Best Practices for
CPG Pitch Slams
Benji Fitts
Director, Customer Education
At its core, with a protagonist (good guy) and antagonist (bad guy), a showcase of past performance, future expectations, and a call to action.
a pitch is a story
As a brand you’re going to need a compelling pitch to build your empire. It will need to be
convincing, authentic, and timely. Data helps but, in the beginning, not having it won’t be held
against you. You’ll need to feel comfortable delivering the pitch and able to improve it over time.
Most of the pitches you will give will go to two audiences – retailers and investors. There’s a little
spur off of the investor fork and that is Pitch Slam competitions. These are similar to what you
see on the TV show Shark Tank, but are usually shorter (3-5 minutes), have a visual element like
PowerPoint or Canva, and contain more emotional appeal than the average boardroom pitch.
Your goal is to come out strong. You have about 15 seconds to
make it or break it with the audience; get them on your side with
an emotional appeal and strong, charismatic personality. The
people in the audience and the judges will usually come from the
industry and are die-hards for a good, heroic story. Talk about
why your product is beating the odds or will change the food
landscape (but be realistic – and don’t overuse the phrase
“category disruptor.”)
Time management on stage is essential. If the competition is 3
minutes long, get it down to 2:45 in practice so you have some
buffer time. Remember, you only get one shot so make it count!
There is a clear difference between the protagonist (you!) and the antagonist (other brands
The story starts in the middle of the action
In literature, starting in the middle of the action is referred to as “in medias res,” and you’ll see
this device used in almost every piece of entertainment. Action movies don’t start with a long
monologue from the hero telling the audience their name, work history and why they’re happy to
be here – they start with the hero kicking some ass!
Don’t waste precious time telling us who you are, start by telling us what intractable, important
problem made you so agitated you had to put everything aside to fix it yourself.
Pitch slams are stories, and good stories have
two things in common:
Pitch slam presentations usually follow this pattern:
Let’s go through each of these sections
Problem Customer Response
The Team The Ask or Next Milestone
Quick closing restating how this product
or brand will fix the problem, and a call
to action to the audience and judges
Future Expectations
Solution Comparison Past Performance
The duty of an entrepreneur is finding a problem
worth solving. In many cases the problem is personal
to the founder or is troubling society at large (and
therefore has a large addressable market.) Often this
slide will have some TAM (total addressable market –
the size and growth of the market, often paired with
your obtainable slice of that market) information on it.
Using big numbers or simple charts (pie or bar) can
get this point across quickly.
Problem: What is it? Who is it plaguing? Parents are fed up with baby food!
of parents are largely not buying baby food
60%
How is your brand or product different than what
currently exists? Often this slide is more nuanced and
can show off a raft of current solutions that are flawed
in some way, but ends on the protagonist brand or
product being the perfect solution.
Solution: If the problem is the antagonist of the story, this is where the protagonist comes in.
We believe kids should be eating food that’s fresh, organic, & REAL!
What are the key differentiators? How do they stack up
against the competition?
When it comes to naming (or shaming!) the competition,
don’t be afraid to take a swing at brands bigger than you.
Comparison: Deeper dive on the antagonist(s) vs the protagonist. Our Brand Big Brand A Big Brand B
Show off sales figures, velocities, trended sales, or
margin data. Add in context for each milestone.
Use a variety of clear visuals for your data – a mix of
big numbers, bar or line charts. Avoid tables of
information.
Past Performance: How has the protagonist gained traction in the market?
Powerful growth is proof
we’ve tapped into an unmet need
2024
2023 2022
These are usually chock full of clips or snippets from
social media or marketing channels. Is your product
living up to your own hype? Tell that story though the
words and experiences of others.
Customer Response: How are people responding to what you are doing?
Our Community Loves Us
Show a Realistic growth projection – and make sure it
matches the TAM’s size. Tell the crowd what you’ll
need in terms of stores, factory space, and capital to
get there.
Future Expectations: What’s your plan for the next 2–5 years? Our Path to Growth
$$$
$$
$ $
2027202620252024
Who is aiding you on this quest? Show off their prior
success and credentials. This can help build credibility
and enhance your brand’s investibility.
The Team: Frodo didn’t find the ring alone. Our Team
A line extension or retailer debut?
Give the audience a tangible vision for the future – and
make sure it’s grounded in reality.
The Ask or Next Milestone:
What is the next big thing you’re focusing on?
202720262025
New Product Launch
Mass Retailer Expansion
Natural Retailers Expansion
B&M Debut
2024
We’re Ready to Scale
Pull the narrative thread you laid down on the first two
slides through to the end. Quick wrap up (5-10sec) of
how you and your team will solve this problem and give
a call to action to the judges and crowd (“…and I hope
you’ll help us fix this problem together!”)
Closing is hard! Write a few different closes to your
pitch and practice them on a colleague, relative or loved
one. Pick the one that get people fired up.
Quick Closing: Restate how this product or brand will fix the problem. Let’s disrupt the baby food category.
Together.
In many cases the pitch will be followed by a few
minutes of Q&A. These are the most common
questions we’ve heard – so make sure you have
good answers for them.
Being honest is the best strategy here. Make sure
to know essential business information like
margins and revenue because otherwise the
judges can count it against you. If you don’t know
the answer to a question, it’s OK to say that and
offer to follow up. Don’t make something up.
Q&A
What are your COGS, margins, or unit
economics
Where are you merchandised in the
store / what category are you in
What are your velocities
Who is your competition
How easily can you scale
How are you educating the consumer
about your product, and what type of
sales traction are you seeing
What is in your future product
pipeline
What keeps you up at night when
considering this next phase of growth?
Packaging & Differentiation Your packaging is your brands
hardest working salesperson—it’s
out on the shelf shouting your
message into the void 24 hours a
day. Good packaging can be the
difference between mediocre and
fast shelf velocity. Make sure your
pitch and packaging are both
telling the story of what benefit or
value prop your product will bring.
Retailer or
Consumer Traction Like we said before, the mandate
of an entrepreneur is finding a
problem worth solving. Are
people responding to your
solution? Show off numbers and
the more concrete the better—
dollar sales are always worth
more than vanity social media
metrics.
Investability &
Scalability Can you 10x this business
tomorrow? Tell the audience
about your manufacturing scale.
What would hold you back from
growth — or can you do it
overnight? Also, investors want to
have confidence in your business.
Know the intimate financial of
your business and present a team
that is capable of executing on
your strategy.
This can vary widely, but you want to make sure you’re covering some essential bases:
Judging Criteria
These pitches are HARD – distilling the essence of what you’ve been busy doing for the last 1-3 years
in 3 minutes is incredibly difficult. However, if you’ve been selected to participate in one of these
events, someone out there believes in you. You’ve got this!
General Advice
Play Around with the Formula We’ve laid out the essentials of what we’ve seen over the last few years. But disrupting expectations can be
powerful – if the audience is expecting you to zig, zagging can snap them to attention.
Simple Visuals Are Instinctively Understood Simplify charts by removing extra colors and chart labels. If you are listing your retail partners or store
footprint, don’t list names – a logo cloud is good, and a map of the USA with the logos overlaid on top is even
better. Highly technical or dense slides can lose an audience. Protip: can you squint your eyes while looking at
the slide and still get the gist? If you cannot, simplify the visuals and message.
Things to Avoid
Accept That Technology Might Not Work Anticipate that your slides might
not show up on time, disappear, or
your mic will crackle or cut out.
Don’t let it phase you! Accept that
this could happen and plan to
recover. And if the slides totally
fail and the tech people are fixing
it, memorize a joke or two to fill
the dead space.
Avoid Text Heavy
Slides, Soft Transitions, or Videos Clicking more than once on a
slide is time consuming and
takes the audience’s eye off of
you to absorb another micro-
dose of information from the
screen behind or next to you.
Just put it all out there at once
instead of drip feeding content
or overwhelming people with
bullet points.
Don’t Rely on Having
A “Clicker” Similar to the previous point,
controlling the flow of the
presentation might not be in your
(literal) hands. Budget some time
in your pitch to add in “next slide
please” between every slide.
General Advice (cont.)
Stick the Opening… Start strong! You may have 3 minutes to pitch, but the first 10-15 secs are make or break to get the audience
on your side. Come out swinging, from a place of emotion, or authenticity.
…and Stick the Landing Pull the narrative you planted in the beginning all the way through to the end – you planted the idea, now leave
them with a call to action.
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