Interview with yamo.bio

How can it be that baby food that is older than the child eating it is still being sold in supermarkets today? This is a central question that motivated the founders of the Zug-based start-up, yamo, to develop baby food that’s fresh, healthy and free of additives.

From the very outset, yamo focused on direct online sales. We spoke with Tobias Gunzenhauser, one of the founders of yamo, about the joys and pains of a start-up and his recipe for success in the direct-to-consumer market.

You decided to focus on direct online sales from the outset. This isn’t altogether easy when it comes to food. What led to this decision?

There were two main reasons. First, we were aware that it’s very difficult to persuade larger retailers to add you to their range. We didn’t assume that we would be able to overcome this hurdle within a reasonable period of time.

Second, proximity to customers was and remains central. We wanted to develop our products quickly and this made direct customer contact extremely important to us. During the early days, we were especially keen to interact with our customers in order to understand what we can do better and find out how our products are perceived. Of course, regular and intensive interaction with customers is time consuming, but its immense benefits were clear to us and we learnt a lot.

Your success proves you right. Were there any aspects that were considerably easier than expected and went entirely to plan and others which became quite challenging?

We were pleasantly surprised by our customers’ willingness to give feedback. We used various formats for customer dialogue ranging from direct phone calls, interacting in the Facebook group and visits to kindergartens. Our customers participated enthusiastically.

Of course, there were some areas that we perhaps underestimated. Logistics, for one, which is an obstacle for fresh products. This led us to work hard on finding the right packaging to ensure the products reach customers in flawless condition while allowing us to use easily recyclable materials.

I also find striking a balance between agility and the strict pursuit of goals challenging. Start-ups can be faced with a very high number of opportunities. At the same time, you need to be careful not to go down every potential avenue. Once we became better known, we received huge numbers of enquiries and offers. I had to learn to be stricter and willing to say no every now and then.

What do you think was especially important to your success?

Without a doubt, the most crucial element is now the team. It may sound trivial, but I was unaware of its significance at the beginning of our journey. However, a team that passionately pulls together and is willing to go the extra mile when needed is without equal.

And ultimately, it also comes down to a great deal of demanding work and stamina.

You’re now finding your way onto more and more supermarket shelves. Is this a departure from the D2C model? Where do you see yourselves in three years?

It’s impossible to say exactly. We think a healthy mix is important. But we still want to achieve considerable growth in the traditional retail sector, even if the coronavirus pandemic has slowed us down. Growth in high street retail requires a lot of hard work. Expansion in this sector is highly linear and is only possible through increased floorspace in businesses.

We’ve also started our first trial with Amazon, but we’re not placing a very heavy focus on this at present.

Which developments in digital retail do you think are particularly important?

Logistics is a central topic for us. It’s still very complex. At a time when the whole e-food sector is growing, it’s likely there will be new logistics solutions coming onto the market for chilled products, which will help us too.

Voice-based ordering will also become more important. Smart speakers from Amazon, Google, Apple and co. are now in widespread use in certain countries and this will have an impact on purchasing habits.

Finally, I’m sure that the products on offer will become more personalized. For instance, we’ve drawn up a questionnaire to help us suggest the right products to customers. We’ll also be doing more with personalization in terms of product design and marketing.