The Honest Kitchen is a San Diego-based pet food company that crafts amazing, natural human-grade dog and cat food. They’re a truly innovative company, combining both technology and practicality to satisfy a rapidly-emerging market. Their nation-wide client base ranges from individual consumers to mom & pop pet stores, and even big-name retailers.

The Honest Kitchen had a ~15 person sales team tasked with covering the whole country (plus Canada) and management needed a way to organize, direct, and track their team. Additionally, reps needed a way to use their time more efficiently and have better meetings with customers. 

The date for their new product launch was fast approaching and they lacked a sound strategy to efficiently place it where they wanted. That was until one fateful interview with a candidate who suggested they integrate Badger into their sales toolbelt after she had used it with great success at a previous company.

Fast forward a few years and The Honest Kitchen’s sales team is still in love with Badger, but more importantly, they’re in love with the ROI they receive with Badger. Keep reading to see for yourself how Badger helped increase visibility in the field for The Honest Kitchen, leading to the perfect sales strategy that spurred a 15% overall growth for the business.

When Elwin Warsh, Strategic Sales Analyst, joined The Honest Kitchen, his focus was dedicated entirely to: 

• increasing the visibility of their new products and
• ensuring that the new products were placed in their best performing stores. 

This goal demanded a method of generating more meaningful face-to-face meetings with their highest potential customers.

The sales team was also spending too much time doing administrative work like pulling together customer information from different databases prior to meetings. Additionally, they were wasting time driving from A to B without taking into account customer C, D, E and so on. Clearly, they were in dire need of a route optimization tool.

Time is money in sales. Elwin knew there had to be a better way to strategically allocate their sales team’s time.

Prior to Badger Maps, The Honest Kitchen had an unprepared but capable sales force. Their ability to sell was proven, however they lacked the necessary tools to operate at maximum efficiency.

Elwin and sales management had no way of seeing where they were doing bad, and where they were having more success. This kept them from making informed tactical decisions based on where their current strategy was working and where it wasn’t. Sales data would come in a month-and-a-half after the fact, which made Elwin realize that their snail-paced flow of information just wasn't going to cut it if they wanted a successful new product launch.

Additionally, without any route optimization in place, the sales force had to solely rely on Apple Maps or Google Maps to get to all their meetings on time. Needless to say, they were wasting huge amounts of precious time and gas driving around without a sound routing strategy in place.

Training the entire sales team on the new tool was a breeze. After one month with Badger, the entire sales team was fully trained and in love with the easy-to-use app!

The field sales team used route optimization to quickly plan their fastest routes to their highest potential customers. They were able to maximize the time spent with the best clients, yet also place the new products in many different stores. Badger’s ability to prioritize based on The Honest Kitchen's specific needs made the simultaneous accomplishment of these two goals possible.

When the sales rep arrived at their meeting location, they would check that customer’s account details and notes. This allowed them quick access to previous sales data and gave context for more meaningful conversations with their customers. Having this information at their fingertips sped up sales cycles.

Reps would create “Check-ins” after each meeting detailing the key information they learned from that meeting while it was still fresh. Elwin used this data to create reports, sort by rep, and analyze where they're checking in and how they're placing new items. He then redirects specific territory managers to focus on the places where the new product had yet to be placed. The increased field visibility that Badger Maps offered to Elwin and the sales directors was invaluable.

After a pilot with Badger earned the approval of the sales team, Elwin fully implemented Badger in their team to help meet their goals with their new product launch looming in the very near future.

This constant flow of information helped facilitate The Honest Kitchen’s impressive growth. Their better-informed sales strategy helped grow their business by 15%. They estimate that 33% of that growth can be directly attributed to their use of Badger.

The time the sales team saved on their routes allowed them to spend their time selling, rather than driving or collecting notes. The route planning and check-ins allowed Elwin oversight of the sales process for each and every meeting.

Not only did Badger Maps help paint the big picture of their sales activity that gave them the insight for a solid growth strategy, but every team hit their placement goal of getting the new products in 80% of all their top stores for their new product launch.