Today we’d like to introduce you to Anthony Flynn.
YouBar was launched in 2006 after mother-son founders, Ava Bise and Anthony began creating custom protein bars at home to meet their own nutritional ideals. Since then, YouBar has been recognized nation-wide by hundreds of media outlets, including the The New York Times, ABC News, Business Rock Stars, Good Morning America and The Today Show.
Today at YouBar, they develop and manufacture cutting edge protein bars for leading brands, entrepreneurs and influencers. Many of the brands that they co-manufacture bars for are sold nationally in Whole Foods, GNC and The Vitamin Shop.
They pride themselves on their strong innovation team and are able to incorporate the most on-trend and newest ingredients into exciting new formulas for their clients. As a result, their clients’ bars can hit nutritional and taste profiles that stand out from the competition. Indeed, they are much more than a standard protein bar co-packer. Instead, they see themselves as a full-service innovation team, R&D lab and turn-key protein bar co-manufacturer all rolled into one.
Has it been a smooth road?
The main industry challenge we overcame was delivering the ability to efficiently produce bars at lower minimum order quantities than anyone else. We believe that flexible runs are necessary to empower our clients to innovate with truly new and disruptive products.
We did this by combining state-of-the-art technology with completely custom-created changeover processes and an innovation team staffed with the most forward-thinking food scientists and chefs. As a result, we have the capacity to produce over 100,000 bars per day, and many of our clients sell tens of millions of bars per year. However, we also pride ourselves on helping businesses grow from the ground up or experiment with new ideas and our minimum order quantities start at just 5,000 bars.
So let’s switch gears a bit and go into the YouBar story. Tell us more about the business.
At YouBar, we believe that protein bars should be a disruptive industry that constantly challenges the status quo.
This is what makes YouBar unique… we are our clients’ partner in developing and manufacturing cutting-edge protein bars. This includes four key features:
1. Innovation. We help ort clients disrupt the marketplace.
2. Flexible MOQs. We offer runs starting at just 5,000 units but have the ability to grow with our clients to millions of bars per year.
3. Full Service. As our clients’ partner, we want them to be able to focus on growing their businesses, enhancing their retail and consumer relationships and creating sales. We free them up to do this by handling everything from recipe formulation to ingredient and package sourcing to production and FDA compliance. We are our clients’ innovation lab, co-packer, sourcing specialist and manufacturing business partner all rolled into one.
4. Continuous improvement. We do this by constantly optimizing production through the most leading-edge robotics and state of the art technology to drive prices down and enhance efficiencies.
How do you think the industry will change over the next decade?
As American consumers have embraced high protein, low carb diets over the last several years, the protein bar has exploded because it’s the natural on-the-go delivery method for snacks that exemplify these macro trends in healthy eating. Unlike breakfast cereals, chips, pretzels and popcorn – protein bars are high in protein, low in net carbs, typically gluten-free and paleo. The industry has experienced double-digit year on year growth for the last five years and that momentum is showing absolutely no signs in slowing down over the next five years – with projections pointing to the industry being worth more than $10 billion by the end of 2018.
The hottest trends in both bars and healthy eating for 2018 promise to be an increase in snacks (and more bars!) that are:
1. Keto-friendly (high in good fats, low in net carbs);
2. Packed with ‘functional foods’ (real food items that are good for everything from skin to strength);
3. Come in fun bite-sized forms;
4. Utilize a wide range of animal and plant-based proteins – from hemp to grass-fed bovine.
Contact Info:
- Address: 597 Monterey Pass Road, Monterey Park, CA 91754
- Website: youbars.com
- Phone: 323-513-7527
- Email: [email protected]
Getting in touch: VoyageLA is built on recommendations from the community; it’s how we uncover hidden gems, so if you know someone who deserves recognition please let us know here.
