Be honest. How many times have you surreptitiously slunk down an aisle or averted your eyes to avoid someone offering samples in the supermarket? Now, a number of America’s largest retail brands are turning to flavored, edible, food-grade strips manufactured by Bala Cynwyd-based First Flavor to tickle consumers’ taste buds. Inspired by the fruit-flavored wallpaper from the movie Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory, these dissolvable wonders are changing the face of food and beverage marketing. We spoke with company co-founder, president and CEO Jay Minkoff, a Wharton Business School graduate who lives in Wynnewood.
MLT: Tell us about your product.
JM: First Flavor is the first company to use edible film as a way to sample product flavors. They are to food and beverages what scent strips are to perfumes. We’re also the first to use them strictly for marketing purposes through attachments to newspaper and magazine pages, direct mail, and in-store and on-the-street distribution. We could even put a chocolate cake-flavored piece in a birthday card.
MLT: What are the past, present and future of First Flavor?
JM: Fellow Penn alumni Adnan Aziz, Josh Kopelman and I co-founded the company in 2005 based on Adnan’s Willy Wonka-inspired brainstorm, a grant from the Weiss Technology House at Penn and a Snider Seed Capital Award from the Wharton Venture Initiation Program. Because our sales cycle from initial client meeting to product debut can be anywhere from six months to two years, we’ve started slowly. Our revenues for 2009 were under $2 million. But, based on what we’ve already booked, we’re expecting to do somewhere between $3 and $5 million [this year].
MLT: Who are some of your clients?
JM: We’ve created flavor strips for Campbell Soup Company, Finlandia vodka, Sunny Delight, Bacardi and Captain Morgan rums, Jim Beam, Arm & Hammer and Welch Foods. We even made a mojito-flavored strip to help CBS Television promote one of its new shows. Right now, we’re working with our first international client to begin sampling in Europe.
MLT: How are you able to replicate complex, multilayered flavors?
JM: First, the flavor scientists at our strategic partner, David Michael & Co. in Northeast Philadelphia, break down the flavor into its basic components—think sweet, sour, smoky, cherry … This allows us to create layers for flavors like mojito, pepperoni pizza, buttered popcorn and glazed doughnut. As the film dissolves, it releases a sequence of flavors. For the doughnut, first you taste the glaze and then the dough. We can even replicate the authentic burn of rum or vodka without the use of alcohol.
MLT: What are the weirdest flavors you’ve been asked to replicate?
JM: The Florida Department of Health asked us to recreate the flavor of the bottom of an ashtray for its antismoking campaign for middle school students. At the request of a major racing bike manufacturer, we replicated a flavor with the components of dirt, sweat and grass.
MLT: So would Willy Wonka’s snozberries taste like snozberries?
JM: If we could get a snozberry sample, I’m confident that we could replicate it.
To learn more, visit firstflavor.com.