What is a food broker?

Food Brokers & Foodservice Sales Agencies — Everything You’ve Ever Wanted to Know

“So, what is a food broker, exactly?”

It’s a question we hear a lot — from prospective clients, friends and even family members.

If you haven’t worked in the food industry before, our line of work may seem confusing at first. The reason is simple. When most people enjoy a great meal at a restaurant, they don’t consider what it takes to get certain ingredients or products onto their plate — and you shouldn’t have to! If we’re doing our jobs correctly, most of the work of a food broker is happening behind the scenes. However, those small decisions that influence the groceries you buy or meals you eat are exactly where our work lies.

WHAT IS A FOOD BROKER?

Often used interchangeably with the terms manufacturer representative, foodservice sales agency or FSAs, food brokers are sales agents whose goal is to expand a food product’s presence in the market on behalf of their clients. Clients can also include producers of non-edible items that foodservice businesses need to thrive as well — including packaging and supplies. Food brokers partner with manufacturers or producers that need help getting their product into wholesalers, restaurants, stadiums, hospitals, schools and more.

Let’s imagine this scenario as a small example…

After years of hard work, a woman named Suzy has created the best salsa in her city. Even though her salsa wins local awards and is performing well in her state, she can’t get a single meeting with the big decision-makers at high-volume restaurants and wholesalers. They’re bombarded with hundreds of makers like Suzy every day, and she can’t get her product to stand-out in the pile of inquiries that they have sitting in their inbox. Suzy’s great at making salsa and has the ability to rapidly ramp-up production, but she wishes she could hire a sales team to manage this other critical piece of her business. However, she doesn’t have the money to hire a full-time salesperson, let alone a team.

That’s where food brokers and FSAs come in. They partner with companies like Suzy’s to provide a cost-effective way to get their products into the market. Instead of Suzy having to provide a full-time salary and benefits to a sales staff, she can hire a food broker or sales and marketing agency and compensate them with a small percentage of the sales they bring to her.

It’s important to remember — just because you can’t see it, doesn’t mean it isn’t there. This arrangement isn’t limited to brands as small as Suzy’s. As recently as last year, the FSMA (Foodservice Sales & Marketing Association) reports that more than 70% of US food products that make it into broad foodservice distribution worked with someone like us to get them there.

WHY DO I NEED A FOOD BROKER OR FOODSERVICE SALES AGENCY?

Numbers don’t lie. Brands have worked with food brokers for more than 100 years because it works. Foodservice sales agencies and food brokers aren’t just salespeople. They partner with clients to develop a strategy, identify target introductions, maintain key relationships, manage administrative functions and outline plans for continued success in the marketplace. It’s not just about moving product — it’s about building relationships in the food industry that make sense for each producer.

WHAT’S THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN FOOD BROKERS AND FOOD DISTRIBUTORS?

Food brokers do work with distributors, but they are not distributors themselves. The key difference is that a food distributor buys inventory from vendors and then takes ownership of it. They stock it, manage the inventory and then resell it to retailers on their behalf. And, although distributors have many of the same relationships with decision-makers as brokers, your product goes into a larger sales portfolio, oftentimes with 5,000 – 15,000 other products. Food brokers and food distributors work in tandem.

WHAT ARE THE PROS OF WORKING WITH A FOOD BROKER OR FOODSERVICE SALES AGENCY?

Here are a few of the biggest pros of working with a food broker or foodservice sales agency:

Food brokers and foodservice sales agencies are cost effective.

Like in Suzy’s salsa case, food brokers or foodservice sales agencies are a great way to get the sales assistance you need without having to break the bank on your business. Because brokers only take a small commission off of the sales they bring to their clients, the client isn’t left with the risk of paying out-of-pocket for something that may or may not work.

Food brokers and foodservice sales agencies are highly motivated to sell.

Commission-based FSAs are very invested in your businesses’ success. Not only do they want their clients to succeed, they also know that they don’t get paid until that happens. There’s an extreme incentive on the line for food brokers and FSAs to go to bat for your brand.

Food brokers and foodservice sales agencies already have key relationships in place.

Successful FSAs already have relationships with the decision makers that most producers may have trouble reaching, like large leverage operators and multi-unit chain connections. Many of the best food brokers in the business have spent years (if not decades) building trusted relationships with the people who decide what products go where, and when you partner with one, you’re getting instant access.

Food brokers and foodservice sales agencies know the market.

Most trusted food brokers and FSAs dedicate a lot of time to knowing their market inside and out. They keep a pulse on what wholesalers and retailers are looking for and how to get it to them. They stay well-versed on emerging trends so they can speak knowledgeably about your food products’ potential success in the marketplace.

HOW DO I CHOOSE THE RIGHT FOOD BROKER OR FOODSERVICE SALES AGENCY?

Our company Lakeland Marketing has been in this business for more than 30 years. During that time, we’ve identified ways to help countless vendors find the best food broker or foodservice sales agency to meet their unique needs.

Here are a few questions you should ask yourself and your team to identify those needs before meeting with a broker:

• What are your expectations of your food broker or foodservice sales agency?
• What territories are your priority?
• What is a realistic commission rate you can afford to pay?
• Do you have the operations to support the high volume requests that come from successful sales?
• Do you have your branding and marketing in place so that you can accurately articulate who you are and what you do to your food broker?
• What categories or business types do you see your line in? Are you being realistic?

It’s important to note that a food broker can help guide a few of these pieces, but it’s also critical for you to take an independent evaluation of them as well.

Once you’ve narrowed down a list of potential food brokers or FSAs to consider, here are a few questions we recommend asking while shopping around for the perfect partner:

• What big players do you have relationships with?
• What other lines do you carry?
• What territory/territories do you cover?
• What success have you seen with products like mine in this market?
• Where will I fit within your portfolio of clients?
• What is your staff like? Do you have enough people to get the job done?
• How long has your staff been in this business? How much expertise lies in your food brokerage team?
• What is your market reach? Does it align with my goals?
• What is your commission breakdown?

WHAT MAKES LAKELAND MARKETING DIFFERENT FROM OTHER FOOD BROKERS?

Every food broker or foodservice sales agency is different, and the questions above are meant to help you identify those subtle differences to figure out which food broker is best for your business.

Here are a few things that make us proud to work for Lakeland Marketing within this industry:

We’re local with national reach.

Lakeland Marketing is structured in a way that serves our clients best. We’re a collection of individual owners operating in different markets across the entire United States. This gives us the ability to combine local know-how with national reach. Our regional presidents live in the markets they serve — they eat in them, they network in them, their children go to school in them. They know their individual markets well, but they still have the power to move a product nationally by tapping into our regional partners across the country.

We’ve been doing this — independently owned — for more than 30 years.

And we’ve learned a lot along the way. A majority of our leadership staff has been with us for more than a decade, and their relationships within the food industry extend even further. We don’t pair clients with just-out-of-college kids with no experience or rolodex. We maintain long-lasting relationships with our distributor partners to provide more expertise than that. While many food brokerage companies have sold to venture capitalists, we’re proud to have stayed independently owned. That means the only people we have to answer to are our clients and each other.

We’re trained across multiple product lines.

Lakeland Marketing has expertise in the foodservice arena from breakfast to dessert. Our years of experience has allowed us to build knowledge across every part of the food system, and this positions us to be better consultants for clients and the retailers and wholesalers with which we work.

We’re picky.

Decades of experience has taught us to be choosy about the clients we take on each year. When we enter into a partnership, we want to be sure it’s beneficial for our company and yours. That means we invest in the vetting process — taking time to get to know each brand, its features and its benefits to be sure we’re the right fit for the client and vice versa. We want to identify what makes each brand unique so when we enter into a partnership, we know we can make it a successful one. This also allows are teams to dedicate their time to a manageable number of clients, so we can manage the relationship and sales cycle effectively.

If you are ready to take your business to the next level, we would love to have a conversation with you. Please reach out to us at info@lakelandden.com.