SMALL BITES N°2 Perseverance

March news, updates, and insights on building LEXINGTON BAKES

Author

Lex Evan®
March 01, 2023

Small Bites with Lex Evan

If you didn't know, I was sick for 20 days in January. As you can imagine, that caused a lot of set back, but I still managed to get through a lot of my January priorities.

February was lovely, but it's a short month and I was short on time. So I skipped the update and went right to work on March madness! No I don't care about hoops, but I do love puns.

The last 60 days have been about moving forward. Persevering with intention and focus despite failing to meet my goal of $100K revenue in year one. I was close though! LXB brought in nearly $70K, all while holding down my day job.

Perseverance is about analyzing, adjusting, and continuing. That's what I did. I figured out why we didn't meet our goal. Happy to report it's not because of a drop in performance. We're still selling out weekly in Foxtrot since we launched in June 2022. 🤯 The challenge I'm facing now is ensuring the shelves have plenty of LEXINGTON BAKES to keep selling.

Most of my time has been spent behind the scenes planning, manufacturing, reformulating, securing new ingredient partnerships, and developing our content strategy.

The incredible success we found in year one gave me the courage to invest more personal funds into growing LXB, which in turn helped us secure a sizable small business loan to lead our growth in early 2023. Yay for postponing dilution.

There are a lot of big announcements to share in March; here's what to expect.

🔥 Spicy Appetizers 🔥

  • Fleur de Sel Brownie and Choc Chip N°5 reformulated to 99% organic! 🥳

  • LXB invited back to Pop Up Grocer in NYC flagship location

  • Monica Watrous & Amrit Richmond discuss LXB as brand to watch in 2023 Trends

  • LXB now on gifting platform Zest & distributed commerce platform Klickly 💛

  • EvolveCPG's Gage Mitchell interviews Lex about Over Delivering on Experience

  • Startup to Scale's Jordan Buckner interviews Lex about Building in Public

  • LXB now in Austin, TX at Royal Blue Grocery and Foxtrot's Burnet Road location.

  • Raspberry Velvet Brownies sold 60% of inventory in first week. 3 boxes left for 2023!

  • LXB is now a Certified LGBTQ+ Business via National LGBT Chamber of Commerce

  • We launched our LXB x Melrose Place Pop Up, visit us every Sunday 10am - 2pm!

  • LEXINGTON BAKES is going nowhere, fast. **hint hint** 🚀

Analysis 👨‍🔬

Updates from Last Time

  • Surpassed goal of 98% organic ingredients - and without a price increase! 🤯

  • CoMan plan is ready to go. Waiting on packaging to get printed

  • Pushed off pre-seed round. Raised non-dilutive cap! 🥳 

  • Packaging updated to include NFPs, free-of claims, and more

  • Content studio build and prop library complete

  • Art Direction, PR & Content Plan pushed out

  • 2023 Roadmap Finalized! 🚀 Still working on goals

March Tasting 👨🏻‍🍳

🍫 Top Priorities

  • Get packaging into production

  • LXB x Calabasas weekly Pop Up starts 3/15

  • Awareness campaign for Pop Up Grocer NYC

  • Seeking new bookkeeping partners

  • Get LXB on Bubble - know someone there?

  • Finalize brand messaging and communication points

  • Women's History Month content series on LinkedIn

🍪 In the Oven

  • Organic, Fair Trade, Non-GMO Project Certifications 🕺$$$

  • Kicking off B-Corp Certification process 💛

  • Partnering with alt-protein company for vegan brownie SKUs

  • First brand campaign in development 😎

🍭 Sprinkles (dropping soon)

  • TikTok programming still in the works

  • LXB Minis for events & premium sampling

  • LA Food Publication Interview

  • New retailer announcement 👀👀👀

🧊 On Ice

  • Black Forrest Flavor

  • Corp Gifting Catalog

  • Premium Note Cards for Order Add-ons

  • Direct Mail campaign - Find stats of effectiveness

  • Find co-man for our GF SKUs

À La Carte 🛒

🍿 Savory Insights, Research & Reports

  • Awareness of food's impact on sustainability is gaining focus, but not solutions.

  • Speaking of sustainable food, cocoa-free chocolate startup WNWN raises series A.

  • From Mondelez snacking report: "61% portion out snacks", "78% believe 'It's more important than ever to have moments of indulgence in the day'", "64% would pay more for snacks that are better for the environment." (via Nate Rosen)

  • CNN highlighted a study published in the journal Nature Medicine claiming a clotting risk from erythritol consumption and a direct link to heart attack and stroke. More studies are needed to confirm, but I'd still advise people to be mindful of their daily consumption of alt-sweeteners.

  • Industry giants push back as FDA inches forward toward healthier regulations. I for one think 'healthy' is too subjective an attribute and highly dependent on an individual, therefore should not be allowed on any packaging.

  • Oatly brilliantly executed a monumental marketing strategy that will go in the history books. Soft-launching its cream cheese (which happens to be plant-based, but not the prominent rtb) in the town famous for cream cheese, but where the famous cream cheese brand that took it's name has always been absent. Checkmate Oatly.

  • Further proof that leading a US-based food brand with Euro ingredient standards is a smart and healthier strategy than relying on FDA standards.

  • Not savory, but rather dark insights revealed on the food industry including exploitative migrant youth labor as documented by the New York Times, and high risk of death and serious injury in product movement according to a Penn State study.

🍭 Sweet Content Shares

😋 Tasty New Treats Worth Trying

Simmering Thoughts ☕️

  • What makes a brand great today can make it terrible tomorrow.

  • You don't have to tear anyone down to win. Let the good speak for itself.

  • Brands don't succeed, they endure.

  • Far too few people and brands control our food system.

Thanks for reading! I'm happy to have you along my journey to building LEXINGTON BAKES into the next great American bakery brand. 🍪

Feel free to strike a chat about anything you've read here — that's kind of the point. 💛

Until next time,Lex