During the opening session of BevNET Live Summer 2024 in New York City, industry stakeholders from multiple arenas sat down with editor in chief Jeff Klineman to share their insights into the current state of the beverage market and the dynamics affecting entrepreneurs.
“We’re hitting all of our goals,” stated Sahra Nguyen, CEO of Nguyen Coffee. “But on the back end, we’re thinking about how to be lean, thinking about how to be efficient, thinking about how we can reduce our COGs as quickly as possible – which requires getting distribution, which is very expensive, but you also have all of the retail marketing and trade spend to support so it’s a bit of a chaotic puzzle.”
Nguyen was joined by Charlie New, global category manager of refrigerated beverage at Whole Foods Market; Ryan Williams, founder of FABID; and Patrick English owner and VP of Dana Distributors, Inc., who each shared their thoughts on how to navigate the challenge of building and scaling within the beverage business in the current climate, particularly when investors are “tightening their purse strings.”