Trader Joe

"That’s something to be remembered in this distribution discussion: we were not dealing with a static problem. The company was growing 20 percent per year (doubling every 3.6 years). And the more efficacious the distribution program became, the more our sales increased."

"where I thought we should go: “We want continuous products. Any sane person does. The trick is to have continuous products which are profitable without creating a high-price image.” To create such products, they needed to be differentiated at least in order to avoid direct price comparison. Of course there was no price comparison for almond butter (it was our exclusive) except vs. peanut butter. Products in which we had an absolute buying advantage. For example, we were the largest seller of cheap Bordeaux blanc in the United States. I was willing to continue to indulge in"