"Cleveland is our primary market," Pierre's Ice Cream CEO Shelley Roth said. "As we branch out, we still have that connection. There's a lot of value to being a Midwest company." Sometimes ice cream can get from the cow to your freezer "in as quickly as a few days."
CLEVELAND, Ohio -- Pierre's Ice Cream, MTD Products and Naturepedic may have started out as small businesses in Northeast Ohio, but they are making some major waves nationally and even internationally. The American Advertising Federation's Cleveland Chapter asked each of them to share some of their secrets for going global with 115 attendees at Wednesday's networking luncheon.
View full sizeShelley Roth, CEO of Pierre's Ice Cream, says of the company's Cleveland roots: "There's a lot of value in being a Midwest company." Shelley Roth, president and chief executive of Pierre's Ice Cream, left a marketing job at Atlantic Records in New York at age 22 to join her father, Sol, in the family business.
She now oversees a company whose branded and private-label products are sold all over the U.S., as well as overseas (orders have come in from Pakistan, Puerto Rico, Aruba and Bermuda), from its headquarters and bustling ice cream factory in Midtown Cleveland.
"But Cleveland is our primary market," she said. "As we branch out, we still have that connection. There's a lot of value to being a Midwest company." Sometimes ice cream can get from the cow to your freezer "in as quickly as a few days," she said.
View full sizeA worker stacks ice cream at Pierre's Ice Cream during a 2011 tour of the company's 35,000 sq. ft. factory in Midtown Cleveland. The 82-year-old Pierre's began as an ice cream parlor on Euclid Avenue and then Hough Avenue, back when there were hundreds of family owned ice cream shops in Cleveland and pints were still packed by hand.
But now with major national competitors with big advertising budgets, the company's greatest challenge is persuading shoppers to pick Pierre's over its competitors in the freezer case. So Pierre's spends a great deal of time designing eye-catching packages and delivery trucks to showcase its brands and flavors.
It also relies on free samples, coupons, radio and print ads, promotions and social media to get people to try new products. "Our core market is Northeast Ohio, so it's important that we continue to grow in our back yard," Roth said.
When moderator Lute Harmon Jr., president of Great Lakes Publishing, asked Roth for Pierre's best-selling flavor, she said, "vanilla, by far," with french vanilla and vanilla bean also in the top 10. Roth said the best way to understand and appreciate a company's commitment to quality is by tasting its vanilla first.
View full sizeHeidi Ketvertis, director of marketing, MTD Products. Heidi Ketvertis, director of marketing communications for the mass retail group at MTD Products Inc., said Clevelanders may not know that MTD is based here in Valley City, Medina County, or what the company does, but many are avid fans of its snow throwers and riding mowers.
MTD, which stands for "Modern Tool and Die," was founded in 1932 by three German immigrants, Theo Moll, Emil Jochum and Erwin Gerhard, whose descendants still run the company.
One of their founders was taking a train from Ellis Island to family in Wisconsin when he saw Cleveland's steel mills outside his windows and said, "This is where I need to be," Ketvertis said. He got off the train, summoned his cousin to Cleveland, and they both became skilled tool and die makers.
"In 1959, they made their first lawnmower, and the rest is history," she said. MTD has built a reputation for its commercial and residential lawn and garden equipment, including Cub Cadet, Troy-Bilt and Yard Machines, built primarily in 10 U.S. factories, as well as in Europe, North America, Asia, Australia and South America. Since 2000, more than 125 MTD products have been named "Best Buys" by Consumer Reports.
View full sizeA Troy-Bilt tiller from MTD Products Inc. MTD promotes its products via digital and social media, blogger and media relations, content marketing and in-store referrals. Because its machines are costly purchases, customers tend to do research and ask around before deciding what to buy, Ketvertis said.
What used to be 25 manufacturers has dwindled to five, with 70 percent of U.S. lawnmowers now sold at Lowes, Home Depot and Sears. MTD is also looking to expand into other countries where, as in the U.S. and England, homeowners enjoy taking care of their lawns.
"Being a company that was founded by immigrants, there's a lot of commitment by the family to remain in the area; most of the family still lives in the area," Ketvertis said of Northeast Ohio. "It's nice to be able to say that 'We're made in America.'"
Heidi Baumgart bought a two-sided Naturepedic mattress for her daughter before she joined the company as director of marketing last year.
Naturepedic, a Bainbridge Township manufacturer and distributor of certified organic and non-toxic mattresses, was founded in 2004, by Barry Cik, a chemical engineer who refused to let his grandson sleep on an ordinary crib mattress.
View full sizeHeidi Baumgart, director of marketing, Naturepedic. Baumgart said that because mass retailers were initially reluctant to sell Naturepedic crib mattresses alongside their own, the company has relied heavily on search engine referrals and social media, especially Pinterest, Facebook and Google+.
Naturepedic has also sponsored baby events, cultivated buzz among Mom bloggers, and sought out celebrity endorsements of its luxury organic cotton mattresses.
But the company really took off "when our customers went to their stores and said, 'This is what I want, and you don't have it'," she said. "The Internet has been pivotal to what we do, because how else do you educate people" about why their mattresses are different.
In addition to its Bainbridge Township factory and showroom, the company also has retail shops in Beverly Hills, Dallas and Toronto.
Baumgart said Naturepedic tries as much as possible to get its materials from U.S. sources, and every mattress is built by hand by skilled craftsmen and women, many of whom are Amish. "It's a huge differentiator for us," she said.