⚡ How this Start-Up is Disrupting the Food Industry with Salad Dressings

Morning Innovators ⚡ In less than 5 minutes, we’ll cover…

🥳 The best funding opportunities, events and jobs in the start-up world
📰 The biggest news stories in the start-up world
🥗 How this Start-Up is disrupting the food industry with salad dressings
🤬 How you can use bad reviews for global publicity
📥 A tool to get your pitch deck in front of investors

✨ Last weeks most clicked link was this link to take you through to Spring Studio’s accelerator programme in which successful applicants are eligible to up to $150,000 in investment.

Happy hustling,
Rich

🎤 Events/Opportunities

🧑‍🚀 Aviva and Founders Factory have partnered up to create a dedicated Fintech programme. Successful applicants get access to £50,000 in funding, alongside 6 months operational support. You can apply here.

💸 Seedcamp are actively looking to invest up to $1,000,000 in Angel rounds all the way up to Seed rounds in companies solving global problems with technology, you can pitch them here.

💻 Founder + Lightning are looking to invest in business with a B2B offering who are looking for help with their existing tech or are looking for their next tech opportunity, you can apply here.

🐶 Product Manager, PetsApp
👷 Senior Fullstack Engineer, Shamaazi
🗂 Business Operations, Tilt

🚕 The Bolt Alumni are starting their own companies across Europe. Sifted

🏧 a16z-backed Fintech Tally, which raised $172m in funding, is shutting down because they’ve run out of cash TechCrunch

🎶 SoundCloud launches its own merch store, will let artists create their own designs. TechCrunch

💤 Revolut Backer, Balderton Capital, raises £1bn over 2 funds. UKTN

🥗 All Dressed Up Dressings: Revolutionising the Dressings Market with Natural Flavours

In a market often dominated by processed ingredients and artificial flavours, All Dressed Up is on a mission to shake up the dressings category! Founded by former private chef, Tessa Reed, this challenger brand emphasises flavour, health, and convenience by offering dressings made with all-natural ingredients. Free from refined sugar, gluten, and dairy, All Dressed Up aims to make healthy eating more enjoyable and accessible. This article explores the journey of All Dressed Up, highlighting their strategies, challenges, and lessons learned, providing valuable insights for aspiring entrepreneurs in the food and beverage industry.

The Genesis of All Dressed Up: Crafting Healthy, Flavourful Dressings

All Dressed Up was born out of a desire to create dressings that are not only delicious but also healthy and made from natural ingredients. The founder, Tessa Reed, has a background as a private chef, which played a crucial role in developing dressings that cater to health-conscious consumers who refuse to compromise on flavour. By focusing on high-quality ingredients and exceptional taste, All Dressed Up aims to elevate the dressing experience for everyone.

Acquiring the First Customers: Engaging on Social Media

All Dressed Up leveraged the power of social media to attract their first customers, launching via Instagram in December 2023. In the build-up to the launch the brand engaged with its followers to make key decisions about branding, including logos, colours, and fonts. This really gave their followers the ability to feel involved with the development of the brand, creating a deeper connection with it. Tessa then went deeper into creating content by creating recipe reels showcasing the dressings in various dishes, they demonstrated how easy it is to enhance meals, resulting in the sale of over 350 bottles within just two weeks.

Scaling the Business: Outsourcing Production

As demand grew, the founder realised that scaling production beyond their own kitchen was essential. Outsourcing production allowed All Dressed Up to meet increasing demand and prepare for larger retail opportunities. This strategic move was necessary for growth but came with its own set of challenges, including finding a manufacturer willing to work with a Start-Up. Lots of people said it was too early to be looking for a manufacturer, but the founder was pleased they started looking when they did, as it takes a long time to get everything set up

Lessons Learned: Persistence and Product Development

One of the key lessons for All Dressed Up was the importance of persistence and laying the right foundations for success. Building a business requires time and effort, and the journey can often feel slow. Additionally, if starting over, the founder would have focused more on developing a wider range of dressings initially, capitalizing on the time spent on new product development (NPD).

Funding the Start-Up: Bootstrapping to Profitability

All Dressed Up was initially funded through personal savings of approximately £7k. These funds were used for the first production run, including purchasing bottles, labels, and other essentials. Despite not yet investing in promotional activities, the business has achieved profitability. Looking ahead, the founder plans to raise investment to support marketing, SEO, and further growth.

Overcoming Challenges: Finding the Right Manufacturer

One of the most significant challenges All Dressed Up faced was finding a suitable manufacturer. While the current manufacturing partner meets their needs, the journey to find the right one was not straightforward, highlighting the difficulties Start-Ups can face in securing reliable production partners.

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We’ve all seen it when that local business we love, that we know is absolutely fantastic, gets one scathingly bad review because they caught a customer on a bad day. Inside, we’re all also petrified that it might happen to us too!

Well, that’s exactly what happened to the Italian restaurant, Mario House. After one customer claimed that their coffee was the worst she’d had in her life, the team at Mario House saw this as an opportunity for a viral marketing stunt.

By creating this sign outside, it got people laughing, talking and posting it everywhere. As a result of that, national and international media outlets picked it up and within a matter of days, this local Italian was global!

The extra layer of genius to this, was that everyone wanted to go in and try it to see if it really was that bad! So, not only did it get them global attention, it also got them record levels of footfall!

How can you use a negative review to create record levels of traffic to your business?

Each week we highlight our favourite tools - either something we’ve been using in our businesses, or tools that our innovator community have recommended.

OpenVC Decks is a free DocSend alternative to share your pitch deck with investors. Generate unlimited deck links from a PDF, share them via email, Whatsapp, X, and get powerful analytics. The best part: all the data is automatically sent to your Fundraising CRM!

Next week I’ll be highlighting another awesome Start-Up (if you want us to feature you, drop us a message), as well as sharing all the usuals including funding opportunities, Start-Up news, plus plenty of awesome tips, tricks and tools.

P.S. Connect with me on LinkedIn…