SUN Sailor Editions Plymouth/Wayzata | Page 12

Business Sun Sailor Newspapers welcomes news releases and story ideas from the community. Send to [email protected]; mail to: Sun Sailor, 33 Second St. N.E., Osseo, MN 55369. sailor.mnsun.com Thursday, Feb. 28, 2019 • Page 12 Trend line for JonnyPops continues to surge upward By SETH ROWE [email protected] JonnyPops treats have been popping up in most states in the country. The St. Louis Park-based company that makes fruit-fl avored treats has been dou- bling in size each year, said co-founder and CEO Erik Brust at a TwinWest Chamber of Commerce Leadership Luncheon Feb. 20 in Plymouth. Brust currently manages 50 employees in the marketing, sales, operations and production departments of the company, said Deb McMillan, vice president of public policy for TwinWest. “Erik’s been instrumental in the success of the company,” McMillan said. After audience members who braved piles of snow to reach the presentation tried samples of the frozen snacks inside the warmth of the Crowne Plaza Minne- apolis West hotel, Brust related the Jonny- Pops story of tragedy and success. The name is in honor of his cousin, Jonathan Jeffery, who Brust has said of- fered him homemade ice cream during a trip. The two thought they could make a better product, but Jeffery died of a drug overdose before they could pursue the idea further. “That obviously was a big shock to the family and nothing that we had been through before,” Brust said at the Twin- West event. When Brust started JonnyPops with fel- low St. Olaf College students, they agreed to name the company JonnyPops after Jef- fery. The founders decided to partner with the Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation, which provides drug and alcohol addic- tion treatment at centers locally in Plym- outh, Maple Grove, Chaska and St. Paul and throughout the country. The idea was to create healthier treats that also support- ed addiction recovery. The positive messages printed on sticks save the date! EXPO brought to you by: april 27, 2019 • 11:00am-2:30pm southdale YMCA, edina Share your NEWS A nniversaries • C ongratulations • G raduation • E ngagements • W eddings BIRTHDAY Lisa Benders is 80! Help us celebrate Lisa’s 80th birthday at the American Legion on Sunday from 1-4 p.m. Cake and refreshments will be served. BIRTH Walters Jim and Judy Walters of Anoka announce the birth of their son, Jack John Walters, on Jan. 15, 2018. He weighed 8 pounds, 5 ounces and was 21 inches long. Big sister Bella Mae welcomed him home. ANNIVERSARY Barthel The family of Tim and Betty Barthel of Edina invite you to celebrate their 50th anniversary at DiVanni’s from 2-4 p.m. on Saturday. Your presence is your gift. Share Your Happy News! Announcements placed in the newspaper also go online for you share on Facebook and Tweet! Place your announcement online anytime at announcements.ecmpublishers.com/announcements below the creamy frozen pops are part of the company’s mission to improve the world, Brust said. The company’s goal of providing jobs for people coming out of halfway houses and addiction recovery is less well-known. “We employed them straight on our plant fl oor,” Brust said, noting that the company does not discuss the effort as part of their branding efforts. “The information is certainly made available, but we never wanted to come across as someone who’s trying to capi- talize on a tragic event,” he said. That aspect of the company has infl u- enced its growth plans. Company leaders realized they needed to support volume year-around because at-risk people whose workplace routine is disrupted can have a hard time maintaining recovery, Brust said. “We do the best that we can to maintain a full schedule, and that’s something that the whole team is behind,” he said. Because the volume of sales in Minne- sota can plummet during the state’s cold months, company leaders decided to enter Southern markets. They also began cater- ing to corporations like 3M and Thomson Reuters. With its healthier ingredients, the com- pany also entered the school lunch mar- ket. They offered pops at reduced prices to Minneapolis Public Schools. “From my gross margin standpoint, it was pretty challenging to just want to even take that bet in the fi rst place,” Brust said of the discounted rate. However, the efforts paid off as Jonny- Pops expanded to the St. Paul and Ano- ka-Hennepin districts and eventually emerged at schools in about 40 states. “There’s all these things we stumble into that I’m sure later on in life I’ll just look back and say, ‘well, that’s luck, right?’” Brust said. He noted that Michelle Obama’s sup- port for rules that required healthier choices in schools benefi ted the company. “All of a sudden, all the other ice creams are kicked out,” he recalled. “Like, we’re allowed in with seven other products.” He noted initiatives in schools to help excite kids about school lunches and to promote attendance by providing stickers for free JonnyPops to students who make goals. Outside of schools, the product is available in about 11,000 retail locations, including some Walmart stores. Of the rapid growth, Brust said, “We have been drinking from a fi re hose since day one.” Sales have doubled every year since 2012, and he anticipates sales to double again in 2019 compared to 2018. In the beginning, he said doubling the business was not diffi cult. Its founders had been promoting the product at the Min- nesota State Fair and turned some modest profi ts, but basically had been working for free for the fi rst few years, Brust said. With the large-scale sales the company now has, an audience member asked Brust if he had an exit strategy. “I don’t think we have to anticipate go- ing anywhere anytime soon, but I do think (SUN SAILOR STAFF PHOTO BY SETH ROWE) JonnyPops CEO Erik Brust holds a box of a prod- uct made by his St. Louis Park-based company at a TwinWest Chamber of Commerce Leadership Luncheon Feb. 20 in Plymouth. that this team inherently is excited about growth,” he said. National attention, local attitude Forbes Magazine named Brust and co- founder Connor Wray to a 30 Under 30 list for 2018. “It was pretty awesome to just go get out with that group of other young entrepre- neurs and people who are doing amazing things in their communities,” Brust said. The attention has come with some risks. Some early advisers in the food industry decided to create similar products as JonnyPops, Brust said. “We had a lot of early mentors who met us through some of the Minneapo- lis events who have certainly turned their backs on us and launched competitive products because of it,” he said. Two of the fi ve products that he said took aim at JonnyPops have failed while three remain. “It’s not like I think our fu- ture is necessarily determined by that, but I think that’s some of the big surprises in terms of like, most shocking,” Brust said. However, he also credited the local food industry for its support for new business- es, comparing the Minneapolis area favor- ably with Portland, Oregon, and Boulder, Colorado. Many markets do not have a Lunds & Byerlys or Kowalski’s Market grocer that will welcome new, local prod- ucts, he indicated. Even as JonnyPops has expanded well beyond Minnesota and ended up with products in big-box stores, Brust said, “I think we appeal to a lot of the same ethos that people have for a local product just because of the authenticity, of the age of it, how accessible it is and how young we are. “So, even though we can only be local to Minneapolis, we are fi nding that in other hotbed communities around food, a lot of people started still rooting for us as, like, the underdog, hometown hero, because we have this, whatever – dogged determi- nation to go fi gure it out. And we’re sort of very transparent on what we stand for as a business.” To learn more, visit jonnypops.com.