00;00;03;00 - 00;00;18;29
VO
Welcome to Dig In, the podcast brought to you by Dig Insights. Each week Jess Gaedeke chats with world class brand professionals to bring you the story behind the story of some of the most breakthrough innovations, marketing tactics, and campaigns.

00;00;19;01 - 00;00;36;25
Jess
Hello everybody. Thanks so much for joining us on the Dig In podcast. I'm Jess Gaedeke. I'm very excited to be joined today by Karen Kraft, Associate Director of Consumer Insights and Analytics at Johnsonville. And Karen, you have so much wisdom to share. I love that we see you so often at conferences, sharing case studies and your point of view.

00;00;36;25 - 00;00;39;23
Jess
And I'm just thrilled that you took some time to sit down with me today.

00;00;39;25 - 00;00;43;00
Karen
Nice to see you, Jess. Thanks for the invite. This should be fun.

00;00;43;02 - 00;00;47;18
Jess
Yeah. Well, let's start with you telling us a little bit about your background and and where you are now.

00;00;47;24 - 00;01;15;24
Karen
I grew up in market research. My mom started as a bookkeeper at a marketing research firm in LA when I was six. By eight, I was pulling unused pencils off of unused questionnaires that my older siblings would bring back from having done movie exit interviews in LA the night before, because I grew up in LA. and then that became kind of a high school summer job.

00;01;15;24 - 00;01;33;26
Karen
And then I worked my way through college after a couple of years after college. I got an itch to go do something wild and crazy. So I quit my job. And worked on a cruise ship for two years in Hawaii. So that's where I met my husband. We ended up, he's from Iowa, I was from California,

00;01;33;27 - 00;02;00;04
Karen
we ended up settling and let's move to Texas. So we lived in North Texas for 11 years. and there I had the choice of going back to either hospitality or market research, and I felt market research probably had a better long term, it was a better long term choice. So I went to work for Decision Analyst based in Arlington, worked there for 11 years and then got the itch to work on the client side.

00;02;00;04 - 00;02;14;19
Karen
So I went to work for Hormel in Minnesota, worked there for almost eight years, and then I've been at Johnsonville for the last five and a half. So I have spent a lot of time on the client side and a lot of time talking to people about protein and meat.

00;02;14;21 - 00;02;30;28
Jess
That's a good combination. And, gosh, few people can say that they've really been in market research almost their whole life. So that's really cool where you got your start. so I'm going to just throw an impromptu question out there to get things going. This one should be a good one for you. What beverage goes best with pizza?

00;02;30;29 - 00;02;47;04
Karen
What beverage goes best with pizza? If it’s not alcoholic, real Coke. And you need, it has to be coke because you need the acidity. But if it's alcoholic probably a really nice red deep red cab.

00;02;47;07 - 00;02;48;15
Jess
I like those two options.

00;02;48;18 - 00;02;51;27
Karen
My two favorite pizza options.

00;02;52;00 - 00;03;11;29
Jess
I love it. Well let's get in then. We're going to dig in here. So our listeners crave inspiration from leaders who can share their stories of things that they've done to bring to market. And one of the best ways to inspire, I think, is to tell a story. So I'd love for you to tell us the story of the Keep It Juicy campaign, something that recently launched from Johnsonville.

00;03;12;04 - 00;03;17;25
Jess
So go to the beginning. Where did that idea originate? What inspired it, and how did you bring it to market?

00;03;17;28 - 00;03;45;15
Karen
Well, the idea originated we hadn't really done any major marketing for almost a decade in terms of developing a brand new campaign, and we had been challenged by a couple of our board members and the president of our division to do some big, bold, badass marketing, you know, stand for something more than the products we make and really identify something that we stand against.

00;03;45;16 - 00;04;20;16
Karen
And out of that, we came up with the, we discovered this insight that, you know, people are really divided in today's world, and a lot of it has to do with kind of ridiculous outrage. You know, there's big issues that people are worried about. And we definitely want people to stay worried about the big things. But people that throw beverages at fast food workers or if you troll somebody just for some little thing they said online or, or, you know, get in fights at Little League games, that's ridiculous.

00;04;20;19 - 00;04;40;01
Karen
And it puts everybody on edge. And sausage is actually kind of one of the ultimate hangout foods. A lot of the times when people are eating sausage, they're eating it with lots with other people. And if people aren't hanging out, that's not good for business. So that was kind of the insight that led to the campaign.

00;04;40;01 - 00;05;01;26
Karen
And the campaign brings that to life of literally showing these ridiculous moments of outrage at the beginning of each spot, then going into, what if we just turn down the temperature, which if you actually are making it, especially if you're grilling sausage, if you grill it on low, it stays much juicier and it'll taste so much better. It takes a little bit longer, but it's worth the wait.

00;05;01;28 - 00;05;23;18
Karen
But if you turn down the temperature and can just enjoy a meal with others and we did, a poll with the Harris Poll called the National Temperature Check, that we found that most people agree with us, that they really want to get together with other people, and they miss getting together with other people. And it's harder to have fun.

00;05;23;20 - 00;05;52;00
Karen
But food is something that they agree, I want to say it's 70 some people, percent of people agree that they can sit down and have and enjoy a meal with someone else, and they don't have to agree on everything. So we're trying to, you know, hopefully encourage Americans to, you know, come together for at least small moments in time, enjoy a block party, a potluck, a brunch, and enjoy time together.

00;05;52;00 - 00;05;59;23
Karen
And you don't have to agree on everything, but you don't, you don't have to live together every day. You just have to enjoy each other while you're there.

00;05;59;25 - 00;06;21;06
Jess
And keep it juicy. I love that that contrast in the spot. Yeah. Well, that really resonates with me. So I'm a parent of two sort of pre-teen teenagers and you know, flag football is not that serious. It's not that deep. But people get so fired up on the sidelines. And what are we showing our kids when we do that kind of ridiculous stuff?

00;06;21;06 - 00;06;41;25
Jess
You know? So I don't know, that insight really resonates with me. And certainly foods and certainly foods like sausages are a way to build community, right? To enjoy, enjoy life a little more. So, as you developed the campaign, did you put any new ways of thinking together with the group? Did you sort of approach it in a novel way?

00;06;41;28 - 00;07;11;04
Karen
Definitely. You know, no one wants to be the next big canceled brand and developing any campaign that stands more for than just showing the great products you make and the tasty food you need to really, you know, be thoughtful about how you're depicting people. you know, what you're showing. And we actually worked with C+R Research and did a series of multicultural consulting with them

00;07;11;10 - 00;07;52;04
Karen
as we developed the campaign. Their culturebeat team were, you know, basically on call consultants that evaluated the scripts and all the visuals, the casting, the costumes, the hair, everything. And then they also they had kind of small focus groups within their team, just of their team of multicultural professionals. And then after the groups, we actually did some online groups with consumers to understand how different groups of consumers reacted to the campaign.

00;07;52;07 - 00;08;11;10
Karen
Was there any red flags which luckily there weren't any. But there were some tweaks that were made and we kept the we're able to keep the spirit of the campaign and not have to water it down at all. Just change a few visuals here or there and then, you know, bring it to where it is today when it launched.

00;08;11;13 - 00;08;31;04
Jess
I think that's so important to make sure that you're being careful with how you're representing these, these ideas because you're right. It could be a bold swing that actually, you know, does harm to the brand. So was there was there internal trepidation at any point? Did you kind of have to to pivot based on either internal stakeholders or other pressures you were getting?

00;08;31;06 - 00;08;52;22
Karen
I think one really nice benefit of this campaign, this is one of the first big, as I mentioned, a big branding campaign we had done in a long time. And my coach, that's what we call our bosses at Johnsonville, the head of Growth Strategies also has our Marcom team reports to him, as well as our innovation and and also insights.

00;08;52;24 - 00;09;21;11
Karen
And he was given he was granted the autonomy to make the decisions for the campaign. Like what campaign are we going to go with? What are we going to show? He was granted that autonomy, which is really rare, you know, especially when you're a privately held company and you have owners and you have a board and you have a president of the division, there's lots of potential stakeholders and they let him be a professional and do his job.

00;09;21;16 - 00;09;41;29
Karen
And I think that really freed things up because, yeah, there were things that came up along the way, bumps along the road, there is any project. But having kind of one person that was that could solve the problems and make a call was refreshing. You didn't have to worry. We didn't have to worry about decision by committee.

00;09;42;02 - 00;09;42;24
Jess
Yeah.

00;09;42;26 - 00;10;01;10
Jess
And hopefully there was some freedom. I love how you kind of started this with this big bold badass marketing when that's the objective and that's the spirit. Hopefully that did give some extra conviction. Like we can you know go with something bold. That's that's fantastic. How will you know that that campaign is a success? Have you already seen some good results from it?

00;10;01;13 - 00;10;24;08
Karen
Well, just the response to the campaign and the release of the, national temperature check has been overwhelmingly positive, which has been awesome. we know that there's some people and we actually did studies before to understand who does the campaign turn off. And there is a small percentage of the population that weren't going to like it.

00;10;24;10 - 00;10;54;09
Karen
But we were prepared for that. And we actually, you know, kind of war gamed how would we react or not, depending on who responds and what they say? luckily we haven't had anything, you know, crazy negative out there that couldn't be addressed. Or in fact, we had one, you know, commenter on, I think, Instagram or it was Instagram or Facebook who, you know, made some comment about, you know, Johnsonville was not, you know, not family owned.

00;10;54;09 - 00;11;14;17
Karen
And there, you know, I think something about we were, you know, putting people out of work and hiring illegals and things that we were like, wait, no, we responded to them and said, actually, no, we are a family owned company and we have been since the beginning. You're mistaken. And the person totally reversed themselves, which was which was refreshing and like like, oh, sorry, you weren't the company I was thinking of.

00;11;14;17 - 00;11;23;19
Karen
And they actually did call out the company that they were thinking of and all the brands at that company. So we were just we were shocked. They're like, well, thanks.

00;11;23;22 - 00;11;25;13
Jess
Yeah. Well.

00;11;25;16 - 00;11;43;19
Jess
There's some irony in some kind of humor in that, because that comment is exactly what the campaign has sort of like grounded in. Right? Is like, why are you so angsty? Like, why? Yeah, why do you have to fight? But I love the outcome of that is like, well, I was wrong. And that's that's wonderful. I love that like anecdotally

00;11;43;20 - 00;11;51;04
Jess
it's playing out the impact of the campaign. Right. That's so cool. So what was your biggest takeaway from that from that campaign?

00;11;51;09 - 00;12;17;01
Karen
I think, you know, it's still early in its infancy. It started on April 8th. but I think, you know, we're seeing, you know, really good response from the public. And also we're really seeing the networks that we've shown it to before it aired. And even, you know, that now that it's on the air and our customers in terms of, you know, retail channels that have seen it, everybody gets it and everybody's on board.

00;12;17;01 - 00;12;41;16
Karen
And I think it's really refreshing to see people reacting so positively. And, you know, we hope we haven't seen any obviously sales numbers yet. But we hope it turns into more business for us. But I think if anything, it's just a really great brand building effort to show that we're standing kind of on the side of the positive and, and let's, you know, let's, you know, be the fun brand that we are.

00;12;41;17 - 00;12;59;19
Jess
Well, it's great for Johnsonville to be part of that conversation in a really big, bold way. So thanks so much for sharing that story. I'd love to now turn to you as a leader. Karen, you have really some passionate points of view that I'd love for you to talk to us about. One is you're in a female dominated industry in terms of insights, right?

00;12;59;19 - 00;13;13;11
Jess
We have a lot of female leadership in our insights community. But you're in a male dominated industry in terms of the meat industry. So what are some of the things that you've been doing to advocate for women in the meat industry?

00;13;13;14 - 00;13;47;07
Karen
Well, obviously this, this situation, you know, I first confronted that when I went to Hormel and that was when I was like, wow, meat is a lot of men. at the highest levels, especially, and at Hormel, they had an employee resource group that I became active in, that called Women Our Way rebranded near the end of what I was there, but that really did a lot to empower women and create leadership opportunities for women.

00;13;47;07 - 00;14;12;22
Karen
So even if they weren't hadn't moved up high in the organization, formerly they could become officers of ERG or run a committee or, you know, and, and have a lot of great leadership experience that they weren't necessarily getting in their everyday jobs. When I joined Johnsonville, again, I was a in a very female heavy department marketing department at Johnsonville.

00;14;12;22 - 00;14;39;04
Karen
Had probably at least 50% women when I first joined. And that's where insight sits. And yet a lot of the other areas, and especially our plants, are much more heavily male. so it was a, a very the two companies experience very similar issues. However, there was no MRG which were members, not employees. So we didn't have a member resource group.

00;14;39;09 - 00;15;17;18
Karen
So I partnered with another colleague from our marketing team, and we started the first women's member resource group called Women at Johnsonville. WJVL and it's now, you know, and it got off to a shaky start because we were trying to start it during a pandemic, which was hard to do when you can't get together for anything. but now we just, you know, just this week we had a great guest speaker in and probably at least 40 women in the room and online listening and and learning, you know, from a local ObGyn who's also a wellness coach

00;15;17;18 - 00;15;38;20
Karen
and just great talking about burnout and stress and things. But it was a great, great forum. And other women in the other departments where they don't have a lot of female peers they're working with day by day. They feel like they have a network now, and someone people they can talk to and relate to.

00;15;38;22 - 00;16;07;23
Karen
and as a result, the MRG has worked with our new head of member resources. That's what human resources is called at Johnsonville. And we've, you know, moved on to advocate for better maternity leave policies and actually have an entire new parental leave policy in place that none of that would have happened had we just sat down and the two of us that started the organization, she didn't have any kids yet.

00;16;07;23 - 00;16;40;12
Karen
She now has a very cute son who's almost two, and I don't have any kids, and I'm never going to have kids. And, you know, we were doing things to advocate for all the women in the organization because we want to make sure we can recruit and retain the best women around. And, you know, insights and through organizations like the Insights Association, I'm inspired by women that I meet all the time, and I try to bring that inspiration back to work and share stories so that people can see.

00;16;40;15 - 00;17;13;01
Karen
While they may not necessarily have it all the time, although our head of it is now, female, which is awesome, I think talk about the male dominated area and, you know, she’s one of the highest ranking leaders in the company now. So it's really great to see how things are moving and just to see that there's this network of people that, you know, may not deal with each other every day, but know they have someone that they can fall back on and talk to when they need it, and they need someone to talk to that can relate.

00;17;13;03 - 00;17;27;09
Jess
I love how grassroots that was developed, right? You and your colleagues sitting down and saying, what can we do to, you know, advocate for women in our organization? I also think, her two year old might be next on your list for Halloween costumes, Karen.

00;17;27;12 - 00;17;42;13
Karen
I think he's actually going to get to borrow a costume that I made for one of my nieces years ago that no longer fits. I think he's probably going to be a bag of a box of popcorn next year. Or a bucket of popcorn.

00;17;42;16 - 00;17;46;15
Jess
I love it. I need to see pictures of this. It's such a talent you have. It's so, so cool.

00;17;46;26 - 00;17;49;29
Karen
Check out my Facebook page.

00;17;50;02 - 00;17;55;08
Jess
Ok, I will totally. I'm definitely going to check it out. What's your hot take on the future of the insights industry?

00;17;55;12 - 00;18;20;12
Karen
I think we need to be less research nerds. We need to be less nerdy. we need to be able to think like marketers. We advise marketers all the time on, you know, how to best communicate about their brands, or you know, how to put together, you know how to support their business cases for things. Yet we don't sell ourselves very well.

00;18;20;17 - 00;18;45;11
Karen
And I think that's a shame. And if we just act like we're research doers, there are things out there computers, new AI, DIY tools that are taking that away. We need to show that we're adding value, and we need to show that we're really consultants, and that we are business partners that are driving the business. And a lot of time showing ROI within the insights industry is really hard.

00;18;45;11 - 00;19;02;05
Karen
I know I find it hard because so much of what I'm working on is so far out, especially like with innovation, I'm working on the early stuff. I'm not. by the time it gets to, you know, to market, it's two years. I might be two years after I really did the bulk of the work that I did on it.

00;19;02;07 - 00;19;21;18
Karen
and I think we need to really get better at that and really and make sure we are sharing our wins within our companies and really making sure that we're providing good, solid business advice, not just here's what the research said, because there's lots of ways people are going to get there at their answers. And we can't just be the answer to people.

00;19;21;18 - 00;19;41;03
Jess
Data does not equal decisions. That's something that we believe in pretty passionately. And, I agree, I like the be less nerdy. I think that's a nice, nice tip for all of us in the industry. So we'll go to the final dig. Now, this is all about you as, as a human being consumer. Feel free to take off your professional hat here for a moment.

00;19;41;06 - 00;19;44;15
Jess
What's the last product or service that you bought on impulse?

00;19;44;17 - 00;20;05;04
Karen
Probably, I think I had to think about this, Peacock streaming. During the football playoffs there was, you know, one game on Peacock, we decided, okay, we're going to sign up and we'll just cancel it after a month. Fine. Whatever. We bought it. And then I was like, oh, while I have it, let me check out some things.

00;20;05;09 - 00;20;21;03
Karen
I'm now addicted to The Traders. I'm now watching The Traders New Zealand because I've seen all those episodes of The Traders US and the traders in the UK and the Traders Australia. So now I'm watching Traders New Zealand and I'm watching other things on Peacock. And so I've kept it and now my husband's like, are we going to cancel that.

00;20;21;03 - 00;20;31;20
Karen
I'm like no, there’s too many good shows on it. But it was definitely one of those last minute impulses. We really want to watch this game. But now and now we just still have it.

00;20;31;26 - 00;20;36;06
Jess
Got you yeah I, I that's probably was one of their strategies. If you think about it.

00;20;36;06 - 00;20;37;04
Karen
Yeah. Right.

00;20;37;06 - 00;20;42;23
Karen
I feel I, I feel so bad that I fell for it but oh well it worked.

00;20;42;25 - 00;20;55;12
Jess
It worked. And you're enjoying it. It's now playing a role in your life. It's not like you have something you you know, you don't need. I like it. what's the category or a brand or a product that you could rationalize any price point for? You just have to have it in your life.

00;20;55;12 - 00;21;15;29
Karen
Definitely Major League Baseball. My husband and I are huge baseball fans, and we're slowly trying to get to all the major league ballparks. And when we go to the ballpark, we want to go, we want to sit usually our favorite seats are lower bowl. You know, fairly as close to a high on the plate, we as we can get, but near the back.

00;21;15;29 - 00;21;35;04
Karen
So you don't have to hike up all the stairs to get to the bathrooms and get yourself a beverage. and price is never an option. And now, as I said, we're slowly trying to make our way to the major league ballpark. So that's because one of my nephews plays in the minor leagues and he's in Triple-A, and he's on the verge of making the big leagues.

00;21;35;06 - 00;21;55;10
Karen
And when he gets that call and I get the notification that he is getting called up to the show, my husband and I have already decided no expense spared. We will fly. However, we need to get to whatever city he's in, get a hotel and make sure we're at the game because there's no price that I would ever put on that.

00;21;55;12 - 00;22;10;25
Karen
And my coach at work and everyone at work knows that I will drop anything. And I said, I don't even care if I'm doing in-home interviews. I will be out there, obviously gone so bad, but haven't been doing a lot of in-home. So I don't think that's going to happen this summer if he gets called out.

00;22;11;00 - 00;22;24;21
Jess
Anything could be canceled in favor of that, for your family. That's very cool. I love that, brands have distinct personalities. What's a brand that you would love to date? And a brand that you would love to marry? And they can be the same brand, but they're not always.

00;22;24;28 - 00;22;44;26
Karen
Obviously, I've been married a long time. I've been married for over 20 years. So I thought about like, who, who, who of my past had I dated? I would say I've dated a lot of guys that fit, you know, into the Jack Daniels mold. And I used to work, there used to be a client when I lived in Texas.

00;22;44;26 - 00;23;11;19
Karen
They were one of my biggest clients. But the thing about the Jack Daniels brand is that Jack Daniels is comfortable in the boardroom and in a biker bar anywhere and, you know, is very approachable, has a good time, probably is a decent dancer, can carry a tune and karaoke. That's probably Jeff Daniels is probably the guy I would date. Who did I marry?

00;23;11;22 - 00;23;38;12
Karen
Well, my husband is a huge sports fan, so definitely a little bit of ESPN. Because has way too many stats running through his head, but I think a better depiction of that is Progressive, Progressive insurance. okay. Great sense of humor. You never know what you know, it's not always the same. Like their campaigns are very different in terms of, you know, they have the Flo campaign, but they also have the you don't want to be your parents.

00;23;38;12 - 00;24;08;12
Karen
And then they have cavemen. All of these different, ah no actually cavemen as Geico. But they have all these different campaigns going on and they're all just very intelligent, funny humor that gets that comes out in something boring like insurance in different ways. And my husband has an amazing sense of humor. Probably some of it's rubbed off on me over the years, and definitely that's a brand I would marry, or I probably have married.

00;24;08;15 - 00;24;17;14
Jess
I love that it sounds like you guys just have a blast. So this was fantastic. I love hearing that. So finally, Karen, what keeps you inspired at work?

00;24;17;16 - 00;24;42;14
Karen
Definitely seeing my coworkers utilize insights. When I, it's funny because every year we have two sales meetings a year. Some years I present, some years I don't. And when I don't present people like, oh, it's a shame that you're not presenting. And like, no, look at all the people that are using all the insights that were worked into, everything that the brand managers and the innovation managers presented.

00;24;42;16 - 00;24;59;29
Karen
And when I see people being able to make decisions or before they make a decision, they stop themselves. And like, we need to find out what does the consumer think about this? Then I know I'm doing my job because I know that they care about what I do, and they want to hear from me and hear from hear what I have to share with them.

00;25;00;03 - 00;25;03;22
Karen
That's definitely what keeps me inspired at work.

00;25;03;25 - 00;25;11;21
Jess
Well, it's having an impact. So I'm so glad that you joined today to share some of your stories and your wisdom. Thank you so much for being here, Karen.

00;25;11;24 - 00;25;14;16
Karen
Thanks, Jess. It was really a fun time.

00;25;14;18 - 00;25;15;21
VO
Like what you heard?

00;25;15;23 - 00;25;20;28
VO
Share the inspiration or head to diginsights.com to learn more about what we do.