Building Food Community and Connection With Jill McLewis

Jill McLewis is the Executive Director of Naturally NorCal, a nonprofit that connects and supports Northern California’s emerging and established natural-products brands through education, events, peer forums, and partnerships. She leads strategy, operations, community growth, and programs that link founders with experienced industry leaders. Jill also helped guide the merger of Naturally North Bay and Naturally Bay Area and brings a unique background as Sebastopol’s mayor, a nonprofit executive, and a classically trained pastry chef and chocolate entrepreneur.

Here’s a glimpse of what you’ll learn:

[2:01] Jill McLewis’s unconventional path from respiratory therapy and nonprofit leadership to pastry entrepreneurship
[5:23] How Naturally NorCal grew through the merger of two regional organizations
[11:39] Jill’s perspective on building an authentic, supportive industry community
[15:45] Peer forums, workshops, and events designed to connect members and share knowledge
[20:32] What emerging brands need to consider when navigating omnichannel growth and market uncertainty
[25:28] Jill’s work connecting entrepreneurs and industry leaders across the natural-products network
[31:31] How AI can help small teams save time and access more business resources
[37:50] Jill’s appreciation for the partners and volunteers supporting Naturally NorCal’s growth

In this episode…

Strong industry communities grow when people share knowledge openly, make space for honest conversations, and help others avoid familiar mistakes. How can food and beverage leaders turn professional connections into lasting support?

For Jill McLewis, whose expertise spans nonprofit leadership, entrepreneurship, and natural-products community building, strong communities begin when people stop treating connection as a transaction. Bringing emerging founders together with experienced leaders creates opportunities for practical guidance, while peer forums allow members to discuss real challenges and learn from one another. In that spirit, Jill recommends shaping educational programs around current business needs and using AI for focused, time-saving tasks without losing the human relationships that make a community valuable. These practices help individual brands grow while strengthening the broader industry.

In this episode of The Missing Ingredient, CJ Bruce talks with Jill McLewis, Executive Director of Naturally NorCal, about building a stronger food and beverage community through authentic connection. Jill explores the merger of two regional groups, the value of peer forums and events, and ways experienced leaders can support emerging brands. She also touches on AI, omnichannel growth, and how legal, financial, marketing, and other industry partners help emerging brands succeed.

Resources mentioned in this episode:

Quotable Moments:

“I am living proof that you can have multiple careers and sometimes at the same time.”
“It’s the kindest group of people I’ve ever actually worked with and the most authentic.”
“This is specifically set up so that you can connect with people and not just your peers.”
“Entrepreneurs, they’re doing everything. So they only have so much time in the day.”
“But it’s an amazing tool, but you know, it’s a tool; it doesn’t solve everything.”

Action Steps:

Show up consistently to industry events and peer forums: Active participation creates stronger relationships, practical learning opportunities, and access to people who can help solve real business challenges.
Connect emerging founders with experienced industry leaders: Direct mentorship can help newer brands avoid costly mistakes, gain clarity, and build a stronger path forward.
Create spaces for honest, non-transactional collaboration: Bringing competitors and peers together encourages open knowledge-sharing and strengthens the entire food and beverage community.
Use member feedback to shape educational programming: Surveys, conversations, and committee insights help ensure workshops address the most relevant challenges brands are facing.
Apply AI to specific, meaningful business tasks: Using AI to save time and expand limited resources can help small teams compete more effectively without treating it as a solution for everything.

This episode is sponsored by The Missing Ingredient, a food and beverage marketing agency that believes a better future starts with food. They partner with purpose-driven brands to drive growth through smart, results-focused marketing — without the “set it and forget it” approach.

From brand awareness and paid media to content, influencer partnerships, and loyalty programs, they act as true strategic partners invested in your long-term success.

To learn more about how they help food and beverage brands grow with impact, visit themissingingredient.com today.

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Full Transcript

Introduction and Guest Background

Intro: 00:01

Welcome to The Missing Ingredient podcast with CJ Bruce, where food and beverage founders, operators and experts share the real strategies behind building successful brands. Let’s jump into today’s show.

CJ Bruce: 00:15

Hey, I’m CJ Bruce and welcome to the show. This is the podcast where founders and leaders of high impact food and beverage brands who are serious about scaling. Each episode, I sit down with the people who power the food and beverage industry, brand operators, agencies, vendors, creators, and retailers to uncomplicate the strategies that take brands from early traction to serious scale.

This episode is sponsored by The Missing Ingredient, a food and beverage marketing agency with over a decade in the industry. We take a different approach, starting with your business goals, looking at the full picture and building a marketing strategy that actually ties back to growth. From content performance marketing to influencer partnerships and AI powered workflows. We’re an extension of your team, not just another vendor. Learn more at themissingingredient.com.

Now for today’s guest. Jill McLewis is the Executive Director of Naturally NorCal and a city mayor known for bringing people together across business, community and public leadership. She’s passionate about supporting both emerging and legacy brands and the natural products industry by creating meaningful connections between entrepreneurs, innovators, investors, and industry leaders. With a background that spans nonprofit leadership, civic service, and advocacy, Jill is dedicated to helping purpose driven companies grow while strengthening Northern California’s vibrant natural and organic ecosystem. Welcome to the show, Jill.

Jill McLewis: 01:32

Thank you so much for having me. Truly, it’s a pleasure to be here.

Jill’s Career Journey From Healthcare to Food

CJ Bruce: 01:37

Excited to have you. So I want to start with your background. We talked a little bit before we started recording the eclectic career path. So curious just to touch a little bit on that. I know when I, you know, pretty sure researched or respiratory therapy, medical device sales, you know, your masters, your cooking, getting into food.

So can you just take a little bit, you know, about your, your past and how that kind of led you to where you are today.

Jill McLewis: 02:01

Sure, I am living proof that you can have multiple careers and sometimes at the same time yes, I did start in healthcare. I was a respiratory therapist for many years up until Covid. I don’t think anyone really knew what that was, but I think people are pretty versed in that. And then I did work for a startup.

I moved from the bedside care to actually bringing new technologies to hospitals and to clinicians just to help them provide better care for patients. And so I did that as a project manager and in sales. And then I eventually transitioned into running nonprofits. I’m a very service minded person. So going from taking care of people to, you know, working with that naturally in the businesses, it all seems so natural to me.

And people always ask, where is that connection with food? And that’s because that connection for me is that I’m a classically trained pastry chef as well. And opened up a small chocolate shop in the city where I live with a friend of mine, and it’s been there for about a decade, so, you know, I have that I would say I have the, the right and left brain going at the same time, the science and the creativity and being an entrepreneur. So I feel like, you know, in this role now I can really connect with everyone and understand you know, a lot of our entrepreneurs and the challenges they’re having when you start a business because it’s not easy.

CJ Bruce: 03:24

Not easy. Yeah, we’re definitely going to get into some of those challenges tell us a little bit more about the artisan chocolate so is that you got, you got a shop like what’s, what does that business look like today? And you know, how much of your time is spent there?

Jill McLewis: 03:38

It has evolved a lot it’s, it was ten years in February that it’s been around everything there has been handmade I, like I said, I’m classically trained by a lot of different European chefs. I have a degree in baking and pastry management as well and I did this with my business partner, who is an eye surgeon by day and a master chocolatier trained you know, as well.

So we did this together. It was a, a, a passion business for us. It allowed us to connect in a way that our professional careers, you know, we were busy with them during the day and in the evening we’d come together and we’re like so many people loved our are the things that we made. They kept asking to buy it. So that’s kind of what, you know, that’s what started the shop.

And it evolved. I mean, like most businesses through Covid and all the different, you know you know, things that we’ve gone through, we’ve had multiple iterations and right now it’s actually I converted it to, rather than being a shop where people walk in a brick and mortar, we actually embrace technology. And there’s a company here in Sonoma County that does RFID vendor vending machines. And so right now items are sold out of that. So it requires less of my time.

I can put more time into you know, Naturally NorCal and the entrepreneurs that we have, they’re so neat.

The Formation of Naturally NorCal

CJ Bruce: 05:01

Oh that’s cool. Yeah so let’s get into Naturally NorCal. So I think the, I wanted to start with just the formation of Naturally NorCal because there were two chapters. And so maybe give, give just the audience a little bit of a background on, you know, what is the Naturally Network.

And then there are these two chapters, part of that merger to then get us into, you know, what is Naturally NorCal today.

Jill McLewis: 05:23

Yeah. And some days you’ll find that we’re calling, we’re calling the organization, you know, different names because we were Naturally North Bay and there was Naturally Bay Area two naturally organizations overlapping geographically in some areas. But Naturally North Bay is actually where I began as the executive director about four years ago and prior to that, it had been called North Bay Food Industry Group or FIG. It was lovingly called Fig.

And prior to that, it was even we, the organization was actually started out of the economic development office in Sonoma County and there was, they saw a need for that, back in like 2010, 2011, somewhere around there. And after a couple years, like most government funding, it was, it was phased out and all of the folks who were involved with that, the manufacturers really felt like there was a need. So Blair Kellison, who was at that time the CEO for traditional medicinal, was just, you know, he’s so passionate about it. I appreciate him so much. He was just like, hey, we need to keep this going.

, you know, no one has ever represented food manufacturers like this before, you know, so, so from that side, North Bay, that’s how it got started. All the service, from what I understand, and I’ve been told all the service providers, you know, that serve work in the industry, in addition to the food manufacturers such as like La tortilla, Cowgirl Creamery, Strauss, Clover, all those big names that we know and the and, and Northern California, they all came together and said, let’s form this nonprofit and advocacy organization. And then it’s the same thing with Bay Area you know, the other organization that was here in the country was Naturally Boulder, and they had a vision for making this more national and Naturally Network like you, I think you referenced. So Bay Area, Naturally Bay Area actually became the first affiliate of Naturally Boulder.

And so, you know, over time it’s evolved. We we were in some ways providing overlap in some of our programming. And we had, what I found was many people thought they were a member of one, but it was the other. And it was just very confusing all the time. People were like, I thought I was a member.

So, you know, a few years ago, everyone came together, a group of us, and we’re like, you know, what would it mean? What would it look like if we merged? We, we serve different, we serve a lot of the, some of the same, but also a lot of different people. Naturally Bay Area primarily concentrated on emerging brands.

Entrepreneurs had some legacy brands and then the service providers and then Naturally North Bay serve mostly legacy brands and not many entrepreneurs. So bringing that all together made so much sense to us. It got rid of the confusion of who, which organization do I belong to? And we could grow organically just by not, you know, eliminating any sort of overlap in any of the work that we were doing. So it was, it was you know, at first we wondered how it would go.

My, my experience has been that it’s often culture that is the biggest thing to overcome when you’re merging any kind of company or nonprofit, whatever it is, it’s the culture where people really, you know, they join an organization because of a lot of times for how it makes them feel. So that was the big worry is like when we merge, what would happen with that? And we have a lot of board members. When we merged, we had, just shy of about 50 board members at the time, a lot merge.

Yeah, it is a lot. And, myself and Monique. Monique, there’s just two of us on, on staff here, full time employees. And between us and all of the board members, and we now are sitting with 32 board members but it was, it was a feat.

And I can honestly say it went so well. It really did you know, I’m sure there’s always going to be varying opinions out there, but I would say overall, I mean, I very little trouble with making the merge for so many people. The response was it’s about time. So it’s, I mean, it was just great.

It was, it’s been great. And I, I, I love that people are so excited about it all the time. I would say the one biggest challenge is the geography. It’s such a big area you know, all of northern California, but we’re, we’re making it work.

We’re committed to doing geographic type events. And that’s what you know, that’s what we continue to ask ourselves every day. Are we serving everyone, you know? So that’s, that’s a long answer.

Navigating Geography and Community Growth

CJ Bruce: 10:01

No, it’s a good answer. Yeah, it’s a good answer. And we’ll get into more details. And I think it is, you know, it is a tricky thing to do in an organization like that. And I mean, I’m in Sacramento and I’m, I’m commuting out to, to events from time to time when it makes sense for me.

And I think, you know, and I’ve had similar experiences with I was on the board of Conscious Capitalism Los Angeles. And so yeah, LA is a market to try to figure out where and when do you do things and who’s going to be able to travel for how long? And you know, all of that, that can be challenging.

Jill McLewis: 10:31

Yeah, it can be. And one thing that, you know, initially, we really, we fretted over it like, oh my gosh, what’s it going to mean? You know, but at the end of the day, we can’t change geography, right? We can only just be very conscious of every decision that we make. And, and looking, you know, where have we done the events and how many people have shown up, and we do a lot of surveys asking people, you know, where are you coming from?

Where would you like to go to? And we just have to be okay with the fact that, you know, not everyone shows up at every event, right? I mean, it just, you know, that’s just how it’s going to be. And, and we’re growing. We’re growing quite a bit.

So I’m quite excited about that. So to me, that is the message that we’re doing. You know, we’re doing something right.

CJ Bruce: 11:13

Totally. Yeah, totally. So let’s yeah, let’s get into the membership. So I think the, you know, think about hearing an industry organization and it’s like, okay, I’ve got like a, you know, a newsletter maybe, or I put a logo that I’m saying I’m a part of this, but can you say a little bit more about, you know what, maybe maybe using, you know, real example, if you have one of, you know, a brand coming into the organization, you know, what does that community look like? Right?

Like what are they actually getting out of that community aspect?

Jill McLewis: 11:39

Sure. I love this organization. I wish when I worked in healthcare, I had this kind of community, right? I mean, it’s just it’s, it’s such a unique community. And they, they, they tire of me saying how honored I feel to be part of this community and with everyone, because it’s the kindest group of people I’ve ever actually worked with and the most authentic.

You know, there’s a lot of authenticity a lot of care and it’s all about the people. It truly is. I, I’ve not experienced this before where you can have competitors in the room and they’re sharing, they’re sharing information about, you know, how they overcame something. And it’s like, it’s so interesting to me because in other industries, competitors don’t talk necessarily, you know, and yet I’m able to bring them all in the room.

Some of them are on my board together, and they’re also passionate about just the fact that we all need to support each other and to help these emerging brands, you know, I mean, grow and maybe help them, you know, skip a few of the mistakes that maybe they made along the way. So having that available to all of the members, you know, and, and, and it’s like anything you get out of it, what you put into it, you know, you got to show up to the events, you got to show up to the you know, we do forums and such. So I mean, it’s this community is all about the people. It’s not transactional. It’s just truly you know, authentic.

That’s the word that I always think of when I think of this group.

CJ Bruce: 13:13

Yeah. And I’m curious, like digging into the emerging and legacy piece of it. Like, are there any examples of like an emerging brand that maybe got paired with the legacy brand or met them through that, or there’s any kind of collaboration or direct learning or any, anything that comes out of that?

Jill McLewis: 13:28

I can tell you it’s not specific to like a brand, but, you know, just at our last event, Naturally Rising that we had last month, you know, we had some folks there who are in a master’s program and building a business right now. They’re part of an entrepreneur program, and they’re building a business, and they were there to meet as many people as they could, especially the legacy folks. And I can tell you, it’s so interesting, they they connected one specific they connected with Blair. And the next thing I know, I’m talking to him the following week. He’s like, oh yeah, I already had a call with them.

I, you know, I’ve given them this advice, this advice and this advice and, and these are the steps they need to take. And now I’m really invested and I want to really help them. And, you know, I was just, I, it was like, wow, this is truly what it’s about. You know, last week they just met and now they’ve already had a call and they’ve got, you know, some kind of plan together. And to me, that is what the this is.

That’s exactly why we’re here. So that’s great. That’s very like real time just last month.

Naturally Rising and Ongoing Founder Support

CJ Bruce: 14:31

So yeah that’s great. It’s great. I mean, I was at that event as well. And I think another, you know, another thing I liked, I know you know, Brandie from Mochi Love was on stage with the pitch and she had pitched previously. And just seeing that kind of continuation of, you know, you were on stage last year and now you’re here like supporting the, you know, the next round of people that are pitching their products.

And yeah, it’s just neat to see that in real time.

Jill McLewis: 14:56

And we, and we try to do that, you know, other folks who have been involved with our Naturally Rising you know, event and we really do try to bring them back. Last year, you know, we had a fireside chat last year with some of them to understand where they’re at. And honestly, I mean, I, it’s exciting to see where they’re going and to hear updates and, you know, and I think you had her on your show too, maybe..

CJ Bruce: 15:19

Yeah, yeah. She’s on an earlier episode. Yeah and so what did get a little bit on, you know, you mentioned, you know, you get out of it what you put into it. I’m curious, like, where have you, have you seen people get the most out of it?

Like showing up to events as part of it? but there’s some other things you mentioned about forums and other ways to get involved or even like directly reaching out to other members, like how are the brands that get the most out of the organization? What are they doing differently than other members?

Jill McLewis: 15:45

, a couple things I always recommend and it’s for members only. It’s one of the few things that we do where it’s just members only. It’s, high value. Our, our peer forums, we do peer forums and, the majority of them are virtual we’ve gone back and forth over the years.

They’ve existed for a long time. North Bay Naturally, North Bay actually started them over a decade ago. And we have them, they service, you know, we have HR, QA and ops sales, marketing a variety of ones. We also have an AI one that’s not, it’s not necessarily peer related, but, you know, the demand for AI has become so great that we now have an AI forum every other week.

And in those forums basically they’re, they’re set up like a round table. It’s not, it’s not where you’re going to have listen to a webinar and you’re going to log off and then, you know, never talk to anybody. This is specifically set up so that you can connect with people and not just your peers, but sometimes depending on the forum, it could be topic driven, or it could just be simply a round table where everyone just gets on there and they start talking. And I’ve seen, you know, like on our sales forum, we get a lot of different folks from different companies who are doing sales. And on some forums, I see the same entrepreneur on marketing, you know, sales, HR, because they’re doing everything right, but they’re learning from all of these people and it’s just having that connection.

You know, we’ve had a few people show up from different distributors or, you know, they show up and someone says, hey, I’m having this problem. I’ve been trying to reach out to you guys and they’re right there in that forum and they can have that conversation right there and exchange. And it just sort of takes out that, that space of like, I sent an email, where did it go? Because they’re right in the room, you know, so that’s an example. Another like with QA and ops, I personally witnessed it is when we, I brought the group together.

We actually did one in person and went to one of our manufacturers and it was so endearing because everyone works in that group, works in, ops, and they were just going around looking at all these little things that I never would have noticed. They’re like, oh, you do that, oh, you do that. So it was just so interesting, you know, when they were sharing all the ins and outs with that. So it varies with every group, but the value in just having that connection and, you know, having that real live conversation and they can vary. Our HR forums are pretty small, which they like to keep it smaller.

They range from 8 to 10. And you can get our sales and marketing that, you know, get up to 20 to 30 people and AI it garners quite a bit of interest as well. So I would say that that’s one of the top things. And then, you know, of course we do our in-person events and workshops. So, you know, we did a finance workshop and, a few months ago we had our Naturally Rising event, which, you know, brought over 200 people to Mill Valley.

And then we’re doing an omnichannel workshop in September and then in October, we’re holding our largest, our second largest event, which is celebrate in San Francisco. It’s typically held in Sonoma County. That’s where it’s been for over a decade, but we’re switching it up this year and holding it at the Adobe headquarters in San Francisco October, in October. So that’s cool.

Those are the ways you bring everyone together. You know, we offer up. People can sample, you know, the brands can sample large and small. And it’s just about getting in the room with the people that you want to talk to. You know, I mean, we have so many legacy brands and we try to get all of our founders there if we can.

From those brands and go from there. You know, we have, we have Paul from Amy’s and we’ve had Mike from Straus, you know, all of these folks who are leading these organizations and they’re there, you know, for you to ask any question. So, you know. And some of it’s just about hugging on necks while we’re there too. You know, people haven’t seen each other in a while.

They’re so busy with their large companies that this is a time where they can actually connect and reminisce and, and honestly just catch up and feel relaxed in that environment.

Omnichannel Challenges for Emerging Brands

CJ Bruce: 19:57

So yeah, that’s great. Yeah, it’s really great so I wanted to shift and talk a little bit about, you know, you, you sit at this perspective where you see a lot of brands or different sizes and going through different stages of growth and curious about, you know, what you see or any patterns you’ve seen in that. Like now with omnichannel specifically, you mentioned there’s going to be, you know, a whole session on that coming up but brands selling direct to consumer selling on, you know, online retailer like Amazon selling at retail, like, have you seen that evolve or any, any, like takeaways you’ve seen on how brands are approaching that these days?

Jill McLewis: 20:32

I have, I mean, it, there’s so much noise out there now. You know, it’s like it’s really hard for emerging brands to understand where they need to take their product. You know, who are they? Who are they selling to? Who is their market?

And, you know, and so I guess my, my perspective from that is just, that’s where talking to folks who have maybe gone down that path a little bit further, you know, is very helpful and helps them avoid some of the pitfalls. But there’s also just so much new, new opportunities out there. Honestly, I see it as being very challenging for brands. And that’s why, you know, Monique is putting together this workshop for everyone so that we can have those discussions and ask those questions because it’s challenging. It’s challenging.

I mean, right now, it’s, it’s, it’s rough out there, you know, for businesses and, and all the different things that are happening that you know, people don’t feel the stability isn’t there, you know so I’m not sure if that answers your question, but.

CJ Bruce: 21:35

Yeah, no, I think it’s, I mean, I guess maybe to follow up from that, how do you figure out what types of workshops and things to run and the education that the community would find valuable.

Jill McLewis: 21:47

Are valuable board members and some of the members who bring, you know, all of our board members are involved in this in the CPG space in some way. We have we are we’re run by, we have 45 volunteers. Those are 45 deeply involved volunteers. That’s including our board. And that’s how we’re powered.

And, and on these committees, they, they get together, we have an education committee, they get together and they talk about what they’re seeing, the trends that are happening, what they’re seeing, what, what questions they’re seeing, you know, from customers or people that they’re working with challenges. And then that’s how, you know, like, and probably I’m trying to think, what is it? So probably like mid-summer, we’ll start planning for, we’re already planning for the fall, but mid-summer to early fall. We’re planning for next year already. So it’s just all of these board members who have committed so much of their time.

And then also just some of our members, you know, we get, we talk to all, we’re constantly talking to all of these different brands who are involved in various ways. So we get requests and then also because we belong to the Naturally Network, we have a lot of other chapters that are doing things. So we meet weekly. And in doing that, you know, we’re meeting with people across the country.

So we’re able to kind of keep our finger on the pulse of what’s happening in New York and Minnesota and, and Boulder. And so all of us get together and talk and figure out ways for us to collaborate and even bring even more you know, if we, if we’re not one of us isn’t able to plan it, then, you know, we talk about who else could plan it and how could we bring it to everybody. So yeah, yeah. And being part of that, not the national, that national piece of it really makes a difference. It expands what we can offer so much.

Collaboration Across the Naturally Network

CJ Bruce: 23:42

Is there any cross pollination from, as you mentioned, from like the board level, but from like the member level and like attending other chapter events or being able to connect with other, you know, businesses across the country.

Jill McLewis: 23:54

So we’re each individual nonprofits. So that’s how we run. So each chapter has its own membership. So we don’t actually like if you’re a member here, you’re not automatically a member in Colorado or San Diego just because we all have to being a nonprofit, we all have to run.

And the only way we can do that is by, through the membership being a membership organization. But we do, I mean, anything that is open, you know, for many, many things, I’d say more than not are open to members and non-members. So you know, we do cross market a lot of our different events and such. So I know that there are some people here that fly all the way to Boulder for their, some of their different in-person events. They’re accustomed to doing that before any of this started.

And it’s just a piece of their life and what they do. So it’s really interesting we have some people that are flying to New York to go to fancy food, but also just to be part of the events that are going on there put on by the Naturally organizations on the East Coast.

CJ Bruce: 25:01

Yeah, that’s really cool. Yeah. I went to the Expo West this year. There were a couple, I think it was like an east meets West and like a Midwest chapter. There are a couple.

Yeah, different events around Naturally that got to meet some just members from across the country. And it kind of goes back to what you said earlier about the community and how unique like this natural products community and naturally specific specifically are and just welcoming. And, you know, you already have this common ground. And so yeah, it was, it was cool to see that in action.

Jill McLewis: 25:28

And everyone wants to, we all want to help make that connection. I mean, I, I promise you, like that is something that we talk about constantly is who who needs to be connected? Who’s asking how do we do that? We have a Slack channel that through national that we communicate on as well. And we really do try to bring as much value as we can to everyone because we honestly really just care about everybody.

It’s not just, you know, they’re not just a member, you know, it’s not transactional. I want to say it’s like, you know, when, when they join, they’re truly joining that community and everyone, everyone one truly wants to lift them up.

Emerging Food and Beverage Brands to Watch

CJ Bruce: 26:03

So yeah, that’s great. I do want to, I think, yeah, talk about just brands in general, brands to watch or brands you’ve seen and maybe just, you know, outside of the kind of growth, like talking about what are some brands that people should know about or watch you’ve learned about through you know, the, the national network, you don’t need to pick favorites. I know there’s a lot.

Jill McLewis: 26:24

So I’m just going to say, oh my gosh, how do I do this? There are so many brands.

CJ Bruce: 26:28

Yeah, I think like knowing some of the brands and some of the fun things they’re working on.

Jill McLewis: 26:32

I think just to keep it tight and like relevant to like, you know, what we’ve been dealing with in the last few months is, you know, we had our pitch slam where we had a number of people, a great deal of applicants submit to for the pitch slam and it was narrowed down to seven brands. And, and for that, I mean, I would say some of the brands that I, and I love is like, hey, hunger or pets. Pets, pets. Pets one are pitch slam.

, you know, people were talking about how do we, how do we evaluate, you know, like a pet, you know, like some of some of the products are like, how do we evaluate them? And you know, and that’s always a challenge. But I have to say, and I told him the story of when they ship all of their samples, they ship them to me. And specifically I, I have cats and my cats. I was trying to figure out why they were trying to get into this box like that.

I that I had everything boxed up and it was the PC pet bag as soon as we took that out, they snatched it and ran away with it and were fighting over it. So I shared, you know, I shared that afterwards with everyone it was just like, well, to me that was like, that was the, that was the sampling there. You didn’t, we didn’t need to taste it.

You know, we had proof with the animals, but I would say project power coffee, they’re really growing they’ve started here. I’m so excited. We did a show with them with Unfi in Sacramento well over a year ago.

And it’s just, it’s, it’s fun to watch them grow. I have to say the most meaningful experience I have sounds goofy is when I go into a grocery store, like I was at rainbow and I’m walking around and I’m looking at shelf after shelf and, and I know the story behind all of these brands, you know, these emerging brands that I’m like, it’s almost like a proud not not that I have anything to do with their success, but just knowing that they’re involved and like they’re in our community and that I see them on the shelf, I’m like, oh, I feel so proud. I know them, or like, I know the story behind and how hard they worked to get to that space on the shelf. So I must confess, there are times when I’m standing looking at a product and I see other people looking and I’m like, no, you need that one and you need that one. And this is why and this is the person, you know, because every brand has people behind it, right?

Stories and, and challenges and, you know, so, so I would say those are two, we have Mama Teav’s. They were part of our pitch slam as well. And then dime so I’m just calling out those names and then abstinence, you know, the non-alcoholic drink. I mean that is like taking off everywhere.

I mean, you know, drinking is, is not necessarily even drinking alcohol now isn’t necessarily the end thing. And so she’s like, right on that, you know, right there on the tip of the spear with, you know, something that’s really happening right now. So those are probably the big. And then KIMPOPS, I’m sure. Did you see KIMPOPS?

CJ Bruce: 29:37

Yeah, yeah. Great pitch.

Jill McLewis: 29:38

Great college students who are like creating this brand I mean, how amazing is that to watch them? I’m, I keep watching them to see where they’re going to go next. So those are a few of our local brands that, you know, everybody you know, everybody really loved seeing them pitch at the event.

CJ Bruce: 29:57

So yeah, that’s great. Yeah. That’s, I love the comment about the grocery store. I feel like this is a theme that’s emerging with the podcast that’s like everybody on is a grocery store weirdo. And we’re all at the grocery store, you know, staring at products and spending too much time or taking pictures, you know, like, what are these people doing?

Jill McLewis: 30:15

My son doesn’t even want to go the store with me. He’s because he’s like, mom, you tell me the story about every, like, you know, this product. And you know, he’s like, I know the whole story about everyone. We it takes two hours to get through the grocery store. I just love doing it.

I mean, we I know people must think it’s strange, but I stand there and try to sell their products too, because, I mean, you know, it’s something to know where they’re coming from.

CJ Bruce: 30:41

Yeah. That was great. I mean, I, I’m, I do the same thing. I’m going swimming a lot of time, you know, reading, packaging, looking at what else is in the set or how it’s organized in different stores. And you know, all those pieces are, are fun, fun.

Jill McLewis: 30:55

And I send and I send texts to Monique. Monique. Look, Monique is our program director, right? So you know her, but yeah, I’m sending her look in the wild. I saw this in the wild fun.

Using AI to Support Emerging Brands

CJ Bruce: 31:10

But. Yeah. So I did want to circle back to AI. I know you mentioned it’s, you know, it’s a hot topic. A lot of people are interested in it. And so we’re, you know, we do a lot with AI at different levels. And so I ask every guest, it’s like, how is AI impacting your, I mean, your role in Naturally.

But I also like what you see within the community and how it’s being adopted.

Jill McLewis: 31:31

Oh my goodness. AI creates a lot of noise, a lot of energy. It’s such a mixed bag, I guess it’s, you know, we have obviously the demand for that. Everyone wants to know how to use it meaningfully.

Right? There’s a, you know, I feel like when this first became, I don’t know when it, you know, very mainstream people were talking about there was a lot of philosophical discussions about it. And so we started the AI forum and I’ve seen it evolve. And I think what the biggest piece of feedback that we receive from everyone is, I need meaningful things that can help me, you know, take care of this task or, you know, whatever. And I also AI is like leveling the playing field in some ways.

You know, I mean, marketing, branding strategy, I mean, it’s really leveling it for emerging brands who can’t afford, you know, to hire someone for all of these pieces. And now if they can figure out how to leverage AI in a way to help them, you know, that’s what we’re trying to do. And we have a new company that joined as a partner and is going to work with us a lot Novi Connect, they’ve joined with us and really they do a lot of SEO is, you know, now it’s a e o.

So the AI piece is just, I think it’s going to continue and it’s evolving so fast. That’s why we have a lot of different people that come on, you know, every other week, we have different people sharing all the different pieces that they’re learning because there’s, it’s like drinking from a fire hose. I think for some people and other people have really embraced it and are really like trying to break it down into very small pieces of like different ways that it can help them with their business so it’s interesting to watch. We have a core group of people that come to that AI forum.

And then we have, you know a group of people that kind of fluctuate in and out. And it always changes and changes just depending on the topic. But it’s an amazing tool, but you know, it’s a tool. It doesn’t solve everything. So that’s what I try to remind people.

And, and, you know, I’m also involved in it from the government standpoint or the legislative standpoint. So in California. So for me, it’s interesting to watch it from this industry. And then from the side of like, what do we do with this? And, you know, and how do we, how do we create some guardrails around it?

CJ Bruce: 34:00

So yeah, that is an interesting space to sit.

Jill McLewis: 34:03

And I sit on a statewide committee for Cal City. So I’m the vice chair of that committee and one of our big topics is AI.

CJ Bruce: 34:13

Interesting. Yeah.

Jill McLewis: 34:14

It is, but I mean, from our perspective, I, I love the fact that it for a lot of our emerging brands and entrepreneurs, it really, it gives them access and, you know, and allows them to achieve things that they might not have been able to do without it.

CJ Bruce: 34:30

So yeah, it’s, that’s really yeah, good perspective there. I think it is something worth saying too. And just the possibilities that it opens up and then, but it also feels just very early, still like it’s still like figuring out how does it work? Where is it actually legitimate versus just being hyped as being able to do something and then bringing it down to like, it’s a fun thing to play with. But then are you, like you said earlier, you’re actually solving business problems and able to actually move the needle on something that you know, matters for your business and not just, you know, it’s fun to play with.

Jill McLewis: 35:02

You know, an entrepreneurs, they’re doing everything. So they only have so much time in the day. So, you know, if, if they can harness it and figure out how to use it meaningfully and, you know, and take away some of the tasks that they need to do or to get them done more quickly, I think it’s super beneficial. And so that’s what with our AI forum, we’re really hoping to bring, you know, our goal every time we have this is to have, you know, breaking it down to meaningful solutions. So and we will continue to do that.

And because it’s changing so fast, it’s, you know, amazingly fast.

CJ Bruce: 35:38

Yeah. It is really fast. Yeah okay, I have one more question I was going to ask you before we wrap up. But before I do that, I want to make sure to point people at the right places to connect.

So let everybody know about naturallynorcal.org as the website to go to learn more about the organization and what it takes to become a member is there anywhere else that you’d recommend people go to learn about you or the work you’re doing at NorCal?

Jill McLewis: 36:05

We, we, you know, we’re on LinkedIn a lot it’s mostly our website and then LinkedIn, you know, on our website, we have all the events that are public, they’re all listed right there on the, on the website. So it’s really easy. We are constantly working on that and keeping it updated just because we do offer so much for, you know, a plethora of people but LinkedIn as well is probably the next, the next best place.

We’re, we’re on Instagram as well but I would say mostly, you know, we, you’re going to find more about us on LinkedIn than any other place. So again, constantly keeping up with all these different channels that you have available because someone asks, are you on TikTok? And we know.

CJ Bruce: 36:48

No, yeah, I think it’s okay to, you know focus on the channels where you can actually, well, where the people are that you’re trying to reach and where you can, you know, consistently, sustainably show up so that we, you know, we talk about that a lot. It’s just you can’t be everywhere.

Jill McLewis: 37:03

And, and, you know, we not only serve brands and emerging, you know, legacy brands and emerging brands, but we have a ton of service providers that we work with. And we couldn’t do any of this without, without them, you know, stepping in and being our connective tissue and, you know, and, and supporting us financially. I mean, and, and that’s where we find them is on LinkedIn, right? So that’s where the biggest value is for, you know, all the different groups that we serve.

The Service Providers Supporting Naturally NorCal

CJ Bruce: 37:32

So yeah. Well, this was a, that’s a great segue to the last question I was going to ask is this, are there other, you know, we haven’t talked about people who haven’t talked about our organizations that are doing great work behind the scenes that deserve a shout out could be supporting the community, supporting the entrepreneurs. And you take that any way you like.

Jill McLewis: 37:50

Sure so when we just to take it back to like, when we merged, one of the topics and discussions that we had was like, you know, okay, we’re going to merge. What does this look like financially? All nonprofits have to look at that. Like, how do we, how do we survive?

And what we did is we put together and talked to our original founders. And then we expanded that. We decided to ask folks to commit to us for our long term, you know, a multi-year commitment financially. And we have 24 founders that did that. And I would say it’s about equal.

CPG brands and service providers. So, you know, I mean, we’ve had some that have been with us from the very beginning, and I don’t want to miss out on, on any of them, but a few that just come to mind are, you know, like BPM and Moss Adams, Baker, Tilly Davis, Wright, Tremaine Baker Botts. I mean, like Baker Botts, they just donated a ton of legal time for everyone. Nearly everyone who participated or was a finalist in our pitch slam. You know, I mean, they’re literally providing free services to a lot of these emerging brands that could never actually afford to, to do that.

And so for them to step up and do that, and we have so many, and I don’t want to miss any. But so we have 24 founders. And people get confused when we say founders, you know, because we have so many different founders, but they’re the founders of our organization. Naturally NorCal is a nonprofit and then, you know, we just have a ton of different ones.

We have a lot of people that we work with that do pro bono work with us for our PR and all the different pieces that we have out there. It’s a ton of time that people have committed to us again, we kind of laugh sometimes because we have a number of emails with Naturally NorCal info, you know, events, etc but there are only two of us and any of those emails will go to myself and Monique but in our board members, I mean, we have 32 board members right now and we just couldn’t be powered without them. You know, they, they help us with, you know, we, we always meet yearly for strategy.

And two of our goals for this year was to bring more retail access programming to our members and then also expanding into Sacramento.

CJ Bruce: 40:10

So nice.

Jill McLewis: 40:11

That is something we’re talking about and hoping to do some type of happy hour or get together in Sacramento in the fall when it’s not quite so hot. Hopefully.

CJ Bruce: 40:22

Well, I’d love to know about that. Yeah, let me know. Anything I can do.

Jill McLewis: 40:24

That.

CJ Bruce: 40:25

Would be great.

Jill McLewis: 40:26

That is happening behind the scenes. And yeah, we’re starting to work on that. But honestly, it’s just the service providers. I don’t want to forget them because we couldn’t be here without them and the commitment they have to everybody.

CJ Bruce: 40:39

So I love that. That’s great. All right. Well we’ve been talking to Jill McLewis, the Executive Director of Naturally NorCal. Be sure to check out the organization at naturallynorcal.org and follow along on LinkedIn, not TikTok.

Jill, thanks so much for being on the show.

Jill McLewis: 40:56

Oh, thank you so much for having me. Truly appreciate the opportunity to talk about this wonderful nonprofit.

Outro: 41:03

Thanks for listening to The Missing Ingredient podcast. We’ll see you again next time, and be sure to click subscribe to get future episodes.