🎙 EPISODE 311 — Trade Marketing Isn’t Broken (You Were Never Taught the System)

🔥 Why Trade Marketing Feels Like a Tax

If you’re an emerging CPG brand, trade marketing probably feels like this:
You spend money…
You run promotions…
You follow the retailer’s plan…

And somehow—
👉 your margins shrink
👉 your cashflow tightens
👉 and your growth still feels unpredictable

So you start asking:
“Why does this feel so hard?”
“Why does it feel like I’m paying to stay on shelf?”
“Why does every promotion feel like a gamble?”
“Why do my promotions just generate more deductions?”

Here’s the truth no one says out loud:
👉 Trade marketing is NOT broken
👉 The way you’ve been taught to use it is

Because most founders are taught:
tactics instead of strategy
tools instead of thinking
activity instead of outcomes

And that leads to one dangerous pattern:
👉 Trade spend becomes a tax… instead of a growth engine

But when you understand how this system actually works…
Trade marketing becomes:
your biggest lever for growth
your fastest way to extend runway
your unfair competitive advantage
how you compete with bigger better funded brands and win
That’s what we’re going to fix today.

🎯 THE STORY — When It Finally Clicked
Early in my career, I saw something that didn’t make sense.
I was working inside big CPG.
Managing promotions.
Reviewing performance.
And on paper… everything looked good.
Sales were up.
Promotions were “working.”
Volume was growing.
But something felt off.

Because when I looked deeper…
👉 the category wasn’t growing
👉 profitability was inconsistent
👉 our base volume was declining
👉 and we were repeating the same promotions over and over

Rinse and repeat is not a strategy and key this is what Mose brands do. What’s the definition of insanity?

That’s when I realized:
👉 We weren’t building strategy
👉 We were running plays
And those are not the same thing.

Around that same time, I started working more closely with retailers.
And I saw the other side of the equation:
Retailers weren’t asking:
“Did your sales go up?”

They were asking:
Did this grow the category?
Did this bring in new shoppers?
Did this improve profitability?
Did this increase profits?

That’s when it clicked:
👉 Trade marketing isn’t about promotions
👉 It’s about behavior change
And most brands completely miss that.

Behavior is trading shoppers up, increasing foot traffic, increasing trial, growing contribution. What goals do you set for your promotions?

⚠️ WHY THIS MATTERS — The $ Hidden in Plain Sight
Let’s simplify this.
Trade marketing is typically:
👉 ~25% of your gross sales
👉 and 70%+ of it is wasted or ineffective
Let that sink in.
This should sting. Especially for emerging brands with limited runway

This isn’t a small inefficiency.
👉 This is the difference between:
surviving and shutting down
scaling and stalling
raising capital and running out of cash

And here’s what makes it worse:
Most brands don’t even realize it’s happening.
Because they’re measuring:
volume
lift
activity

Why, because this is what our industry teaches you.

Instead start asking:
👉 “Did this actually create incremental growth?”
👉 “did that promotion achieve its objective?”

That’s the game.
And if you don’t understand that…
You’ll keep spending money without building momentum.

Here are the top 5 strategies to maximize your trade marketing ROI

⭐ #1 Trade Marketing Fails Without a System
Most brands treat trade marketing like a checklist:
run a promotion
pay a fee
get a display
hope for lift

But here’s the problem:
👉 Trade marketing only works as a system

It must connect:
planning
pricing
promotion strategy
execution
measurement
learning
And it much include how customers shop

Miss one piece…
👉 and everything weakens

This is why:
promotions feel random
results feel inconsistent
and nothing compounds

The Shift
Stop asking:
👉 “What promotion should we run?”
Start asking:
👉 “What system drives our growth?”

Action Step
Write this down:
👉 “Our trade strategy is designed to change ______ behavior.”
If you can’t answer that clearly… its time to rethink why you are promoting

That’s your starting point.

⭐ #2 Most Promotions Don’t Drive Growth (They Subsidize It)

Here’s one of the most misunderstood concepts in CPG:
👉 Not all sales are good sales

There are two types:
1. Subsidized Sales
Sales that would have happened anyway—just discounted
2. Incremental Sales
Sales that only happen because of the promotion

Most brands celebrate:
👉 volume spikes
But retailers evaluate:
👉 incrementally

If your promotion:
discounts loyal customers
pulls demand forward
doesn’t change behavior
👉 you’re losing money

The Shift
Stop asking:
👉 “Did sales go up?”
Start asking:
👉 “Did we create new behavior?”

There are better more effective ways to reward existing customers. I talk about this on other podcast episodes.

Action Step
After your next promotion:
Ask:
Did we attract new shoppers?
Did we increase basket size?
Did base sales grow after?
If not…
👉 that promotion didn’t work

⭐ #3 Retailers Don’t Want More Promotions (They Want Better Ones)
Most founders believe:
👉 “Retailers want more promotions”

That’s not true.
Retailers want:
fewer promotions
better outcomes
more predictability

They’re asking:
Did this grow my category?
Did this bring in traffic?
Did this improve margin?
Did this give me a competitive edge?

Promotions that do that:
👉 earn trust
Promotions that don’t:
👉 quietly lose support

The Shift
Stop thinking like a brand.
Start thinking like a retailer:
👉 “How does this help them win?”

I know it can be confusing when retailers are constantly telling you to promote. That is because some retailers are more interested in the fees they charge than growing category sales or making their shoppers happy. That behavior can also be changed when you focus first on maximizing your trade promotion ROI. This puts their customers first. Helping retailers rethink their promotion strategy is some I cover in the free download at the end of the episode.

Action Step
Build your next promotion around:
traffic
basket size
category growth
That’s how you stand out.

⭐ #4 Execution Is Where Everything Breaks
You can have:
great strategy
great pricing
great planning
And still fail.

Why?
👉 Because execution is everything
Let’s make this simple:
👉 Shoppers can’t buy what they can’t find

Most failures come from:
poor merchandising
out-of-stocks
inconsistent placement
broken communication

And when that happens:
Retailers assume:
👉 the product failed
Even when demand is strong.

The Shift
Treat execution like a system:
placement
inventory
replenishment
store-level consistency

Use scorecards to schedule every aspect of the promotion, assign who is responsible, and then hold them accountable. Flawless execution will dramatically improve your trade marketing ROI.

Action Step
Create a checklist:
👉 “What must be true in every store for us to win?”
Then enforce it.

⭐ #5 Trade Spend Becomes Dangerous Without Discipline
Here’s what most founders don’t realize:
👉 Trade spend compounds quietly
promotions stack year over year
costs increase
margins shrink
learning doesn’t happen
And you teach shoppers to only buy your brand when discounted

And suddenly:
👉 trade spend grows faster than revenue

That’s when brands get into trouble.
Not because sales dropped…
👉 because cash disappeared

The Shift
Trade marketing is NOT:
👉 “cost of doing business”
It is:
👉 a strategic investment

It is your primary growth lever, when used correctly.

Action Step
After every promotion, answer:
What worked?
What didn’t?
What changes next time?

If you’re not doing this…
👉 you’re repeating expensive mistakes
Since most brands lack the discipline to do this, you will gain an incremental advantage each time you make this a priority.

🔁 RECAP — What Actually Works
Trade marketing works when:
You build a system—not just run tactics
You focus on incremental growth—not just volume
You align with retailer goals—not just your own
You prioritize execution—not just strategy
You create learning loops—not just activity

Fix these…
And everything changes:
your promotions become predictable
your margins stabilize
your retailers trust you
your runway extends
And shoppers place more value in your brand

🚀 CLOSING — The Real Opportunity
You don’t need:
more promotions
more spend
more complexity

You need:
👉 clarity
👉 discipline
👉 and a system

Because trade marketing isn’t the problem.
👉 It’s the fastest path to growth when done right

And when you understand it…
You don’t just compete with bigger brands—
👉 you outmaneuver them

🎯 CTA
If this episode helped you think differently:
Download the free Trade Management Essentials To Grow And Scale Your Brand at RetailSolved.com/guide15 and with the show notes at retailsolved.com/session311
Go deeper into the New Item Essentials system
And share this with a founder who’s spending money… but not seeing results

Because you don’t need to spend more to grow.
👉 You need to spend smarter

I’m Dan Lohman
And this is the Bulletproof Your CPG Brand podcast
Use Guide 15 Trade Management Essentials To Grow And Scale Your Brand