December 18, 2025 • 26 mins
Why did CPGs stop innovating? We sit down with Bobby Moesta, CEO of The Rewired Group and co-creator of Jobs To Be Done, to unpack why large brands stalled, how innovation drifted into launch theater, and what it takes to build products consumers will actually hire and use. Bobby brings decades of experience across defense, food, and software to reveal a blunt truth: categories are a supply-side fiction, while real competition lives in the moments consumers' own "struggling moments."
We explore how to replace segment thinking with struggling moments, why Snickers competes with coffee and sandwiches, and how “more choice” often lowers velocity by increasing confusion. Bobby lays out a practical reset: start with frank post-mortems, map unknowns early, and design your own innovation process based on your market’s pace of change. Tie teams to outcomes, not ship dates — measure pounds of cash, repeat purchase, and usage occasions instead of margin percent and project completion. Align the big hire (why they buy) with the little hire (when they use), so you grow consumption, not just pantry inventory.
We also dig into AI’s real role in consumer goods. The winners don’t sell AI; they quietly use it to remove friction where talent is scarce and response time matters. Build a kick-ass half, then improve — just like the earliest iPhones. If you’re ready to stop copying features and start solving real jobs, this conversation is your roadmap. Subscribe, share with a teammate who owns a launch calendar, and tell us: what struggling moment will you tackle next?
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_03 (00:02):
From Aloy AI, this is Shelf Life.
SPEAKER_02 (00:19):
What's broken in the traditional innovation model for
CPG brands?
SPEAKER_03 (00:24):
How can sales and marketing teams better identify
their true competition?
SPEAKER_02 (00:29):
How should leaders think differently about product
launches, forecasting, andmeasurement?
SPEAKER_03 (00:34):
On every episode of Shelf Life, we answer questions
like these and more with thehelp of leaders across the
consumer goods industry.
SPEAKER_02 (00:42):
Today we welcome Bobby Moesta, CEO and founder of
the Rewired Group.
SPEAKER_03 (00:48):
Bobby is a co-creator of the Jobs to be
done theory and an expert ininnovation and product
development.
He's worked on and helped launchmore than 3,500 new products,
ranging from the guidance systemfor the Patriot missile to
Pokemon Mac and Cheese andeverything in between.
SPEAKER_02 (01:04):
I'm your co-host, Joel Beal, CEO of Alloy AI.
SPEAKER_03 (01:08):
And I'm your co-host, Logan Ensign, Chief
Customer Officer at Alloy AI.
SPEAKER_02 (01:13):
We'll be back with Bobby right after this.
SPEAKER_00 (01:19):
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(01:41):
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SPEAKER_01 (01:58):
Thanks for having me.
I'm excited to be here.
SPEAKER_03 (02:00):
Well, dive right in.
I know you have been in a lot ofdifferent sort of vertical
consulting different verticalsacross the board, but we are
particularly interested here inthe CPG space.
One of the comments you'd madeis about how a lot of the
large-scale CPGs have outsourcedinnovation.
So I'm curious, from yourvantage, why is that the case?
(02:22):
And perhaps what's broken in inmore traditional innovation
models?
SPEAKER_01 (02:26):
I worked in innovation since 1987.
I started in the automotivebusiness and then I moved to the
defense business.
And then I moved to the foodbusiness from 1993 to 2000.
I have this company now calledThe Rewired Group.
And I started that in 2008.
And I've been working with CPGsince then as well.
(02:47):
So I've seen kind of this longerterm thing, if you will.
I feel like between 2000 and2010, somehow they lost their
way.
And I think they lost their wayfrom two perspectives.
One is what I term as sustaininginnovations or cost reduction
kind of innovations outpaced thenotion of new products.
(03:09):
And so it was easier to go do acost reduction and save$20
million on some line than it wasto go build a new line.
And so when finance andmarketing kind of teamed up, RD
got kind of pushed back to theside.
I worked with Nielsen at somepoint in time where they had
launched something along thelines of 25,000 new pro SKUs in
(03:30):
a year, and less than 40 made itover 10 million.
Ultimately, people were puttingin millions of dollars and
getting thousands of dollarsout.
And so over time, managementstarted to look at it.
And I think when 3G bought Kraftand Heinz was when it really
kind of hit, they literally shutdown almost all the RD centers.
(03:52):
They were like, we're not goingto do RD, we're just going to
milk this thing as long as wecan.
And then other companies startedto follow.
And you start to realize thatwhat they ended up doing is
building an incubator systemwhere they'd innovate by putting
things into academic orcommunities like Techstars or,
you know, some entrepreneurialkind of network, and they would
(04:12):
pour money into that and thenacquire.
But ultimately, most of them allgrew by acquiring something, not
by actually innovating onanything.
And so they've lost theirinnovation muscle.
And I feel like it's starting tocome back, but I haven't seen
anybody kind of take the charge.
I would say PG is the exceptionto this rule.
Their whole business model isbased on innovating.
(04:33):
And so they're one of the fewthat I know of that have been
continuously innovatingthroughout their entire 30-year
history that I know of them.
Is it a people challenge anissue?
Is it a process challenge orissue?
I think it's a leadershipproblem.
Most of the people who werepromoted to the top positions
were not innovators.
They were salespeople trying togrow.
(04:54):
They were finance people tryingto save money.
They were HR people trying tobasically make it a good place
to work.
Like you started to realize,like and you look at it, and
it's mostly finance people orsalespeople are the people,
sales and marketing people kindof leading those organizations.
And so it just took a backseat.
SPEAKER_02 (05:11):
What's wrong with the model of having excellent
operators who can efficientlymarket and run a supply chain
and separating out theinnovation, outsourcing it, as
you said, to incubators, tosmall companies that they
acquire?
SPEAKER_01 (05:25):
I think there's a couple things.
One is they can't count on whatthey have because the customers
change, not the market, thecustomers.
And so you start to realize weneed to actually innovate to
just keep up with how they'rechanging.
All of a sudden we have we haveto take a lot of the food
coloring out of stuff.
Like that's a big deal.
And if I don't have thecapability to do it, all of a
sudden I got to outsource thator I got to find capability to
(05:47):
do it.
And it just bottles bottleneckseverything up.
Ultimately, my experience, andthis is my opinion, right?
My opinion is that I feel likeit's led by marketers, and
marketers see the market, butthey don't see consumers and
they don't see buyers.
They see segments.
And so they don't have enoughintimacy on the true innovation
(06:08):
pieces.
And so we plan about aninnovation project when we're
the stupidest.
And so we are asked how muchbudget we need, as opposed to
being able to say, like, whatare the what are the milestones
we have to think about and whatare the unknowns we have to go
solve?
And so a lot of innovation isn'tabout executing unknowns.
It's actually uncovering theunknowns and solving those
unknowns as fastly as possible.
(06:30):
So it's about learning.
And so most of them are set upas project management type
things, like we know what to do,but when we hit a bump or we
actually find an unknown, wedon't know what to do next.
SPEAKER_02 (06:41):
I don't think this is a problem unique to CPG, the
focus on the financial aspects,take the innovation out.
A lot of people have complainedthat MBAs did this a little bit.
What do you think is causing itto swing, though, the other way?
SPEAKER_01 (06:54):
Part of it is to realize that at some point they
they have to actually start totarget where people struggle, as
opposed to copycat everybodyelse and try to say one more
feature, one more benefit isgoing to get me more sales.
It doesn't work.
The thing is they're losingmarket.
I mean, think look at Kellogg's,for example.
Kellogg's just almost imploded,from my opinion.
They've been trying to innovatefor so long with so much money
(07:17):
that the fact is, but theycouldn't make anything stick.
They had the people, they hadthe resources, they had they
have the food science knowledge,they have the marketing
knowledge.
Like what's missing ultimately,to me, and my experience would
say is they didn't have enoughunderstanding of that you can't
steal market share.
You need to create market shareby going after struggling
moments in people's lives.
When you try to innovate insidethe corporation, you compare it
(07:43):
to everything you already have.
So think of craft.
We make craft macaroni andcheese.
I don't even know what a boxcosts anymore, but let's say
it's two bucks, right?
And it makes this much margin.
Whatever I have to make has toactually have incremental margin
or I won't launch it.
We shouldn't be measuring thingson margin.
We should be measuring things onpounds of cash that it
(08:05):
generates.
Because even though it has lessmargin, I might sell 10 times
the other thing.
The reality is like it's still abetter product.
And so what happens is we end upusing the value system of the
current products line that wehave, comparing it to the new
product line, which is like ininfancy, right?
The the second thing is you haveto realize that most of the
(08:27):
people running CP CPG companieshave inherited everything.
They actually have never createdmuch.
And so the notion of knowing howto create versus knowing how to
manage is really, reallydifferent type of work.
And so those are the two bigthings that I think are kind of
hindering that industry.
SPEAKER_03 (08:44):
Bobby, you mentioned something interesting about
innovation centers being oftendriven by marketing.
I'm curious as you think aboutevaluating categories and
competition and sort oftraditional ways of thinking
about categories andcompetition.
When you kind of extend thethinking around, okay, job to be
done, solving new pain, how doescompetitive landscape and
(09:05):
understanding your competitionrelate to all this?
SPEAKER_01 (09:07):
This is a really good question to me, because
what happens is I think the waywe've described categories is
not how consumers look atanything.
Most people would say Milky Wayand Snickers compete with each
other.
They're both candy bars, theyboth sold next to each other.
But when you ask the consumer,uh Snickers actually competes
with a Red Bull and a coffee anda and a and a sandwich and an
(09:30):
apple.
Well, it's because it's a foodbar where a Milky Way competes
with ice cream and a glass ofwine.
You're talking to a couple ofrunners here, Bobby.
SPEAKER_02 (09:38):
So speaking of, I'm laughing, it's the best food for
climbing because you get so manycalories in a small bar.
SPEAKER_01 (09:44):
It's compact, it's dense, I can eat it, it satiates
in my stomach.
And so when we start to, whenyou start to realize that
categories are built by thesupply side, they're built by
the industry, not by theconsumer.
We end up kind of going like,ooh, we need to actually
innovate in our category.
That's just that that's like youknow, incrementalism on a
pinhead.
How many more cookies do weneed?
(10:04):
How many more shampoos do weneed?
One of the myths that I think isjust crazy that most people see
is more choice is good.
It's like, no, more choiceactually creates confusion and
actually less consumption in thecategory in the innovation space
in the CPG industry.
It's about launching it.
Everybody goes like, oh, I'velaunched eight products.
Like, okay, how many weresuccessful?
Oh, I don't know.
I just move on to the nextproject.
(10:25):
And so their whole notion ofsuccess is literally just
getting it out the door.
Whether it's profitable, whetherit generates, you know, whether
it's growing, like, well, andand they would say, that's not
on me.
I'm like, no, you should be tiedto the upside of how it actually
works and and and tied tobasically the results of it, not
just the act of launching it.
SPEAKER_03 (10:45):
Bobby, when you specifically go and engage and
consult with you know theseCPGs, where do you start?
SPEAKER_01 (10:51):
I don't believe there's one innovation process
that works for everybody.
That's just crazy.
Everybody has their own, itshould have their own innovation
process based on what marketthey're in, the pace of
technological change, both iningredients and packaging and in
process.
The place we always start iswith some post-mortems.
We literally go and say, like,let's talk to about to two or
(11:14):
three project teams.
We're gonna relive thoseprojects.
What went well, what didn't gowell, and what would we keep
doing, what would we stop doing,what we need to start doing.
It's literally sitting down withwith project teams and
diagnosing kind of where are youat, prioritizing kind of what do
we need to work on first.
And typically the way we we endup doing is making it very
(11:35):
customer-centric andunderstanding where, when, who,
and why do we need a newproduct?
SPEAKER_02 (11:42):
One of the things I will sometimes hear from our
customers is that retailers willcome to them and say, I'm
looking for this type of productto put on my shelves.
I feel like there's a gap.
SPEAKER_01 (11:52):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (11:53):
Do you think that's something?
I mean, giving to your earlierpoint of you really want to be
dialed in with that consumer andwhat they're doing, do you think
brands should be listening tothe retailers or should they
say, like, no, I need to reallyvalidate this?
SPEAKER_01 (12:07):
This is signal and noise, right?
There's a signal there that theyhave shelf space they're willing
to do something with.
But short of that, mostretailers don't know what's
possible.
And so all we really need toknow is there's an opportunity
to get shelf space.
How do we actually go figure outwhat to put on that shelf?
Most retailers have no idea whatconsumers want.
I mean, think about it.
They let P and G run the laundryaisle because they know more
(12:30):
about laundry than the retailer.
Consumers don't know what theywant.
They know that they want to dosomething different and they
know the outcomes they want, butthey don't know the solution.
If we just listen to them, theirexact words, and make what they
say, we're always behind theeight ball because we're gonna
be like, no, no, no, no, that'snot what I meant.
I wanted it crunchy.
Well, this is crunchy.
(12:51):
Yeah, but this is too crunchy.
You're like, we have to actuallyunderstand why crunchy is
important, right?
Crunchy is about frustration insome cases.
Sometimes crunchy is aboutdistraction, sometimes crunchy
is about different things.
This is one of those thingswhere I feel like the industry
has lost its rigor and it'strying to work on what I call
Pablum or very, verysuperficial.
(13:13):
Make it easier, make it fresher,make it make it cleaner label,
make it this, but they don'tknow why, and they don't know
what people are doing with it.
And so they're just literallytaking orders and and and
iterating, and it's not making adifference.
They're like on a treadmill,they're just doing a bunch of
stuff, but it's not making thebusiness grow.
SPEAKER_03 (13:30):
Well, you said something interesting that may
seem counterintuitive, which isthe major retailers let PNG run
the laundry aisle.
Wouldn't retailers actually muchbetter understand the consumer
because they know all thecompetitors, they know that the
consumer is buying coffee versusPepsi, which is not information
that uh a supplier would have.
SPEAKER_01 (13:51):
So the the there's something called lag measure and
lead measure, right?
And the purchasing data is lagmeasurement.
They know that they sold it, butthey don't know why, they don't
know where, they don't knowwhen, they don't know who.
They're buying it to putsomewhere, but when do they use
it and how do they use it?
Most people are trying to lookfor what they bought last time,
and when you change the labeland it's not there, it's like,
which one is it?
(14:11):
Which one did I have?
I don't know.
I was doing uh toilet blowcleaner, right?
And it's like, and somebodyfinally came up to me and said,
like, how like can I help you?
I'm like, yeah, I'm trying tobuy toilet blow cleaner, but I
don't know which one to choose.
And then I'll interview them ofhow they pick their toilet bowl
cleaner.
Oh, I've used this one for ayear, but but this one has
bleach.
Don't I want bleach?
It's like, no, no, no.
And you start to realize, like,you can understand how people
(14:34):
look at it and they say, well,when this one's not available,
I'll buy this one as the backup.
A backup?
Why do you need a backup?
Well, sometimes, you know, whenI have guests over, I use this
one to actually be because ithas a better smell than that
one.
And you start to realize, like,they have these elaborate
algorithms in their head of howthey use and consume these
products.
And we have no clue besides onThursday, they bought they
(14:55):
bought Lysol toilet bowlcleaner.
The jumbo size, the two-pack.
SPEAKER_03 (15:00):
Then that's it.
No context.
SPEAKER_01 (15:03):
No context, no anything.
Retailers are are merchants, andso their whole thing is it's not
about the products, it's aboutthe movement of the products.
And so their whole thing is likewhat's moving, what's not
moving.
We're going three layers deeperbecause at some point we have to
understand the social,emotional, and functional
requirements of why they'rebuying what they're buying.
They're not randomly buyinganything.
(15:26):
They say, oh, I bought a pack ofgum at the in the aisle and it
was, you know, I didn't plan tobuy it, so it's an impulse buy.
It's not an impulse buy.
The fact is, they're sittingthere going through the list and
like, oh, I've got thesemeetings coming up, I'm gonna be
out, you know what, I'm gonnaneed gum because I can't brush
my teeth.
There's some logic of why theypick it.
When I learned market research,I didn't learn it from
(15:47):
marketers.
I actually learned it fromcriminal and intelligence
interrogators because I realizedconsumers lie.
They just want to tell you whatyou want to hear.
SPEAKER_02 (15:55):
So, how do you get that data out of somebody?
SPEAKER_01 (15:58):
So, to be honest, it doesn't take many interviews,
but it takes, it takes 10one-hour interviews to help us
actually get to what I call thevariables that are important in
the consumption.
So there's two kinds of twokinds of jobs.
There's what we call the bighigher jobs, which is when do
they buy the can of Windex,right?
And then there's the littlehigher jobs, is when do they
(16:19):
spray the can of Windex?
And so part of it is you have torealize you have to align those
two things because at some pointin time I can actually make it
easier for them to buy theproduct, but if they don't use
it more, it's just gonna be aninventory in their store as
opposed to or in their cupboardas opposed to the store.
But if I can actually get themto spray more and figure out
other applications of it, now Ican actually increase
(16:40):
consumption, which will thenincrease velocity.
It's not the buying of it, it'sthe using.
This is why innovation is sohard.
It's about a it's in some cases,it's like threading the needle,
and some people have done it.
But the reality is like it takesa lot of rigor to do that.
And and I just don't believethat the financial side has the
patience to get that rigor.
SPEAKER_03 (16:58):
And now, Joel, is there more you wanted to dive
into on the sales and retail?
Because there's a big meatytopic, and we got 16 minutes on
uh we we can go to that.
SPEAKER_02 (17:06):
I have lots of things I would ask.
It's it's just very interesting,uh, Bobby.
SPEAKER_01 (17:11):
I'm very different.
I'm 60 years old.
I've only got so much time.
I wish people would have beenthis blunt with me back in when
I was 30.
I'm sure I'm gonna catch a bunchof flack for it.
This is gonna be the probablythe most polarizing you know
podcast you have.
But the reality is like at somepoint in time, I feel like you
have to basically put thisforward because nobody's talking
about this stuff.
SPEAKER_03 (17:31):
Well, what's interesting, Bobby, is Joel and
I are in technology, right?
And and and we're on theinnovation side of technology,
and it is interesting to thinkabout technology across
verticals.
SPEAKER_01 (17:41):
Uh so software, like I do a lot of software work.
You have to be pretty committedto actually engage us.
I don't have a big staff.
I have five people in this firm.
We've been doing this for almost17 years.
And the number one reason why Idon't have a big staff or big
group of people is because wemake you do the work.
(18:02):
People, most of the time theyhire consultants as outsourced,
hey, write this PowerPoint, dothis little thing.
Like, no, no, no, no.
We're gonna help you rethink howyou do it, and we're gonna we're
gonna sit side by side with youand help you do it.
SPEAKER_03 (18:14):
Well, shifting gears into I think a topic that's on a
lot of people's mind is aroundAI.
If you've got a perspective oror advice around generative AI
and its role, as you've kind ofseen that.
SPEAKER_01 (18:25):
The people who are really killing it in AI are the
people who aren't talking aboutAI, they're solving struggling
moments for consumers with AI.
And so the best example I haveright now is a company I've
worked with for since about2012.
It's called Intercom.
And Intercom is a customersuccess package.
They do everything from inboundto basically onboarding to
(18:48):
ongoing support to ticketing,right?
Instead of trying to make itreplace people, what it first
did is it tried to use AI justto help the current people
service better and servicefaster.
And so the best way to do thisis to actually have it add value
as early as possible and asquickly as possible and have it
take the things where you can'tfind people to help.
(19:10):
So, like when people started tohave trouble recruiting customer
success people, that's one ofthe reasons why it was there, is
like, yeah, we need three more,but we can't do it.
All right, well, here, let ustry to do that.
And so all of a sudden, whenthey couldn't find people, then
they could actually substitutepeople for the AI.
But the intent was never tobasically replace people, it was
more or less help people becausethere's not enough people there
(19:31):
to begin with.
It's kind of like Amazon withrobots, right?
It's so hard to hire and recruitpeople to do all that work,
which is hard work in thewarehouses.
Everybody's trying to make it socustomer facing to say, oh, we
now have AI, we can build yourlist for you for today.
It's like, no, I don't want youto build my list.
They're trying to actually addfeatures and benefits where
(19:51):
nobody wants them.
Most people are we gotta add AI,we gotta get AI, we gotta put it
in the product.
And it's like, okay, let's let'sjust talk about if we're
customer.
Customer-centric, what problemsdo they have and how will AI
help them?
We're not building AI for AI'ssake.
SPEAKER_03 (20:06):
It's tempting to start with a technology or
solution.
Yeah.
And then and and kind of cominginto AI.
Is this a technology that is assusceptible or more susceptible
or less susceptible to brands,technology companies starting
with the technology, notunderstanding the job to be
done?
SPEAKER_01 (20:25):
Aaron Powell So this is where like if you study
technologically pushedinnovations to the market, most
of them fail because theyover-engineer it, they try to
make it perfect, they try tomake it fit everybody's
situation, and then it's tooexpensive, and then it's not at
the right place at the righttime and what's there.
(20:46):
And so one of the things I wouldsay I pride myself on is I'm
better building a kick-ass halfthan a half-ass hole.
And so most people, most peoplewant to say, oh, it's got to
have this, it's got to havethat.
I'm like, no, if we do thesethree things really well, they
won't give a shit about anythingelse.
unknown (21:00):
Right?
SPEAKER_01 (21:01):
And this is where it's like, well, no, we you
know, we were gonna have peoplerejecting it.
And it's like, no, no, go testit, go show, go do this.
And you start to realize, like,that's true.
Like, think of the iPhone.
What did the iPhone when itfirst came out suck at?
It literally was horrible at it.
Reception, the calls, the callssucked.
(21:21):
But it it brought the PDA in, itgave me the iPod, it gave me
songs in it, and basically theand then they made it better.
And then what happened?
The battery sucked.
unknown (21:31):
Right?
SPEAKER_01 (21:32):
And then all of a sudden they got the better, and
then the camera sucked.
And then the and so you start torealize that they've been
incrementalizing the iPhone.
They're pretty close to the end.
Like, like if you notice, theywere coming out with one every
year for a long time because thetechnology was changing, but the
technology is not changing asmuch anymore.
It's all in software, nothardware.
SPEAKER_03 (21:49):
So I'm hearing Bobby's solve problems that
actually exist if we're yourconsumer.
SPEAKER_01 (21:54):
That's right.
SPEAKER_03 (21:54):
And don't and don't try and solve these manufactured
problems.
SPEAKER_01 (21:59):
Yeah, don't try to solve all the problems, solve
the things that are important.
But the other thing is, once yousolve one problem, a new problem
is always created.
Every technological innovationsolves one problem, creates a
new one every time.
SPEAKER_03 (22:13):
This has been really great, Bobby.
Joel, Bobby, were there otherthings that wanted to be said,
questions to ask?
SPEAKER_01 (22:21):
Yeah, I want to say one thing here, which is I want
you to know that I'm verybullish on the CPG market.
It's ripe for somebody to walkin and basically start to change
how they think about it and howthey work on it.
PG has proven that theirstrategy of being able to solve
customers' real problems andthen use scale to basically get
it down to prices that matter.
It's like it's repeatable, butnobody's studied them enough and
(22:45):
nobody wants to actually copythem.
But the reality is like there isa there is a pathway through
this forest, but the reality isit requires work and dedication
and rigor.
There's no silver bullet.
My belief is the a lot of thisindustry has been built on
silver bullets.
The next thing is is alwaysgonna be the best thing.
I would tell you if you're inthe industry, like you have the
(23:06):
opportunity to change the world.
I feel like there's opportunityeverywhere.
SPEAKER_02 (23:10):
And Bobby, do you think those changes are they
gonna come from the incumbents,or do you think this is gonna be
new brands that that reallycreate this change?
SPEAKER_01 (23:21):
I I think there's gonna be a combination of people
who will buy nostalgic brandsand hold a series of brands that
have been around and they'llrealize how to actually make
them more and more relevant inpeople's lives.
And then I think there will benew brands that will basically
talk about new experiences.
We're trying to connect Pringlesand Tony the Tiger to today's
(23:44):
kind of lifestyles, and that'svery hard to do.
There has to be some new brandsthat are built, but building a
brand is very hard and veryexpensive, and most people don't
want to do it.
But my belief is there are wideopen opportunities in certain
categories to do that, just todominate, just to walk in and
dominate.
Because everybody's gonna belike, oh no, we can't do that.
Like, I remember when everybodysaid, like, we can't go on
(24:07):
Amazon because Walmart willdelist us, and then all of a
sudden the COVID COVID happened,and everybody's like, oh my
gosh, they don't care, theydon't even notice.
SPEAKER_03 (24:17):
Well, Bobby, it really has been great having you
on Shelf Life.
Appreciate the animatedconversation and the insight
that you brought to us.
SPEAKER_01 (24:25):
Thank you for having me on.
I hope I didn't piss off toomany of your of your audience,
but hopefully I inspired a fewof them.
SPEAKER_02 (24:31):
Look, I think yeah, being animated, hopefully
actually getting a couple peopleriled up is generally good.
SPEAKER_01 (24:37):
So yeah, yeah.
I I think the the the debate isthe way to go.
That's how we get past theseconflicts and get past our our
biases.
SPEAKER_03 (24:45):
If people do want to get to know more about what you
do, your work, you know, yourcurrent thinking, how can they
learn more and what are you upto these days?
SPEAKER_01 (24:53):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
First thing is I would tell youLinkedIn is the best place.
I have a website called TheRewired Group, which is the name
of my firm.
I have a couple of books.
One is called Learning to Build,which is uh an homage to my four
mentors.
Um I'm a dyslexic, uh,illiterate kid at 18, told to be
a carpenter or uh uh either acarpenter or a construction
worker or baggage handler at theairport.
(25:15):
These people poured all theirknowledge into me and helped me
basically become the innovatorthat I am.
There's another book calledDemand Side Sales, which is
about this notion of stopselling and help your customers
make progress.
I have two podcasts.
One is called Jobs to be doneradio, which is kind of old, um,
but it's still out there and Istill get people listening to
it.
And then there's a one where mymy business partner of 20 years,
(25:36):
Greg Engel and I just riff oncertain topics.
People give us topics, and it'scalled the circuit breaker.
And it's about 20 minutes, andit's just like a bunch of random
topics uh of what people eitherwrestle with or want to hear our
opinion on it.
It's a lot of fun.
SPEAKER_02 (25:50):
Excellent.
Well, thank you, Bobby.
We really appreciate you beingon today.
SPEAKER_01 (25:53):
Thanks.
It was great.
From Aloy AI, this is Shelf Life.
SPEAKER_02 (00:19):
What's broken in the traditional innovation model for
CPG brands?
SPEAKER_03 (00:24):
How can sales and marketing teams better identify
their true competition?
SPEAKER_02 (00:29):
How should leaders think differently about product
launches, forecasting, andmeasurement?
SPEAKER_03 (00:34):
On every episode of Shelf Life, we answer questions
like these and more with thehelp of leaders across the
consumer goods industry.
SPEAKER_02 (00:42):
Today we welcome Bobby Moesta, CEO and founder of
the Rewired Group.
SPEAKER_03 (00:48):
Bobby is a co-creator of the Jobs to be
done theory and an expert ininnovation and product
development.
He's worked on and helped launchmore than 3,500 new products,
ranging from the guidance systemfor the Patriot missile to
Pokemon Mac and Cheese andeverything in between.
SPEAKER_02 (01:04):
I'm your co-host, Joel Beal, CEO of Alloy AI.
SPEAKER_03 (01:08):
And I'm your co-host, Logan Ensign, Chief
Customer Officer at Alloy AI.
SPEAKER_02 (01:13):
We'll be back with Bobby right after this.
SPEAKER_00 (01:19):
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external partners and internalsystems to get a complete
picture of your business.
Each one is different.
Alloy AI makes it easy toconnect data from retailers,
e-commerce, supply chainpartners, and even your own ERP,
then easily surface insights todrive sales growth.
Every day, brands use Alloy AIto see POS trends, measure
(01:41):
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Get a demo at Alloy.ai today.
SPEAKER_01 (01:58):
Thanks for having me.
I'm excited to be here.
SPEAKER_03 (02:00):
Well, dive right in.
I know you have been in a lot ofdifferent sort of vertical
consulting different verticalsacross the board, but we are
particularly interested here inthe CPG space.
One of the comments you'd madeis about how a lot of the
large-scale CPGs have outsourcedinnovation.
So I'm curious, from yourvantage, why is that the case?
(02:22):
And perhaps what's broken in inmore traditional innovation
models?
SPEAKER_01 (02:26):
I worked in innovation since 1987.
I started in the automotivebusiness and then I moved to the
defense business.
And then I moved to the foodbusiness from 1993 to 2000.
I have this company now calledThe Rewired Group.
And I started that in 2008.
And I've been working with CPGsince then as well.
(02:47):
So I've seen kind of this longerterm thing, if you will.
I feel like between 2000 and2010, somehow they lost their
way.
And I think they lost their wayfrom two perspectives.
One is what I term as sustaininginnovations or cost reduction
kind of innovations outpaced thenotion of new products.
(03:09):
And so it was easier to go do acost reduction and save$20
million on some line than it wasto go build a new line.
And so when finance andmarketing kind of teamed up, RD
got kind of pushed back to theside.
I worked with Nielsen at somepoint in time where they had
launched something along thelines of 25,000 new pro SKUs in
(03:30):
a year, and less than 40 made itover 10 million.
Ultimately, people were puttingin millions of dollars and
getting thousands of dollarsout.
And so over time, managementstarted to look at it.
And I think when 3G bought Kraftand Heinz was when it really
kind of hit, they literally shutdown almost all the RD centers.
(03:52):
They were like, we're not goingto do RD, we're just going to
milk this thing as long as wecan.
And then other companies startedto follow.
And you start to realize thatwhat they ended up doing is
building an incubator systemwhere they'd innovate by putting
things into academic orcommunities like Techstars or,
you know, some entrepreneurialkind of network, and they would
(04:12):
pour money into that and thenacquire.
But ultimately, most of them allgrew by acquiring something, not
by actually innovating onanything.
And so they've lost theirinnovation muscle.
And I feel like it's starting tocome back, but I haven't seen
anybody kind of take the charge.
I would say PG is the exceptionto this rule.
Their whole business model isbased on innovating.
(04:33):
And so they're one of the fewthat I know of that have been
continuously innovatingthroughout their entire 30-year
history that I know of them.
Is it a people challenge anissue?
Is it a process challenge orissue?
I think it's a leadershipproblem.
Most of the people who werepromoted to the top positions
were not innovators.
They were salespeople trying togrow.
(04:54):
They were finance people tryingto save money.
They were HR people trying tobasically make it a good place
to work.
Like you started to realize,like and you look at it, and
it's mostly finance people orsalespeople are the people,
sales and marketing people kindof leading those organizations.
And so it just took a backseat.
SPEAKER_02 (05:11):
What's wrong with the model of having excellent
operators who can efficientlymarket and run a supply chain
and separating out theinnovation, outsourcing it, as
you said, to incubators, tosmall companies that they
acquire?
SPEAKER_01 (05:25):
I think there's a couple things.
One is they can't count on whatthey have because the customers
change, not the market, thecustomers.
And so you start to realize weneed to actually innovate to
just keep up with how they'rechanging.
All of a sudden we have we haveto take a lot of the food
coloring out of stuff.
Like that's a big deal.
And if I don't have thecapability to do it, all of a
sudden I got to outsource thator I got to find capability to
(05:47):
do it.
And it just bottles bottleneckseverything up.
Ultimately, my experience, andthis is my opinion, right?
My opinion is that I feel likeit's led by marketers, and
marketers see the market, butthey don't see consumers and
they don't see buyers.
They see segments.
And so they don't have enoughintimacy on the true innovation
(06:08):
pieces.
And so we plan about aninnovation project when we're
the stupidest.
And so we are asked how muchbudget we need, as opposed to
being able to say, like, whatare the what are the milestones
we have to think about and whatare the unknowns we have to go
solve?
And so a lot of innovation isn'tabout executing unknowns.
It's actually uncovering theunknowns and solving those
unknowns as fastly as possible.
(06:30):
So it's about learning.
And so most of them are set upas project management type
things, like we know what to do,but when we hit a bump or we
actually find an unknown, wedon't know what to do next.
SPEAKER_02 (06:41):
I don't think this is a problem unique to CPG, the
focus on the financial aspects,take the innovation out.
A lot of people have complainedthat MBAs did this a little bit.
What do you think is causing itto swing, though, the other way?
SPEAKER_01 (06:54):
Part of it is to realize that at some point they
they have to actually start totarget where people struggle, as
opposed to copycat everybodyelse and try to say one more
feature, one more benefit isgoing to get me more sales.
It doesn't work.
The thing is they're losingmarket.
I mean, think look at Kellogg's,for example.
Kellogg's just almost imploded,from my opinion.
They've been trying to innovatefor so long with so much money
(07:17):
that the fact is, but theycouldn't make anything stick.
They had the people, they hadthe resources, they had they
have the food science knowledge,they have the marketing
knowledge.
Like what's missing ultimately,to me, and my experience would
say is they didn't have enoughunderstanding of that you can't
steal market share.
You need to create market shareby going after struggling
moments in people's lives.
When you try to innovate insidethe corporation, you compare it
(07:43):
to everything you already have.
So think of craft.
We make craft macaroni andcheese.
I don't even know what a boxcosts anymore, but let's say
it's two bucks, right?
And it makes this much margin.
Whatever I have to make has toactually have incremental margin
or I won't launch it.
We shouldn't be measuring thingson margin.
We should be measuring things onpounds of cash that it
(08:05):
generates.
Because even though it has lessmargin, I might sell 10 times
the other thing.
The reality is like it's still abetter product.
And so what happens is we end upusing the value system of the
current products line that wehave, comparing it to the new
product line, which is like ininfancy, right?
The the second thing is you haveto realize that most of the
(08:27):
people running CP CPG companieshave inherited everything.
They actually have never createdmuch.
And so the notion of knowing howto create versus knowing how to
manage is really, reallydifferent type of work.
And so those are the two bigthings that I think are kind of
hindering that industry.
SPEAKER_03 (08:44):
Bobby, you mentioned something interesting about
innovation centers being oftendriven by marketing.
I'm curious as you think aboutevaluating categories and
competition and sort oftraditional ways of thinking
about categories andcompetition.
When you kind of extend thethinking around, okay, job to be
done, solving new pain, how doescompetitive landscape and
(09:05):
understanding your competitionrelate to all this?
SPEAKER_01 (09:07):
This is a really good question to me, because
what happens is I think the waywe've described categories is
not how consumers look atanything.
Most people would say Milky Wayand Snickers compete with each
other.
They're both candy bars, theyboth sold next to each other.
But when you ask the consumer,uh Snickers actually competes
with a Red Bull and a coffee anda and a and a sandwich and an
(09:30):
apple.
Well, it's because it's a foodbar where a Milky Way competes
with ice cream and a glass ofwine.
You're talking to a couple ofrunners here, Bobby.
SPEAKER_02 (09:38):
So speaking of, I'm laughing, it's the best food for
climbing because you get so manycalories in a small bar.
SPEAKER_01 (09:44):
It's compact, it's dense, I can eat it, it satiates
in my stomach.
And so when we start to, whenyou start to realize that
categories are built by thesupply side, they're built by
the industry, not by theconsumer.
We end up kind of going like,ooh, we need to actually
innovate in our category.
That's just that that's like youknow, incrementalism on a
pinhead.
How many more cookies do weneed?
(10:04):
How many more shampoos do weneed?
One of the myths that I think isjust crazy that most people see
is more choice is good.
It's like, no, more choiceactually creates confusion and
actually less consumption in thecategory in the innovation space
in the CPG industry.
It's about launching it.
Everybody goes like, oh, I'velaunched eight products.
Like, okay, how many weresuccessful?
Oh, I don't know.
I just move on to the nextproject.
(10:25):
And so their whole notion ofsuccess is literally just
getting it out the door.
Whether it's profitable, whetherit generates, you know, whether
it's growing, like, well, andand they would say, that's not
on me.
I'm like, no, you should be tiedto the upside of how it actually
works and and and tied tobasically the results of it, not
just the act of launching it.
SPEAKER_03 (10:45):
Bobby, when you specifically go and engage and
consult with you know theseCPGs, where do you start?
SPEAKER_01 (10:51):
I don't believe there's one innovation process
that works for everybody.
That's just crazy.
Everybody has their own, itshould have their own innovation
process based on what marketthey're in, the pace of
technological change, both iningredients and packaging and in
process.
The place we always start iswith some post-mortems.
We literally go and say, like,let's talk to about to two or
(11:14):
three project teams.
We're gonna relive thoseprojects.
What went well, what didn't gowell, and what would we keep
doing, what would we stop doing,what we need to start doing.
It's literally sitting down withwith project teams and
diagnosing kind of where are youat, prioritizing kind of what do
we need to work on first.
And typically the way we we endup doing is making it very
(11:35):
customer-centric andunderstanding where, when, who,
and why do we need a newproduct?
SPEAKER_02 (11:42):
One of the things I will sometimes hear from our
customers is that retailers willcome to them and say, I'm
looking for this type of productto put on my shelves.
I feel like there's a gap.
SPEAKER_01 (11:52):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (11:53):
Do you think that's something?
I mean, giving to your earlierpoint of you really want to be
dialed in with that consumer andwhat they're doing, do you think
brands should be listening tothe retailers or should they
say, like, no, I need to reallyvalidate this?
SPEAKER_01 (12:07):
This is signal and noise, right?
There's a signal there that theyhave shelf space they're willing
to do something with.
But short of that, mostretailers don't know what's
possible.
And so all we really need toknow is there's an opportunity
to get shelf space.
How do we actually go figure outwhat to put on that shelf?
Most retailers have no idea whatconsumers want.
I mean, think about it.
They let P and G run the laundryaisle because they know more
(12:30):
about laundry than the retailer.
Consumers don't know what theywant.
They know that they want to dosomething different and they
know the outcomes they want, butthey don't know the solution.
If we just listen to them, theirexact words, and make what they
say, we're always behind theeight ball because we're gonna
be like, no, no, no, no, that'snot what I meant.
I wanted it crunchy.
Well, this is crunchy.
(12:51):
Yeah, but this is too crunchy.
You're like, we have to actuallyunderstand why crunchy is
important, right?
Crunchy is about frustration insome cases.
Sometimes crunchy is aboutdistraction, sometimes crunchy
is about different things.
This is one of those thingswhere I feel like the industry
has lost its rigor and it'strying to work on what I call
Pablum or very, verysuperficial.
(13:13):
Make it easier, make it fresher,make it make it cleaner label,
make it this, but they don'tknow why, and they don't know
what people are doing with it.
And so they're just literallytaking orders and and and
iterating, and it's not making adifference.
They're like on a treadmill,they're just doing a bunch of
stuff, but it's not making thebusiness grow.
SPEAKER_03 (13:30):
Well, you said something interesting that may
seem counterintuitive, which isthe major retailers let PNG run
the laundry aisle.
Wouldn't retailers actually muchbetter understand the consumer
because they know all thecompetitors, they know that the
consumer is buying coffee versusPepsi, which is not information
that uh a supplier would have.
SPEAKER_01 (13:51):
So the the there's something called lag measure and
lead measure, right?
And the purchasing data is lagmeasurement.
They know that they sold it, butthey don't know why, they don't
know where, they don't knowwhen, they don't know who.
They're buying it to putsomewhere, but when do they use
it and how do they use it?
Most people are trying to lookfor what they bought last time,
and when you change the labeland it's not there, it's like,
which one is it?
(14:11):
Which one did I have?
I don't know.
I was doing uh toilet blowcleaner, right?
And it's like, and somebodyfinally came up to me and said,
like, how like can I help you?
I'm like, yeah, I'm trying tobuy toilet blow cleaner, but I
don't know which one to choose.
And then I'll interview them ofhow they pick their toilet bowl
cleaner.
Oh, I've used this one for ayear, but but this one has
bleach.
Don't I want bleach?
It's like, no, no, no.
And you start to realize, like,you can understand how people
(14:34):
look at it and they say, well,when this one's not available,
I'll buy this one as the backup.
A backup?
Why do you need a backup?
Well, sometimes, you know, whenI have guests over, I use this
one to actually be because ithas a better smell than that
one.
And you start to realize, like,they have these elaborate
algorithms in their head of howthey use and consume these
products.
And we have no clue besides onThursday, they bought they
(14:55):
bought Lysol toilet bowlcleaner.
The jumbo size, the two-pack.
SPEAKER_03 (15:00):
Then that's it.
No context.
SPEAKER_01 (15:03):
No context, no anything.
Retailers are are merchants, andso their whole thing is it's not
about the products, it's aboutthe movement of the products.
And so their whole thing is likewhat's moving, what's not
moving.
We're going three layers deeperbecause at some point we have to
understand the social,emotional, and functional
requirements of why they'rebuying what they're buying.
They're not randomly buyinganything.
(15:26):
They say, oh, I bought a pack ofgum at the in the aisle and it
was, you know, I didn't plan tobuy it, so it's an impulse buy.
It's not an impulse buy.
The fact is, they're sittingthere going through the list and
like, oh, I've got thesemeetings coming up, I'm gonna be
out, you know what, I'm gonnaneed gum because I can't brush
my teeth.
There's some logic of why theypick it.
When I learned market research,I didn't learn it from
(15:47):
marketers.
I actually learned it fromcriminal and intelligence
interrogators because I realizedconsumers lie.
They just want to tell you whatyou want to hear.
SPEAKER_02 (15:55):
So, how do you get that data out of somebody?
SPEAKER_01 (15:58):
So, to be honest, it doesn't take many interviews,
but it takes, it takes 10one-hour interviews to help us
actually get to what I call thevariables that are important in
the consumption.
So there's two kinds of twokinds of jobs.
There's what we call the bighigher jobs, which is when do
they buy the can of Windex,right?
And then there's the littlehigher jobs, is when do they
(16:19):
spray the can of Windex?
And so part of it is you have torealize you have to align those
two things because at some pointin time I can actually make it
easier for them to buy theproduct, but if they don't use
it more, it's just gonna be aninventory in their store as
opposed to or in their cupboardas opposed to the store.
But if I can actually get themto spray more and figure out
other applications of it, now Ican actually increase
(16:40):
consumption, which will thenincrease velocity.
It's not the buying of it, it'sthe using.
This is why innovation is sohard.
It's about a it's in some cases,it's like threading the needle,
and some people have done it.
But the reality is like it takesa lot of rigor to do that.
And and I just don't believethat the financial side has the
patience to get that rigor.
SPEAKER_03 (16:58):
And now, Joel, is there more you wanted to dive
into on the sales and retail?
Because there's a big meatytopic, and we got 16 minutes on
uh we we can go to that.
SPEAKER_02 (17:06):
I have lots of things I would ask.
It's it's just very interesting,uh, Bobby.
SPEAKER_01 (17:11):
I'm very different.
I'm 60 years old.
I've only got so much time.
I wish people would have beenthis blunt with me back in when
I was 30.
I'm sure I'm gonna catch a bunchof flack for it.
This is gonna be the probablythe most polarizing you know
podcast you have.
But the reality is like at somepoint in time, I feel like you
have to basically put thisforward because nobody's talking
about this stuff.
SPEAKER_03 (17:31):
Well, what's interesting, Bobby, is Joel and
I are in technology, right?
And and and we're on theinnovation side of technology,
and it is interesting to thinkabout technology across
verticals.
SPEAKER_01 (17:41):
Uh so software, like I do a lot of software work.
You have to be pretty committedto actually engage us.
I don't have a big staff.
I have five people in this firm.
We've been doing this for almost17 years.
And the number one reason why Idon't have a big staff or big
group of people is because wemake you do the work.
(18:02):
People, most of the time theyhire consultants as outsourced,
hey, write this PowerPoint, dothis little thing.
Like, no, no, no, no.
We're gonna help you rethink howyou do it, and we're gonna we're
gonna sit side by side with youand help you do it.
SPEAKER_03 (18:14):
Well, shifting gears into I think a topic that's on a
lot of people's mind is aroundAI.
If you've got a perspective oror advice around generative AI
and its role, as you've kind ofseen that.
SPEAKER_01 (18:25):
The people who are really killing it in AI are the
people who aren't talking aboutAI, they're solving struggling
moments for consumers with AI.
And so the best example I haveright now is a company I've
worked with for since about2012.
It's called Intercom.
And Intercom is a customersuccess package.
They do everything from inboundto basically onboarding to
(18:48):
ongoing support to ticketing,right?
Instead of trying to make itreplace people, what it first
did is it tried to use AI justto help the current people
service better and servicefaster.
And so the best way to do thisis to actually have it add value
as early as possible and asquickly as possible and have it
take the things where you can'tfind people to help.
(19:10):
So, like when people started tohave trouble recruiting customer
success people, that's one ofthe reasons why it was there, is
like, yeah, we need three more,but we can't do it.
All right, well, here, let ustry to do that.
And so all of a sudden, whenthey couldn't find people, then
they could actually substitutepeople for the AI.
But the intent was never tobasically replace people, it was
more or less help people becausethere's not enough people there
(19:31):
to begin with.
It's kind of like Amazon withrobots, right?
It's so hard to hire and recruitpeople to do all that work,
which is hard work in thewarehouses.
Everybody's trying to make it socustomer facing to say, oh, we
now have AI, we can build yourlist for you for today.
It's like, no, I don't want youto build my list.
They're trying to actually addfeatures and benefits where
(19:51):
nobody wants them.
Most people are we gotta add AI,we gotta get AI, we gotta put it
in the product.
And it's like, okay, let's let'sjust talk about if we're
customer.
Customer-centric, what problemsdo they have and how will AI
help them?
We're not building AI for AI'ssake.
SPEAKER_03 (20:06):
It's tempting to start with a technology or
solution.
Yeah.
And then and and kind of cominginto AI.
Is this a technology that is assusceptible or more susceptible
or less susceptible to brands,technology companies starting
with the technology, notunderstanding the job to be
done?
SPEAKER_01 (20:25):
Aaron Powell So this is where like if you study
technologically pushedinnovations to the market, most
of them fail because theyover-engineer it, they try to
make it perfect, they try tomake it fit everybody's
situation, and then it's tooexpensive, and then it's not at
the right place at the righttime and what's there.
(20:46):
And so one of the things I wouldsay I pride myself on is I'm
better building a kick-ass halfthan a half-ass hole.
And so most people, most peoplewant to say, oh, it's got to
have this, it's got to havethat.
I'm like, no, if we do thesethree things really well, they
won't give a shit about anythingelse.
unknown (21:00):
Right?
SPEAKER_01 (21:01):
And this is where it's like, well, no, we you
know, we were gonna have peoplerejecting it.
And it's like, no, no, go testit, go show, go do this.
And you start to realize, like,that's true.
Like, think of the iPhone.
What did the iPhone when itfirst came out suck at?
It literally was horrible at it.
Reception, the calls, the callssucked.
(21:21):
But it it brought the PDA in, itgave me the iPod, it gave me
songs in it, and basically theand then they made it better.
And then what happened?
The battery sucked.
unknown (21:31):
Right?
SPEAKER_01 (21:32):
And then all of a sudden they got the better, and
then the camera sucked.
And then the and so you start torealize that they've been
incrementalizing the iPhone.
They're pretty close to the end.
Like, like if you notice, theywere coming out with one every
year for a long time because thetechnology was changing, but the
technology is not changing asmuch anymore.
It's all in software, nothardware.
SPEAKER_03 (21:49):
So I'm hearing Bobby's solve problems that
actually exist if we're yourconsumer.
SPEAKER_01 (21:54):
That's right.
SPEAKER_03 (21:54):
And don't and don't try and solve these manufactured
problems.
SPEAKER_01 (21:59):
Yeah, don't try to solve all the problems, solve
the things that are important.
But the other thing is, once yousolve one problem, a new problem
is always created.
Every technological innovationsolves one problem, creates a
new one every time.
SPEAKER_03 (22:13):
This has been really great, Bobby.
Joel, Bobby, were there otherthings that wanted to be said,
questions to ask?
SPEAKER_01 (22:21):
Yeah, I want to say one thing here, which is I want
you to know that I'm verybullish on the CPG market.
It's ripe for somebody to walkin and basically start to change
how they think about it and howthey work on it.
PG has proven that theirstrategy of being able to solve
customers' real problems andthen use scale to basically get
it down to prices that matter.
It's like it's repeatable, butnobody's studied them enough and
(22:45):
nobody wants to actually copythem.
But the reality is like there isa there is a pathway through
this forest, but the reality isit requires work and dedication
and rigor.
There's no silver bullet.
My belief is the a lot of thisindustry has been built on
silver bullets.
The next thing is is alwaysgonna be the best thing.
I would tell you if you're inthe industry, like you have the
(23:06):
opportunity to change the world.
I feel like there's opportunityeverywhere.
SPEAKER_02 (23:10):
And Bobby, do you think those changes are they
gonna come from the incumbents,or do you think this is gonna be
new brands that that reallycreate this change?
SPEAKER_01 (23:21):
I I think there's gonna be a combination of people
who will buy nostalgic brandsand hold a series of brands that
have been around and they'llrealize how to actually make
them more and more relevant inpeople's lives.
And then I think there will benew brands that will basically
talk about new experiences.
We're trying to connect Pringlesand Tony the Tiger to today's
(23:44):
kind of lifestyles, and that'svery hard to do.
There has to be some new brandsthat are built, but building a
brand is very hard and veryexpensive, and most people don't
want to do it.
But my belief is there are wideopen opportunities in certain
categories to do that, just todominate, just to walk in and
dominate.
Because everybody's gonna belike, oh no, we can't do that.
Like, I remember when everybodysaid, like, we can't go on
(24:07):
Amazon because Walmart willdelist us, and then all of a
sudden the COVID COVID happened,and everybody's like, oh my
gosh, they don't care, theydon't even notice.
SPEAKER_03 (24:17):
Well, Bobby, it really has been great having you
on Shelf Life.
Appreciate the animatedconversation and the insight
that you brought to us.
SPEAKER_01 (24:25):
Thank you for having me on.
I hope I didn't piss off toomany of your of your audience,
but hopefully I inspired a fewof them.
SPEAKER_02 (24:31):
Look, I think yeah, being animated, hopefully
actually getting a couple peopleriled up is generally good.
SPEAKER_01 (24:37):
So yeah, yeah.
I I think the the the debate isthe way to go.
That's how we get past theseconflicts and get past our our
biases.
SPEAKER_03 (24:45):
If people do want to get to know more about what you
do, your work, you know, yourcurrent thinking, how can they
learn more and what are you upto these days?
SPEAKER_01 (24:53):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
First thing is I would tell youLinkedIn is the best place.
I have a website called TheRewired Group, which is the name
of my firm.
I have a couple of books.
One is called Learning to Build,which is uh an homage to my four
mentors.
Um I'm a dyslexic, uh,illiterate kid at 18, told to be
a carpenter or uh uh either acarpenter or a construction
worker or baggage handler at theairport.
(25:15):
These people poured all theirknowledge into me and helped me
basically become the innovatorthat I am.
There's another book calledDemand Side Sales, which is
about this notion of stopselling and help your customers
make progress.
I have two podcasts.
One is called Jobs to be doneradio, which is kind of old, um,
but it's still out there and Istill get people listening to
it.
And then there's a one where mymy business partner of 20 years,
(25:36):
Greg Engel and I just riff oncertain topics.
People give us topics, and it'scalled the circuit breaker.
And it's about 20 minutes, andit's just like a bunch of random
topics uh of what people eitherwrestle with or want to hear our
opinion on it.
It's a lot of fun.
SPEAKER_02 (25:50):
Excellent.
Well, thank you, Bobby.
We really appreciate you beingon today.
SPEAKER_01 (25:53):
Thanks.
It was great.
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