Why I Almost Quit My Small Business

This is probably the most transparent blog I’ve ever written. Did you grow up with a family who would from time to time call a “family meeting” to discuss something so serious that your parents had to call it a “family meeting”? Usually family meetings are called to talk about a death or divorce or some other serious matter that needs clarification and conversation. Well for The Elderberry Co family of customers, I’d like to call a family meeting. 2022 has easily been the hardest year for me as a business owner and while I’m NOT quitting, I want to tell you guys why I almost quit my small business. Are you ready? Ok, family meeting starts now :-)

Our Extra Strength Elderberry Gummies launched in November 2020 and quickly became our second most popular product (second to our Elderberry Syrup). We heard back from so many customers how much they LOVED these gummies! They were flying off the shelves! Exciting, right? It was exciting, but as a new business owner, I was having to navigate for the first time working with a manufacturer to make my product. All of our other products at the time were small batch, handcrafted, made in our kitchen with our tiny and awesome team. These gummies were a completely different game where I didn’t have the control of the production process like I had with my other products. I quickly learned the hardships that come with working with manufacturers. These past 6 months have been filled with lots of tears, stress and sleepless nights for me. I’ll spare you the details but I will say I’ve never been closer to wanting to quit something than I have been with these gummies.

From the beginning, I was committed to working with a manufacturer that upheld my quality standards, but being so new at this, I wasn’t aware of all the things that can go wrong in manufacturing. While the first batch of our gummies were SO GOOD, over time it became clear that our manufacturer simply could not give us consistency over multiple production runs. I rejected several production runs from them and worked hard to come up with solutions. 

Our customers know that we LOVE providing the BEST customer experience so it was really hard on my team and me to hear customers voicing their dissatisfaction with our gummies. I knew I needed to fix this. So over the past few months, I have been tirelessly working to find a new manufacturer and am so relieved to say that we have partnered with a new manufacturer that matches perfectly with our team. This manufacturer has already delivered a fantastic product to us, our Collagen + Biotin Gummies and they have done so well, I decided to make the switch to giving them our Extra Strength Elderberry Gummies as well. 

So in the coming week, we will be relaunching our Extra Strength Elderberry Gummies and renaming them “Elderberry Immunity Gummies”. They will have a beautiful purple label and the only significant difference in their formula will be that these new Immunity Gummies will have 220 mg of elderberry in them, instead of 300 mg. We will keep the serving suggestion the same for adults and children as these gummies have the same levels of Vitamins C, D, E and Zinc. The taste and texture will be slightly different from our Extra Strength Elderberry Gummies, but we honestly think you will like them even more! And you can rest assured that every bottle you get will be consistent and awesome. Oh…and since we all feel the sting of rising gas prices (and rising prices in general) we will be lowering the price on these new gummies too! Woo hoo!

Words cannot express how relieved I am to be on the other side of this mountain of a problem I have been facing. I still have more to learn in running our business, but one thing I know: We have the BEST customers in the world. The grace and patience our customers have shown us with this gummy problem have reminded me of the good in people. Our customers love us and know that while we may not be perfect, we are committed to providing quality products to our customers, and that will never change. 

So be on the lookout soon for the relaunch of our Elderberry Immunity Gummies! For our subscribers, we will automatically switch your gummies to these new ones so you don’t have to do any work. We are so excited for you to try them we can hardly stand it! In the meantime, if you have any questions at all, please feel free to comment below or email us at info@theelderberryco.com.

And that’s it! Family meeting adjourned. Time for ice cream and a movie now, right?