“History is a great teacher.” – MBO Partners’ CEO shares a fruitful lesson from a grape juice company’s history! [Fridays: Mindfulness by Miles]
Miles Everson’s Business Builder Daily speaks to the heart of what great marketers, business leaders, and other professionals need to succeed in advertising, communications, managing their investments, career strategy, and more.
A Note from Miles Everson:
Welcome to “Mindfulness by Miles!”
Each Friday, I am bringing you my own voice on a certain topic or event that I find useful in my everyday business life and personal life. I hope my own experiences and personal interests will also help you in your own pursuits.
This week in particular, I am sharing with you a business lesson I learned from history. As someone with a passion for learning and reflecting on past events, I believe history is a great teacher that helps us reflect on how we approach our current-day realities. I’m confident this historical business lesson will guide you towards successfully building your brand and your career.
Keep reading to find out this major business lesson I learned from history. As business builders and team players, you ought to know this too.
Miles Everson
CEO, MBO Partners
Chairman of the Advisory Board, The I Institute
Mindfulness by Miles
The years 2019 to 2022 are full of major changes for us all, especially because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
During these years, we’ve seen the impact the health crisis has had in our personal, professional, and financial lives.
According to Miles Everson, CEO of MBO Partners, it’s helpful for business builders and leaders to reflect on the things that happened in history whenever times of uncertainties come.
He said that while we live in a fast-paced world now, he still believes pausing and focusing on how to solve the problems confronting us today leads to positive impacts in our lives, careers, and businesses.
Everson said that as a business builder himself, he learned everything he does today through personal experience, expert mentorship, examples, and HISTORY. That’s why he would like to share the lesson of “Adapt or Die” through the historical example of the juice company Welch’s.
Photo from ClickTheCity.com
Like others, Everson also enjoys a sweet glass of juice every once in a while. Whether it’s before a workout for an extra energy boost or at a family brunch during the weekend, juice has been a part of his day-to-day life.
This past week, as he opened up a Welch’s Fruit Snack while sitting in front of his desk and going from one Zoom meeting to the next, he began to wonder about this company.
In case you’re not aware yet, Welch’s is not only filling store racks with multiple juice flavors of Grape, Cranberry, Raspberry Cranberry, and Pomegranate Cranberry, but also filling the frozen aisle and snack aisle of grocery stores with a multitude of other products. In fact, Welch’s logo is everywhere!
So, Everson asked himself,
“How did Welch’s get to where it is today and what has been its journey?”
What he found out not only surprised him, but also reminded him of a vital lesson every great business leader must learn to survive and thrive: Adapt or Die.
After doing some research, he learned that Welch’s was a family business that started in 1849. A man named Ephraim Bull began to grow the first Concord grapes on a farm in Massachusetts.
Photo from Welchs.com
A few years later, the farm was passed down to Thomas Welch, a minister who avidly opposed the use of alcohol in churches for communion. His idea was to use grapes as unfermented juice for communion instead of alcohol. Thus, the juice company was created under the name, “Dr. Welch’s Unfermented Wine.” However, the business didn’t take off with the widespread fame Thomas wanted.
Years later, Thomas’s son took over the company in 1890 during the Great Depression. What Thomas’ son saw was that industrial jobs lacked manpower, and people were unable to spend money on fine items like wines. He also saw the continuous development of Concord grapes being harvested on a multitude of farms. Because of this, he positioned the business into a major juice company.
The brand’s unique selling proposition?
A delicious juice that could be used as an alternative to wine!
Thomas’ son successfully brought the flavorful juice into market by debuting it at one of the largest economic gatherings in the US: The Chicago World’s Fair. It was during this time that the business took major steam and became a household name.
The novelty of the juice continued as Welch’s developed over time. The company began processing new items that met the current society’s needs, such as the famous jars of Grape Jelly (1923) and the Frozen Grape Juice Concentrate (1949). The love of Welch’s in America became so affluent that by 1987, the company was processing over 300 tons of grapes!
Even when Welch’s was sold to the National Grape Cooperative Association, Inc. in 1956, the juice company continued the idea of adapting to change by creating new flavors and products that a lot of people keep in their cupboards and refrigerators. Now, Welch’s processes over 414,000 tons of its products each year.
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As Everson said, history teaches many fruitful lessons… and Welch’s history is just one of those!
In stories like this, we can see that a business can achieve success if it chooses to adapt to changes and address society’s current needs and wants.
Everson’s main point?
Even in uncertain and trying times, we can continue to grow a successful business as long as we adapt to the environment around us!
We hope you find this lesson insightful and beneficial in building your own career or brand!
(This article is from The Business Builder Daily, a newsletter by The I Institute in collaboration with MBO Partners.)
About The Dynamic Marketing Communiqué’s
“Fridays: Mindfulness by Miles”
High-performance businesses are run by people who think and act differently.
In other words, these are people who are high-performing individuals.
Companies and individuals of this kind have found ways to escape the grind of commoditization and competition by focusing on the RIGHT goals.
High-performing businesses and individuals are also “return driven” businesses and “career driven” individuals. They conscientiously develop unique capabilities and resources that allow them to deliver offerings in ways no other firm or individual can.
Every Friday, we’ll publish tips and insights from MBO Partners and The I Institute’s “The Business Builder Daily” newsletter.
These will help you gain knowledge on the things that Miles Everson, the CEO of MBO Partners, often talks about regarding the future of the workforce.
We’ll also highlight other mindfulness tips and advice on how you can be a high-performing individual both in your career and personal life.
Hope you’ve found this week’s insight interesting and helpful.
Stay tuned for next Friday’s “Mindfulness by Miles”
Cheers,
Kyle Yu
Head of Marketing
Valens Dynamic Marketing Capabilities
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