Food broker or your own outreach: which do you need first?

What a food broker does

A food broker represents several brands to buyers, mostly at chains, wholesalers and foodservice companies. They pitch your product, manage the relationship with the buyer, and often help with promotions and the paperwork a listing needs. They do not buy your stock or deliver it. It is one of the routes we compare for brands deciding how to get into stores.

Brokers are usually paid a commission on the sales they bring in, and some also charge a monthly retainer. Terms vary a lot, so get them in writing before you sign.

What doing your own outreach means

You contact the owners and buyers of the stores you want, directly: cafés, delis, grocers, bars, bottle shops. You hold the relationship, you hear the objections first-hand, and nobody takes a cut of the orders you win.

The cost is your time. Finding the right stores, the right person at each and the right words for every email is slow by hand, which is the part software can take off you.

Side by side

The two do different jobs, so compare them on what each is good at.

• Who they reach. Brokers are strongest with chains and wholesalers. Your own outreach is strongest with independents.
• How you pay. A broker takes a commission and sometimes a retainer. Outreach costs your time, or a subscription to do it for you.
• Who owns the relationship. With a broker, the buyer knows the broker. With outreach, the store knows you.
• What they need from you. A broker wants a product with sales behind it. Outreach is how you get those sales.
• Speed. A chain pitch runs on the chain's review calendar, often months. An independent can say yes in a week.

What about a sales rep?

A rep, often paid on commission, walks into stores for you. That works when they cover a territory full of the stores you want and have a reason to put your product near the top of their bag. It works less well when they carry many brands and you are the newest.

Outreach and a rep fit together. Emails find the stores that are interested; the rep visits the ones that replied. A rep with a diary full of stores that asked to see them sells more than one doing cold walk-ins.

Questions to ask a broker before you sign

A broker agreement can run for a long time. Ask these first.

• Which chains and wholesalers do you call on now, and who are your contacts there?
• Which brands do you represent, and do any compete with mine?
• How is your commission worked out, and is there a retainer on top?
• What is the minimum term, and how much notice does either of us give to end it?
• What will you need from me: samples, promotion budget, sales data?
• How and how often will you report back on who you pitched and what they said?

When a broker makes sense

A good broker earns their commission once you have traction and want to reach buyers you cannot get in front of yourself. That usually means steady sales and reorders from independents, a product ready for a chain's volumes and paperwork, and a margin that can carry a commission on top of a distributor's share.

Before that point, a broker has little to sell. Most good ones will tell you so, and the ones who do not are worth being careful with.

When your own outreach comes first

For most emerging brands, the first stockists come from direct contact with independent store owners. Those stores give you sales data, reorders and names you can mention, which is what a broker, a distributor and a chain buyer all ask for. It also teaches you your pitch: you hear why stores say yes and why they say no, in their words.

Mixing routes as you grow

Most brands end up using more than one route. A common path: your own outreach to independents in your home city, a distributor once delivery becomes the bottleneck, then a broker or a rep when chains or a new region come into view.

Two other routes come up often. A buyer platform puts your product in front of chain buyers who come looking, which we cover in RangeMe vs reaching owners yourself. A wholesale marketplace handles ordering and payment for stores already on it, which we cover in Faire vs selling direct.

Each stage pays for the next. The stockists and reorders you win directly are the evidence a distributor and a broker ask for, and the wholesale price you set at the start has to survive both of them taking a share. If you are still at the first stage, the wholesale price calculator shows what your price looks like with each of them added.

How LaunchPal fits

LaunchPal is the outreach side. We find the independent stores that fit your product and the owner or buyer at each, write every email around that store, and send it from a separate domain we set up for you. Follow-ups stop when a store replies, and you take the conversation from there.

It is not a broker. Nobody from LaunchPal pitches your product in a buyer's office, and we do not sell to chains on your behalf. When the time comes for chains, the stockists you win are what you take to a broker. Our guides to how to find a distributor and beverage sales cover the steps around it.