CPG Licensing Launches Free Opportunity Scorecard for Food and Beverage Companies

New online tool helps CPG brands and manufacturers evaluate whether licensing another brand can create meaningful incremental growth

August 31, 2026 — CPG Licensing has launched the CPG Licensing Opportunity Scorecard, a free online decision tool designed to help food, beverage and consumer packaged goods companies evaluate prospective brand licensing opportunities before committing significant time and resources.

The Scorecard addresses a question that often comes well before a licensing agreement: Does bringing another brand onto a product actually create a better business opportunity?

Developed from the framework CPG Licensing founder Phil Gorman uses to evaluate licensed CPG opportunities, the tool scores potential opportunities across six areas:

• Consumer Permission - Does the brand-product combination make intuitive sense?
• Incrementality - Can the opportunity generate new consumers, occasions, formats, channels or sales rather than primarily shifting existing volume?
• Brand Contribution - What does the licensed brand add beyond name recognition?
• Retail Opportunity - Is there a compelling reason for a retail buyer to add the product?
• Economics - Can royalty expense, COGS, margins and realistic sales volume work together?
• Execution Readiness - Can the company develop, produce, sell, distribute and support the opportunity effectively?

“People often ask me how I’ve been able to create licensing relationships, and the short answer is that I asked,” said Gorman. “But getting a conversation started is the easy part. The harder question is whether a licensing opportunity is actually worth pursuing. I wanted to take some of the thinking I use when evaluating these opportunities and make it available to other CPG operators.”

The online Scorecard takes approximately six minutes to complete and provides an overall opportunity score, along with individual results across each of the six dimensions.

Importantly, the tool is not designed to steer every respondent toward licensing.

“Sometimes licensing can open a new consumer audience, product format, flavor proposition or retail opportunity without taking the company into an entirely new category,” Gorman said. “Other times a recognizable name adds cost and complexity without creating enough incremental value. Understanding the difference is the point of the Scorecard.”

Results identify where an opportunity appears strongest, where additional validation may be required, and which assumptions warrant closer examination before a company pursues a license.

The Scorecard is intended as a directional decision tool rather than a substitute for consumer research, financial modeling, retailer validation or a full licensing opportunity assessment.

The CPG Licensing Opportunity Scorecard is available free at assess.cpglicensing.com.

About CPG Licensing

CPG Licensing helps food and consumer products companies evaluate, develop and commercialize brand licensing opportunities. Services include licensing opportunity assessment, strategy development, partner identification, deal support and fractional licensing leadership.

For more information, visit cpglicensing.com.

Media Contact

Phil Gorman
Founder, CPG Licensing

619-602-2374