SnackGood’s Mar 2022 Recap: Time well spent

It felt like just yesterday when I shared our #BehindSnackGood Reel Recap for February 2022. Time — it’s slow when you take a step back and take stock of things you’ve done, and yet it’s fast when you realise another week/month/year has passed. So March Recap is all about SnackGood expansion and time well spent :)

Time well spent

In our regular catch-ups, Jeannie and Arij often shared the sentiment that we moved very fast while I often felt that we could move faster. However, sitting down on the last day of March to take stock of what we have done & rolled out, I must agree with Jeannie & Arij that we’ve made such good progress within a short time with such limited resources. So here we go, the list of initiatives we’ve spent a good amount of time on in March, and are super proud of.

#1 She Rocks launch

Launching our key community initiative She Rocks was the highlight and my favourite. During the preparation, we got the chance to connect more with other female founders & leaders on and off SnackGood. I’m happy that we’ve managed to learn more about their businesses, stories, and how we (and you) can show our support in the long run. It was a good start and we’re looking forward to more ways to grow ‘She Rocks’ into a resource hub that is truly valuable and useful for female founders and leaders from all walks of life. 

#2 More brands, more products, new categories

The second major item that happened in March is our brand and product expansion. We’ve doubled the number of brands being featured to over 40 brands now, and tripled the number of products to over 300 unique products for your selection. That was because many of you shared with us that you want to see more drinks, and products beyond consumables such as wellness, body care, moms & babies, and products suitable for men. While the variety has increased significantly compared to when we first started in Jan, I’m sure we have a long way to go and I hope you will continue to share your ideas and suggestions as we introduce more quality & interesting products for you. 

#3 Chats with early customers

That brings me to the third major item on my list. We, especially Jeannie who took the lead role in running our customer calls, had such a good time learning about your experiences and getting to know many of you – our early supporters and pioneer customers. Most of the calls were pretty long, and it was during your after-work hours or weekends. For that, I just want to let you know again that we’re very thankful for the time you spent engaging with us and helping us make SnackGood better.

#4 New additions to our team 

Next on the list is the time spent to get additional help, so we can continue to move fast while making sure Jeannie, Arij & I are not exhausted all the time. We welcomed Sheen, our first hire in early March. Sheen’s role is to take care of your weekends’ SnackGood needs. Sheen deserves a proper introduction and spotlight in April we promise, so keep a lookout for updates on our blog & social media. 

You’ve probably noticed that there was a big gap between Valentine's Day guides and the recent blog articles we’ve published. That was me being swamped with many must-dos and my growing list of new ideas. Lucky for us, besides Sheen, we also completed our search and found Thu, a very competent content marketer. With Thu joining us as our first remote freelance copywriter, we now can start creating quality guides & reads regularly on our blog again — yay!

#5 A brand new About Us page

Yes, you read that right. When we first started in Jan, we didn’t have an ‘About Us’ page because we still weren’t sure how to best describe SnackGood yet. So when we launched, we wrote a blog post on what we were sure about and what we were still figuring out. And that was our very first, informal ‘About Us’ page. 

After running for 2-3 months, we’ve gotten more clarity and the right words started coming to us. So yes, check it out — our first official ‘About Us’ to get to know more about SnackGood and our founding team. 

#6 More box packaging choices

Amidst many things that happened, we also rolled out new boxes woohoo! This addition deserved a celebration dance because now we felt good sending out the “enhanced” good box to your loved ones as gifts. 

Packaging has always been one of our key considerations because it enhanced the overall experience of the recipients, especially if the order was a surprise gift. But when we first launched, we went with the quickest solution – which was the plain kraft box and the SnackGood logo sticker – allowing us to move fast and test the right sizes we need. 

We know this is not the end game, but it’s good progress towards delivering delightful experiences, one good box at a time :D

#7 Bid for 2 big corporate orders, and… didn’t win any :D

Well, that’s life I suppose — full of surprises, ups, and downs. Regardless of the outcome, these failed attempts still made it to our list of time well spent, because failures like these are not celebrated enough. In our case, we spent many hours working out the best possible offers, planning out how we would fulfill these thousand-pax orders if we won them, and so on. Truthfully, I felt depressed for a few days after we heard the news that we lost the bids. However, it was so heart-warming when we received many encouraging messages from all of our partners – brand partners, printing partners, logistic partners, and our friends –  who closely assisted us during the bidding process. So just after a few days, I felt much better and gained a strong sense of confidence that we’re well-prepared for orders of that size down the road because we’re not alone. 

How we plan to spend our time in April

I often wish & dream if only every day had more than 24 hours. Since it’s not gonna happen, we consciously plan and prioritise our limited time & resources so we can make meaningful progress on values & initiatives that matter most to us, and the business.  So here you go, the list of key initiatives we’d like to spend our time on for April :)

#1 Launch Good Market

Many of you have shared that you’d love to consume more healthy snacks, drinks, and good products not just as gifts, but also for yourself and your pantry at home. In addition, with offices reopening in Singapore, you & your teams also look forward to a well-stocked office pantry with healthy, delicious bites & sips from brands that are sustainable and socially responsible. With those considerations in mind, we’ve decided to launch Good Market – making it simple, easy, and convenient for you to discover, try and repurchase these not-so-common snacks, drinks, and wellness brands at home and work. 

Give it a try and let us know what you think! Take me to Good Market.

#2 Grow She Rocks

When we started She Rocks in March, we were clear that it was not a one-off ‘celebration’. As much as She Rocks' launch was our highlight and #1 on the Time Well Spent list in March, we were not happy at how slow we were in following up with female founders being nominated. So in April, we want to prioritise our time to make good progress here — it’s time to catch up, connect and learn more about these amazing women. We’ll also start to gather information about what kind of concrete support female founders need, and how we can go about building an all-in-one resources hub and support platform that are inclusive and create real impact.  

I’d love to chat if you have any interesting ideas and thoughts to share or want to be involved. Drop me a note at minnie@snackgood.co anytime!

#3 Connect with more customers & partners

We had a good time connecting with early customers and brand partners through different initiatives in March, and we want to continue doing so moving forward. When we started SnackGood, we wanted to build good things that offer great value to our customers and empower our business partners. We want to do it to have our customers and partners engaged and involved in shaping the future of SnackGood with us. It’s not easy and it’ll take time but that’s what keeps us excited as we look ahead.  

#4 Team dinner & drink

Just like you, we’re all excited about life getting back closer to normal and being about to meet up in person more often. Since our ideation days, we’ve been mostly collaborating online among our team. Even when we did meet in the office on weekends sometimes, the hectic schedule hasn’t allowed us to unwind and connect on a deeper, personal level. We can’t wait for our team’s unwinding dinner and drinks sessions coming mid-April! 

It’s the process of us growing together and those little moments that we want to make time for :) 

#5 A short vacation

Yay — travel! Taking a short trip is definitely on our wishlist, though we will have to take turns (the true struggle of a small startup :D). Since we started, it has been so busy that we compromised on me-time a fair bit. It’s extremely hard to maintain boundaries when running your own business. However, we’re committed to doing things differently, to reimagine building a workplace and culture that enables us (and our team in the future) to be our best selves at work while being able to pause and breathe when we need to. 

Till next update

How about you? What was on your time-well-spent list in March? And what are your must-do's this April? We’d love to hear from you at hello@snackgood.co.

P/S: Stay tuned for our #BehindSnackGood team’s outing photos & trips!

With love,
Minnie