How a Functional Ice Cube Brand Landed Sprouts and Wegmans | Belle Robinson, ROXII Supercube

Speaker 1: 00:00
Welcome to Shelf Help. Today we're speaking with Belle Robinson, founder of Roxy Supercube, the brand that brought functional wellness and ice cubes together to create a really cool product, which I'm excited to chat about. Belle's a certified nutritional therapist, spent years freezing superfoods and adaptogens into her water before eventually teaming up with Pete, her co-founder, General Mills alum, former CEO of Wicked Kitchen. And now, fast forward today, they've got a national footprint at Sprouts Wegmans, continue to scale pretty rapidly. So really cool new product format. Excited to dive into it. Yeah, Bell, just first off, for the listeners that maybe are not as familiar with the brand, would love to just get a quick lay of the land, just in terms of kind of the origin story, why behind the brand, and then what the core product lineup looks like today, and then uh we'll go from there.

Speaker: 00:49
Yeah, sure. So I'm Belle. Um, like Adam said, I am the founder of Roxy, and I was a nutrition nutritionist who was super overwhelmed by the wellness industry. I was constantly adding in powders, taking wellness shots, adding tinctures to my water, and it was just messy, time consuming, and also super expensive. So one day I thought when I was adding my powder to my water, and I was also adding ice because I always had to add ice for it to taste better. Um, I thought, what if this could be as easy as dropping ice into water? So I started playing around at home and I created our immunity cube. And from there, the idea kind of just spiraled and I thought this is a really cool concept, and if only I could buy these off the shelf. So, yes, fast forward two years, we are nationwide and we have four SKUs on shelf, which is our hydration, glow, immunity, and chill cubes. And they all have different flavors and different functions, which I can also dive into.

Speaker 1: 01:42
What else can you tell me about why frozen? And the related question is does freezing do anything in terms of maintaining the nutrients and ingredients, or you know, something that maybe a shelf-stable format can do quite as well?

Speaker: 01:57
Mm-hmm. Yeah, we wanted to make wellness fit into an existing habit. So obviously, ice is something that people already do, people already drink their water. Um, so it's it's not a new behavior, but it is total innovation um when it comes to a habit people are already doing. And the reason I love frozen is frozen is a lot more nutrient dense than fresh, which a lot of people don't know. So it locks in a lot of the nutrition and the goodness. And then also when it comes to the taste, it creates a whole entirely elevated experience. So if you've tried our cubes and they melt into a beverage, it's super fresh because those nutrients have been hyper-frozen and the taste factor. And then when it melts, you just get this like explosion of flavor in your mouth. We hyperfreeze our cubes at super cold temperatures, which locks everything in even more. And like I said, I think the melting experience, it's a real experience when it comes to Roxy. You're not just having to shake or use a hand blender or stir something in and it goes clumpy. You literally just drop a cube into whatever you're drinking and everything just melts in. And when we talk about what we drop the cubes into, you know, it doesn't just have to be water. A lot of people love them in sparkling water, in soda. I've heard people use them in alcohol, and they really can be used in a lot of different ways and fit into your lifestyle, whatever your thing is.

Speaker 1: 03:10
Very cool. Any trade-offs that you knew that you were signing up for and what the implications of that have been? Obvious one to me is just cold chain stuff.

Speaker: 03:16
Yeah, froze, uh, you know, a few people before we started this journey said, you know, beware of frozen. It's super complicated, it's super expensive, which yes, it can be. And my experience has been pretty smooth so far, to be fair. The one thing I do think it impacts is the D2C model. So we are just our focus is retail. We just sell by retail, we don't sell direct to consumer. And I think we miss out on a slice of the pie there because that's a real important learning curve, I think, going D2C. It really gives you time before you launch in retail to learn a lot about your consumer and the product and the education. So we didn't we did miss out on that because we went direct to retail. Our first retailer, like we were speaking about, was Lunds and Baileys, which is local to Minneapolis. And that was a great retailer to launch in because it has 30 doors. But yeah, it's it's a shame sometimes that we didn't have that time to go D2C because I would have just loved a bit more time to learn from the consumer because education is a big part of this product.

Speaker 1: 04:11
For some other founders that are thinking about launching a brand with a new product format, one thing that you tell them to keep top of mind as they build the business and launch.

Speaker: 04:23
Yeah, um, that's a great question. Think if, you know, make it instantly understandable. If it takes too long to explain to someone or it's super overcomplicated, you've already lost them. Um so we spend a huge amount of time simplifying the message as much as we as we can around proxy, um, which does take time, but you know, a real simple messaging and really making it easy to understand is important. And then also building for repeat behavior. So, does this fit into someone's daily routine? Um, is a real important question to ask yourself. And if you can't answer that, then I think it's probably quite difficult to build a lasting ritual. It's all down to like we know that repeat purchase, right? So, really, can you build that into someone's daily routine?

Speaker 1: 05:03
Yeah, that totally makes sense. One thing just came to mind, you're talking about people drop it in, drop the cubes into alcohol even. Have you guys thought about the on-premise versus off-premise?

Speaker: 05:14
Yeah, we actually have so food service, I think is a big opportunity and one that we haven't really tapped into yet, but it's definitely on our radar. And we've been having a lot of conversations about it behind the scenes. And I think there's a huge opportunity for Roxy. You know, if you can, it's such an experience, like I said. So if you can add a Roxy Cube, if you're at a hotel or at a bar or you're not drinking alcohol and you want a mop tail, but you want something a little immersive, I think Roxy has a real, yeah, a real USP there for sure.

Speaker 1: 05:38
From a formulation RD perspective, uh, as you were building out and kind of iterating along the way, without giving away any trade secrets, what were some of the key variables that were you were playing around with as you were dialing into things? Let's just say like the the first frozen cube you made to the the version that you felt like, okay, this feels right, this feels ready, I'm ready to take this to market.

Speaker: 05:59
Yeah, we worked with a really great um product developer who we partnered with, and they've been great through this journey. We're still working with them closely on a new project. But I that was I kind of split it into three different things. So it was nutrition, taste, and format. And as a nutritionist, I was really picky on what the nutritionals were. You know, I wanted it to be meaningful. I really wanted it to bring something to people. And obviously, I know the impact of 200% of a certain nutrient versus 5%. So I was extra picky in that process because I really wanted it to be impactful. And then when it came to taste, as we all know, taste is so important and it's the main reason why people will come back time and time again to repeat purchase. So the taste had to be delicious. We really spent time, we actually did a lot of research on what was trending, what flavor profiles we wanted to go down. For example, our hydration cube is garden mink cucumber lime, so it's super refreshing and it's full of electrolytes and magnesium, so that paired perfectly. And then our glow cube, which is collagen and vitamin A, is slightly more hair, skin, and nails, potentially female focused. So we made that raspberry, we made that raspberry lemonade and it's pink. So kind of really like pairing things nicely together. Um, and then finally, of course, format. So frozen ice cube, which had never been done before. We wrote, so that's where you know it got a little more technical. Um, and it took time, it did take time to like perfect it, but we did get there in the end. You know, we played around a lot with like the size of the cube and we have our X on the base of the cube. And do we have that? Do we not? So there's a lot of um, yeah, a lot of decisions to be made through the process.

Speaker 1: 07:31
Yeah. Well, what was the hardest part of the developing the product?

Speaker: 07:35
I think as a nutritionist, having to narrow down to four functions and four flavors. I could have, I could have done 40 because there are so many more in my brain, which I think um we could bring to people. But yeah, that was probably a challenge.

Speaker 1: 07:48
That makes sense. Shit thing gears a little bit in the context of brand identity, building up the brand, visual identity, packaging design, thinking back to those early days. What were some of those key variables that were top of mind for you when you were building out that initial brand identity positioning voice for the brand?

Speaker: 08:04
Yeah, we always wanted to target the Gen Z audience. I think because the product is so visual and it's so fun and it's so Instagram, TikTok worthy, I feel as though those consumers are online. That's where they'll learn a lot about it and they're getting educated from those platforms. So we did target Gen Z to start. I wanted the brand to be very fun, colourful, a little bit sporty and playful, not too feminine, even though we are targeting like Gen Z females. I think it's like that kind of tomboy effect, I think Roxy is. And we think of Roxy as like a bit of a person, like what would Roxy want? Um, so yeah, developing the product, the branding was a really fun process. As you can probably see from our product, we kept, you know, the packaging is green, it has this like melty tie-dye print on front of the pack, and we kept that cohesive throughout the four SKUs, and then we just have the cube on glass on the front, which were the pop-up colour. But it's funny, when we actually started developing the packaging, we just had the cube on the front, the super cube. And I went to Expo West um for my second time, and I was carrying the packaging around with me. And I bumped into a buyer in the lift, I saw her badge, and I asked her what she thought of front of pack, and she thought it was a smoothie cube because of the cube on front of pack. And from there, you know, we really pivoted and said we need to have this cube melting in a glass so people understand we're not a smoothie cube. Um, because we're something new to market, no one's gonna look at that and say, Oh, it's a functional ice cube because we don't exist. So, so yeah, so that there were learning curves along the way.

Speaker 1: 09:30
How did you come up with the name?

Speaker: 09:32
Yeah, it's a hard one. So we are Roxy, like on the rocks, which a lot of people don't connect with at first. They're like, why Roxy? Is your name Roxy? But no, Roxy is on the rocks, and the double eye at the end is a little bit playful. And then Supercube, um, because that's what we are. Roxy is not just a normal ice cube, it is a supercube. But we did have a few other names lined up. Right at the start, I had a name in mind, but when I was walking the stores, I noticed the name was being used a lot um in different kinds of categories, and it was causing confusion. So I said, no, we need something totally unique that hasn't been used before.

Speaker 1: 10:05
Makes total sense. I think that was the right move. Looking back now, going through that building and the brand identity and packaging design, what were some of the biggest learnings from the process? And anything you would have done differently if now, with all the experience you've got, if you were to do it again?

Speaker: 10:18
Yeah, I think one thing is I've spent even extra time testing like communication with people that don't know what Roxy is or had never seen the product before. I think bumping into that bio Expo West was such a good learning curve and a great exercise to do. And I wish I did it even more. You know, I don't live full-time in the US and the UK is quite different. Um, we think quite differently. So I wish I could have been on the ground kind of walking around and just asking people what do you think this is? Because they have to get it in the first three seconds when they're down the aisle, yeah, down the frozen aisle.

Speaker 1: 10:48
Yeah, totally agree. On that topic from a retail standpoint, understanding that this is uh a new product format, uh, how did you go about deciding what your go-to-market price was gonna be? And and did they end up working out, or did you have to make some tweaks once you started chatting with buyers?

Speaker: 11:05
So we did a lot of market research. Um, and we, you know, our cubes in sprouts are just under $3 a cube. And if you're comparing that to shots like immunity shots, um, which can go up to $5 for a shot, or even powders and these like ready to drink ready RTDs, uh we like we punch in a lot of nutrition. Each one of our cubes has six grams of fiber. Um they're all low sugar, they are like I said, they've all got like really, really good amount of nutrients packed inside the cube. So for what you're getting, um you're getting a pretty good dose of bang for your buck. So I felt really comfortable with that. And in Wegmans, we're everyday low price at $9.99.

Speaker 1: 11:46
Okay, cool. Yeah, that makes sense. Where does Roxy actually sit in the store? I assume you're not in the coolers at the front where the ice cubes are. Like, are you fighting for space in those smoothie cubes? More like the breakfast novelties. I imagine that's probably not. Yeah, like where do you sit in the store? Are you sitting where you want to sit? And have you found anything in terms of where where in the store you sit that the product moves best?

Speaker: 12:09
Yeah, it's a really great question and one that every single buyer asks us at every pitch, you know, where do you sit? Because I'm learning that they don't always know where to put you. So it's like a it really is a um a partnership when you're talking to these buyers. But we did a lot of market research on the frozen isle and all different types of retailers, and that is, you know, it is changing. Things like true fruit, things like fruit riot, they really have injected a level of fun and energy into the frozen aisle. I think frozen was always known for being quite sleepy and stale and it hasn't changed in years. You've got your frozen pizzas, and I think with things like smoothie cubes and frozen fruits and all of this, I think it really is bringing like a wellness door to frozen. So in a lot of the majority of the retailers we're in, they do have a wellness section. So we do see it in the frozen fruit set with smoothie cubes, smoothie bowls, yeah, the frozen fruit. Sometimes it's different in every every retailer, but in some we're in we share a door with true fruit and fruit riot, and in others, we're just with smoothie cubes and and frozen mangoes. So it really does depend like which store. But yeah, it's a great question. And I think there's still a lot of change happening in Frozen, and I think over the next few years we're gonna see, you know, wellness is popping up in every aisle of the store, apart from Frozen, when it comes to functional wellness, like it's not happening in Frozen. So I think there really is an untapped white space there.

Speaker 1: 13:31
Yeah, I agree. For the buyers that were maybe at least initially a bit more skeptical just because this is a new type of product and never seen before, what have you found has been the most impactful or successful in terms of getting their buy-in and shifting their view from skeptical to excited?

Speaker: 13:48
Yeah, I think every buyer has a different hurdle you've got to kind of get over. So, you know, with some, once they try the product, I love doing meetings in person because our product is so visual if we can. So once they try the product and they see the melting experience, they love that. We've had a buyer say, you know, I want more fiber in my site. I'm obsessed with fiber, fiber's hot right now. So they loved the fact we've got six grams of fiber per cube. Uh, we had another buyer who loved the way we looked on shelf. We kind of like are a serious billboard. We've got that green, we glow through the door. So yeah, it really is different with every buyer. But I think once they try the product and experience the product, um, we've only had good feedback, which is great.

Speaker 1: 14:30
That makes total sense.

Speaker: 14:31
Yeah.

Speaker 1: 14:32
A bit of a similar track. What have you found has been uh having the most impact, most successful thing that in terms of when they're walking down the aisle and people see this and like, oh, this makes sense. I know exactly how to fit this into my daily routine.

Speaker: 14:44
Yeah, I think making it as simple as possible. Like we don't want to lead with complicated science. We don't want to be too complicated or think thought of as a supplement on shelf. We want to keep it fun and drop one cube into water or nutrient-infused daily ice cube. We really want to make it as simple as possible so someone gets it as quickly as they can. And then, like you said, making the packaging do a lot of the education because we know we only have a few seconds once that consumer is walking down the aisle. And then creating experiences where the customer can really experience the product. So install demoing, and we can talk about that, but that's something we've done a lot of because with Roxy, I think it is a lot about education. And once people see it, they get it very instantly and then they become quite hooked. Yeah. So yeah, getting in front of people, people seeing the cube draw up, people tasting the product as much as we can. Like we really did go all in on demos at the start of the year. Yeah, because the concept just clicks.

Speaker 1: 15:39
Frozen category is just seeing a lot of change right now. It's historically been a bit stale, but there seemed to be a lot of attention being put on it right now. If you could magic wand, you had the ability to just redesign like the way the frozen section is laid out in the average retailer, what might you change?

Speaker: 15:58
I'd love to see frozen merchandised around occasions. So rather than just like frozen fruit here, vegetables here, um, more like, you know, morning wellness in one part, having our immunity shots, our immunity cubes would sit really well in breakfast. And we've spoken about that quite a lot. But if there was like a morning wellness section with your smoothie cubes, your immunity cubes and your morning bits, and then your like recovery and hydration set, I think eventually it will go that way. Um, and even like true fruit and fruit riot, I think buyers are still confused where to put them. Do they sit with ice cream or do they sit in more of like the wellness healthy set because they sit under frozen fruit? So I think over time there will be like a healthy indulgence and there'll be like different sets for all of these products who right now are just being kind of partnered all together.

Speaker 1: 16:44
From a growth standpoint, tell me about the journey of landing national on shelf nationally at both Sprouts and Wegmans. What was kind of the key to in terms of getting that first meeting and then getting their buy-in and then getting that approval? So yeah, we're gonna we're gonna make you national.

Speaker: 17:02
Yeah, Sprouts was always one that was on my hit list. I really wanted Sprouts first. I think our customer is shopping in Sprouts. Um, they're actively, actively looking for innovation. They go there to find like cool new products, better view products. And but that also does mean that the bar is set incredibly high because Sprouts see a lot of brands. So we just spent time with the buyer who's been amazing and kind of telling the story, talking about the set, why Frozen made sense for Roxy, and yeah, showing, explaining how they can get their functional ingredients within Frozen, and we're the first to be functional to Frozen. Um, so yeah, the buyer was very excited by that. So that's been a great listing for us. You know, there's a lot of sprout stores, but like I said, in the natural channel and our customers walking those aisles. When it comes to Wegmans, their shopper is incredibly engaged. So Wegmans is a is slightly different as we know they're more like East Coast focused, which works nicely for us because then we've got Sprouts who are like slightly heavier on the West Coast. Um, but Wegmans, they're known for discovering new products, they're willing to try innovation. Um, and yeah, we've had great we've had great feedback from Wegmans.

Speaker 1: 18:05
I love their stores. Outside of demos, what have you found as having the biggest impact from a really driving velocity, really driving trial and repeat purchase right now?

Speaker: 18:17
So we have been cleating a group of brand ambassadors at Roxy. So people on the ground in locations with sprouts because wedmans, you can't actually, they don't allow you to do as much. So with Sprouts, you know, people who are around the Sprouts areas, and we've got them doing Roxy pop-ups, which is a really fun way to get people to try it. So we're targeting locations where our customer is hanging out. So those workout studios, hot polarities, wellness events in the local area. I want Roxy to be seen at every if you're a wellness girl, you should be seeing it numerous times a month. So we've really gone all in with that and we post a lot about them on social media. We now have a lot of workout studios and events companies reaching out to us and wanting to get us involved, which is great. So brand ambassadors have been great just to spread the word and have our pop-ups. And then social media video has been a really big unlock for us because, like I said, the product is so visual. So really going all in with Instagram um and partnering with some influencers. But to be honest, we've got the most out of building our own community a lot of through these events, and we do giveaways and we've done partnerships um with other brands. All of these things kind of help you grow your own and brand awareness.

Speaker 1: 19:26
That makes sense. One thing I was curious about, you're a founder, you started this brand, you're based in London, uh that's sold in in the UK, having a lot of success and growing in the US. Maybe just I'd love to hear a bit more about what that journey has been like running a brand from you know across the Atlantic, and then for maybe just some other founders that maybe you're not based in the UK, or maybe they are just other places, but they're you know, targeting and want to build a brand, focus on the US market. Curious, like any kind of recommendations you might have for them or things that kind of make them feel a bit more confident and say, hey, even though I'm not based there, I can I can still do this.

Speaker: 20:02
Yeah, it's such a good question. Everyone always says to me, you know, why have you done the US? Why have you launched Roxy in the US, not the UK? Because you're not from here. You know, US are ready for those health and wellness trends. You guys, a lot of the trends start there and then they trickle down to us. Being having Roxy launched in the US was so important to me. But as a founder and not being on the ground, it has been a lot more challenging, I think, than I thought it would be. Just like being there, being able to touch my product, being able to go to the store and just like keep an eye on things. So I think having the right team around you is more important than ever. And I partnered with Pete Sprenzler, like you mentioned, our CEO, who's based in the US. So he's been a great partner in this. I think trust, you know, trust really comes down to it. You were working different hours for a lot of it. I'm on calls super late, he's on calls very early. And so it's just about going all in and feeling passionate and also having the ability to travel. So I have I do travel to the US a lot and I don't like missing out on anything. So if I can be there, I will be there.

Speaker 1: 20:59
What has been the the fundraising journey look like thus far if you've raised any capital, or maybe it's been bootstrapped? And in terms of the future, what what are you thinking in terms of fundraising, if at all?

Speaker: 21:10
Yeah, up until now, we have bootstrapped um the business. And we wanted to do it for as long as we could. You know, let's see where we're at next year. But potentially we've had a lot of conversations, you've had people reaching out. We've it's just great to like stay in the know and expand your network and keep having these conversations because at some point we probably will go down that route.

Speaker 1: 21:31
Totally. Last question for you, Belle. Obviously, you've been in the CBG world for quite a bit. You're in, you know, in Sprouts and Wegmans, you're in stores a lot. I'm you've imagined you have a pretty good pulse in the CPG space in general. Any particular brands or just trends in general in the CPG space overall that have kind of been just peaking it into slightly, or things you've been following just because they seem interesting?

Speaker: 21:54
Yeah, I love this question because I'm such a big foodie. I love seeing what's going on, staying in the know. I'm really excited by brands that are creating entirely new occasions. Um, so not just another flavor or another version of something. Um so, for example, Fruit Right and True Fruit. I know we've spoken about them a bit, but they really did create a new category within snacking. You know, you'd never walk up the freezer aisle looking for snacking or looking for share bags. So I think those brands, like I always go back to them. They are a blueprint in Frozen. Um, along with what else am I loving? Dates. Dates are really blowing up right now with gatto, French Squirrel, Indie Dates, and they're really having their moment. Other brands I love keeping an eye on a hot girl pickles. Very fun brand. Life.

Speaker 1: 22:36
Yep, great.

Speaker: 22:37
Like really, yeah, great one. Then I can keep going. On trick pony, peanut butter with the super cool tub. And then mud water. I don't know if you know that one. It's like a cacao.

Speaker 1: 22:46
Oh, yeah, for sure.

Speaker: 22:47
Yeah, like a coffee alternative. Yeah, there's so much happening. I'm constantly inspired, and social media is a great place. You just have to stay on the pulse all the time as a founder.

Speaker 1: 22:55
Yeah, of course. I agree. This has been great, Belle. Appreciate the time. It's been awesome learning more about the brand, about yourself. What's what's the best place for people to follow along with you? And then what's the best place you were wanting people to be following along with the brand these days as well?

Speaker: 23:10
Yeah, so follow along with Roxy at Roxy Supercube, and we are R O X I I. And then I love posting some founder bits on my account, which is at Glow With Bell. And obviously, we're online. Um, and always reach out to us if you're trying the product, if you have feedback, we love hearing.

Speaker 1: 23:27
Perfect. Awesome, Bella. I appreciate the time. I think uh I think that's the pod.

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