When Michael Jackel was 46 years old, he did what many health-conscience people do each year—he had his annual checkup.
In good health, he was then a very successful sales executive who did much traveling and entertaining within his job. Jackel confessed that he spent a lot of his working days sitting on airplanes or in offices, snacking during business meetings. Blessed with a good metabolism, his waist never blew up; but, for the first time, his blood work showed the “red alert” of high cholesterol.
When Jackel mentioned this to his mother, she warned him of his family history of heart disease and not to disregard this warning. Not only did he take this report seriously, he took a hyper-vigilant approach to change his diet.
“The checkup was in December, so when the New Year started, I began cleaning up my act,” Jackel recalls.
Now he was eating only minimally-processed foods. No dairy or cheese, no bread, and nothing with refined sugar. While his diet was “super easy to follow,” it provided “no answer” for his sweet tooth cravings.
He and his wife, Katie, “were looking for a snack that was healthy, delicious and fun to eat that would satisfy both his sweet tooth and snack cravings,” Jackel recalls. But that didn’t seem to exist or at least they couldn’t find such a product. With that, they decided to experiment with making their own.
Their first attempt almost blew up the whole idea. The couple followed an on-line recipe for a homemade fruit roll-up. They blended fresh fruit, put it in a sheet-pan, and then stuck it in the oven to cook for 10 hours.
While their snack was cooking, they started to get headaches, and realized that maybe cooking the recipe for that long in a gas oven was a bad idea. So the Jackels bought a dehydrator machine and created their first batch of fruit snacks. They iterated on recipes, playing with multiple combinations of fruits.
This went on for years and eventually the snacks turned into a type of sweet fruit bar that was dry and firm on the outside, and soft and chewy on the inside. Jackel got good at it. So good, he recalls, that he would receive requests from friends and family.
“We started calling it ‘Jackel’s Juice Jerky’,” he remembers. “We even made a cartoon logo of my face and packaged them up for fun.”
Jackel took them on the road for his snacking, and shared several with his colleagues who enjoyed them so much, that a question arose: Why don’t you sell these, they are really good.
His entrepreneurial spirit kicked in and he ran the numbers, which at that time just did not work for him. They were buying retail produce, the snacks were sticky and didn’t hold up in the packaging, and it didn’t seem like it had potential to be a retail product.
The Pandemic
And then the pandemic hit.
Their twins were born in 2019, and Jackel’s travel schedule began to take its toll on him and the family. Like so many, COVID-19 changed the Jackels’ look on work and life.
“We had 10-month-old twins; I had lost my enthusiasm for business travel and we wanted to be closer to family,” he recalls. Nevertheless, “I’m making these very cool fruit snacks and we didn’t know what we wanted to do.”
They decided it was time to leave L.A. and move back home to San Diego to be closer to Michael’s sibling’s, their families and his parents.
“The world was so crazy,” Jackel exclaims. “The plan was to just move to San Diego, not worry about work for a bit and figure it out later.”
A bit of a gutsy move at the time. While in transition, he decided to take the time to learn more about running a home food business, as well as packaging, labeling and how to sell in farmers markets. But, the main focus became how to eliminate the “sticky” element from the product.
“The bars we were making had harder, drier, chewier edges, and we loved cutting them off of the bars,” Jackel recalls. “The edges had a jerky-like, chewy texture, and was really more fun to eat. It was actually our favorite part.”
That’s when the light went on in his head. He took a moment and realized while tasting the edges that “this is the product. We may be onto something.”
With more tinkering, he finally was able to create the jerky product he had tasted—only in the edges.
“So we reached out to farmers markets and started filling our pouches with
Juice Jerky.”
They had figured out that indeed, farmers markets were desirable places to be. San Diego is a thriving farmers market community with more than 20 farmers markets taking place each week, and at least one every day of the week. And, each market is filled with a significant number of food startups.
However, these booths were quite coveted. Most of the markets had waiting lists, and some brands had waited years to break out as a regular vendor.
“We first had to fill out applications and then hope to get interest,” Jackel recalls. “We had to wait for an opening at the market.”
The Rancho Santa Fe Farmers Market in North San Diego County was the first to respond in August of 2020. Jackel received great feedback, and was told they’d reconnect when they had a cancelation so Juice Jerky could have a “trial” fill-in spot.
On Sunday, September 6, 2020, Jackel and
Juice Jerky made its public debut. It was 100 degrees on Labor Day Weekend when most people were cooling off at the beach. Accompanied by his 80-year-old father— who was there for support—they set up shop on a sweltering day.
“We sold two pouches that day,” Jackel lamented, and thought, ”maybe there’s nothing here.”
Perseverence
But Jackel didn’t give up. Immediately, he began to think about “the next time” he could get a booth. He really wanted the ability to offer samples of the jerky, but due to Covid, there were limited opportunities. Jackel knew in his gut that if people could taste the product, they’d like it, which could significantly impact sales.
“We caught a break and got invited back three weeks later,” he recalls.
Within that time, Jackel approached the Health Department to find out whether they could do open sampling at the market. The response was no. However, they did tell him that prepackaged sampling would be acceptable as long as samples were individually wrapped with the proper labeling. So, that’s what they did.
There was a lot of work involved with preparing the samples which added on significant costs but Jackel was betting big on the ability of customers to experience the taste of something that was truly unique, and get them to understand what the product was all about.
And back to the market they went, with the samples in tow. That day, they grossed $200. He changed his tune to: “I got really excited…maybe there is something here.”
On top of the improved sales, Jackel was invited to the market full-time. One market quickly became two, and within a few months, “we were up to five farmers markets per week and had two part-time salespeople helping sell in the markets.”
“What I learned early on while talking to people about the product, was that many of them shared my sweets cravings and were looking for a healthier way to satisfy theirs.”
In good health
It was once customers heard the story of how Juice Jerky was developed, followed by the sampling of the product, they began to eat it up.
Jackel boasts that the product is made with “only real fruit blended and dehydrated and never cooked, so it maintains the majority of the benefits of the fruit ingredients. The technique and recipe is what makes it unique. It comes out similar to a fruit leather, but it’s chewy with texture like jerky.”
He is very proud about what is not in the snack.
“There is no added sugar or sweeteners nor are there dyes, gelatin or sulfur,” he says. Additionally, “our flavors are led by our best-sellers; strawberry, raspberry and mango pineapple, which are so bold and flavorful, and the colors are rich and beautiful. People are often surprised they are made only from real fruit.”
Are they healthy?
“That’s always a tough question to answer in the food industry because it depends on the person that’s consuming a product,” Jackel explains. “What might be healthy for one person to eat might not be right for another. It’s an ongoing discussion so we avoid making health claims and let people decide for themselves.”
In October of 2016, Harvard Medical School published a report about the health benefits of dried fruit: “Dried fruits contain more fiber and more of the antioxidants called phenols than fresh fruit, per ounce. Fiber fights heart disease, obesity, and some types of cancer (although it’s possible protective effect against colon cancer is controversial). People with diets rich in plant phenols have lower rates of heart disease, diabetes, several kinds of cancer, and possibly degenerative brain diseases.”
It appears that Jackel has achieved his goal of creating a healthier snack.
Christine Davis runs the
Carlsbad, California Village Association highly acclaimed farmers market every Wednesday from 2:30 to 7 p.m. Now 30 years old, the market is unique in that it has been right on State Street in downtown Carlsbad for a decade.
Davis knows a good product for her market when she sees one.
“Michael had such a good pitch and was so knowledgeable and passionate about Juice Jerky that we saw it was something that could benefit both of us,” she explains. “We thrive when our partners thrive.”
Next there was a taste test in which 10 people sampled Juice Jerky.
“He passed inspection very quickly,” Davis recalls. ”And we loved his packaging.”
“Timing is everything,” and at that time there was a booth spot available for Jackel. He was in. Since then Juice Jerky has blossomed, becoming one of the top producing vendors at the market.
Davis added that she is “a huge fan” of Juice Jerky
“I love it, and as an avid hiker, it’s easy to toss my favorite spicy mango in a backpack to enjoy when I’m out on a trail.”
Success
Jackel moved his operation out of their house a couple years ago, and is now manufacturing in a commercial kitchen. His farmers market total has grown to seven locations in San Diego County, and his product can also be found in specialty stores and cafes, as well as a number of independent grocery stores, like Seaside Market in Cardiff, and Valley Farm Market in La Jolla.
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