Gourmet News

Southern Glazer’s Promotes Kenrick to President of West Region

Published March 4, 2024

Southern Glazer’s Wine & Spirits—the world’s preeminent distributor of beverage alcohol—has promoted Lewis Kenrick to the role of president, West Region, effective March 1.

In his most recent role, Kenrick served as executive vice president, general manager of California. He will now report to John Wittig, Chief Commercial Officer, and is filling the position of Patrick Daul who recently announced his retirement. As President, West Region, Kenrick will be responsible for leading all business activities in Alaska, Idaho, Oregon, Washington, Arizona, New Mexico, California, Nevada, and Hawaii.

“Lewis’ commercial leadership experience in California, our largest market, helps make him the ideal successor for our sizeable West Region,” said Wittig. “I am confident that he will build on Patrick’s great leadership and continue to drive success for customers and suppliers well into the future.”

In 2008, Kenrick commenced his career at Southern Wine & Spirits, pioneering Trade Development for Chains across California. He soon stepped into roles of increasing responsibility, including Pacific Wine & Spirits vice president, sales manager for chains in 2010, followed by his appointment to vice president, general manager, PWS of California in 2013. In his next role as executive vice president, general manager, PWS of California and Hawaii, Kenrick led a dedicated division of over 500 sales professionals representing the prestigious portfolios of Diageo, Moët Hennessy USA, and Nolet Spirits. Prior to his tenure at Southern Glazer’s, Kenrick honed his expertise at Diageo, with roles at Chateau & Estates in Napa, Calif., and later in the National Account organization.

An announcement for Lewis Kenrick’s successor will be forthcoming.

Southern Glazer’s Wine & Spirits is the world’s preeminent distributor of beverage alcohol, building brands for moments that matter. The multi-generational, family-owned company has operations in 44 U.S. states, the District of Columbia, and Canada, as well as brokerage operations through its WEBB Banks division in the Caribbean, Central and South America. Southern Glazer’s urges all retail customers and adult consumers to market, sell, serve, and enjoy its products responsibly. For more information visit www.southernglazers.com. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram @sgwinespirits.

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Milkboy to Promote New White Chocolate Bar at Natural Products Expo West

Published March 4, 2024

Milkboy Swiss Chocolates will showcase its newest White Chocolate with Bourbon Vanilla and Raspberries bar at Natural Products Expo West from March 13-15 at the Anaheim Convention Center. From their Swiss Chalet-themed booth #N247 in the North Hall, Milkboy will also preview other upcoming seasonal chocolate flavors.The new White Chocolate bar joins a product line that includes other flavors like Finest Alpine Milk, Alpine Milk with Roasted Almonds, Alpine Milk with Crunchy Caramel and Sea Salt, White Chocolate with Bourbon Vanilla, Extra Dark 85% Cocoa, Finest 72% Dark Chocolate with Fresh Roasted Coffee, and Finest 72% Dark Chocolate with Crispy Mint. All bars have a suggested retail price of $4.99.

“After seeing the incredible feedback for our original white chocolate bar, we were inspired to make the new White Chocolate with Bourbon Vanilla and Raspberries bar. It pairs bourbon vanilla with all-natural cocoa butter and raspberries for a decadent taste experience,” said Milkboy founder Emanuel Schmerling. “We use 100 percent all-natural Madagascan vanilla, Swiss Alpine milk and sustainably-sourced cocoa beans to produce this exceptional bar and we invite everyone to stop by our booth for a taste.”

Milkboy Swiss Chocolates are sold at many specialty food retailers, including Whole Foods Market and Sprouts Farmers Market locations. Milkboy Chocolates are also available online at https://milkboy.com/ and on Amazon.

Milkboy Swiss Chocolates is on a mission to source the finest quality, natural and sustainable ingredients in order to create extraordinary chocolate and practice traditional Swiss chocolate manufacturing without compromise or shortcuts. Chocolates are produced in Switzerland from milk sourced from the Swiss Alpine region.

Milkboy Swiss Chocolates is a five-time sofi Award winner for Best Chocolates, including a 2021 sofi Gold Award for the Best Milk Chocolate, and five-time Great Taste Award winner. The chocolates are gluten-free, non-GMO, soy-free and certified Kosher.

Milkboy chocolate uses only Rainforest Alliance-certified cocoa in its chocolate products and Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certified paper for its packaging. For more information, please visit https://milkboy.com/. Follow Milkboy on Instagram or Facebook @milkboychocolate.

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Food Industry Operators See Growth in 2024, FLIP Report Shows

Published March 1, 2024

The Food Liability Insurance Program, a national insurance program designed for small- to mid-sized operators in the food industry, released its inaugural “Food Industry Economic and Trend Outlook Report,” which includes proprietary statistics on insurance trends in the category, survey results from operators insured by FLIP, and general economic statistics on the category as a whole.

The report includes a marketwide analysis of out-of-home food businesses, excluding restaurants and grocers, and segment-specific insights of bakers, mobile bartenders, caterers, event-based businesses such as food truck and farmers market vendors, personal chefs and home (cottage) food businesses.

“We look to not only be an insurance vendor to our customers but a partner in their success,” said Daryle Stafford, CEO of Veracity Insurance, FLIP’s parent company. “As such, we decided to compile this report in the hopes that our insured will find the information valuable in planning and benchmarking their business against industrywide and segmented trends as they look to grow.

“Some inspiring notes from our findings include that 64 percent of our client operators believe their businesses will grow in 2024 and that consumers are spending more on out-of-home food than ever before (a 6 percent increase YoY). We look forward to continuing to provide actionable content for our customers in the months ahead aligning with our commitment of being a true partner in their businesses.”
FLIP statistical highlights from the report include:

An analysis of insurance claims processed in 2023 compared to 2022 shows an increase of 2.3 percent. The most prevalent claim type in 2023 was an auto or trailer incident, which represented 28 percent of all claims. The following three claim types were accident-causing third-party damage (18 percent), theft (13 percent) and equipment failure of food spoilage (13 percent) respectively.
The average payout for all claims filed was $4,632.
California, Texas and Florida represented the highest concentrations of claims throughout the United States.

Food business owners felt the impact of higher food costs in 2023, with 65 percent of those surveyed indicating rising costs impacted their net income, although data suggests that from the beginning of 2023 to the end, wholesale food prices decreased 5.7 percent. Less than 3 percent of FLIP operators surveyed believe costs will continue to go down.

Operators are planning to continue to raise prices in 2024, with 91 percent reporting they believe ticket sizes will go up in 2024.
Operators are still relying on cash as 69 percent indicated they do not plan on going cashless in 2024, with 30 percent planning to do so.
56 percent of food operators plan to spend similar amounts on marketing in 2024 as they did in 2023, with 34 percent planning to increase their spend.

Overall, each category analyzed is growing in market size YoY with food trucks being the most (9.9 percent), followed by caterers (7.7 percent), farmers market vendors (7 percent), home-based (cottage) food businesses (4.2 percent), mobile bartenders (3 percent), bakers (2.4 percent) and personal chefs (2.4 percent).

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