Health-Conscious Coffee Lover Steeps Into Crowded Market

This transcript was generated from the episode audio and may contain minor errors.

[Music]

All right, thanks for tuning in today. My name's Chris Guillebeau, this is Side Hustle School. I have our weekly case study for you here. This case study features, or promises, let's say, a new way to flavor your coffee. The Side Hustler in question doesn't sell coffee itself, but rather a line of steepable coffee flavoring bags.

A little bit of an invention here. Taking a cue from her cardamom, this sales professional by day creates steepable coffee flavoring bags at night, and the bags, in fact, contain organic spices instead of artificial syrups. Interesting project, she is getting it into stores, she is selling direct, and she is learning a lot about starting a business along the way. The story is called "Health-Conscious Coffee Lover Steeps Into Crowded Market." I'm gonna bring you that story right after this quick message. [Music]

When Vivienne Versescu's mom immigrated to America from the Netherlands, she took the scenic route, traveling the world before settling.

During those travels, she encountered some unique coffee flavors, including cardamom, a popular addition to coffee in Israel and elsewhere. Like mother, like daughter, Vivienne enjoyed the exotic flavor of cardamom and coffee, but wasn't as excited about the delivery method. Sipping around cardamom seeds while trying not to choke on them wasn't exactly her ideal cup of tea, or coffee, I suppose. So one day, she went online, purchased a few disposable tea bags, placed the cardamom in them, and voila, problem solved. She and her mom were hooked, and for Vivienne, this single experience perked an enduring idea.

Being health-conscious, she wasn't a big fan of artificial flavor syrups. Maybe, she hypothesized, this was a new way to flavor coffee, but would Americans like it? Cardamom and coffee tasted great to her, but would it be popular with a different audience? After all, it's not on any Starbucks menu, it's not widely available in most grocery stores. So she got crafty, turning her kitchen into a spice flavor lab, hoping to discover unique flavor combinations that would entice a new audience.

This part of the development, Vivienne enjoyed the most, testing and tasting, a process she shared with her sisters. Their experiments yielded some surprising results. For example, some flavors that she assumed would work didn't. Peppermint mocha, for example. It sounded like a good idea, but it tasted bitter and awful.

Before long, however, Vivienne landed on some delicious combos like cinnamon and clove, a spicy flavoring concept. Next, she had to source ingredients. She had to package those ingredients, design the labels, and find the right boxes for shipping. All of this cost an investment of about $4,000, a price she admits was a bit steep, but worth it. Vivienne was motivated by the regret of not trying.

Finally, she had to pick a price. She started with the market standard for flavoring syrups, recognizing that her product might be unapproachable if she went above it. She settled on $12 for a box of 20 spice baggies, and adjusted slightly based on the ingredient cost. Now, how would she get the word out? While Vivienne thought if this product were to be a success, it would take the help of some influencers.

So before bringing the product to market, she researched its potential through Instagram. She poked around, getting inspiration, and carefully studying the market. And before long, Vivienne started to see a path to that market. With a strategy in mind and that proof of concept, Vivienne moved forward. She called it shade in reference to the hint of flavoring, just a shade of flavor, not overpowering, not in your face.

She wanted to emphasize her product's subtlety, not its potency. For her first customers, like so many of us, Vivienne started with friends and family. She also connected to a customer base through those Instagram influencers, often through an affiliate relationship. Influencers with five to 8,000 followers were willing to help her out for free, and were fun to work with. One of those people yielded a surprise market for her.

This market was similar to Vivienne because they were health conscious, they needed to avoid sugary drinks, but for a different reason. Who did she tap into? That was people with diabetes. They found her flavorings a welcome change to what was available elsewhere, a win for them, and a surprise win for Vivienne. From this relationship, she made her first big sale.

Since she packed the products herself while working a full-time job, it was a daunting task, but she rallied, packaged them up, and shipped them out within the week. Little by little, shade continues to grow. Her website serves as the face of the company and drives some traffic, but the clear winner is still Instagram. It's driven her sales the most consistently. Occasionally, Vivienne will experiment with different forms of marketing, like paid ads, but those ads have underperformed compared to organic content, so she backed off.

For now, Vivienne enjoys the process of selling in farmer's markets, on shelves and coffee shops, and through Instagram reels. She's looking forward to an upcoming cake pop pop-up, and enjoys the creative process of crafting new recipes. [Music]

All right, let's look at this idea of using social media before you actually start your business. I've seen a lot of people do this, and what you're doing is you're just trying to slowly get to know people, make those relationships, begin posting photos, of course, it's Instagram, so that when you actually have a product go to market, then you actually have buyers, or at least people who are potentially interested. So that's what Vivienne did.

She says, "Before I even started selling shade, "I started working on the shade Instagram. "I followed coffee-themed accounts, "and I interacted with local Philly coffee shops." So she's thinking about her area, who does she want to eventually sell this product through, or at least get some help from them in some way, while she starts connecting with them months in advance. And she also says this helped build the algorithm to show her accounts similar to hers. A good tip for someone out there today, that's where I'll leave you. Inspiration is good, but inspiration with action is better.

Today's show notes, including links to shade, anything else I mentioned in the episode will be at sidehustleschool.com/2054. If you've got a comment or question for the show, you can leave it there as well. I hope you'll subscribe, follow, come back tomorrow. My name is Chris Guillebeau, this is "Side Hustle School." [Music]

from The Onward Project.