FruitWise | BradMcLaws v 1.5

My Role

Chief Product Developer

I was the creator and chief product developer for FruitWise. I worked full-time for PepsiCo (as a contractor) from 2002-2006, reporting to the Chief Innovation Officer of PepsiCo who reported to the CEO/Chairman. Of course, the inevitable FruitWise launch was a team effort lead by PepsiCo's VP of Innovation Mike Munro. My role was to:

From Fruit Snack Segmentation

to National Ad Campaign

Create/sell in the strategic insight to make a play to dominate the fragmented fruit snack market
Create/sell in the FruitWise idea including the name, branding, testing and prototype products
Prepared and sold in the business plan for launch including a full P&L model for the business with sophisticated forecasting and budgeting models
Helped sell in and manage a six month Test Market in Whole Foods
Following this step, a launch team of five full-time Tropicana employees were deployed to help launch the product
Identified a network of co-packers capable of making the products
Lead the branding and design work
Developed the final formulas and flavors, in conjunction with Tropicana R&D
Helped sell in to National Accounts (including sales calls to Kroger, Safeway, etc.)
Helped build the national launch marketing campaign including TV commercials (remember those)

Status

Launched 2005

Not Still in Market

During the national launch of FruitWise, there was devastating weather that destroyed the Florida orange crop. As this was Tropicana's core business all operational and financial resources were redeployed to address this emergency. Slotting fees and millions in marketing budgets were rescinded and diverted to the orange juice crisis. Reneged trade allowance angered the national accounts. And the all important sales team were required to divert all their attention to the orange juice crisis. FruitWise foundered during its first year due to this orange crisis. This was unfortunate timing as the product had tested very well and was expected to yield a billion dollars in revenue at steady state.