Fourth-generation family-owned consumer goods companies don’t have a reputation for innovation or risk-taking, but don’t tell that to Ken Wegner, president of Jel Sert. The 95-year-old Chicago-based company is in the midst of its largest new product launch ever with the introduction of SLIQ Spirited Ice, an alcohol-infused freezer pop gaining widespread distribution just in time for peak demand during the summer.
“We’ve been working on SLIQ for two years and are putting a tremendous amount of manufacturing capability and marketing support behind it,” Wegner says of the new brand, which features a rum, vodka or agave base, with three flavors of each. “We think the brand is going to do tremendous things. We have a very large marketing program behind it this year with iHeartRadio and Barstool Sports.”
The brand, while new, isn’t far removed from Jel Sert’s core competency of making freezer pops such as the Fla-Vor-Ice and Otter Pops brands. To bring the new brand to market, however, the company had to establish new distribution relationships and adjust manufacturing capacity to create lines dedicated to packaging a product that will be 8% alcohol by volume.
“We established a national distribution network, which is pretty amazing to do in the first year,” Wegner says. “Most companies that launch an alcohol brand do so regionally and build on it for years. We decided to go national on day one. This is our business. We’ve been making freezer pops longer than anyone in the world.”
The Origin of Innovation
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