Bars are Food Review: Elevate Me! Espresso Cocoa Crunch
May 10, 2009 by admin · Leave a Comment
We sent our bars in to barsarefood.com for a review and of the seven flavors they chose our “Espresso Cocoa Crunch”. Seems they liked the flavor overall but not the packaging so much, should we tell them that we designed it ourselves in photoshop?
Review:
Billed as “The world’s simplest protein & fruit energy bar”, the flavor of this bar certainly lives up to this intention. Blending whey protein isolate, dates, organic raisins, apples, almonds, cranberries, cocoa, and coffee beans, the product has a very “raw” and homemade flavor to it. It has a dry but chewy consistency, with pleasant notes of dried fruit and nuts, followed by decent note of cocoa and a hint of coffee to the finish. All in all, it’s a very pleasant and satisfying bar to eat. Nutritionally, this bar has 230 calories, 6g of fiber, and 16g of protein, which is certainly enough substance for us. That leaves us with the packaging, which is the largest area for improvement. Specifically, there’s something that’s unappealing about the design, especially compared to the better designs of other players in the category. We’d probably say the same for the name, which sounds like something that’s more appropriate for a supplement product. Overall, very enjoyable flavor and nutrition, but needs work on the packaging.
Link: http://www.barsarefood.com/reviews/2009/elevate-me-espresso-cocoa-crunch/
ElevateMe! Natural Protein Bars – The Story Continued
May 1, 2009 by admin · Leave a Comment
So we got out the food processor and started working off mom’s recipe of whey protein isolate mixed with almonds and various whole dried fruits. We found an old guy with a packaging machine who worked on a per bar basis and we used an inkjet printer to make labels.
We didn’t want to be just another bar so we chopped each one into 3 bite size chunks. We’d make a batch, drive them in our 1979 Toyota Corona to the wrong side of town to package, then cold-call the stores.
After a few months we had like 20 stores and we were ready to rock so we got a business plan together, borrowed some cash from the bank and once that check cleared we promptly quit our corporate jobs to focus on the biz.
So we basically had enough money to last 6 months. That’s pressure but it worked and we had almost 100 stores by mid 2003 and it slowly grew and evolved from there: Apartment to nightly rental of catering kitchen to tiny garage factory to 1 employee to 2 employees to 5 employees to second leased space to 10 employees and now we make about a million Elevate Me’s a year in 7 flavors.
Are we rich? No.
Do we work our own hours? No. We work whenever the company needs us to get something done. Such as now, it’s 9pm on a Thursday and I’m sitting on the patio typing under the moon.
Is it worth it? Hell yes, so far so good.
Welcome to ElevateMe! Blog
May 1, 2009 by admin · Leave a Comment
Welcome to the Elevate Me! blog.
I’m Earl the co-owner and co-founder with my wife Trish who wants nothing to do with writing about herself, so you’re stuck with me.
Since this is blog 1 I guess I’ll talk about the genesis of our little protein/energy bar project. We started this little company as all good little companies start, either in someone’s parent’s garage, basement or studio apartment. Since we moved around back in the early 2000’s all of those apply. As college students we were living off student loans and my mom would occasionally fire us some of her little creations, called Power Balls (disclaimer: nothing to do with Powerbar). They were ugly little things wrapped in saran wrap but did they ever fill the gut in a hurry and keep the flow going for dubious studying, so we inhaled them.
Fast forward to 2002 through school, a couple corporate gigs in the real 9-5 world and we sit down for a heart to heart about what the hell we’re really going to do to make a living. Our memories tweak back to those powerballs and we start thinking of health foods as a career: They are nutritious, portable and travel well, how can it lose?
And wouldn’t it be fun to own our own company, be our own bosses and work only when we feel like it? Yeah!
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