EP 171: Build, Buy Or Partner? How Smart Brands Create New Business Models

Yeah, that is amazing.

And the word new business models just sounds like very transformative opportunities, getting creative, collaborating across different units.

Let's dig into that word a little bit more.

What are some of those digital products and experiences that you're managing underneath the new business models banner?

Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

So the easiest way to think about the new business models team at Nested Green is it is our portfolio of digital first brands.

So we're still building brands, still very much focused on the consumer, but they're digital first.

So across the portfolio, we have all of our apps, our websites, all the content that we publish online.

We have a brand and a portfolio of connected devices and health kits, IoT devices.

Our direct-to-consumer brands sit within new business models.

So if it is a digitally native brand, it sits with us.

We've got a software product, a website that is the largest shelter rescue adoption site, Petfinder.

So a lot of different, it's quite a conglomeration of brands.

It's really exciting.

And in many cases, these things are pretty new, right? Within the last couple of years that we have started from scratch.

So you have the overall Nestle Purina brand.

And then let's talk about that pet shelter one.

What were some of the insights or where did you even get the insights to say, hey, this feels like an opportunity to have a digital first brand do something different underneath the Purina banner?

Yeah.

I mean, so we're very focused on deeply understanding the consumer, in our case, the pet owner.

We spend a lot of time and a lot of resources building consumer insight, understanding what jobs need to be done, what are the pain points that pet owners have, and then solving for those.

And so that's really the way that any of these ideas have come to life within my team.

So new business models in this team exists in order to drive the core business, our traditional food, treats, litter, supplements.

So everything that we do has a focus on how do we drive back to that core.

And in the case of PetFinders, it's a great example of the best time to form a relationship with a pet owner is at the moment of acquisition.