Within two months of its formation, Toodaloo LLC began selling its trail mix in the Erewhon Market and Central Market grocery chains. It later moved into Mom’s Organic Market and others.
Needless to say, the Austin-based consumer packaged goods company has gotten off to a fast start. But it's about to triple its retail presence by landing on the shelves of every location nationwide of Sprouts Farmers Market Inc.
All those hours founder Cattie Khoury spent binging episodes of "Shark Tank" and "How I Built This" are paying off. A person can hear the same thing over and over again, but finally one day it ignites a thought and action. The key phrase that finally made sense to Khoury is that entrepreneurs should find an uncapped category that needs to be reinvented or remixed.
She did just that by taking a snack she depended on during the pandemic and remaking it into a "superfood" with adaptogen herbs, which are plants and mushrooms such as ashwagandha and Asian ginseng, thought to help the body’s response to stress, anxiety and fatigue. Toodaloo became available to consumers online in July 2021 and took off, growing 25% month-over-month through its direct-to-consumer and retail sales.
Now Khoury is focusing on retail growth after a 2021 Apple iOS update made online advertising more difficult, a trend echoed by other entrepreneurs who sell online. She expects retail sales to eclipse e-commerce sales by next year — but the company won’t stop hacking at its online presence, either.
Online sales helped Toodaloo establish a foothold. Erewhon, a California-based upscale supermarket chain, contacted Khoury within the first few weeks of the product release to sample the trail mix. Then a friend of Khoury’s offered to present Toodaloo to a buyer for H-E-B-owned Central Market. The product hit shelves in those retailers in September.
Toodaloo recently made its way into Mom's Organic Market, plus a variety of smaller stores. Khoury said that, by the end of July, Toodaloo should be in all 300-plus locations of Sprouts (Nasdaq: SFM), a milestone that roughly coincides with the company's first birthday.
Getting in Sprouts means going from approximately 190 stores to more than 500.
Khoury’s isn’t worried about the amount of orders her co-packer can fulfill, but there could be difficulties as supply chains remain strained. Her plan is to order more material in advance and closer to home to properly secure ingredients. And as demand grows, Toodaloo’s relationship with suppliers and farmers needs to grow stronger. Khoury looks forward to finding more stability in the company over the next year as she finds her footing in the industry.
Toodaloo produces a large batch every three months to fulfill its orders, but as the company is so young and undergoing monumental changes, Khoury said she is adapting to the incoming opportunities. If she can land another retail whale, such as Whole Foods Market, it will give Khoury better insight on how the company will look next year.
Toodaloo is zeroing in on retail because it allows more interaction with customers, whether through the placement of the colorfully packaged product or trying samples.
"As soon as we can be in front of a customer and have them try the product, it's a done deal,” Khoury said.
TikTok and social media influencers are a focus point for online advertisement, allowing companies to connect with legions of passionate followers. Khoury is still trying to crack that code. So far, Toodaloo is getting involved with influencers on TikTok, finding it less expensive and more effective.
"It's just this kind of fertile place, whereas it's very crowded in the other channels," Khoury said. "So we're trying to hack TikTok. It took a lot to understand what was happening on TikTok."
Toodaloo recently hired a director of sales to secure meetings and give samples to retail stores. The company has a total of four employees and contractors and Khoury expects to grow her team by a few more hires next year.
