Business Spotlight: Float the Boat

Up a creek without a paddle.

That’s what many might predict for a startup selling expensive specialty food during this slow-moving economic recovery. Yet during the past 18 months, that’s exactly what law partners Jerry Harmison Jr. and Greg Pearman have done with Float Trip Pickles LLC.

The endeavor began as a hobby, a recreational diversion from Harmison & Pearman PC, their 20-year-old practice specializing in workers’ compensation defense.

The three-product Float Trip line – including the original pickle and jalapeno mix, pickle and jalapeno relish, and basic jalapeno peppers – has gained a strong local presence and is expanding into other regional markets. Using a recipe perfected during nearly two decades of the Harmison family’s annual excursions on the North Fork River, the company founded in April 2011 is building its brand on grassroots marketing, niche strategies and a national trend toward locally sourced food.

The first public exposure came at the 2010 Rotary Rock ‘n Ribs BBQ Festival, when their sampling supply disappeared within hours of the event kick-off. Harmison and Pearman returned the next year with cases of the product, packaged and branded with the Pearman-designed Float Trip Pickles logo, which memorializes the red canoe favored by the late Jerry Harmison Sr.

On advice from fellow attorney and crossover chocolatier Shawn Askinosie, founder of small-batch manufacturer Askinosie Chocolate, the pickle partners launched a strategy of cautious growth to counter any surges in unmet demand.

“Shawn told us to definitely keep our day jobs,” Pearman says. “But he also offered us a key piece of advice. He said, ‘Don’t under-price your product. You are not competing with Vlasic. Like specialty chocolate, you have a niche product, and niche consumers are willing to pay more for a unique product.’”

And many consumers have. At $6.75 per jar, there are numerous pickle, pepper and relish options at a fraction of the cost. Yet as Float Trip Pickles wrapped up its first full calendar business cycle, Pearman estimated 2012 production of about 9,000 jars, with combined wholesale and direct sales revenues of roughly $42,000.

Grassroots efforts
The partnership includes Harmison’s daughter, Jessica Straub, whose husband Taylor also helps with production. Drawing on the network of the law partners’ business and civic associations, Float Trip Pickles has built clientele through sampling and word-of-mouth. The first local retail outlets were Harter House, Brown Derby International Wine Center and Homegrown Foods. The partners expanded distribution to Price Cutter a year ago, and product is now on the shelves of 28 of the chain’s area stores.

Local collaboration also is extending the product’s reach beyond festival booths and grocery store sampling. Springfield’s Touch Restaurant touts the product in a co-branded menu item, as does Nixa’s Pickled Pepper Deli with its Float Trip Chicken Salad. Doc’s Hickory Roadhouse in Branson sells Float Trip Pickle products, and the partners are working with other local eateries on similar deals.

While Price Cutter accepts shipment at its warehouse and delivers to their own stores, the partners have just begun using Springfield-based Packers Distributing Co. to expand the reach of Float Trip products throughout northwest Arkansas and as far north as the Interstate 70 corridor.

The company keeps production simple and inexpensive, spending around $100 for their semiweekly four-hour sessions at Your Commercial Kitchen, 3433 S. Campbell Ave., Ste. C. This type of leased space has become a popular choice for other culinary entrepreneurs, allowing them to adhere to health codes while creating products and sharing stories of trial and error.

“Float Trip has done fantastic,” says Carol Muldrow, owner of Your Commercial Kitchen. “I love to see these businesses grow. Instead of doing cases with 24 jars of pickles, they’re now doing pallets of cases. It’s getting to the point where they’ll need their own packaging equipment pretty soon.”

The Float Trip partners, however, intend to keep the pickle production secondary to their law practice.

“This is still a hobby job, so we do it at night,” Pearman says of the partners’ efforts in adding their spices and flavors to store-bought pickles and jalapenos. “With the four of us working together, the current process is such that each additional hour we put in yields an exponential increase in output. Even if we doubled our weekly cooking time, leasing this space would still be the most viable means of production.”

Regional markets and sourcing
To continue the grassroots efforts, the partners commit between 2 and 4 percent of all stock to samplings and giveaways. While this may impact short-term revenues, they have begun to reap the long-term benefits of expanding nontraditional distribution vehicles. Their strategy has included donations to charity auctions and sending sample cases with tailgaters traveling to St. Louis Rams, Kansas City Chiefs and University of Missouri football games.

Visits to St. Louis and Kansas City trade shows also have helped open doors to new markets. Product is now stocked on the shelves of Cosentino’s markets and Price Chopper stores in Kansas City, as well as across the state in St. Louis area Schnucks stores.

With a presence in the online marketplace, Float Trip Pickles have been shipped to individual consumers in 20 states.

With an estimated second-year sales growth of 25 percent, Float Trip Pickles is riding the specialty foods culinary trend. Their product category – Refrigerated Salsas and Dips, Teas and Pickles, Peppers, Olives and Other Vegetables – claims the highest penetration of the 51 segments in the $75 billion annual specialty foods industry, according to the National Association for the Specialty Food Trade. Additionally, the trade group reports that four out of every 10 specialty food manufacturers recorded sales increases of 20 percent or more last year.

“Southwest Missouri mirrors these trends,” Pearman says. “As culinary tastes continue to diversify, we plan on being available on even more shelves and in more local eateries to meet that demand.”[[In-content Ad]]