Spreading eCommerce Innovation With Nut Butters And Jams

When Zach Fishbain and his now-wife, Val, were planning their shoes-optional wedding, they didn’t outsource much of the unique event to anyone. “It was not your traditional wedding,” Zach told PYMNTS in an interview. And, when the couple thought about wedding favors for their guests, they knew they couldn’t fall short and offer them generic gifts. Nothing about the wedding was generic from the food to the decorations and the accommodations — and the couple knew they had to provide a gift that would fit into the theme of the rest of the wedding.

Val was already making some homemade peanut butter using the Vitamix blender that she had received from her bridal shower. And they came up with the idea to make the peanut butter their wedding favor, cranking out 50 pounds of the product and packaging it into little jars. “We could only make like a few pounds at a time,” Zach said. As soon as they finished preparing the peanut butter, they thought, thank goodness we don’t have to do this again.

But guests were excited about the peanut butter at the wedding. The couple thought guests would bring the peanut butter home as a gift, but they were enjoying it at the wedding. And they were asking for more before he and his wife could go on their honeymoon. Their guests wanted the peanut butter for their offices, and they wanted to give it to their friends. They also wanted to purchase the product for themselves.

With all of the interest in their peanut butter, the couple decided to start an informal business selling the product. And they then decided to make the company official by forming an LLC and opening a bank account. Today, they have a company that sells its products online called Spread The Love Foods.

The Nut Butters and Jams

Spread The Love Foods sells a wide range of nut butter and jams made from only one or two ingredients. Its peanut butter and almond butter, for instance, only have a single ingredient. “It’s made with just the almonds or made with just the peanuts,” Zach said. The company also sells an almond flax butter made with only almonds and flax seeds, and it has an almond cashew butter that only has almonds and cashews as ingredients. Its jams have only two ingredients as well — raspberries and sugar, in one case.

The company offers nut butters with creamy textures, and it doesn’t put any additives into its products, such as palm oil. It also provides crunchy options as well for customers that prefer that type of consistency. Zach says that the company’s target market are consumers who are “taking their diets and their health very seriously.” Customers might have had their doctors tell them they need to cut out salt, or they might be looking for an option without palm oil. Shoppers might also be looking for a clean choice for their diets. The company, which has a social media presence of more than 16,000 followers on Instagram, sells its products through Amazon and its eCommerce website. Grocery stores and other retailers also stock its products.

The eCommerce Experience

Through the company’s website, consumers can purchase a single jar as well as a three-pack or a six-pack of its nut butters and jams. The company also lets consumers buy 15-pound pails of peanut butter and almond butter along with the option to purchase a 40-pound pail of almond butter. It also sells a gift set, which includes organic peanut butter, almond cashew power butter, marionberry artisan jam, raspberry artisan jam, and a PBspoon (a cross between a spoon and a spatula).

The company offers a wholesale portal that customers such as, say, stores and restaurants can use after the company has granted them access to the feature. site Shopify powers the company’s website, and the brand offers PayPal as well as credit cards as payment options. As it stands, Zach said the company is currently making “big strides” with its single-serve packets. It plans to add more products in the future: Zach sees the company growing into other types of spreadable products.

With a name like Spread The Love, he says, the brand lends itself perfectly to other spreadable products such as honey, cream cheese and hummus.