Products BY concerned parents FOR concerned parents. Little Duck Organics of Peterborough, New Hampshire, was founded with the mission of supplying parents with snacks for their toddlers they could feel good about. As a parent myself, it’s a motive I can completely understand. Kids generally wants chips, crackers or “fruit” snacks (made with “real” fruit juice). On the one hand you want to give them something fun, but, on the other, too many children’s snacks are loaded with sugar. Little Duck provides customers with something better, certified organic bite sized, freeze dried pieces of fruit.
I caught up with company spokesman, Zach DeAngelo, via email last week.
Founder Zak Normandin seemed to have started the business in the good old-fashioned way…through gut instinct and not consumer product test panels. What has the customer response been to the product?
We have been extremely lucky to have had such wonderful and loyal customers who follow us on
Facebook and Twitter, promote us to their friends, and buy our Tiny Fruits in the store. Our message of purity and sustainable sourcing seems to be resonating with consumers and we are very excited about launching new products that adhere to these beliefs.
The product is freakishly addictive. Technically it’s a children’s snack but the reality is that it works just as well for grown-ups. I put it in my cereal and was thinking it would go well in snack mix. (Full disclosure: my child isn’t actually old enough to try these yet… soon though. In the meantime, I was forced to do the product testing myself.) It seems like maybe these “baby snacks” aren’t just for babies…
I actually put our Tiny Fruits in my yogurt every morning and customers have sent in multitudes of other applications. Some great ones that come to mind are using the product in Rice Krispie treats and putting them in fresh salsa! To answer the question though, our snacks are convenient, resealable, delicious, and incredibly healthy which are attributes adults certainly appreciate.
How do you go about sourcing and manufacturing the product?
All the fruit that we purchase comes from sustainable and small-scale farms. Our ingredients are certified-organic and we work directly with farmers to ensure quality and consistency on an on-going basis. As part of our company’s mission, we have committed 1% of our revenues to promote sustainable farming and to improve the quality of life in the communities where our fruit is sourced. Zak, our founder, recently got back from a trip to Nicaragua where we are looking at sourcing mangoes and was shocked to discover that babies are given sugar water as a principle source of sustenance. These are the issues that we are trying to address and this mission is integral to our sourcing efforts. All of our fruit is “manufactured” in Chicago, though really it is just a packaging operation as our product is simply 100% fruit that has been freeze-dried to create an airy, crunchy, delicious texture and flavor.
Little Duck has a great product and a terrific brand – what’s next? Any new products in the works?
In one week we will be launching our second line of products called Mighty Oats which is an ancient-grain based cereal that includes our organic fruit and unique spices and flavor combinations to create the healthiest, most unique baby cereal option on the market.”
I can’t wait to try it… I mean, my daughter can’t wait. What will you be showcasing at the BLFF?
We will be showcasing our line of Tiny Fruits at the BLFF which will include our new packaging.
Thanks, Zach.
This post was written by Jon Ross-Wiley of Local in Season, go check them out! They are also one of our (awesome) media sponsors so look out for them at the festival!