Specialty Food Magazine is the leading publication for retailers, manufacturers and foodservice professionals in the specialty food trade. It provides news, trends and business-building insights that help readers keep their businesses competitive.
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Foray into Food. In Summit, New Jersey, when he was 15, Roberts got a job at the local A&P store and stayed on through college at Seton Hall. ShopRite lured him with more money, a com- pany car, and a chance to wear a suit. He went on to become a sales rep for General Foods, earned an MBA, and climbed the ladder at Hunt-Wesson and Buitoni. His first venture into specialty food was marketing Romanoff caviar. Breaking Boundaries. "When I came to the NASFT in 1989, it was not a fledgling operation," Roberts says. He brought the Fancy Food Shows under the Association's direct control in 1997, allow- ing the organization to better serve its members, adding education programs and building attendance by inviting bakery, bookstore, and gift-shop owners as well as supermarket buyers. He also put the "show" in trade shows, adding pizzazz by inviting culinary celebrities like Julia Child, Craig Claiborne, Wolfgang Puck, and Alice Waters to the Fancy Food Shows. In the 1990s, supermarkets stocked very few specialty food products, often relegating them to a dusty corner, Roberts recalls. He made presentations at stores like Kroger, explaining why spe- cialty food was so important. "Our customers were the golden customer of the supermarket," he notes. "Our studies showed that the specialty food consumer who bought [a product like] Rao's Marinara Sauce spent more annually on food for the home than the average customer. They entertained more, bought f lowers and prepared foods, had larger incomes." Supermarket executives responded, integrating specialty mus- tard on the mustard shelf, specialty pasta along with mass-market pastas, Rao's sauces next to Ragu. By 2000, almost all retail chains had discovered it was good business to include specialty items in the same category as mass-produced products. Industry Impact. Roberts authored a workbook, "The Basics: The Business of Specialty Food," an indispensable guide for getting started in the industry with a corresponding education program he founded and still participates in at the Fancy Food Shows. While heading up the Specialty Food Association, Roberts championed the small business. In 1990, he saw the U.S. Food and Drug Administration's Nutrition Labeling and Education Act as harmful to small companies. He succeeded in getting Congress to grant specialty food producers an exemption. "We were not trying to avoid nutritional labeling," he explains, "we wanted it phased in slowly. Otherwise, everyone would have had to change their labels and add nutritional content within one year." Roberts generated publicity for the Fancy Food Show by expanding the annual Product Awards competition (today known as the sofi Awards) and its nominee base and getting booked on talk shows to discuss them. One category grew to 18, from break- fast items to condiments to dessert. (Today, the awards span 32 categories. Find this year's winners beginning on p. S6.) "It gave food writers more to write about," he explains. "People like Florence Fabricant wrote about specialty foods in a more respectable manner and it helped legitimize the organization." JOHN ROBERTS Specialty Food Association/NASFT John Roberts led the Specialty Food Association, then known as the National Association for the Specialty Food Trade, for 17 years, joining in 1989 as executive director/general manager and being promoted to president in 1996. The organization's revenues climbed from $4 million to over $22 million under his watch. His wealth of experience in the food industry informed his successful reign. Roberts put the "show" in trade shows, adding pizzazz by inviting culinary celebrities like Julia Child, Craig Claiborne, Wolfgang Puck, and Alice Waters to the Fancy Food Shows. Roberts poses with luminaries inside and outside the food industry including Julia Child and (with wife Pat) Tony Bennett. 56 ❘ SPECIALTY FOOD MAGAZINE specialtyfood.com