Grow-NY

After two days of enjoying himself at a Grow-NY convention, Paul Guglielmo knew it was time to get serious. He was approaching his time to be on stage pitching for up to a million bucks to expand his Craft Cannery business.

Enter Alexander Hamilton. Or at least the soundtrack of the famed Broadway musical about America’s founding father. No wonder Guglielmo chose this piece of music to pump him up before his turn came: “I’m not throwing away my shot,” begins one of the tunes in a spunky rap-sung style.

And he certainly didn't. He just learned Wednesday that his pitch won a $500,000 prize. 

“It really worked. By the time I stepped on stage I was really psyched,” Guglielmo said Thursday about giving his pitch during the Grow-NY competition in Syracuse. “There was so much energy.”

The news was embargoed until Thursday, but Guglielmo figured there’s always the “mom rule,” so he confided in her before the news became public.

“She screamed at the top of her lungs,” he said. “We did a lot of practice, I’d say at least 50 times; it was well-rehearsed, but not memorized. There were six judges, sort of six disciplines all related to the food and agriculture business. The $500,000 is a really, really big deal, of course, but also having six people at the absolute tops of their field in food and agriculture give you that kind of validation, hearing your plan and say ‘we believe in that plan,’ that’s a big deal too. It really is a big deal.”

He received the award Wednesday night on behalf of the Bergen-based company. The top three priorities he pitched involved job creation, expansion of the building on Appletree Avenue, and the purchase of needed equipment. Most likely, it won’t happen in that order, though, as a building expansion needs to be done first in order to fit more equipment and then hire additional people to help operate everything.

Guglielmo (inset photo left), has been supported throughout his entrepreneurial journey by his wife Ryann, who assists with the company’s marketing, and partner Tom Riggio (inset photo, right). For more, go to the company website.

First up on the task list is to hire an architect and move forward with an expansion, Guglielmo said. That should be happening during the next several months, he said.

“Monday, we’ll have our first set of meetings, and have a goal of that being done in a year,” he said. “We have the land to do 10,000 square feet."

With a personality that tends to be “all over the place,” one big lesson he has learned from this experience is to focus. The judges homed in on various elements of his pitch, and pointed out an area he hadn’t really thought about, he said: the diversity of his staff. While clients and the advisory board are diverse groups, his staff looks like Bergen, he said: nine white people. He has attempted to recruit temp workers from an Afghan-based employee pool, but workers didn’t have transportation. He appreciated the panel’s point.

“The efforts have been made. And there's barriers that need to be broken down, specifically with the transportation, because I've heard a couple of times, well, where's the nearest bus stop, and we don't have one. And so that's a barrier,” he said. “So it's something that I would like to pay a lot more attention to and do a better job of.”

Once expansion and new equipment purchases happen, then Craft Cannery will be looking to hire “realistically between two and five people,” the Brighton resident said. Although the “B2B” company produces well-known products, it sells to businesses versus directly to the public. As a result, it hasn’t garnered a whole lot of attention — until now. Guglielmo knows how challenging it can be to pursue a business dream, and he wants entrepreneurs to know that Craft Cannery is there to help.

“The first thing I ever thought when I wanted to start my pasta sauce business was that it was almost for sure that the answer I would get would be that it was impossible. And I couldn't believe it when I finally started to have some people take me seriously, like the people at Cornell University and their food venture center,” he said. “When they took me seriously, I was like, ‘Oh my God, somebody's actually taking me seriously that I want to bottle this sauce. This is so cool.’”

State recognition
Governor Kathy Hochul announced the winners of the Grow-NY business competition Thursday, including the top prize recipient ProAgni of Lavington, Australia, for the $1 million grand prize.

Now in its fourth year, the program once again attracted exceptional startups and entrepreneurial talent from around the globe to compete in its business development accelerator and two-day pitch competition at the Grow-NY Summit, Hochul’s press release stated.

ProAgni and Craft Cannery were two of eight finalists to take home prize money. The winning teams must commit to operating in the Central New York, Finger Lakes, or Southern Tier regions for at least one year while providing Grow-NY with a small equity investment stake in their entity. Funding for the competition, which is administered by Cornell University's Center for Regional Economic Advancement, is provided through the state's Upstate Revitalization Initiative. 

"Congratulations to all of the forward-thinking entrepreneurs that took part in the fourth round of the Grow-NY competition," Hochul said. "This competition not only helps these companies continue to innovate, but it further supports New York State's regional economies by drawing even more worldwide attention to our globally renowned food and agriculture industry.”

In all, 390 startups applied from 52 countries, including Singapore, Australia, and Sri Lanka. In the U.S., 25 states were represented, including 92 entries from New York. The 20 finalists, including Craft Cannery, received dedicated mentorship from hand-selected regional business advisors leading up to the competition.

Those selected as winners will now immediately get to work executing their business plans in New York state, leveraging the connections made and regional knowledge gained from the competition, the release stated. 

More than 1,200 people registered for the fourth annual Grow-NY Summit. The 20 finalists gave highly-anticipated business pitches to a panel of six judges reflecting a depth and breadth of agriculture, food production, and venture development expertise, who listened to each pitch and asked probing questions, before deliberating to determine the top winners, it stated.

"Grow-NY has become one of New York's finest annual traditions, shining a spotlight on the many diverse, innovative, exciting agricultural and food businesses across the State,” Department of Agriculture and Markets Commissioner Richard A. Ball said. “I thank Governor Hochul for her continued support of the Grow-NY competition and send my congratulations to all of the winners and participants this year. I look forward to seeing you create the technologies and jobs of the future while continuing to provide a boost to our local farmers." 

Craft Cannery promotes itself as taking cherished recipes from your kitchen to the shelves of grocery stores, restaurants, farmers markets and beyond, specializing in the contract manufacturing of sauces, dressings, marinades, and more. 

Grow-NY judges based award decisions on the following criteria: 

• The viability of the startup's business model 
• The diversity, quality, readiness, and completeness of the startup team  
• The value that the startup offers customers 
• The agrifood innovation that that the startup has invented

Prior coverage includes:

• Sauce boss buys Bergen food manufacturing plant
• Bergen business owner takes food prep to a whole other level
• Bergen entrepreneur a top 20 for Grow-NY competition

Top photo submitted of Paul Guglielmo, center, celebrating his win Wednesday in Syracuse. 

 

 

Paul Guglielmo was sitting at his desk chatting with wife Ryann while he multi-tasked with emails, and spotted one message in particular.

He apologized for the expletive.

“I think I literally went ‘holy s—, I think we got selected for Grow New York,” Guglielmo said during an interview with The Batavian. “The realistic future of the next five years or so … this would accelerate it from a five-year plan to become a two-year plan.”

Earlier this summer, at the end of June, Guglielmo, CEO of Craft Cannery in Bergen, submitted an application for the 2022 Grow-NY competition. He was one of 390 entries. Touted as one of the biggest food and agriculture business competitions in the world targeting companies in the Finger Lakes, Central New York and the Southern Tier, Grow-NY provides opportunities for business owners to go on to a final competition with prizes of $250,000 up to $1 million for business investments.

Guglielmo attended last year’s event and ended up watching every single one of the 20 finalists. They each gave a 10-minute pitch, followed by five minutes of questions from the judges. Think: Shark Tank minus Mark Cuban.

He was impressed, to say the least, with those contenders, and thought ‘how smart’ they all were. It didn’t seriously cross his mind to enter until after a trusted friend and mentor suggested that he go for it. Tom Riggio, who is also his business partner for Craft Cannery, helped Guglielmo with the application.

“We sat down together and went through the application, and kind of punched it up,” Guglielmo said. “There was an option to add a video.”

As it turns out, a prospective company asked for some help to make a batch of new sauces at Craft Cannery. The company had someone who could shoot videos, so they bartered to make some sauce and record a video for the competition.

Guglielmo, who is also founder and CEO of Guglielmo Sauce, said he felt pretty confident going into it at that point. He had the two-minute promo and his own experience and knowledge of what he has — a two-year-old company that began with three employees and now has 10 — and the potential for so much more to double his staff, he said.

He will attend an orientation and get a mentor and a coach to prepare until the final competition on Nov. 16 in Syracuse. His pitch, not quite yet fully fleshed out, is three-pronged:

1. Funding us means funding the creation of other businesses.

“What I love about us is you’re funding all of these other businesses too, at least a few a month,” the 39-year-old said.

2. In order to service our bigger customers, we need the equipment.

3. Sustainability: Craft Cannery takes tomatoes deemed inappropriate for the retail market (they don’t look perfect) and uses them to make “perfect” sauce. By working with Intergrow Greenhouses, there is a potential to process 500,000 pounds of tomatoes that otherwise get tossed due to aesthetics.

“We rescue a couple tons a week of tomatoes headed to the dump … they’re undersized, oversized, and didn’t look good,” he said. “If we were operating in pure perfection, we could do about 200,000 pounds a year. I want to do all 500,000 pounds.”

Right now the company is doing much of the prep work by hand — scrubbing tomatoes, for example — and larger processing equipment would streamline that for more efficiency and ability to take on more product, he said.

Guglielmo’s vision is to create an entire line of New York State grown tomato products, with a full slate of crushed, chopped, diced and sauced versions of the red fruits. All of these plans need an infusion of money to expand the physical footprint of the business and fill a production room with equipment, such as large high-pressure hot water containers that spin tomatoes on metal wheels to peel off their skins and remove the seeds for puree and other similar seedless items.

He could easily spend the top $1 million award, Guglielmo said, but would be grateful for any amount, and is going into the final competition an optimist.

“I’m literally speaking out loud, talking to myself in my car. I want to bring some energy to the room, being energetic and enthusiastic without being corny,” he said. “Worst-case scenario, we come out of it with a really fine-tuned plan.”

Empire State Development is funding the competition through its Upstate Revitalization Initiative connected with the three regions—Finger Lakes Forward, CNY Rising and Southern Tier Soaring. Cornell University’s Center for Regional Economic Advancement is administering the competition.

Craft Cannery specializes in taking recipes from individuals, restaurants or food production brands, and adjusting it for large production. Customers range from marinara sauces to oils to hot sauces and BBQ sauces to salsas for brands across the region. It’s the exclusive production facility for Guglielmo Sauce, Sticky Lips BBQ, Old Pueblo Grill, Coach Tony’s, Uncle Ralph’s, Red Osier and dozens of other high-profile food brands.

File Photo of Paul Guglielmo, CEO of Craft Cannery in Bergen, by Howard Owens.

Submitted photo and press release:

Assemblyman Steve Hawley (R,C,I-Batavia) met with supporters at a rally in Albany Wednesday organized by the New York Farm Bureau and Grow-NY regarding the dangers of allowing farm workers to unionize.

Hawley, the former owner and operator of Hawley Farms in Batavia, is a longtime member of the Assembly Agriculture Committee and has been outspoken on the damaging effects labor regulations would have on the family farming industry.

“I was proud to stand with dedicated farmers, activists and producers yesterday in Albany as we push back against labor regulations being advanced by New York City politicians,” Hawley said.

“Our family farms are already struggling under suffocating minimum-wage mandates and low commodity prices, and to regulate an industry, which thrives off the necessity to operate unique hours at different times would be devastating.”

Net farm income is down 50 percent from just a few years ago and farmers have little to no control over the prices they receive for what they produce, unlike most manufacturers who can set their own prices.

According to a 2019 report from Farm Credit East, mandatory overtime would increase labor costs on farms by almost $300 million and decrease net farm income by almost 25 percent.

“We know what works best for our family farms and that is the ability to regulate their own labor to produce the best results. I will continue to stand in the way of harmful farm mandates as session nears its end next week,” Hawley concluded.

Photo: ​Assemblyman Steve Hawley (R,C,I-Batavia) meets with Maureen Torrey and Shelley Stein, on left, from Grow-NY at Wednesday’s New York Farm Bureau Rally in Albany.