Congratulations! You have just landed your first major deal with a big-box retailer. Your product is slated to hit the shelves of dozens, hundreds, or perhaps even thousands of locations. The champagne has been popped, and the team is celebrating. However, now the REAL work begins!
The transition from pitching to scaling is where many emerging brands falter. It is no longer just about the brilliance of your branding or the quality of your ingredients; it is about the reliability of your supply chain.
To help brands navigate this high-stakes transition, I sat with CPG Growth Strategist Emily Page, founder of brand coaching consultancy Start to Sold and CEO of CPG branding and packaging design firm Pearl Resourcing, who shared her strategic roadmap for ensuring that your brand’s supply chain operations are ready for the big leagues.
The Emotional Stakes of Out-of-Stock Performance
In retail, an empty shelf space is more than just a missed sale – it is a damaged relationship. Page emphasizes that, once a deal is made, a founder’s focus must shift immediately to driving sales at the shelf, and ensuring that their supply chain is ready to handle it. Because while the initial deal is built on excitement and opportunity, that goodwill can evaporate instantly if you fail to deliver.
“The biggest risk you have is getting an order from a retailer and then going out of stock,” says Page. “If you go out of stock, that warm, fuzzy feeling the buyer had about you when they placed the first order is going to disintegrate into dislike and almost hate because your short delivery results in empty shelf space for them, lost sales, and punishment or critique from their boss.”
Retail buyers are employees with performance benchmarks, bonuses, and reputations on the line. When you fail to fill an order, you aren’t just hurting your bottom line; you are putting their professional standing at risk. As Page puts it, “You’re bringing shame on their choices of trusting you.”
To avoid this, transparency is paramount from the very first meeting. If you cannot handle a nationwide rollout, it is better to ask for a 10- or 20-store test and grow from there. But as a new brand with a limited track record, how do you know what your supply chain needs will be?
Mastering the Guesstimate: How to Forecast Without Historical Data
One of the most significant hurdles for emerging brands is the lack of historical retail data. How do you plan production when you have never been in a brick-and-mortar environment? Page suggests a guesstimate built on a spreadsheet and specific retailer inquiries.
1. Identify Store Types and Planograms
Don’t rely solely on Google for store counts. Retailers like Target or Walmart have vastly different footprints depending on the location. “When you’re in New York, there’s a different footprint for a Target than there is here in Texas where Targets are huge,” Page notes. You must ask the retailer exactly which store types and regions you will be placed in first to accurately estimate volume.
2. Understand the Expected Retail Sales Velocity
The most critical metric to uncover is the expected weekly turn – the number of units sold per store, per week. Page recommends asking the buyer for three specific benchmarks to fill out your spreadsheet:
- The Best Seller’s Turn: This is the sales velocity of the best-selling product in your category. It provides the upper bound of what is possible.
- The Worst Seller’s Turn: Usually the product you are replacing, this tells you the floor you must stay above to avoid being kicked out.
- The Minimum to Stay: Every retailer has a threshold for performance; knowing this helps you gauge the risk of your production levels.
3. Consider Price Point Parity
When comparing your turn to that of existing products, ensure it is an apples to apples comparison. For example, if a top-selling competitor is a discount product and yours is premium, their high turn data may not be an accurate predictor for your brand.
Aligning Production with Retail Reorder Cycles
The retail reorder cycle can be a shock to brands used to the direct-to-consumer (DTC) model. Often, by the time a retailer places a reorder, they are already dipping into their final cases of inventory.
“Oftentimes a purchase order reflects finished sales, meaning they’re out of inventory,” Page says. “At that point, you’re kind of behind the ball for manufacturing a reorder if they want you to deliver every two weeks.”
To stay ahead, Page suggests two primary strategies:
- Buy Sales Data: If the retailer allows it, purchasing real-time sales data can give you a heads-up before the official purchase order arrives.
- Ask for Early Warnings: Small, emerging brands can sometimes build rapport with buyers to get informal data updates before a PO is issued.
Managing Lead Times and the Weakest Link in Your Supply Chain
A supply chain is only as fast as its slowest component. Page uses a simple algorithm: A (Ingredients) + B (Labor) + C (Packaging) = Y (Product).
Founders must identify which of these components has the longest lead time – often it is packaging or a specialized ingredient. If a single ingredient requires a three-month lead time, your entire ability to scale is constrained by that one item.
Best Practices for Lead Time Management:
- Order Overage: Aim to have at least two purchase orders worth of inventory on hand to cover the gap between the average two-week retail delivery window and the longer manufacturing cycle.
- Backtrack Production: Use your longest lead time item to set your ordering schedule.
- Secure Secondary Suppliers: Bottlenecks are inevitable. Page emphasizes that maintaining warm relationships with backup suppliers is essential for when your primary manufacturer hits a snag.
Preparing for the “TikTok Effect”
In today’s market, a product can go from steady sales to viral sensation overnight. For example, Industrious T.TAiO, which sells beauty products, saw this happen with its Esponjabon soap when a TikTok post about it went viral. They had to pivot from making 40,000 bars per week to 200,000 per day to keep up with demand. Fortunately, they are an established player with a strong supply chain capacity, but for an emerging brand, this could spell trouble. .
To handle such anomalies without breaking your cash flow or your team, Page advises the following:
- Establish “Trigger Rules”: Set up automated flags in your systems to alert you the moment an order triples or deviates from the average. “We need to set rules for our team and systems to notice when there’s a big boost in orders,” she says.
- Communicate Up and Down the Chain: Keep your suppliers informed of potential spikes. If you have a marketing campaign or a potential viral moment on the horizon, tell your factory early so they can prep for flexibility.
The MVP Mindset: Break Bad News Fast
No supply chain is perfect, but the way you handle a shortage determines whether you keep the account. Retailers value visibility and transparency over perfection.
Page shares advice from a Costco buyer who highlighted the importance of speed: “I love the people who told me fast. I could forgive and get over it, but if they didn’t do that, they burned a bridge,” the buyer says.
The rule of thumb? Deliver bad news fast. If you are going to be short on an order:
- Notify the buyer immediately.
- Take full responsibility (no blaming vendors).
- Present a concrete plan to solve the problem.
By being a proactive partner who looks out for the retailer’s sales as much as your own, you transform from a mere vendor into a Most Valuable Player!
Key Takeaways for CPG Founders
- The “Pitch then Scale” Rule: Landing the deal is just the beginning; staying in stock is what builds a multi-year partnership.
- Forecasting Formula: Use the Guesstimate method by asking buyers for store-type details, expected weekly turn, and performance benchmarks of top/bottom sellers.
- Lead Time Logic: Identify your weakest link ingredient or packaging with the longest lead time and order overage to maintain a two-week fulfillment window.
- The Communication Standard: Practice “Bad News Fast.” Transparency builds trust; silence or late notices burn bridges with retail buyers.
- Operational Safeguards: Implement system alerts for sales spikes to ensure your team reacts to viral growth within hours, not weeks.
Scaling is not an accident – it is a strategy. By building these systems early, you protect your buyer, your brand, and your future on the shelf. Learn more insights from brands that have successfully scaled up on the RangeMe Success Stories page!