You're Losing Out On Free Samples: This App Helps You Find Them

**[00:00:00]** Hello everyone, my name is Presc and welcome to the web talk show. Today we've got Al Schuster and Heather Johnson from SampleFinder. Welcome Al. Welcome Heather. How are you doing? Good. >> Great, thanks. Excited to be here. >> No, my pleasure. I'm really happy to hear about SampleFinder. But before that, let's talk a little bit about who you are and how this came along because the audience will want to know why we're talking about SampleFinder today. >> Um, why don't I jump in first? Uh my name is Al Schustster. I'm the president and owner of Polaris Brand Promotions. Uh we're a 9-year-old uh experiential marketing and promotional staffing agency. And uh I'm one of the two co-founders along with Heather of SampleFinder, a brand new app, uh that's going to share experiential events and like samplings and and you know, things like that directly with consumers and reward them through prizes and contests uh for engaging with the app. Very interesting. So tell me what does experiential brand activation mean? So yeah, it all falls under the umbrella of experiential marketing and it is the the word is in the name experience, but what that actually means is that you're providing experiences as a brand for the people who are interested in your brand or products or services to experience them or experience the vibe that you want to give out as a company. So you might create an experience that is super fun and you're basically saying we're a fun company or you might do something that's very complex and it's like if you're able to experience this, our product is very complex and you're one of uh a very specific target audience. So it's knowing who your target audience is and then creating **[00:02:00]** experiences for them. And our agency does everything from um the experiences of maybe trying a product before you get to buy it and learning about what that product is from a person who is standing right there. So it's not just reading on your phone. You're getting the experience of a professional in front of you. Or it could be a product launch that is a bigger deal. It could be a festival. It could be almost anything as long as it's an experience. >> Wow. Okay. So there's a lot to unpack there. What types of brands do these sort of activations? Is it mostly bigger major type businesses? Do small businesses also do this sort of thing? In terms of size, uh our agency works with everything from startup uh brands that are new to market all the way up to national and international brands uh where we've done campaigns in multiple markets simultaneously. Um, as for the types of brands, I'd have to say we've worked, you know, primarily, I would say, in the alcoholic beverage and the consumer package good spaces, um, but anywhere where our clients need to promote their products and services directly to like consumers or to end users, maybe in like a, you know, B2B kind of environment, um, you know, we we'll service all of them. >> Very interesting. While you were talking, Heather, about the the different ways for people to interact with the brand or make it fun, I immediately thought of Chad Holmes and how he talks about like the events that were just regular industry events that were very boring and then he did all these exciting different activities with the lab coats and things like that for people to really enjoy. And for people who **[00:04:00]** don't know who Chad Holm is, he wrote the ultimate sales machine, uh, many other things. But, um, that I remember reading that and it was so interesting to see how something so out of the box can really make that brand outperform the other ones and that event. Is that the sort of thing that we're we're talking about? >> Yeah, it could absolutely be that. I mean, it the experience itself might not be directly tied to what the product is. For example, we go to a lot of trade shows in our industry. We've been to Expo West. We've been to Bar Convent Brooklyn. And one of the booths, one of the alcoholic beverages booth at Bar Convent Brooklyn had a tarot card reading set up. And it was because the vibe of their whole thing was was a little bit in that in that world. So, it could really be anything um with your target audience. And then one thing with the names, um, because our agency, Polaris Brand Promotions, um, has no minimums, we work with smaller brands too to allow them the opportunity at a lower scale to experience this. And then our app, SampleFinder, which I know we're going to get to, it also helps like smaller businesses as well. So, we're really for everybody. Um, the larger brands will have more money to maybe do a little bit more, but it doesn't mean you can't connect with your target audience, even if you're small. That makes sense. And that's where my question was going. So if I'm a small business or a startup or I don't know, maybe I have um businesses that had been around for a long time, maybe I have 50 employees or whatever and I'm thinking about getting **[00:06:00]** out there and maybe doing an event or you talked about festivals. For for me as a business owner, that might be too abstract. Like how am I going to get into a festival? What does my business that sells nuts like drill bits or whatever do in a festival and and things like that? So, how does someone get into these um what does how does one even know to approach a company like Polaris to to do something like this? I'd have to say, you know, obviously just the key thing is knowing your target audience. you know, who is your consumer and you know, what are you selling and how can you engage with them and then really picking the right type of venue, the right atmosphere, things like that. Like you know a lot of times our clients will you know hire us to just do you know events where you know it's a large public space or space with a lot of like foot traffic or things like that. Um you know but also you know they have come to us with like outside the box ideas like um you know we were working with you know a potential client on doing something where we were going around in like a custom fabricated uh you know like drivable um kind of like setup something you put in the back of the truck um where it could go around to different you know festivals and activations and that was a uh kind of a service that was you know any almost anyone could could use. Um so really just you know understanding the event uh itself you know who is like the target demographic uh you know who are the attendees that are going to be **[00:08:00]** going there just to make sure you find that right uh like synergy and alignment um you know in order to maximize your return by hitting that right audience. Interesting. You talk about activation and I know in the space very common term. What does activation mean for someone who has no idea about brand marketing or positioning >> event? So if you if you really if you really bring it all the way back, everything that we do is creating um unforgettable experiences and events for our brands. So if you think about an activation as an event, it's you're creating a little mini event. It could be very small. It could be for your example um we have set up in like an Ace Hardware. So, we could be set up right there and showing how to use this or maybe understanding the different types of bolts or if it's food, the different flavors and you have somebody there speaking to it. So, quite often the events that we work with, we have uh close to 10,000 brand ambassadors nationwide. So, those brand ambassadors are on site as the one-on-one personal touch for your company to be able to maybe say the things you can't say in just a regular ad or, you know, through an influencer. It's somebody who can answer your questions on the spot because we train them to become professionals in your industry. So, it's not like um we're out there like, oh, I'm just a brand ambassador. We we train our brand ambassadors to go out and be like, I'm part of this team and I know how to explain these things to you and give the information directly from the brand to the consumer um through a trained uh we can call **[00:10:00]** them brand ambassador or event staff if it's an event um activation models. All of those types of of like people are under our talent and then they they create the activation for you. So the we we say the term activation because >> it is sort of like you're activating in new markets maybe or existing markets >> to connect with your target audience, but >> it is an event that you're setting up. >> Okay. So like the ninja guy at Costco showing off the blenders or whatever, that's that's the type of Okay. Okay. >> That would technically be an activation. >> Okay. Yeah. Yeah. And I and I think I recall going to one of these like wine places that they sell all sorts of I don't want to say the name, but the they had a booth for a bourbon, right? Somebody had a desk with a bourbon and and I think it I seem to recall there was somebody who was evidently from the brand, but then also there was someone else with them and sort of and assisting with a little more professional touch uh kind of deal. So is that the sort of thing we're talking about? >> Yes, exactly that. >> Interesting. Very interesting. So does this I know you you work in certain industries, but would it apply to any industry? Just depends on on who's servicing it. >> Yeah. Um most of our we started with like 90% of what we do being alcohol and then we've expanded because there's non-alcoholic brands and then there's food and beverage and then there's services. uh we've set up at trade shows to walk people through uh very technical um services. For example, we could be lead source lead helpers. Um you **[00:12:00]** mentioned the person who's helping local help. Sometimes it's really hard to do a lot of activations or talk to a lot of crowd people um at the same time and you have an extra hand just to help. It could be uh they jump in as needed. Maybe they go um and talk about your brand while you're doing um a special sampling or maybe it's the opposite. They're preparing you for the sampling while you're talking. It each company is different. That's why we're super customizable. And then all of those activations we we do are now with our app going to be promoted to the world. >> Okay. So, let's talk about the app. I I want to know what sample finder does and and how it can help businesses and what actually does first of all but uh because it seems to be something that sort of bridges a gap that that is there. Tell me a little bit about that. >> So I came up with the concept of sample finder while I was actually doing an activation. Uh, it was a kind of a really funky layout store with like three entrances and it was split over two levels and I was put in a very like hightraic part of the store. But I I kind of realized that, you know, I really wasn't getting a lot of the traffic in the store. Like people would walk in, they would go to their, you know, whatever aisle they wanted to go to, pick up their items, they pay for it, and leave, and they would not pass me at all. And I was getting set up for my event. I was a little annoyed. And I'm like, I really wish there was a way **[00:14:00]** to promote these uh these sampling events. >> Mhm. >> Um sometimes they are promoted. The stores will have like a dry erase board or a chalkboard with like, you know, the upcoming tasting schedule. Sometimes our clients themselves will put it out in their social media like stop by, you know, the store from 4:00 to 7:00 on a Friday and try our product. Um but there's no real like one centralized hub. A lot of times our clients uh will rely on like the natural foot traffic of the venue, you know, of the people that are engaging, you know, with brands at that space being the store already because they're going in to buy it. Uh we're usually set up, you know, sometimes near where the product, you know, the product aisle is, so you're getting the people are looking to purchase that. Um, so I kind of realiz like it would be not only great to have a um, you know, like an app to share this um, but also be able to like, you know, incentivize people to come back out into stores. Like we launched under the hashtag of or launching under the hashtag of save retail in our kind of our campaign. Um, because so many people are now, you know, going just doing e-commerce and doing grocery delivery and and, you know, you know, all sorts of delivery. It really limits, you know, the consumer's ability to choose it. You know, it kind of kills that, you know, that retail experience of having, you know, products. You can look at an aisle and see different products of different prices and you can look at the boxes and things and really, you know, a lot of the products that are in like, you **[00:16:00]** know, the e-commerce platforms, you know, the ones at the top of the search results are the ones that they want you to see. So, you're not looking at all the options at once. you know, the option you, you know, actually would choose would probably be on the second or third, you know, page of results or something like that. Um, so we're really building SampleFinder to, you know, kind of encourage consumers to get back out into stores. Um, it will help the brands because it'll give additional promotion and exposure to their brands during and really be really before the activation itself. And then for stores, it'll help get traffic back into their retail establishments and may in fact pull consumers that may, you know, do their shopping at a different store into the store where the demo is happening and do like maybe like their entire weekly shopping there just because the demo and activation something cool and fun is going to be there. That makes a lot of sense. So, while you were talking, I don't know if you saw my my insight look, I understood why you were saying sample finder. Okay. So, you're you're finding sample stores that are doing demos for samples. That's amazing. I I would love that because you especially if you know the product because like regard we'll talk about not knowing the product but if let's say there's there's a product that I'm sort of interested in but I've never seen it and I don't know exactly how it works or I don't know if I really like it and I want to know more but it's I feel I'm very far from the brand and not all brands are very social uh media oriented and so having **[00:18:00]** someone like that oh that's the the one I wanted let me just go to at store like you were saying, see the demo, see what's what this is about and then from there it goes, right? And and so I can see it in definitely in the alcoholic the beverage space, but also like we were talking like the the knife space or the kitchen appliance or whatever. Maybe I've wanted to see if those things really work and now I see, oh, they're going to have it at the store. Let me go and like you said, I'll just do my shopping there because I'm there already. Most people are not necessarily tied to a store because they absolutely love it. It's just for convenience or they already know the layout. But if but if if you have another reason to bring them in, that's that's very neat. How does it work in terms of what do I see in the app? Do I just see everything? Does it filter? Do I have my categories that it knows that I like or how does how's that experience? >> Yeah, you you're you're you're describing it a little bit. Um, yes. So, it will be open to obviously all events that we work with with our promo staffing agency. We're open to working with other promo staffing agencies for their events. We're open to working with stores and putting their events in there. And then once those events are in there, the user logs on, they can search if they would like to. They can search by radius, by category, by date, see what's in their area. As they move around, the map updates with them and they can see little pins on the map. Uh, click, see what **[00:20:00]** it is. You can favorite it. So when you favorite a brand, you'll be able to first of all always remember what it was. Because sometimes people try samples and then they're like, I don't know what I just tried, but I loved it. I wish I remembered. I wish I took a photo. Well, now it's in your app and it's in your history. So that helps on that brand loyalty end. And um you also will be able to add it to your calendar so that if you know that you're going to be in a certain place this weekend, you'll be like, "Okay, from doing my grocery shopping at this place so that I can try this new chocolate." Um that's definitely one way that it will work. And then those those brands will always be in there for you to kind of just scroll through and see and read descriptions of what it is, see when there's upcoming events, if there are any in your area. And another thing is that once you do go to the event, you can earn rewards just for checking in. You earn rewards for leaving a review. So say you tried it, you love it so much and you want to tell the brand right now, I love it and I'm switching and I'm always going to use yours. You can you can leave a fivestar review. You could say what you loved best about it. There's a little text field that you can send to the brand. Now, we'll moderate it, of course, but that way the brand is also getting more ROI and more data and more feedback from all of this campaigns that they're putting out there with, you know, fingers crossed people show up. Well, this **[00:22:00]** app will make sure hopefully people will show up. They'll leave reviews for you. >> You can maybe build more well, you'll be building more brand awareness, of course, but brand loyalty at the same time. >> Very neat. We Yeah, I can I definitely see it see the advantage of it. I I want to And also like there's people who go um garage sale hunting, right? And like um um what what are these um estate sale hunting and things like that just for the fun of it, right? Look, they they like these mini activities, mini adventures. And I think there's a big market for this as well in the terms of like, oh, what are we going to do today? Oh, let's go find some samples and like just go to places that are having samples or demos or things like that because it's actually fun. I like I remember going to Sidetrack, sorry, but uh we were in the Kent County Fair and they had this guy doing the you know the the wipe sham I sham or something like that. They were doing the actual thing that you saw on TV like it had the he had the headset and he was talking he was doing all the demos. It was so fun to watch it in real life >> and I I I I don't believe I remembered the name. So the because of that, >> right? So so great as as a tool to find demos or things to just go and browse and just have that experience that human experience that e-commerce doesn't give you. I think it's excellent. And then obviously it comes with everything downstream. But that's really neat. >> Yeah, thank you. We're really excited about it. I **[00:24:00]** loved the idea when Al told me about it and uh we both like he was at an activation. I still go out and do activations. I we've been doing them for years. I remember I used to post on my social media like hey I'm going to be at this place at this time. Come and stop by. And that is so minimal, but I always wanted an app like this. So when when Al came up with the concept, I was like that's it. That's perfect. Let's let's do this because I know our brand ambassadors will be excited and I know and you can see immediately the value that it brings to the brands to the stores. It's exciting. >> And you touched on something very important. Many brands don't have a social presence. They they might have their networks, but they're not using them properly. They're not posting things that people relate to. And so even if they're posting a lot, maybe they don't have good traction on social, which is the what you need nowadays. Like that's the way you get a lot of traffic. >> Yeah. With algorithm that's a whole other challenge >> and and so if if you're very good at content like some influencers are then great because you get a lot of traffic. So if an influencer talks about your brand that's great because people see it etc. This is very helpful I think looking at it from the perspective of let's say this this brand wants to put some samples in a store right or do a demo at an expo or whatever. people don't know about it and if they share it on their socials, people won't know about it either because they're not active on social. So **[00:26:00]** now they have to rely on a third party influencer or whatever. But with this as people start using it for many things, it becomes a sort of hub, right? Which I I guess all that was the purpose of it. And so this hub means there's traffic to it. And so people who don't have their own following can take advantage of that or get gain from that hub having that community that's already looking and so it gives them access to immediately like hey I'm doing a demo or things like that get people into the door. >> Yeah. >> Very nice. >> One of the interesting things about our app is um couple things actually. Um first of all uh to touch on your points um you know we are not giving preferential treatment to any sampling events. Um how the app is going to work is you know on kind of the home screen it's going to show you the events that are happening the closest to you and the soonest in time kind of in that order. So, you know, if you're a startup little, you know, like cola brand, you you're going to get results the same as like, you know, a major soda supplier would. Um, just because you happen to be closer to that event because that event is occurring closer to you. Um, so that's really how we're going to kind of put the brands on equal footing. Now, we may have like, you know, little pop-up advertisements and, you know, kind of specialized marketing campaigns, but as for actually finding the events themselves, um, it's very much evening the playing field. So, you know, those startup brands will have just as much as exposure as the major ones. Excellent. That's **[00:28:00]** sort of how Tik Tok works. Many people don't don't understand this, but it's the way the algorithm works is very complex, of course, but it doesn't matter if you have a 5 million follower audience or a twoerson audience. Your post, if it resonates with an audience, will get boosted. So, you can have an account with five followers and get 1 million views, whereas you can have that 5 million account and have 1,000 views, right? because the post itself didn't resonate with the audience. So, it's that idea of making the audience tell you if it's actually good. So, I really like that you're doing that where it's it's close to the person so it's actually relevant to the person and thus that's what they should see, not just the big brand because they're the big brand and had the money to do it because then the small one never gets access. Right. >> Right. >> That's really neat. And then you just had a debut at CES, correct? >> Mhm. How was that? Tell us about it. >> Um, I would say Heather, I'd love to, you know, obviously, you know, hear your perspective as well. Um, you know, it was interesting. Um, you know, it was, you know, we were in Eureka Park, which is kind of like the startup area. As I said before we started recording, it's very different from, um, you know, like being an exhibitor versus being an attendee. Uh definitely a lot of interest, definitely a lot of traffic to our booth. Um you know, it was good. We did a little bit of pre-show promotion uh that, you know, kind of helped to get some people to stop by. Um but overall, you know, I kind of think that **[00:30:00]** CES, you know, it is what you make of it. Um you know, for events like that, like you really need to do that, you know, that pre-show promotion and really, you know, find ways to, you know, again, resonate with your audience, you know, you know, having a booth there. Um, Heather, what about you? >> Yeah, it was interesting. So, I had never been and so I did get to walk around a little bit and see what else was there and then come and see what we were doing and Eureka Park was very fun place to be. There were so many people excited about their ideas and so we were excited to share ours too. One thing that we did to help differentiate us from the surrounding area was because we are a brand activation promoting app and often those brand activations are sampling. We set up a sample event what it would look like in a store at our booth so that people walking by could see like we had sample cups, we had it all set up. We had our brand ambassador, amazing brand ambassador, uh, handing them out and engaging and I, Al and I would be talking to somebody and being like, this is exactly the type of activation. So, it was really cool in that space to be able to have that opportunity to share what we do in that way. Um, but yeah, being there was it was amazing. It was it was very big and you know it was you know we were all set up talking about engaging with people and hitting your target audience and having one-on-one conversations and right down the aisle are some robots who are also trying to engage. It was really interesting. Um **[00:32:00]** the dynamic was was all over the place at least in Eureka Park which was so exciting to be a part of. >> That's so great that you went there. What is for listeners and for myself? What is Eureka Park versus like the the regular CES venue? I guess >> it's like the startup area. >> Okay. >> I think like you know you have to be a new concept you need to be approved. Um but it's kind of like for new products and services coming to market. um kind of I guess as a way to you know have everyone you know together um that would have similar you know you know processes for launching and kind of be in that same like uh kind of that same stage of their startup and to give a little bit more um you know kind of attention and buzz to them. Interesting. Now going back to sample finder if I am a brand and or a store or either really and I'm going to do an event. Could I reach out to Sample Father say hey I'm I'm going to have an event even if we're not part of your companies that you're promoting or is that something coming down the line or is that not coming down the line? What what's your take on on giving access to something like this to people who might not be under the the main umbrella, I guess? >> Well, we're going to be open to everybody at least um at least if you fit into like kind of what our criteria would be, which is like it does your event I mean you don't have to give out samples, but that's kind of the first question. Or are you offering a **[00:34:00]** freebie or is it you know at the very least is it some sort of discount? Are you are you maybe doing a demonstration of some sort? So, we would need it to sort of be in that. We're not going to be like um say a bar approaches and they're having happy hours and they're like, "Oh, let's put your happy hour on there." It's like, "Well, okay." But that unless you are giving out something free, a sample at your happy hour, we're not going to put things on here that people would then have to further pay money for. So, that would be number one. And yeah, number two, we would talk to us the co-founders and figure out how we would do that. Make a plan for what how much lead time we need and all of the details ahead of time. >> Interesting. Yeah. So, the reason I ask is there's a lot of really good small businesses uh specifically that you see like in farmers market or things like that, right? That that they're they're doing amazing stuff and they're trying to figure out how to get out there. And of course they go to these places and they'll do some do demos and things like that at those fiber markets and other venues and in concerts and festivals and things like that. But uh just thinking that would be really neat if if they could use something like this be like hey we are going to do a demo. We're actually going to give out sample. We want people to taste it. We want people to try it. We want people to feel it or whatever. Uh they're going to get free stuff etc. Uh but again they maybe don't have the reach. **[00:36:00]** So, uh, something like this that I mean I I do see it like they would love this. >> Yeah. And to to Heather's point, like you definitely do want, you know, brands to kind of meet one of the criterion of like giving out a sample um along with a like a discount and or like an item of, you know, merch or swag. >> Um, you can get creative while still falling in that. Even if you maybe provide a service or something, you know, you can show a demonstration and give away like an an item of value like a a promotional uh you know product or something that's branded. Um, so yeah, I mean even in your farmers market example, it's like, you know, you could, you know, if you're a new vendor, like maybe give out free t-shirts or have fun with it and be like one, you know, one free grape sample for every customer, you know, so you can play around and be a little inventive, but, you know, we don't want to stray away. And that's one big thing we talk about in our in our deck is, you know, we're not just another discount app or a coupon app. You know, this is all about like really driving consumers out to physical spaces and kind of, you know, adding value to that instore experience as opposed to just the, you know, kind of the the pain that it can be to like drive to a store, park, have to navigate the aisles and the consumers really adds something back fun in that makes that experience really exciting, even if it's a a little thing like a sample. >> Yeah. And on that note, a small business, they're doing something like that. **[00:38:00]** if you are, you reach out to us. Um, we're launching later this year and we would love to hear from you. But yeah, exactly. It doesn't have to be that big. Like people get excited over very small things because when they're grocery shopping, something that's out of the new um or if it's not grocery shopping, if it's you're just going and you're walking down the mall and all of a sudden there's a setup um from a small business who's, you know, they sell candles, but now here they are giving out little free, you know, a box of matches. Like just that's a random example, but as long as it's something you know it's it helps you too. If you are giving out something that has your logo on it now it's in the store. It helps you being on our app because your logo and your description of what your company does and your products is going to be on the app before or the consumer maybe even shows up. They're still going to read and they're still going to see everything that you're doing. Um, maybe they're not there this time, but next time. Or maybe they'll remember your store and be like, I've never been in this store before, but one time they did an event and now I'm a loyal customer. So many ways to play this. >> Yes. Excellent. I really like the idea. Congrats, by the way. I I I think there's a a big need for it and and as people start using it, that's the whole thing, right? So as as you get critical mass of users, it becomes so much more powerful because then people start sharing about it and they're like, "Oh, this is where I **[00:40:00]** find the samples and things like that." And but I I want to use it for one because I I do like watching the demos and getting samples like even at the supermarket or Costco or whatever when when they have those. We've been I I don't want to say victims of it, but like we don't we've been like you know how you're walking down and it's like oh look and then we try it or the girls try something new and like oh I want it and so they get it and now we buy that thing because it was good and they let us try it beforehand and sort of reduce the barrier to entry and then some of those even like have like coupon yeah get it and you'll get this two for one or or something. So >> I really like where you're going with this. If someone and we talked about like someone wants to just promote an event, right? Good. But if if someone actually wants to have a company like yours, Polaris, be help them promote their brand and things like that and do the whole picture. What what would they typically do? What's the steps they would follow to reach out to you or to your company to start to understand what's that process look like and if there's a fit, etc. They can go to our website polarisbrandpromotions.com and reach out through one of the forms on our site or give us a call and we'll be happy to sit down and go through our service guide and explain you know kind of what we have to offer and and what differentiates us from other uh agencies that are out there and um you know and kind of go from **[00:42:00]** there. you know, really identify what their needs are and, you know, discuss, you know, what their kind what their program looks like and, you know, then we're off to the races. Okay. If I am a company and I'm interested in all this, but I have no idea how to navigate. I don't know if I'm going to fit into a festival. I don't know if I'm going to fit into a store. I do know my ICP, right? I know who my clients are, but up to that. So, can I still do something? Will a will a company like yours assist in figuring that part out or or do I have to do a bunch of research first? >> Well, you can always do research too. Uh but we pride ourselves on being experts in the industry and we are willing to sit down and have a meeting with you and talk and you know bounce ideas off. Uh one of our core values is to be unique and to try new things and so we encourage other people to follow in that with that and we will help. Uh we will also help once you are getting into those stores and help with you know the scheduling and all of the backend work which is daunting but we have a team that does it and we're very good at it. So we can help on that level too. Kind of take some of the worry and work off of your plate when you're trying to be like okay I want to do all of these events. I want to do a whole campaign. How do I start? >> Yes. >> Yes. Talk to us. Uh even if you start small like I said no minimums. So **[00:44:00]** if you are like I just want to do one to two stores and see what it's like. That's fine. If you're like, "Okay, now I want to put one to two events on SampleFinder, see what that's like." That's fine, too. Uh we will figure it out for you. We can work with you. Uh we help a lot of our brands, small businesses grow into new markets. You know, they're on the East Coast and now they're like, >> "I want to, you know what? We're going to we're going to try to take on the West Coast. We're nationwide. Okay, we already have all the training materials ready to go. We've already been experienced with you. We can help you now grow." or you're in one city only and you're like, I need to I need to figure this out. We can help you call the stores and see if it's something that they do. So, yeah, we we partner with our brands. We we care deeply about them. Um and then this actually that's why SampleFinder came to life. We care deeply about them. We want you to be seen. So, the whole idea is to help now that you're doing these experiential marketing campaigns, what we call them, no matter what they are, we want to now help you drive traffic to them. We want to help your relationship with the store. You know, you you you will as a brand will want to have a relationship with whoever your retailers are. Well, now you're showing them that you're working hard to get the shelf the product off the shelf. They put it on the shelf. Now you're getting it moving and the whole thing it's all tied together. >> That's really exciting. I know **[00:46:00]** a lot of people maybe make little they can make products or or food um consumables, etc. But some of them started direct to consumer, right? Maybe they started doing ecom or they started selling at a little booth or whatever and they've tried >> the idea in their minds of maybe I can put it in the store but again that seems very daunting. H what what do people do in like what's the next step there? Do I talk to a company like yours or what's the avenue to like start understanding that landscape and be okay so do I need a distributor or how does that work to be able to go into there's some people that don't even know how to get into the store? Um, one thing I'd suggest doing is, you know, talking with the people at at shows like, uh, Natural Products Expo West or Sweets and Snacks and, you know, exhibiting there because that's where you're going to find a lot of different, uh, you know, distributors walking the floor trying to find new brands as well as stores are looking to get into them. Um we don't really work you know too closely in the relationship between the uh the supplier and you know kind of the distributor the distributor and the store outside of making sure that you know the demo events themselves are scheduled. But a lot of times, you know, we've been to these shows, Heather and I have been to a number of them, and you know, they're like, "Oh, well, you know, we just got into this retail or we just launched on Amazon, and we're looking for dist distributors or distribution." And, you know, we've even gone to a lot of alcoholic beverage theme shows, **[00:48:00]** and they're like, "Oh, like we're an Italian wine or like, you know, some other country." And they're like, "We're looking for distributors in the US." So you know a lot of time the solution to that problem is to go and exhibit and share with the target audience which is the attendees of those shows. >> That that's a great tip just visiting those events because that's where like the scouts if you will will be as well. That's that's interesting because again very daunting to think oh I'm going to reach out to this distribution company. Who do I talk to? Right. But that's a that's a great tip. Going to those events in your particular industry and and then from there maybe finding who those people are. >> Yeah. They're walking around. They're walking around. They also want to hear about your product in depth. So that's one area where then we our agency would come into play where we could provide a brand ambassador so that you know when you're a small company it's the owners of the company on site but they also need to have the conversation. So they they you know we understand the issue of okay I'm in Las Vegas now and I need to also like talk to the distributors but also represent my brand well and also give out samples and also make sure I don't miss anybody. If you hire local help through our agency, we we highly recommend that. It's worth it so that they can be doing all of the engagement and the fun stuff and making it really fun while passing off anybody who's ready to have that conversation. We want you in your store. I want to hear more. the the brand ambassador can be **[00:50:00]** like, "Oh, well, >> president of the company's right here. Why don't you guys sit down and have a conversation?" And then the brand ambassador goes back and continues and drives more people in. It tracks them. Now, they're seeing that these these distributors walking around are seeing that the conversations are happening and that you're excited and you're selling. You might be a good company to work with. >> Yeah. These short shows especially, it is daunting to reach out, but this but but put your best self forward and it will work. >> That's very interesting. That's true because if you have brand ambassadors and that they're good at doing that, they're used to they have the energy, right? An owner will know everything about the company, but some of them are outgoing, some are not. Some need introductions, right? They're they're not good at the at the breaking, right? But if you have that brand ambassador doing that outreach for you, then bring people in like, "Hey, here you go." Then that's where they open up. That's that makes total sense. And so, what is a brand ambassador? Again, for anyone who doesn't have no idea about this industry, what does a brand ambassador do? Are they part of a company? Are they a third party? Are they local? Are they where are they? Uh, a brand ambassador is anyone who uh promotes a product or service on behalf of a company. Um, it can either be an internal staff member who has that title or that role. Um in our case, uh it is an independent contractor that we hire to go out and represent the brands directly to consumers. >> Okay. And then you mentioned they could be local. So if I needed someone here, **[00:52:00]** there could potentially be someone in this area that can do that and I don't have to go look far. >> Yes, we have yeah 9600 now brand ambassadors in our nationwide database. a lot of them concentrated around like major metro markets. Um so yeah that we always want to try to hire local to to save our clients like travel cost and and things like that and um you know we do have an amazing pool of talent across the country. That's amazing. I didn't know that was a thing. So I can hire someone to go to our event or or to our booth in an event and and do this whole experience and they're going to be >> no matter where your event is. >> Wow. And sometimes, you know, again with the keeping the cost down for the company, they, you know, you could fly your whole team out to California to the Anaheim Convention Center or you could and then take everybody out of the office and pay for all of the travel and all of that. Or you could hire a local person who and especially if you work with a promo staffing agency like ours who has already worked with these brand ambassadors, we can be like, "Okay, this person is actually perfect for this. This person has done this this many times." We have a lot of repeat brand ambassadors because we treat them very fairly and we love them, too. So, we have connections in different cities where we're like, "Oh, this is our go-to person and guess what? You're going to get them and they're solid." So, it's it's good to work with an agency in that way as well because uh yeah, we have we have a lot **[00:54:00]** of brand ambassadors nationwide, but we we personally interview all of them and we vet them and when we work with them, it's not like they just go out into the field without any without us. Like, we are behind the scenes. We have field managers who are on call 24/7. So, if you have an event, even though you're we're East Coast, so maybe you're on you're you're over in California and you have an event that goes until 10:00 p.m. that night. Well, even though that's later for us, we're making sure that we are available for that entire event so that the brand ambassador has support. So, we're supporting all over the place. That's a lot of like an agency that backend work that you're right, people don't always think about it because it's it's it's a lot. Um, but the behind-the-scenes work is something that we are so experienced in taking on. We have an amazing operations team. Uh, Al really built a good team. So, we we are ready and prepared uh to help with that. And it's it is very fun and exciting and can help anybody out. >> It's funny because uh the the running joke in our industry is nobody knows our industry exists because our brand ambassadors are always representing our clients brands. They're wearing their shirts. They're talking about it. there at the branded table. No one knows that it's actually like agencies hired this staff uh to go out on, you know, the the client's behalf, on the company's behalf. So, it's like, "Oh, wait a minute. Like, they don't actually work for that company?" I'm like, "Nope, they work for an agency like ours." Wow. No, I had no idea. But it makes perfect sense because you go **[00:56:00]** to these events, bigger events, right? And you see there's a clear difference between some booths, not necessarily the booth itself, but the the person doing the presenting and all that. There's some that you see you, Wow, these guys are like on top of it, and that could be it. Like they have professional talent that's there doing uh running the floor, right? And versus the other person who perhaps it's their first event, they just thought it would make sense to go to the event because they got an email. They're like, "Yeah, there's a lot of people in your market. Let's go." They go, they have no idea that other people are doing this because it's a possibility. Maybe next year they'll try it. But before, >> we talked to a lot of people who are like, I well, first of all, they're like, I can't believe I am standing here for eight hours. I need help. And I just never knew. I never did this before. I had no idea. And so that's why I'm like, oh well, you could hire help. We could make that happen. But what you just said with like seeing a booth as professional and they're really bringing it in. That's because they're creating an experience that the whole thing is and that's why we use experiential marketing because it marketing is marketing but this is this is creating something. Why do people want to go to that booth? Why do they want to go over there? Because they're about to have an experience. Whatever it is, even if it's just talking to a really nice person who's excited about the brand, still an experience. >> Amazing. And then with sample finder being able to get people to go to those **[00:58:00]** experiences, it it just ties everything really nicely. >> Yeah, >> this has been great. Uh Heather, I really appreciate both of you coming on the show. I think our listeners are going to take a lot from this. And if potentially if uh you let us know when SampleFinder comes out, uh we'll we'll link it as well because I for one want to try it out. I think it's going to be really fun to be able to find samples and demos and things like that easily. So, I'm I'm sure some of the listeners will will have that thought as well. So, where can we find it whenever it does launch or or has it launched? I I'm I'm not sure on the time. >> Yeah. No, we will be launching a little bit later this year. Card launch is aimed for April 2026 and samplefinder.com will be the place where you can sign up. We have a a newsletter right now and you add your email address. you're going to find out when it launches and then you will be having a download link right then and there and we will definitely keep you in in the loop as well. >> Excellent. Thank you both for joining and thanks for having us. >> Thank you. >> We'll see everyone in the next one. Thanks.