because that really helps you sort of cement, you know, if this is an activity we're gonna do and it's not and it's but it's the same as what they would do, well then why are we doing it? Um so it just helped held us kind of yeah, have a kind of direction in terms of what things we should be doing. Um but yeah, I I think that and then it it's you know there really is the other one, is just it is just resilience, and it is just going on and on. I mean the I think the amount unanswered emails I sent to Sainsbury's buyer, unanswered calls, you know, it must be in the hundreds because I was just usually and it is just resilience, and there's one day just that you know sometimes the buyer changes and you'll feel you know the and then they go actually here's this person. So you know, those kind of things, um yeah, you can't you can't be over like overstated that you just you just gotta keep trying. Um and you know, things do these do kind of work out eventually. Um just maybe not in the timeline you initially hoped.

SPEAKER_00 17:08

Yeah, yeah, yeah, definitely. Um and I think so. This is this is quite a unique instance we're talking about where you've taken what is a heritage brand, um, and is is known all all around the world and is what was 1777 was is the date on the label. Um so to take that old heritage, um a lot of the brand assets that come with that that aren't in today's world, what what did you do to make the heritage brand behave like a challenger in today's market? What what were the what were the kind of um intentional tactics around that?

SPEAKER_01 17:50

Yeah, I think looking, yeah, you look back at the brand's got a lot of kind of fun, playful elements to it. Go, you know, go on YouTube, great people on adverts, there's some great entertainment, sort of seeing some of that elements. So, yeah, when we're talking about heritage brand, it's about finding those, again, finding those bits that made you famous and doubling down on those. So it was doubling down on kind of the playful and the kind of creative way of doing things, having a bit of fun with the brand. Um, and so and then kind of repositioning it. So it's a heritage brand that's always had this consumer, but that doesn't mean that you can't open it up to more younger consumers. So really kind of focusing on who that audience is, reintroducing those kind of older brands to a kind of younger audience is really effective. And when we see it all the time now, right, with vintage clothing. Uh, yeah, those are some of them you not even real brand, you know, people wear kind of vintage clothing with Campbell, you know, Campbell soup or whatever on the back. Like there is something about those kind of heritage brands really resonates with people and and and even more so with the kind of younger audience. Um so yeah, that that was was kind of really clear. Right. Um yeah, some work for us.

SPEAKER_00 19:01

And if um I quite like to learn from things that didn't didn't go so well, uh, and I think that they're always really there's there's some good lessons in there. So if you could do it all over again, um what would you do more of, less of, and completely fucking avoid?

SPEAKER_01 19:17

Um I kind of wish you'd done a data earlier, or but I don't think I don't think like North Star existed before, like much before we were kind of we we tried out, we were kind of early days with it. So yeah, it would be great if that was kind of earlier, because I think that would have really helped because we we were in a good position and would have helped with those conversations. Um I think I would have stepped on that kind of the mustard revolution position. I would have loved to have kind of taken that to the next level of you know, what does that look like in the real world? How does that turn up in events? What are the kind of what other kind of touch points could we have had a play with um with with that? And then I think the things that didn't work, I mean, with there were quite a few. Um I think the one I definitely wouldn't do would be the NFT. Uh that was that was probably quite high up there. I mean, it was it was at the time, right? It was of a time, so it felt like the the the things try, and you know, it was definitely, you know, we we got some great samples of um the product and we we made some great packs and and something else around the world, but maybe not something we would have rushed into again in hindsight. Um I think I think also you know there were times when we probably uh yeah, we we we worked with the wrong partners um on to do kind of content and things like that because it it was it felt like the right thing to do, but actually the the the content wasn't uh what we wanted we needed it to be in terms of that kind of mess mustard revolution. Yeah, we worked with loads of great partners, by the way. We did some fantastic stuff with um uh Rubens Rubens in London, like pop-up um events. Um I mean, we did like the Waitress Winter Festival as well. That was a really, really good event. So like we we did some really good things on the partner side, but yeah, some of them they just they just didn't work, but sometimes that's just hindsight.

SPEAKER_00 21:04

Yeah, and and obviously overall, you took a brand that was what sub 250k to be well on its way to being a three million pounds brand. So overall it works, but there were some things you would have done less of, but in hindsight's a lovely thing.

SPEAKER_01 21:20

Um yeah, yeah, you only you only got you gotta kind of go and do it first.

SPEAKER_00 21:25

Yeah, of course. And on that kind of it was a pretty hockey stick journey uh in terms of the the rate of sale increase and the distribution increases. What what were the kind of key metrics you kept a close eye on to know is is what I'm doing working or not?

SPEAKER_01 21:42

I yeah, I think when you're in that kind of high growth world, the kind of those kind of simple metrics around distribution, rate of sale units per week are the kind of lifeblood of your business because without those well, hey, that's what the buyer's looking at, right? Um certain terms of right sale, that is that just drives everything. Like how many people are picking up your product every week in how many stores? And that gives you a pretty good indicator. I mean, obviously you can have GSV, but in a world of you know, lots of inflation, in a world of a mustard crisis that we that we also went through, um where you know you you have got so much inflationary pressure as well, um, it's yeah, I guess you've got to really kind of it's easy to sort of say, oh well GSV's up. Um, but actually it's no, it's comes back down to this kind of distribution points and rhetoric that are really important.

SPEAKER_00 22:33

That makes sense, mate. Um and I think my so my last question that I ask uh all my guests is what's the one thing you want challenges to take and learn from from your experience, whether it be just on great people or the challenges throughout your career, what's the one thing you want people to hear?

SPEAKER_01 22:50

I think me it I probably is overstated, but it's it's the resilience piece. It's you just have to keep banging on the door um more times than you think. Like bang up if you think that's a lot, do it by ten, and then and then that's probably enough. Um because ultimately you know there's so many other brands all fighting for kind of buyer's attention, um, as you know, from being a buyer. So you really just have to do things differently. So whether it's turning up differently, talking differently, in in emails, doing something different than that's gonna help you stand up. And I think that's that was one of the things that I took away from it.

SPEAKER_00 23:33

Yeah, I think it's it's very fair. We kind of look on at these overnight successes, and it's you know, this one's a 200-year-old overnight success, isn't it? Which um there's an awful lot that's gone in between the the founding date in 1777 and and and you getting the brand to its peak where it is now. Um that's brilliant. Thank you, thank you so much for coming on. It's really good to see you again. It's really good to see your your new Tash as well. Very much enjoying that. Um, and I'm sure I'm sure people listening will get will get a lot out of this. So thank you so much for your time and for sharing. Yeah, that's been a pleasure. Thanks, Simon. That was an episode of Making Mighty the Challenger Sessions. That was Josh Daly, um, who used to run Grey Poop on used to work with me uh to smash the condiment industry and change uh French mustard on UK retail shelves. Loads of lessons came out of that. I think there's loads of learnings that um are really applicable. People can take into their own businesses. I hope you enjoyed that. If you did, give us a like and subscribe and a follow. All the stuff you can do with podcasts there. You can find it on Spotify, on YouTube, on anywhere you get your podcasts, you can find Make Your Money to the Challengers sessions. If you give me a like and a follow on Instagram and TikTok, I do daily videos on there with hopefully practical tips for challengers and founders, uh, particularly the food and drink space, but challenges in any space. Um and then you can sign up for a mailing list where each week you'll get in your inbox some practical tips of do these three things today, make it tomorrow better. Um, so yeah, follow me on all platforms. And if you want to drop me an email if you've got any questions, a topic you want me to cover in future episodes, or a brand you think we should try and get the founders on, uh, drop me an email to making mighty, and it'll be me that replies. We will see you next time.