Episode 64: Marketing a $100M Brand with Julia Perez, CMO of OWYN

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Transcript

Announcer:

Welcome to Nerd Marketing, an original podcast for e-commerce operators and marketers. Looking to level up? Drew Sanocki and Michael Epstein will bring you actionable strategies from their decades of running eight- and nine-figure brands along with interviews and insights from the leaders of some of the most successful brands in the world.

Drew Sanocki:

Hey everybody. Today on the Nerd Marketing podcast, we talked to Julia Perez, who's the CMO of OWYN. OWYN is a protein drink started in 2018 and is now approaching nine figures. They sell through their own website as well as traditional brick and mortar great CPG story. And Julia tells you about the key growth factors that went into how they've grown so quickly as well as her own career from digital marketer all the way up to CMO. So hope you enjoy this podcast. Thanks. What is OWYN? Julia?

Julia Perez:

OWYN stands for only what you need, and we are a premium plant-based nutrition brand, and we're also an allergen friendly brand, and we're most well-known for our ready to drink protein shakes. Currently the number one bestselling plant-based protein shake in the us.

Drew Sanocki:

And you are the CMO, is that correct?

Julia Perez:

That's correct. Two years in.

Drew Sanocki:

Congratulations. We love OWYN. We see you everywhere. And I guess we'd love to just hear the story of the brand and how you guys have grown and achieved such success.

Julia Perez:

Yeah, sure. So the brand was created in 2017, I believe our first sale was in 2018. I was not there at the time I came on in 2021, but the story behind OWYN is one of our founding members actually has a son with a very severe food allergy. And we wanted to create a brand and bring a brand to market that was allergen friendly and third party tested for the most common allergens. We're now top nine allergen friendly, but also a nutrition brand that was delicious and healthy and medically sound, but at the same time could be considered a badge brand. So a brand that you want to be seen carrying something that felt cool and inclusive. And I think that when you think about health and especially allergen friendly nutrition brands or any brand that's really medically respected, most of them, especially years ago, they tend to be alienating or look medicinal.

And really it was important for us that we created a brand that felt cool, but at the same time was medically respected. So something you could feel proud bringing into an Equinox or a soul cycle, but had ingredients that were respected by the medical community. So I think we're really the first to bridge the gap, especially in our category. When you look at some of the behemoth brands, they're either accomplishing this medical vibe or it's this consumer facing image. And I think we've done a great job at bringing the both together. That's what we'll continue to do.

Drew Sanocki:

That's interesting on the brand because I see it in SoulCycle, I see it in Equinox, and I just assumed it was like, oh, that's the cool brand of what people drink, and I had no idea that it had the sort of medical rigor behind it.

Julia Perez:

Yeah, and I think sometimes people who come into the brand, I mean we have several different consumers, but there's some consumers that come in and say, this is the only brand that I can drink and that doesn't bother my stomach, or that works for my condition or my dietary habits. And then there's another side, which is actually how I came into the brand to what you're describing, drew, where I came into the brand, seeing it everywhere, seeing all the influencers in the fitness community in New York City holding the brand. And that's how I came onto it. I was the same way when I first discovered it. I didn't know that it had the medical rigor behind it and the science. But yeah, it's a special story. What

Michael Epstein:

Was your role when you first started the company? Because it wasn't CMO, what did you come in doing? And then how did you evolve into CMO and what is the difference in your responsibilities once you kind of take the CMO title? So

Julia Perez:

I came onto OWYN as senior director of digital marketing, and it was mostly a content role when you think about editorial content. So how do we show up in emails and SMS and then how do we show up at social and influencers and kind of guiding all of the different pieces of what digital marketing looks like? And very quickly I recognized that we did not have a CMO in the CMO seat. Our current CEO actually used to be the CMO, so he grew into that role. And so I recognized there was no one in that seat. And as much as I love digital, I've been doing it for a while and I don't necessarily think that that's my passion. I felt that my passion was just marketing overall and I really wanted to understand how a brand works from combining sales, combining events, combining digital performance, marketing, social.

So I expressed what my goals were and I just took on opportunities. I really created opportunities because no one's just going to give you opportunities, especially at a startup, everyone's so busy. It wasn't like, Hey, I want you to practice this. It was just like, I want to do this. I want to be in this room, I want to try this thing. I live here in Miami now, and I noticed that there were a lot of opportunities to bring events into what I was doing, which is what I kind of helped with that core water when I was director of digital there. So I was just getting involved in really anything that I possibly could. Little by little day by day, I started adding new additions to my day-to-Day work, and I grew into becoming the CMO today.

Drew Sanocki:

So just for context, you started in digital and OWYN started as direct to consumer first and then OWYN now is in brick and mortar retail also.

Julia Perez:

And since I wasn't here at the start, I don't want to misquote anything, but yes, we did start off in e-commerce, but then very quickly decided to have a focus in New York. And I think that's really smart when you think about retail to have a very specific focus and to not just try to do everything all at once. We started the brand at retail with Big Geyser. I mean, again, that's how I found out about the brand just being in New York, the up and down the street, the bodegas, the mom and pops, the independent stores, that's really where OWYN had a big presence to start from there, went to natural and then grew from there.

Drew Sanocki:

Your own career progression sort of mirrored that growth. You start with digital, which is very much needed obviously for a direct to consumer brand. But as the brand went more sort of traditional, you elevated into that CMO. And how is the job different if you had remained in digital versus what you do today?

Julia Perez:

I love that question because everything has to work together. And just to be clear, I think it might be implied, but since I've been with OWYN, we've had pretty much a national retail presence. We grew a lot in 2022, but that progression of OWYN going to natural and then to all the other change that were available in today that really happened prior to me coming on. And as I grew with the company, the distribution has grown tremendously in the last two years. But to answer your question on how it's different and how do you move from digital to overall marketing? I mean now I make decisions on what is best for the brand and the company overall as an omnichannel approach. And I think in my past I would look at brands. I think it's funny because from my experience having worked on other omnichannel brands, it's almost like retail marketing is kind of not fighting, but they're battling for budgets.

And it's different with OWYN because now I see everything from all sides. So for example, sometimes even when a marketing play may not be the most efficient from ROAS standpoint, there might be a bigger picture as to why we might be embarking on a certain performance strategy or marketing strategy because it suits the larger goal, which maybe is something on the retail side that the performance side isn't privy to. So it's really my job to bridge the gap and understand and to explain to the team why certain approaches are implemented, even if they might not look the most efficient or the best for that specific vertical. So it's just looking at everything with a bird's eye view and making decisions with a mix of gut, with a mix of analytical know-how, and then doing what's best for the brand overall and not just thinking about it in silos.

Michael Epstein:

What are some of the other success metrics you would think about when it's not ros

Julia Perez:

New to brand is huge for a high growth startup? Well, number one, we have a great retention rate and we know our retention rate across Amazon, across D two C. We have the analytics at the retail side as well. So for us, if you're not driving new to brand as a high growth beverage brand, I mean really what's the point? So that is huge for us. Awareness I would say is a second one, but for us, we're not a water brand, we're not a soda brand. So it has to be about the right kind of awareness, looking at impressions and understanding how can we maximize them, but at the same time having a specific lens because not everyone has been introduced to protein shakes. Not everyone is a protein shake consumer, and it's very hard to just spend all your marketing dollars educating impressions, but with a gate around it, if that makes sense.

Drew Sanocki:

I love it. You run into the performance marketers who are there optimizing their Facebook funnel, but there's something bigger about building a brand and there's a lot of data that says that it's like multiple touch points with the customer. If you measure any of them individually, they may not have a positive ROAS, but in aggregate over the long term, you're building a brand that ultimately translates into lower cost of acquisition because people know about you. So yeah, there's data there, but if you just zero in myopically on one specific campaign, you don't see it. 

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Julia Perez:

That’s totally accurate. And then I would add to that, showing up at retail and having a retail presence is arguably, I say arguably because we can't a hundred percent test everything the way we would on meta, but showing up at retail and having a retail presence is some of the best marketing that you can do to bring new customers into your brand. And also customers who, they might be on the fence they might not have purchased, but they might be aware to get customers back into the fold. I mean, as our retail presence has grown, our e-commerce business has shot up our Amazon, our D two C. So we know that retail is, it's obviously a sales channel, but it's also I think of it as marketing. So just having the right type of merchandising and having the right presence in the field is extremely important. And it's not something that you can measure as easily as like an Amazon campaign or meta campaign such and such.

Michael Epstein:

Yeah, that really resonates. There's a book How Brands Grow by Byron Sharpening talks about brand salience, and it's that mental availability you're creating and the awareness you're creating by being present in a lot of places where your customers spend time or where they would be exposed to. And you've grown quickly to nearly a nine figure brand in large part. It sounds like because of that sort of concept of being where the customer is not always measuring it in terms of are we getting a positive ROI on that exact placement and that exact campaign, but thinking more holistically around being present, generating that awareness, getting people to test out the product and become loyal customers.

Julia Perez:

By the way, that book is on my summer reading list, so you've just pushed it up the queue. So thank you for that.

Drew Sanocki:

It's hard to sum up five years of growth, but what would be your top growth tips?

Julia Perez:

So my top growth tips, I think they're very tough to replicate, but I'm going to share what those top growth tips could look like for a CPG business. So number one is the team, and I always say this as my first answer for whenever someone asks, success or choosing a place to work or whatever, because you have to have a team that is completely aligned and so passionate about what you are building. And when I say team, I think about partners as well. So choosing the right distributors or the right retail partners to launch things with. It's all relationships, which is my favorite part about marketing in general is just the communication you do with people every day. Number two, really tough to replicate, but is have a fantastic product right now with marketing. It's harder than ever and more expensive than ever to acquire customers.

It's very tough to be profitable on the first buy. So you need to have a product that you stand by and that is truly fantastic and is bringing something that might not be there already. So when I think about OWYN and other plant-based proteins, they just don't taste that great. I think there's this reputation about plant-based protein that it's gritty or it's not delicious. And when I was first drinking OWYN, I actually had no idea it was plant-based at all. I just purchased it because I thought it looked cool and I saw it, influencers drinking it and tasted really good. And then I looked at the label further and realized it was plant-based. So number two, have a fantastic product. And number three would be to stay laser focused. I mentioned this before, but when we started just focusing on New York and then going into natural and not trying to do everything all at once, I think that's harder than ever right now as well because we have Twitter, we have LinkedIn, we have Instagram, and there's these founder communities, these D two C communities, and you're seeing what everyone else is doing and you don't know the backstory behind their brand or why they're doing certain activities.

You really just need to stay focused on what your goal is and stick to something and let it materialize before you try to do everything all at once. So I'd say that OWYN had a really strong foundation because of the team, because of the product, and then because of the focus and then something that I know those are not really completely actionable pieces of growth advice because like I said, they're hard to replicate. Going back to retail as marketing and the driving costs of acquiring a customer online, I would say think about retail distribution points as marketing levers and really how can you maximize that? So whether it's engaging in the community, the IRL community where you are distributed, so events and field marketing, but really when you go into retail, think of what else can you do in the IRL environment and cultivating a community around your distribution points that really makes sense. So I think that one's more tactical

Michael Epstein:

As CMO. How has your team evolved as you've grown in your role too, and what does that team look like? I know a ton of brands are always asking, how do you structure your team? And so now as a near nine figure brand, what does that look like?

Julia Perez:

This is the hardest part of what I do every single day. It's not the marketing, it's the people. Because you're dealing with so many different things. When you think about people, when you think about a team, you have to make sure that you not only have the right roles in place, but you have the right people in the right roles, which is incredibly challenging as your business is growing at such a fast pace because you might hire someone for one role and then the role quickly over time evolves to a larger role or something that's flexed outside of that original scope. And it can be tough because there are some team members that will grow with the role and with the company, and there are some that might not. I think it's important to know the difference between a good startup employee and then just a good employee because they're quite different.

The way that I look at it is to make sure that you're not making any quick moves. So right now we're thinking about field marketing, for example, but we really need to test more and we really need to experiment more before we just figure out what type of hire we need, what type of experience they need, because we're still figuring out what that role looks like. So I would say to hire very slow and to think really methodically before you plop a new role into your org chart, really just make sure that everyone understands what the vision is and something that we have recently done is really redefine what our company values are, which I think has been so, so important. For example, one of our corporate values is trailblazing. That means that we expect every team member to have a value of trailblazing and to really exude that every day.

So innovation, constantly challenging the status quo, constantly pushing and looking for what's next. That's a big corporate value of ours, so anyone that we hire needs to share that value or else it's not going to work from a foundational standpoint. And then I guess the more actionable part of the question, we have someone on performance marketing. I have someone who is really my right hand and the director of brand marketing. So making sure all of the content works together and reflects that of our brand. And then we have someone on social media. We will be hiring someone dedicated to influencers soon. And I think that's surprising to people that we haven't had someone dedicated to influencers before because from the outside we might look like a big brand, but we keep it really, really lean. And again, that goes back to thinking methodically before you bring on a role that's dedicated to one thing, because this is a big decision. You're affecting someone else's life, you're affecting the company's trajectory. So we've actually never had someone on influencer looking to bring that on soon. And then, yeah, like I mentioned, maybe growing field, but we're very lean. Everyone has to wear a lot of hats and has to want to wear a lot of hats.

Michael Epstein:

How do you recruit for a trailblazing characteristic? What do you look for in somebody?

Julia Perez:

So when I hire for a trailblazing person, a trailblazing hire, I look to see what they're doing outside of what is being asked of them. So I love talking to candidates that say, I have a side hustle. I do this type of thing in my spare time, or I created a jewelry brand, or I've actually asked my company to work on such and such a project, and they're displaying that they want to manage multiple things that they are not going to be happy just doing one thing. They're constantly seeking more. They're curious. I think curiosity is huge as long as you're curious and as long as you want to learn. I think you can teach people to do certain skills or read certain pieces of data, but you cannot teach someone who's curious, who's growth minded. I also try to make sure that it's not just work related because I think being a trailblazer isn't just what do you do in your day job, but it's what else are you doing? Like I said, side hustles or passion projects, things of that nature.

Drew Sanocki:

Julia, you've got a lot of experience. If you were starting something today in CPG or otherwise, what would you

Julia Perez:

Start? If I was to start something in the CPG world today, I would probably start something in fitness or in wellness. I don't think that's a shock to most people who know me. I think women more than ever, we are just finally getting into this fitness scene in a different way. We're showing up in gyms and now it's no longer like a guy's playground, but we know how to lift, we know how to eat. We're interested in learning more, and I think that's really special. So maybe something in supplements, but then also when I think about my personal interests, I have a really true and potentially untapped passion for home goods and making a beautiful home. I love architecture, I love art, I love sense, and something I've thought about is a home sense brand of some sort, maybe one day. It's definitely not in the works now, but that's my personal interest, and I just never think we can have enough of that because it brings joy to the home, and I love being home, and I love to have a beautiful home.

Drew Sanocki:

That's awesome. Thanks, Julia. This was great. Thank you. 

Julia Perez:

Thank you so much.

Michael Epstein:

Thank you, Julia.

Announcer:

Thanks for listening to Nerd Marketing. Don't forget to check out all of the other great episodes, some of which include interviews with e-commerce marketing masters, working with Mr. Beast and Joe Rogan, plus Drew and Michael's experiences in private equity, advice from VC firms on what they look for in investments and so much more like share, subscribe, and tune in every week for a new episode.