Amy Collins - From Grandma's Kitchen to a National Rollout

On this episode, we’re joined by Amy Collins, the Co-Founder and CEO of RoRo’s Baking Company, a Dallas-based brand bringing her grandmother’s beloved cinnamon rolls and dinner rolls to freezers across the country. What started as a family recipe baked by hand in a shared kitchen has grown into a nationally distributed brand carried in Whole Foods, H-E-B, Harris Teeter, and more.

Amy shares her journey from ICU nurse to food entrepreneur, how she scaled from self-manufacturing to partnering with a copacker, and what she’s learned about preserving authenticity while building a frozen brand at scale.

We get into the decision behind frozen vs. refrigerated vs. ready-to-eat and some of the learning lessons that Amy has gathered during the journey thus far.

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Episode Highlights:

🥣 The family legacy behind RoRo’s Baking Company
🍞 Pre-baked & frozen vs. refrigerated vs. ready-to-eat formats
📦 Packaging & brand identity lessons learned the hard way
🏭 From shared kitchen to building a commercial facility
⚙️ Transitioning from self-manufacturing to a copacker
🧊 Competing and winning in the frozen category
🛒 The role of demos in driving retail velocity
💻 DTC and national shipping via Goldbelly
🎯 Managing expectations and staying scrappy
🌟 Trends and brands Amy’s keeping an eye on

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Table of Contents:

00:00 - Intro & RoRo’s Overview
00:41 - Origin Story
03:53 - Pre-baked & Frozen vs. Refrigerated vs. Ready-to-Eat
05:24 - Brand Identity & Packaging Design
09:12 - Kickstarter & Building Out a Commercial Space
12:32 - Commercial Kitchen vs. Copacker
18:38 - Searching for & Choosing a Copacker
22:56 - The Frozen Category
26:36 - Demos
27:48 - DTC & Goldbelly
31:16 - Learning Lessons & Expectations
32:41 - Trade Shows
34:18 - Trends & Brands Amy’s Watching

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Links:

RoRo’s Baking Company - https://rorosbakingcompany.com
Follow Amy Collins on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/amy-collins-4a200216/
Follow me on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/adam-martin-steinberg/ 

For help with CPG production design - packaging and label design, product renders, POS assets, retail media assets, quick-turn sales and marketing assets and all the other work that bogs down creative teams - check out https://www.kitprint.co/  

Transcript

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today we're speaking with Amy Collins co founder and CEO of Roros Baking Company launched around 2,011 I believe out of the Dallas area Roro's is a fresh baked good brand born out of Amy's grandmother's homemade recipes so really excited to get into it learn more about the journey so yeah any first off just for the listeners that that aren't all that familiar with Roro's maybe just give quick lay of the land in terms of origin story kind of why behind the brand core products in the lineup today and maybe just a few places people can get their hands on them and then we'll go from there awesome yeah um well thank you for having me Roro is uh was my grandmother she passed away this January but she started the company with my husband and I I was just out of college I was a nurse I went straight into working an ICU job and kind of all during this time I got this entrepreneurial bug I didn't know quite what I wanted to do and the cinnamon rolls were a tradition in our family and so she would make them out of her home kitchen they were a tradition on like Thanksgiving Christmas mornings and she would sell them like to friends family um and people would go nuts over them and my husband and I got married and she ended up making like 250 pans over the course of several months and just putting them in her freezer at home and so they ended up being the wedding favors at our wedding and then it was that fall went to my husband my brand new husband and I was like let's start a business together let's just see what happens you know I think that we could sell these I didn't see you know myself being a nurse forever I kind of like just got this bug that I could do this part time and see what develops and so so yeah we started we put in all the money ourselves I think we each goodness my grandmother and grandfather and us I think we each pitched in like $3,000 each got a logo designed found a shared used catering kitchen that we rented hourly near us and we just started and so um didn't even really realize where we would sell them thought that we would do coffee shops kind of just some local markets here in Dallas and all of those doors kind of kept closing everyone in a coffee shop expects like a really large cinnamon roll ours was different it was in a pan they were a little bit smaller and so was introduced to a friend of a friend who worked in a Central Market store here in Texas um they loved the story and introduced us to the buyer and she wanted to meet with me and I met her in the Dallas Lovers Lane store which is pretty iconic Central Market location here in Dallas and she loved it and by the end of the meeting walked me over to the frozen set and was like okay here's where your product's gonna go this is before um any talks on price she just loved the brand and she loved the story I won't even say brand she loved the story and us we weren't a brand at that point nor were we trying to be at that point and so that is what threw us into grocery um the world of distribution they helped get us set up with a distributor and just started learning the language of of what it looks like to sell something in retail and so that's how we started we did that hourly kitchen for a couple of years I would work nights and meet everybody at the bakery every Saturday morning I don't think we had a traditional weekend for the first couple of years and we didn't have kids at the time so we could do it we had the time and so it was just kind of the perfect time to to jump in and and start since then things have grown and are obviously different now and how we operate and produce and do things that we'll get into but that was really the origin story and and what pushed us into grocery it wasn't something that I think we were initially planning to do we didn't say I'm starting like the word or the phrase CPG I never said that until like five years ago like it was just not on my radar it was not a thing I didn't know what it even was and it wasn't as hot as it is now but um yeah so that's how we started that's great yeah I guess pre bake reheat versus yeah but in the you know ready to eat bakery section of grocery store yeah so when we started our main reason was we just basically replicated what she was doing so she would make these pans bake them freeze them and then have the ability to store them and so that was kind of the beauty and what people also liked about the product is that when they heated it up it tasted like she just made them and so when we started I don't think we even entertained the idea of fresh bakery you know shelf life and spoils was something that we didn't want it to go bad um we wanted to really if we were going to do something maximize how long that we could even hold on to it and I think that at the time like everybody says that frozen is really difficult which it is but at the time I think to us Fresh Bakery seemed even more difficult to manage um when you don't have distribution it's just kind of you doing that and what we could kind of lose on that so but no she had a the cinnamon rolls and dinner rolls those are the two things that she made and so that was what we really just launched exactly how she did them you know we would hand package everything with dome lids it was very labor intensive um but yeah we just we got a logo we figured out how to get all the nutrition facts and things like that we went to school together she called it and we got our manufacturing licenses together and all of those things and so um but yeah it it was really just that we wanted to preserve what she was already doing and see if other people loved it as much as we did was really the initial goal there from that visual identity kind of packaging design standpoint what were some of the kind of key variables that were top of mind for you yeah I mean I think initially so we went through a logo update last fall and a whole packaging update last fall and so we the initial logo I just knew I wanted something nostalgic she I believe picked the color she loved royal blue that I mean that truly was how we decided the coloring and then we just kind of worked a step by step process like here's what we're thinking we only launched with the cinnamon rolls when we started we actually were called Roro's Cinnamon Rolls originally and then changed the name of the brand a couple years later once we expanded the line but yeah so that that was very I would say just we wanted something that looked cute that represented her something that felt warm but then as things evolved and I know we're probably gonna jump back and forth here but went through 2020 the business exploded that year did really well that's what the kind of when we transitioned to two different co manufacturers we knew that we had to fix our all of the elements of our packaging because that was a really big chunk of um the cost and so we knew that we could do that and so that round I don't recommend doing it that round I went to a company that didn't have a ton of CPG experience um it was a recommendation through a printer and I I didn't feel good about it the whole time and I should have spoken up but that was just one of those things where sometimes you get so far into something and if it doesn't feel like it's on brand like to trust I wish I would have trusted my gut because we went through that it got on shelf fell completely flat I am obviously not a CPG expert in packaging and so we did that got some feedback at the time thought it was great was happy with it quickly realized it was not great and um looking back I'm just mortified honestly and so we actually hired Andy Kurtz with Buttermilk Creative it was awesome um he I went through skew he was one of the mentors there that's how I got connected with him and um I just loved his work I loved just the nostalgic feel that he brought to a couple of the the recent brands he had worked with before us and I I liked him as a person I felt like he got the brand and Roros and so I think that's a big part is like connecting with who's designing your product because regardless of if they're going to have the same style I think somebody who understands truly the feel you're going for it's really hard to convey feeling sometimes on packaging and authenticity and so I think he just did a really good job with that and listening to us we found that having you know her picture on the front of the packaging wasn't necessarily people don't really care about that until they taste it and they like the product and love the product and then they want to know who she is and who our family is and so I think we Learned that kind of lesson through that and I'm not saying that's the case with everybody I some people can do that and it works great but for us still being relatively unknown in in many parts of the country it just wasn't landing how we thought it would and so yeah our goal was really to lean into taste flavor and nostalgia and those were kind of the the subsets that we gave him and brought to him what we really want to convey and and everything else can go on the back everything else can be on social media or our website and that's our job to build that relationship once they try it but we have to get them to try it and so so yeah that was kind of the whole backstory of the packaging growth and where it came from and I'm I wish we had done it sooner but it's hard when you invest a lot of money into something and then it's not exactly how you wanted it and so I felt like we were taking a risk again with Andy and um and I'm super happy with how it turned out so um but yeah that's just starting to hit shelves finally in everywhere this spring but um but yeah that was something we did last last year with him that's awesome that's exciting yeah yeah I've heard I've heard great things about buttermilk yeah you touched on it briefly but you made that leap started baking at a small commercial scale and in that shared hourly kitchen you ran a Kickstarter campaign I haven't really talked to too many people about Kickstarter tell me about that yeah however we did Kickstarter I don't even know what's happening with it now but we did it when it was like pretty exciting and had just kind of had a lot some success stories and um yeah so yeah we I mean we made a video we had a plan a plan but it wasn't necessarily I don't think I knew exactly how to maximize that at the time and so um I I think I had mentioned it wasn't a successful Kickstarter we raised some money it was helpful but that wasn't how we initially raised money for the brand and we we truly have never fundraised for the brand which is also pretty wild but um but yeah so we my grandmother was my grandfather got sick very quickly and so he ended up passing away and we right as we were starting and so we kind of spent a year and a half in a that kitchen I was telling you about like kind of moving stuff back and forth storing stuff at her house it was just crazy and so she came to me and was like Amy I don't want to do this anymore I believe in this brand I have this amount of money that I want to give to you and so she did I mean that was technically like a friends and family I guess you could say is what that equated to and so she put in a a portion of the money for the build out of this facility we found a warehouse I became the general contractor of the the build out and I like went to the city I paid $200 I had no business doing that but I figured it out and I talked to some friends who had just recently done a build out himself and and really just I Learned and I searched online and I talked to people and so yeah we hired all the subs and figured out what we needed as far as a grease trap rotating ovens freezer space all of that just to kind of get us to the next step and I think that everything we've kind of done in our journey was to get us to this next threshold what do we need now versus trying to plan out five years ahead back then I guess what I'm saying so so yeah we did all that it took about I don't know nine to 12 months to get everything before we were up and running and then at that point we hired some staff members it wasn't just us producing it anymore I was able to focus a little bit more on just the growth and just kind of getting my head above water of like okay we have this business we're selling in in stores in Texas and how do we incorporate all these other parts that are needed that we've been kind of neglecting because we've just been going back and forth in this chaotic space hello um so yeah we stayed there for a while um through 2020 and uh it was wonderful it was hard work but just to have a place to produce it and really learn um to make bigger batches larger scale we certainly were not at scale in that facility but it was a much larger scale than we could do prior and it allowed us to expand into more than just you know central market and and keep up with that it was a great stepping stone for us deciding to build out your own in house production facility versus trying to go straight from to trying to go find a co packer that could produce it and how you ultimately decided yeah we're gonna we're gonna continue to scale up in house yeah before we eventually decide maybe we'll go to a co packer you know honestly I think the word co packer and co manufacturer probably wasn't even on my radar at that point I think that we just knew that we this wasn't sustainable um that we knew we needed a place just to put our stuff and to produce it and so I think we probably were starting to maybe look at at what that potentially could look like after we were in our facility for a year or so but no it was really just to give us a starting point because we were really limited in what we could produce and so and my grandmother at that time was still very involved she was at the bakery three days a week if not more and so it was really just a wonderful outlet for us to continue continue to create it and build it and I think we wanted to produce it I don't think we had an initial desire for anyone else to produce it yeah especially because we were you know figuring out the quality and you know when she started baking it she the one thing we changed she would use margarine and we switched it to real butter and so it was just you know some things that like your grandmother does that isn't necessarily gonna translate to a consumer and so just those kind of like things you had to figure out along the way and testing out you know it didn't exactly scale up from you know a 10 quart to a 60 quart and so working through all of those kinks I think if we would have tried to do that to a co manufacturer right out of the gate it would have been a disaster nor do we have the business to you know need a co manufacturer I think sure but yeah to answer your question it it took a while to find one too and I think for what we make I think with bars or drinks or things it's a lot easier not that it's easy but it's easier to find there's just more of them who do that and so like a yeast based dough that rises twice it's labor intensive that a cinnamon roll even it's just a lot more involvement and touch points than people I think really understand which plays into the cost and all of that and so so yeah for a while we just truly could not find someone that was doing what we needed them to do um that would even listen to us there was a couple here that are just massive and we just weren't at the the scale to need it and so yeah that's kind of why we started yeah that totally makes sense which I'm super glad we did because I think if we hadn't have made it ourselves there would just be no way for that quality to still stay there even through transitioning to co manufacturer so yeah yeah I imagine this also you know you got to a certain scale understand what it looks like to make your roles at the quality that you want at least a bit of a larger scale which I'm sure helped as you were on boarding with a co packer I often talk to brands and when they're making that shift to Copack and really getting ready to scale up there's often you have to make some I don't know or production process changes just to be able to transition from a smaller kind of self manufacturing environment to much larger scale co packers in terms of just creating more efficiencies using their larger scale equipment that kind of stuff did you have to make any big changes in that front when you did eventually shift to a co packer we did and so we shifted in 2021 right when everything was starting to go up in cost significantly that year so we I would say so we were planning to do every I know that we talked about the um we have two different manufacturers that wasn't my choice at first we were planning to have everything produced here and got really close into that that situation and then they decided that it didn't make sense for them to produce the cinnamon roll item and so I had to scramble and thankfully found our manufacturer now that we have a wonderful relationship with and now I'm glad that it split at this point just because it kind of diversified some things but yes so I mean we had to change the shape of the the roll we made a decision to change that when we started it was a crescent roll shape which is something that we'd love to bring back and and plan to at some point but at the time it was either to change the recipe or the shape because cost were just killing us and so we decided to change the shape and so that was something when it's a personal brand like that it's really hard to even change things that some people just don't even care about but you care about thankfully with the the cinnamon roll scaling up we I mean we have not had to to touch that recipe which is amazing the rolls with changing the shape we had to you know obviously alter some bake times there's the butter ratio changed a little bit with that just because the way it's not rolled up versus on top and so we had to kind of tweak you know adding more on top of the rolls and things like that but no I mean I think that was a big learning curve one of our buyers once told me she was like you know never move to a co manufacturer when you're launching into a new account and I was like why like it'll be fine and so but yeah I just think there was a lot of nothing ever goes right on the first time okay it is always something that feels like the end of the world when obviously it's not but yeah I I think that um the roll manufacturer I think was difficult because they're a larger manufacturer and so that was the most different than how we were producing things our first day I walked in like with everything you know measured out in our measuring cups and he was like Amy I don't have any measuring cups in this facility like you need to give me the weights like what are you doing and that kind of forced us to really commercialize it and and to get everything accurately weighed out it really um just kind of legitimize the business to an extent for all of our our recipes and everything is very well documented and in weights that can scale up and translate to different you know producers and things like that so it kind of forced us to do that which was good but it was a hard it was definitely a learning huge learning curve big pain point in the business just a lot of growth and um stretching with with that change um yeah you lose control that's hard packers out in the world that can produce the types of products that you have with the yeast and and what not and I just know in general there are you know a lot of readily available just lists of co packers co manufacturers out there in the world of some of them I think don't even have websites and what not yeah I'm curious would you go about actually finding the two that you're working with today and I guess how did you ultimately know that they were the two yeah right one for the time um well I spent two solid years searching and looking and calling and visiting there was a few that we got kind of far in the stage and then the cost was just outlandish there was no way it was gonna work and so it's very difficult and they definitely are there it's do they make something and are they already having lines that are in line with what you do for one of our facilities we invested in a piece of equipment that they didn't have like that was obviously a very expensive risky thing which is you know we own that equity but um but at the same time like it's a give and a take it you're most likely not gonna find a facility that does everything exactly how you need to do it and so that was hard and because there were some you know non negotiables as far as just how things are produced ingredients that are used things like that um my husband found one of them in a Google search and I swear I was like how in the world did you find this I've been searching for like a year and a half and they just come up and that ended up being one of the ones we go with we went with and we still are with them and it's been great um it's very hard to find there's lists and I you know you can search co manufacturer list and kind of you know it's gotten easier for sure I think in the past year but it's still it's not there may be somebody that says they do cakes or brownies and you call and they're like we don't do that anymore we we just do you know these things and so there's a lot of that and there's a lot of people that you know will say that they do these things and and then you know it's just not exactly what you thought but it takes a while and I think when if you self produce before which I do think it has benefits and I would highly recommend to a lot of people if not all in CPG at least to produce it for some time it allows you to know like what's not okay and what's just kind of a deal breaker versus if you're going to bring something to market it has to taste good it has to be a good quality and I think that a lot of times that can be missing if you don't have like that direct contact with the product and and really know what exactly it's supposed to taste and look like if you're just kind of going in with a formulation it's just hard to get that I think um yeah totally I don't know one or two recommendations for some up and coming operators that are a few years behind you they're about to start I guess actually make that transition or the quality is not there you have to speak up and say something I think it's so easy to feel like you are just this small fish in this huge facility and and that they are doing a favor for you and like that you have to speak up for yourself and you can't because that's gonna translate to shelf and and we've had an experience where you know the quality wasn't what it was supposed to be and product was in stores and so it's like you know if somebody tried this and didn't have a good experience like we're never gonna have that person again and so I think even if you're gonna lose some money to speak up if something's not right I I think that that's key for your long term brand success and just realizing that it's a partnership that it's not just a one way street have all of your recipes own all of your recipes some people will go in and tweak things and and then document everything and and just make sure that you know you have ownership of that yeah and I would physically visit them meet them see what they're like see how they treat their staff and really just feel because that's gonna translate into the products that they're they're making for you and so yeah it's hard it's not fun to kind of have to stay on top of things you your job shifts especially if you move from production to co manufacturing you are now a middleman who is kind of managing a lot of moving parts and that can have its own set of stressors and also benefits you know you can place an order and have something to your facility whereas it would have taken us you know a couple of months to make they can make in a few days and yeah I I think there's wonderful benefits to it but it can also definitely be challenging I think just going in with you know feeling confident and and that you are the brand owner that this is your product but also really building a relationship is key and I think kindness also goes a long way with your co go to market side of things you touch on the frozen section category a bit towards the beginning this frozen category yeah so frozen is revamping which I know you know it's all over LinkedIn and stuff but I do feel like frozen is having a moment and yeah whereas before I feel like there just wasn't a lot of options even now like if you look in our set you will see a lot of things that look like they were produced or you know invented 20 years ago or launched brands um which most of them were more than that but it just I feel like nothing has really evolved with the consumer and where they are and just what they like to look at um as far as a shelf presence and I think there's a lot of just inauthenticity that is very clear um in frozen and so I think it's been really fun to see um not only us but other brands just come in with you know joy and color and no preservatives like there's something that you you look on the back of the packaging and there's gonna be a slew of ingredients that have just been there forever um that aren't even needed and so I think that our consumer who's you know buying our products sees that they see through that and so I think it's a really unique opportunity to come in and just be a real family brand and I think that that's being done with some other companies and in other spaces of frozen that you know you see the founder you see the story and and that hasn't really been done before in this space I think it's done really well in a lot of other sections of the grocery store but frozen bread especially it's a lot of giants and then a couple little guys you know coming up the ranks but there there is still a huge gap there and a lot of opportunity um to disrupt so yeah I I think that frozen is definitely on everybody's radar so it's pretty fun to to be part of it all it's definitely the talk of the town these days for for yeah for a lot of reasons it seems like that's one of the challenges is kind of obviously you're behind a glass door and you want them to kind of draw your draw their attention to yeah to roros I mean one of the main changes we made was if you look at the name of the product cinnamon rolls dinner rolls Parker House rolls it's all huge whereas before it was a very small thing the brand um logo we we made smaller and then the colors they're not as muted they're very bright they're eye catching and so just from a shelf perspective I feel like when you look at it on shelf it pops and so that's something just we've changed to try to gain somebody's attention in those few seconds another thing is we do a lot of partnering with influencers and local you know moms and things I think that that's a really good way we do a lot of um something where trialing is um kind of adding on digital offers we found that we've been gaining a very large percentage like 80% I think of of first time buyers through that and so really just gaining trial in a in a more affordable way and so just doing some things that are maybe that people do but it's a little bit outside of the box and then our packaging as we've updated it and those images are kind of flowing through on your apps and stuff it's just much brighter also and catches your attention and just looks like just a feeling of joy and happiness and so I think that is really you know we can't do stuff in the aisle unfortunately and all those kinds of things but yeah and also being selective in how we promote and and what we in certain stores testing out certain promotions seeing how they perform seeing what doesn't we've kind of Learned like what price point gets people to try it what price point isn't worth the investment and that takes time and a lot of trial and error and just looking at you know the data we we stay on top of looking at that every month and and things like that so yeah are demos a part of your guys strategy it has been yeah when we were doing demos all the time and we still do demos but I have found if it's not us doing demos they're not as successful as far as if you're going to spend the money to do it and so I think in certain stores they work better than others that we found as far as resonating with the customer so it is something that we do still do and I I definitely like trade shows things like that when we sample that is highly our most effective way we've been able to go to different headquarters for retailers and sample there I think that's also like a big part of what helps just get excitement and trial where you don't have to spend necessarily as much money but just get a big group of people to try them yes sampling is definitely by far it's just you have to be careful in how you do it we send boxes to people to pass out to their neighborhoods those kind of like grassroots things but yeah that's I think frozen it's a little bit harder as far as doing you know getting people's attention than it is sometimes in um grocery or things like that the trials but yeah I believe you guys focus on partnering with with Goldbelly um so we 2020 was like half of our business for a DC which is crazy for frozen once now we've moved into more retailers we're in about 13 ish stores and so now that they can get them more places we've really focused on in store but no Goldbelly we met at the Fancy Food Show those guys like right when they started doing Goldbelly and so we've been with them for a really long time and so we do a a lot of our dropshipping from there we've had a lot of Good Morning America features and so we will sell a bunch of product within a 24 hour period and so that's a really big e commerce boost for us and then we kind of try to build that and grow that email list and kind of push them where they can also find them in stores and so that's been a really big part of why we built the brand but but yeah Gold Belly is nice things like that are nice because the items they kind of land into both gifting and groceries so they can kind of get away with with playing in both spaces grocery and retail is definitely are the majority of our business now but especially when everyone was on lockdown and everything that's when it kind of we just started to really grow that DTC business and so um yeah but yeah it's they're different animals obviously but I think there's benefits to both and and there's different needs and customers that want both and um yeah that's how we've kind of grown that yeah that makes total sense um product roadmap standpoint and overextend ourselves we brought back some favorites so we have like a pumpkin spice cinnamon roll a cranberry walnut cinnamon roll those were favorites before we um kind of started not producing them and then we launched um a jalapeno cheddar Parker House roll this winter and so that'll be in stores here coming up and so as far as the process you know we really it's very important to us to stay true to who we are stay true to something that my grandmother made that are her recipes or built on her recipes as far as product extensions and so I think staying in the roll space as we're still establishing ourselves is really important and then we're testing out doing some rotating skews like seasonal skews that you see refrigerated does this really well in caps and stuff for holiday people get super excited but frozen has never really done this so that's something we're trialing to do you know a skew for the first three every quarter basically swap that out with a different seasonal item but still have that brand block on shelf so it's not just something and really build excitement and trial and so that's gonna be a way that we test out some new items as well and just seeing what sticks what's successful what's something that people really resonate with without having to you know invest in all that comes with launching a line because it's expensive you know the packaging the design everything and and you have to if it's not selling then you know you've just kind of wasted a lot of time and money and so I think just being a little more strategic in how we trial out some of that but yeah as we grow I mean we have some ideas for some you know extensions I think that for now we want to stay in the frozen space and the frozen bread sweet roll category um and roll space I think there's a lot of opportunity that we still have um where we can maximize what we're already doing um and so that's kind of our core focus right now that's super logical um yeah I mean it's some super impressive 13 plus stores at this point bootstrapped had a lot of success I think other side of things some of the best learning experiences come from when things didn't go exactly as expected looking back anything you kind of would have would have done differently that might be helpful for some other up and coming operators that are a few years behind where you are I mean man the whole packaging thing was a pretty much a disaster so I'd say that that was one of them that I regret and wish that I I spoke up sooner or you know followed my gut instinct but yeah I I think that that's one of them a big one for me but I'm also really happy with where we landed I'm a big believer in you know there are going to be roadblocks there are going to be mistakes there's gonna be a lot of knows there's gonna be things that you think are gonna be great and are just not I mean we've done different shows that I thought was gonna be highly successful I've gone into you know buyer meetings like with this expectation that oh this is happening and then it's a no you know for a couple years and so I think just kind of also like realigning your expectations that it's gonna ebb and flow it's gonna be if you're getting into this business it's gonna be great days and really difficult days and um and not everything that you think is great at the time such as you know our our packaging debacle um is how you actually see it and so I think for me like having other mentors and people around me to kind of help just shed light so you're not just doing it just with your core team of people but that you have other people and other perspectives just to kind of speak into some things that maybe you're blinded by cause you're so in it and so I think that that's that was a big lesson for me both both super helpful really helpful you talk you mentioned trade shows any your favorite one personally so we have done a lot of the fancy food show we did Expo East before it changed um I've been to Expo West um not our own booth that's something that we haven't done which I feel like in this world it's you know you have to do those things but I know that you have to do those things I think that you go to the shows where you feel like you're gonna get the biggest return and um so yeah I'm trying to think what else we've done some distributor shows NFRA is a show we've done for frozen I feel like that's good um but yeah I I feel like Fancy Food is probably one of the more fun shows with um and a lot more uh results than I think some people have thought and it's a little bit smaller a little bit more manageable as far as building relationships and so yeah and that was kind of the first before all these other things have it so it's it's been really neat to see just the involvement of trade shows even but yeah I think they're wonderful I think it's it's a big way I feel like we've we've never gone to one that I can recall and something hasn't panned out whether that's two years down the line from that initial connection so I do think that they're valuable and you can you know go to them every year or you could take a year off it just I think just going based on the needs of your business and not feeling like you have to be at everything is also important so yeah yeah I totally agree with that you've been in the CPG space for a while now definitely in the frozen aisle any brands or specific brands are just kind of trends in the the space in general that you've been kind of tracking or things that have popped up in your radar that's gotten you kind of excited yeah I mean I have other brand friends that I love I went through um with the leisure guys are doing amazing we went through together yeah that's right we have friends a dear friend Carrie Moore and Kelly's biscuits they're in frozen and doing great and so I think just leaning into nostalgia something sweet I love those girls I saw she was on here and really just leaning into who you are and authenticity and I think there's a real desire for connection that people are looking for I think that that is translating to to what they're buying and what they're connecting with on shelf and so I don't know it's fun to see other family brands on shelves that are whether that's siblings or family members or mother daughter things like that I think that it's exciting to see that there's a place for that and that it's a becoming a more mainstream option for people to buy and so it's fun to be a part of that because I think you know all the bigger players in the space that authenticity piece is the key piece that I feel like is is missing and it's not something that you can replicate or recreate easily and and so I think it's just a really unique time and why frozen is doing so well is because that's just kind of coming back there's an expectation there from customers and so it's exciting to see and I'm cheering all of them on too so it's been fun yeah Amy this has been awesome really appreciate the time this has been super informative I think this will be really helpful for other operators in the space that are maybe a few years behind you but yeah what's the best place these days to people to follow along with you and then best place for people to follow along with the brand as well the brand is our Instagram is just Ro Ro's baking company we're on Facebook Instagram LinkedIn we post a lot of like the behind the scenes updates of my life and stuff which has been fun and connecting with people on there and then we're in retailers all throughout the Southeast Southwest so Whole Foods Harris Teeter we're in Gelson's now across by land to California so but lots of our store locators on there and you can find where we are but yeah a lot of retailers in frozen so thank you so much what LED to the whole process to go with the that then you can you know selling just the dough fast forward a few years I think it was like 2,013 you mentioned that the there aren't as many co I think if you and your gut feel like it's not right shifting gears a little bit merchandising standing out in the aisle a bit more when someone's walking down the frozen aisle we first started so we do a lot of e commerce on our website