Gary Crawford San Francisco: Gary Erickson & Kit Crawford
OCTOBER 28, 2015 6:04 PM
Clif Bar’s Gary Erickson offers tips to small businesses
The Cal Poly grad founded Clif Bar in 1992, retaining lessons learned in SLO
His focus: Keeping the products organic and the company true to core values
Erickson has spoken at Cal Poly to show students ‘what a C student can do’
Clif Bar’s husband-wife co-owners, Gary Erickson and Kit Crawford, right, with The Mountain Air’s co-owner, Wayne Patterson. Aaron Lambert
Gary Erickson has only visited San Luis Obispo a few times since graduating fromCal Polywith a business administration degree in 1980 and then launching Clif Bar, maker of organic energy bars and drinks, 12 years later.
He returned to town last weekend to celebrate the 40th anniversary of one of his former employers, The Mountain Air, a fledgling outdoor-gear store when Erickson worked there while a student at Cal Poly.
“I had worked since I was 14 in sporting goods and ski shops,” Erickson said during the event last week. “I walked into Mountain Air, and I said that I can tune skis, and I was literally working the next day.”
Years later, after Clif Bar had grown into a household name, Erickson said he returned to San Luis Obispo to speak to a group of Cal Poly business students “to tell them what a C student can do.” (He said he graduated with a 2.4 GPA.)
The success of his multimillion dollar company — named No. 4 on Fortune magazine’s 2015 list of best workplaces in manufacturing and production — didn’t come overnight.
After graduating, Erickson said he worked as a mountain guide in Yosemite, designed the first gel bicycle saddle while working for Palo Alto-based bicycle company Avocet and then, in 1986, founded Kali’s Bakery — named after his grandmother.
It was the latter company that laid the groundwork for Clif Bar, created when Erickson decided he could make a better energy bar than the ones he ate on a 175-mile bike ride. The Emeryville-based company, which remains family- and employee-owned, expanded beyond its original energy bar to create a range of other products, from the Luna bar — targeted toward women — to energy gels and recovery drinks.
In 2000, Erickson and Kit Crawford, his wife and Clif Bar co-owner, came close to selling the company for a reported $120 million to Quaker Oats. Instead, they kept the company private and eventually bought out their former partner.
WE WANTED TO KEEP OUR COMPANY WHETHER IT SUCCEEDED OR FAILED.
Gary Erickson, co-owner and founder of Clif Bar
“We wanted to keep our company whether it succeeded or failed,” Erickson said.
In 2013, Erickson handed over the CEO reins to Kevin Cleary, then the company’s president and chief operating officer. Erickson and Crawford now serve as co-chief visionary officers, in order to remain involved in big-picture planning, product development and core values.
“It means we have our fingers in all the pies at a certain level,” Crawford said.
The company is guided by five aspirations, according to its website: sustaining its business, brands, people, community and the planet.
It does so by putting organic ingredients and organic farming at the forefront of its sustainability efforts, diverting 85 percent of its office waste from local landfills through recycling and composting and promoting a work-life balance for employees with an on-site fitness center, flexible workweek, a sabbatical program and on-site child care. The company has about 390 employees worldwide, according to the Great Place to Work Institute.
When asked what advice they’d give to small-business owners, Crawford said to look for mentors. “I hear Gary say how he’s worked with all these family-owned business, and I think the values you get from them are really important,” she said.
Erickson was more blunt. “Don’t do 50-50 partnerships. Maybe you want to bring a partner on — but not 50 percent. We bought our partner out and all is fine now. But the company was under a lot of pressure (at that time) to grow and stay true to our core values and try to go organic.”
To those whose business is growing more quickly than expected, Crawford said, “I know a lot of people go out and get money (such as taking on investors) but more often than not, you lose control. We’re control freaks. Try to do it on your own through banks or loans.”
The couple also launched Clif Family Winery in Napa Valley in 2004, and opened a tasting room, Velo Vino, in 2011. Crawford also serves as president of the Clif Bar Family Foundation, founded in 2006.
When asked about his favorite rides in San Luis Obispo County, Erickson said he didn’t ride much during his time in SLO.
But he mentioned some Bay Area favorites — Mount Diablo, Mount Hamilton — and said his No. 1 favorite cycling destination is the Dolomites in Italy. He and Crawford recently lived there for a year and rode 250 days of the year.
Crawford said, “We called it our sabbatical year.”
Gary Crawford San Francisco: Gary Erickson & Kit Crawford
Awesome interview below on my favorite entrepreneurs Kit Crawford and Gary Erickson! San Francisco bay area business owners take notes!
Three questions: Gary Erickson and Kit Crawford
San Francisco
Gary Erickson and Kit Crawford, co-CEOs of Clif Bar. Gary Erickson and Kit Crawford, co-CEOs of Clif Bar.
Company: Clif Bar & Co., Berkeley CA/ San Francisco Bay Area
Company: Clif Bar & Co., Berkeley CA/ San Francisco Bay Area
Title: Co-chief executive officers
Q: You’ve mentioned that in their early days, energy bars were a specialty product that could only be found in stores like bicycle shops. Now you can find them anywhere. How did the product spread into the general consumer market?
Crawford: One of the answers could be that people are more mobile today and Ithink society in general is looking for more convenient ways to eat. One of the benefits of our products is the convenience of having a packaged energy bar with you.
We don’t advocate it as a meal replacement bar, but in those times when you can’t eat breakfast or lunch, sometimes you get hungry. So it’s not only performance food for athletes but you can use it in your daily life. Instead of having a chocolate bar, you can have a wonderful Luna bar and have something that tastes delicious. It replaces a lot of the junk food we put in our lives.
Q: What are your plans in the near future in terms of expanding the brand?
Erickson: Clif Quenches are our biggest launch this year. It’s our organic version of Gatorade. We think it’s healthier, a better hydration system, with no high-fructose syrup and real organic sugars.
Other than that we’re extending the brand to different categories. One is a wine company, where we’re making four different wines and it’s going quite well. The other is sports apparel under the Luna brand that we launched this year.
Q:Despite consumers cutting down on expenses because of the recession and the fact that healthier food products are traditionally more expensive, revenue for your products has grown steadily in recent years. Why is that?
Erickson: We might be losing some custumers but we’re gaining a lot because people are downsizing at lunch time. Instead of that $10 sandwich, maybe I can have a Clif bar and a banana. I know it’s nutritious and it’s not expensive.
(Sports) enthusiasts are also staying closer to home, bike-riding to work or going to Lake Tahoe instead of going to Hawaii, and our products are great for those activities.
I wonder if this economy is a recalibration for people to think about what they do with their free time. I hope a lot of that is healthier and involves doing more outdoor activities.Gary Crawford San Francisco: Gary Erickson & Kit Crawford
As you all know by now I follow the progression of Clif Bar & co very closely. This article (below) was particularly interesting to me because it highlights CEO’s Gary Erickson and Kit Crawford as they sponser their first climbing competition in Japan.
CLIF® Bar Sponsors Its First-Ever Climbing Competition in Japan with World-Class Athletes Chris Sharma and Yuji Hirayama
Gary Erickson’s Book “Raising the Bar” to be Released in Japanese
May 20, 2014 04:11 PM Eastern Daylight Time
San Francisco CA & TOKYO–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Two of the world’s top professional rock climbers and Team CLIF Bar athletes Chris Sharma and Yuji Hirayama will host the first-ever CLIF® Bar sponsored climbing competition in Tokyo, Japan. To coincide with the climbing event, Clif Bar & Company owner and co-chief visionary officer Gary Erickson’s book Raising theBarwill be released in Japanese at a press conference in Tokyo this week.
“Guided by the five aspirations,we have create a different company: the kind of place we want to work, that makes the food we want to eat, and that strives for a healthier, more sustainable world – the kind of world we’d like to pass on to our children”
Tweet this
“Bringing together Japanese climbers and two world-class athletes from the U.S. and Japan symbolizes the growing appetite for the sport, adventure and great-tasting nutritious food around the world,” said Gary Erickson, owner and co-chief visionary officer of Clif Bar & Company. “Great food feeds adventure and we look forward to creating more CLIF Bar experiences in Japan.”
CLIF Bar Sessions was created for Japanese climbers at all levels of competition from amateur to professional athletes to share in the adventure of one of CLIF Bar’s heritage sports. Hirayama and Sharma will set and demonstrate climbing routes of varying difficulty and meet fans at the event. Winners will be selected in 11 divisions and each will receive a year supply of CLIF Bar products and other prizes. The event is sponsored in partnership with Japanese outdoor distributor A&F, organic and natural food distributor MIE PROJECT and Hirayama’s Climb Park Base Camp gym.
“We are very excited to have Chris Sharma, and Gary Erickson and Kit Crawford of Clif Bar in Japan for the CLIF BarSessionsat Climb Park Base Camp,” said Hirayama.
Hirayama is the first Asian climber to win the International Federation ofSport Climbing Lead World Cup in 1998 and 2000, and has climbed some of the hardest climbing routes in the world, including a rapid, two-day free ascent of the Nose route on El Capitan. Sharma is hailed as the world’s best rock climber, a long-standing pioneer who has mastered some of the most difficult routes in the history of the sport.
“I’m thrilled with the opportunity to work with my friend Yuji Hirayama and thankful to CLIF Bar for creating this event,” said Sharma. “I can’t wait to travel to Japan and climb with Yuji outdoors and at his Base Camp gym.”
Raising the Bar in Japanese
Raising the Bar will be released in Japanese at a press event co-hosted by the MIE PROJECT and A&F with husband and wife team Gary Erickson and Kit Crawford, owners and co-chief visionary officers of Clif Bar & Company out of San Francisco. The book tells the inspiring story of Erickson and the company he started in 1992, from the 175-mile bicycle ride where the idea of CLIF Bar was born to becoming the leader in organic energy bars in the U.S. and Canada. The book chronicles Gary Erickson’s compelling personal story and life journeys that became the inspiration for his business philosophy. Erickson, a competitive cyclist and entrepreneur, illustrates how a company built on five aspirations – sustaining its business, brands, people, community and the planet – is good business.
“Guided by the five aspirations, we have create a different company: the kind of place we want to work, that makes the food we want to eat, and that strives for a healthier, more sustainable world – the kind of world we’d like to pass on to our children,” said Crawford. “The five aspirations represent our personal values and ensure that our company contributes to the greater good.”Gary Crawford San Francisco: Gary Erickson & Kit Crawford
I recently read an article on adage.com about some of my favorite CEOs Gary Erickson and Kit Crawford. They are wonderful people who take great care of their employees at Clif Bar & co. If your interested in a CMO’s role within in a company such as Clif Bar read on below!
More Marketers Tasked With Improving Corporate Culture
CMOs’ Role Around Issue Becoming Increasingly Important
AD AGE DATACENTER
$137.8BU.S. ad spend for top 200 advertisers
Subscribe to Datacenter today and access the 200 Leading National Advertisers Report, ranking the nation’s 200 biggest ad spenders and more.
As chief marketing officer of the NFL, Dawn Hudson’s primary job is to sell the league to fans via ad campaigns and other marketing. But as the NFL faced an image crisis last year in the wake of player domestic violence controversies, Commissioner Roger Goodell tasked Ms. Hudson with an extra job: Help define the league’s internal values.
“I looked at our values and said they are well articulated, but they are long and I don’t think people remember long values,” Ms. Hudson recalled in a recent interview. So she went to work, holding focus groups with team officials, players and other NFL partners. The end product was a set of tightly written values that the league now uses to guide everything from how ads are crafted to how it builds relationships with former and current players.
The episode shows how CMOs, whose main responsibility was once limited to marketing brands to the outside world, are being called on to help protect and improve the corporate culture in which those brands live. That’s because more consumers are shunning companies that they don’t trust, no matter how good the marketing is, say experts.
Executive search firm Egon Zehnder recently surveyed 80 senior leaders at theKellogg Marketing Leadership Summit and found that 95% of them believe a company’s perceived culture affects consumer buying decisions. Yet only 60% of those surveyed said they believe their organization’s culture supports their brand. And 20% said their culture undermines their brand. While 60% of the marketing leaders said they claim direct responsibility for corporate culture, “all respondents agree that the CMO should have an increased role,” Egon Zehnder stated in a blog post.
Culture is “a topic that CMOs are struggling with,” Rory Finlay, who co-heads Egon Zehnder’s marketing officer practice with Dick Patton, said in an interview. “It’s a hard thing to define and it’s a hard thing to talk about, but it’s increasingly becoming more important.”
CMOs, who are used to communicating with the outside world, must now “be an active leader of a company’s culture” because companies are “meshing with the marketplace in much more friction-free, seamless ways,” Mr. Patton said. “The world now is incredibly transparent and the days of nobody being able to get a peek under the tent in terms of what is going on at an organization—those days are over.”
At tequila marketer Patrón, fostering a good corporate culture means ensuring everything is “Patrón Worthy.” The stamp of approval is used internally on everything from product packaging to internal documents. The brand first pushed the #PatronWorthy hashtag as part of a consumer marketing program after noticing people using the phrase to describe positive events, like a promotion or birth of a baby.
“We took ‘Patrón Worthy’ and we applied it internally as a standard of how we need to behave as an organization,” said Patrón CMO Lee Applbaum. “If for a consumer ‘Patrón Worthy’ means the most important moments of their life merit Patrón, then our point is everything we do internally has to meet that standard.”
At Clif Bar & Co., a big part of the culture is its employee benefits, which include at least 30 minutes each day to exercise on company time. “What we get is really engaged, energized folks,” said Keith Neumann, senior VP-brand marketing. He views it as his responsibility to ensure people are taking the time for themselves, even when things get busy.
But fostering good culture is “more than just the CMO’s responsibility,” he said. One way the company spreads the leadership around is by holding a weekly companywide breakfast meeting. And everyone in the company takes a turn running the meeting.
Marketing departments are even taking on tasks that had traditionally been left to human resources.
For example, when FIS, a global provider of technology for the financial services industry, recently acquired another company, called SunGard, the marketing department took a key role in onboarding some 13,000 new employees. Tasks included setting up a microsite with infographics and videos explaining “who we are, what it is that we do every day, why does that matter and what’s your role in it,” said Ellyn Raftery, the company’s chief marketing and communications officer.
The messaging had to be simple and memorable, she said. “From my perspective, there was not a question that it was going to be run by marketing.”
Gary Crawford San Francisco: Gary Erickson & Kit Crawford
Just because I’m a fitness instructor and nutrition expert, does not mean I can’t enjoy a good food truck experience! If you are looking for places to visit outside of the San Francisco bay area I suggest The Crawford Clif Family Bruschetteria Food Truck. Read more about it in this write up below.
Crawford Clif Family Bruschetteria Food Truck brings a Taste of Northern Italy
Cyclists and Clif Family Farm and Clif Bar founders Gary Erickson and Kit Crawford have spent many days cycling through the Northern Italian Dolomites, where they were fueled by the bruschetta made by their friends Nene and Paolo.
The memory of these bruschetta traveled back to the Napa Valley with Gary and Crawford, who sought to find a way to re-create the taste and experience of Nene and Paolo’s cooking using ingredients from the Clif Family Farm and local purveyors.
Since they are always on the move — they just returned from almost a year in Northern Italy — a food truck seemed to be the perfect way to share these delights with locals. And so the Clif Family Bruschetteria was born.
Gary and Crawford approached John McConnell, who was the executive chef for Hillstone Restaurant Group, which owns Rutherford Grill and R+D Kitchen here. He was previously chef de cuisine for Michelin-star-rated Campton Place Hotel in San Francisco and chef de cuisine at Terra in St. Helena before that.
He grew up in Oklahoma, then attended Iowa State University for chemical engineering but was called to the culinary arts. He enrolled at the New England Culinary Institute in 2004. After graduating, he accepted an internship at Terra and moved to wine country.
McConnell hadn’t run a food truck before, but he jumped at the opportunity.
The truck itself was a standard 2005 Freightliner step van with a Mercedes-Benz diesel engine with 185,000 miles on it, just a baby. It cost $18,500.
They bought it in Washington, then had it outfitted to McConnell’s specifications at Northwest Mobile Kitchens in Portland, Oregon. Using AutoCAD software, the team at Northwest laid out the inside.
“Coming from a brick-and-mortar background, I had a new experience,” said McConnell. Dimensions were in inches, not feet, and he had to use special appliances and fixtures.
Fortunately, the boom in food trucks based on the recreational vehicle industry had spawned many compact appliances.
The grill is only 18 inches wide, for example, and one compact unit serves as a flat-top griddle, two-burner range,oven and broiler. The heat comes from propane, but electricity is provided either by a generator or the grid as at Velo Vino.
The county requires food trucks to prepare food in a separate commissary and receive supplies there, which McConnell has in the former Go Fish.
That is also now being used by Tra Vigne for events, however, and the Bruschetteria will get its own kitchen across the street from Velo Vino.
They’re waiting for a permit from St. Helena.
The experience
The truck started serving in August 2014, generally parked under a large tree outside the Clif Family’s Velo Vino tasting room in St. Helena, though it occasionally is used for events.
“We want the customers to experience Velo Vino,” said McConnell. Customers can sample and drink wine inside and in a large patio or even order a wine and bruschetta pairing in advance. People can eat inside if it rains.
Velo Vino also offers coffee drinks and interesting merchandise, much related to cycling.
McConnell has embraced a traditional, yet fresh, approach to Northern Italian cuisine, 60 percent of ingredients from the certified organic Clif Family Farm. Most of the restcomes from local purveyors.
The farm is 15 acres, six planted to vegetables and orchards. McConnell and the farm team have to plan six to nine months in advance, a new experience for them all; the truck has only been serving for a little over a year.
Because there’s no fog in Pope Valley where the farm is, it’s not a good site for most tender lettuces, but McConnell has embraced tender kale leaves. It’s just plain kale, not the fancy cavalonero or dinosaur kale from Tuscany.
The Clif Family Bruschetteria serves a seasonal menu of bruschetta, porchetta, farm fresh salads and rotisserie chicken.
A rotisserie in the truckcook chickens and porchetta, the Italian specialty of roasted pork seasoned with spices.
The bruschetta aren’t what most people expect. They’re a large open-faced sandwich cut into pieces.
The bread is made by Model Bakery and is 60 percent whole wheat and 40 percent bread flour. It’s cut lengthwise, not across, creating the large slices. They use more than 50 loaves per week.
McConnell’s crew grills the bread over an open fire, creating a few charred spots, then rubs them with garlic and drizzleson olive oil before adding the toppings.
The best way to experience the bruschetta is to share different varieties with friends, throwing in a side dish or two as well.
The menu changes often and is updated daily on the website. A recent example includes salads, starters,a Mary’s roast chicken and desserts as well as bruschetta that included Pomodoro with tomatoes and cheese, $10; Porchetta, $11; Funghi with mushrooms, $11; Cari with prime rib, $12; Cured smoked salmon, creme fraiche and avocado, $12
Typically, the truck is at the Velo Vino Tasting room at 709 Main St. in downtown St. Helena. It is generally open Tuesday through Sunday from 11:30 a.m. to 4 p.m.
For orders, call 301-7188. Visit ClifFamily.com for the daily menu.
Velo Vino is open seven days a week from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.Gary Crawford San Francisco: Gary Erickson & Kit Crawford
Anyone of my clients can tell you that I am a huge fan of Clif Bars. I think they are a great source of protein for a pre-work out boost or a post-workout treat. Not only are Clif bars awesome but so are CEOs Gary Erickson and Kit Crawford. They started Clif Bar & Co right here in the San Francisco Bay Area. Gary and Crawford are the powerhouse couple that drives this multimillion dollar company to success. Here is a write up in Forbes about Clif Bar’s founder Kit Crawford.
2015 RANKING The Little Black Book of Billionaire Secrets
Education
Bachelor of Arts / Science, Sonoma State University; Associate in Arts / Science, Ohlone College
Bachelor of Arts / Science, Sonoma State University; Associate in Arts / Science, Ohlone College
Crawford on Forbes Lists
#38 America’s Self-Made Women (2015) Kit Crawford is the co-owner of Clif Bar & Co, the Emeryville, Calif. maker of organic nutritional bars and drinks. She was co-CEO from 2007 to 2013 along with husband Gary Erickson; they are now “co-chief visionary officers.” Clif Bar grew from a niche favorite among cyclists and climbers to a household brand sold at mainstream retail outlets in 14 countries. The pair shares an 80% stake in the company, while employees own the rest. They also launched a winery and tasting room in Napa and White Road Investments, a venture firm backing businesses that value sustainability and community involvement. Crawford is also president of the Clif Bar Family Foundation and strategic advisor to LUNAFEST, a traveling short film festival that benefits nonprofits. A native of Canada, she started out as sales manager at a small bakery Erickson owned in the 1980s. She also spent 7 years as a dancer and choreographer and worked in national parks for several summers.
No comments:
Post a Comment