Your Consumer Bro

most cpg brands don't have a moat. they have a shelf slot and a renewal date.

hain's turnaround is in the lenders' hands now, not the brands'. hain makes celestial tea, earth's best baby food and greek gods yogurt. to pay down debt, it agreed to sell its international business, including ella's kitchen, for $323m. regulators approved the sale. the lenders haven't. the deadline to extend hain's debt, which comes due in december, passed without a deal. now the buyer can walk away. hain can't. and even if it closes, the sale only covers about half of hain's $586m of debt. that's why the brands barely matter right now. sales are still shrinking, and there was no q&a on the earnings call. the only priority is december. when the debt comes due before the turnaround, the lenders call the shots.

everyone's fighting over the protein powder aisle. scoops went to the peanut butter aisle instead. lots of foot traffic, one old peanut powder incumbent, almost no new products. target reportedly gave it 1,000+ doors after it pitched for 500. sometimes the best growth move is picking a less crowded shelf.

plenty of buyers. still no deal. four things that can stall a consumer deal, even when the interest is real: 1. valuation gaps the seller prices in the next stage of growth. the buyer won't pay for all of it upfront. both can like the business and still disagree on the price. 2. budgets that start slipping the business starts missing its forecast while buyers are reviewing it. buyers lower what they expect it to earn, and the price they can justify falls with it. 3. customer concentration one retailer accounts for a large share of sales. a lost listing, a smaller order or tougher terms could change the earnings. the buyer has to price that dependence, even if the account stays. 4. falling category consumption the brand is taking share, but people are buying fewer units of the whole category. gaining share doesn't guarantee selling more, which makes the growth plan harder to justify. buyer interest starts the process. agreement on price and risk closes it.

the poppi founders sold one brand. now they're betting $2.5m of their own money on another. jetty, their new hydration brand, launches today at whole foods nationwide plus target.com and amazon. the interesting part is the playbook. poppi took a boring category and made it feel new. hydration is crowded, but the founders already know how to get a drink noticed, stocked and talked about. self-funding also changes the math. no investors means no pressure to grow at any cost, and the founders keep the upside if it works.

just started my chess journey. no experience playing when I was younger. any tips from those who are experienced? things to focus on etc.

imagine being jensen huang and having your personal life become a systemic risk to the global economy after you have an affair with a chinese spy.

bessemer venture partners showcases their anti-portfolio – a collection of companies they passed on

enough with the white monster. ghost is by far the best tasting energy drink. (i have the tastebuds of a 12 year old)

my controversial cpg takes: 1. most food brands need better shelf placement, not a community. 2. a good store brand is a problem for brands whose only advantage is a familiar logo. 3. selling your brand early isn't selling out. the buyer's distribution might do more than your next funding round.

lessons from this week’s monster, keurig dr pepper, and kraft heinz earnings

the first thing i'd check before buying a food brand isn't revenue growth. it's what happens when the discount ends. trial tells you someone wanted a deal. repeat purchase tells you they wanted the product. those are very different things to pay for.

utz is going private with its core snack business barely growing. branded salty-snack sales were roughly flat. adjusted ebitda fell 30%. the new owners need to rebuild profit, not just sell more chips. buying the brands is easier than fixing the earnings.

today showed what investors really trust, and it isn't ai. the s&p fell 4.4%, its worst day since april 2025, wiping out $2.5T. general mills, hershey, unilever and pepsico all closed green. when investors panic, they run to the companies whose sales hold up no matter what. boring is a hedge you buy before you need it.

alani nu just outsold the celsius brand in a quarter. $410m vs $357M. the company still wears the celsius name, but the growth is coming from the brand it bought. the name on the door is not always the one printing money.

the promise behind celsius's premium price is now being tested in court. two proposed class actions say "burns body fat" on the can is misleading. nothing has been decided, and celsius has defended its labels. for a fitness drink, that front-of-can promise is a big part of what you pay for. a claim that earns a premium also earns scrutiny.

coca-cola is up 37.1% this year. pepsico is down 2.2%. through april they traded within a few points. q3 eps growth ex-currency: coke +9%, pepsico +1.5%. north america drink volume, by each company's measure: coke flat, pepsico -2%. boring stocks still have to grow earnings.

people may not be eating less packaged food. they may just be buying it at the gas station. performance food group, one of the big food distributors, said its gas station pizza and chicken programs grew 11% in cases last quarter. the same week, kraft heinz said its volume fell about 1%. food doesn't vanish. it changes address.

celsius reports thursday before the open. watch 0.8. that was the q2 gap in us energy dollar share: celsius brand 9.5%, alani nu 8.7%. alani retail sales +55.7%. celsius brand -2%. in a portfolio, the bought brand can outgrow the name on the door.