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Bacon Jam is going places and its Philly-area founders want you to have a piece of the action

TBJ Gourmet, headquartered in Downingtown, has launched a WeFunder crowdfunding campaign to raise up to $1 million to finance market expansion for its popular bacon jams.

TBI Gourmet produces an assortment of bacon jams and other gourmet food items at their new business headquarters and production facility located at Canopy Foods in Downingtown.
TBI Gourmet produces an assortment of bacon jams and other gourmet food items at their new business headquarters and production facility located at Canopy Foods in Downingtown.Read moreEd Hille / Special to the Inquirer

What started as a Conshohocken chef’s hobby limited to weekend craft markets and Philadelphia’s Christmas Village is now a rapidly growing culinary enterprise with presence in 5,500 retail stores, including Walmart, and served in 1,000 restaurants.

Evidently, people like bacon jam. But will they invest big money in it? Time will tell.

At 9 a.m. Friday, TBJ Gourmet, headquartered in Downingtown, was to launch a crowdfunding campaign to raise at least $250,000 but no more than $1 million to finance market expansion.

This is unlike the 2013 Kickstarter crowdfunding campaign that launched TBJ, then known as The Bacon Jams, by raising $12,000 in 30 days by selling the product. In the new campaign, TBJ’s principals are selling ownership stake in the company under the Securities and Exchange Commission’s Regulation Crowdfunding.

Regulation CF, as it is also known, took effect in May 2016, setting rules for securities crowdfunding in the United States. Most significantly for TBJ, it’s a more accessible process that allows for non-accredited as well as accredited investors.

The required minimum investment through the WeFunder campaign is $100, with the first $75,000 offered at $26.50 per share.

“It allows a regular Joe to buy into something they believe in,” said Michael Oraschewsky, cofounder and TBJ’s chief executive boar – that’s really a title he uses, along with CEO.

It’s perhaps the biggest evolutionary moment for the consumer packaged goods company since Oraschewsky, 38, of Philadelphia, a former owner of Conshohocken Cafe (now operated as Brunch) and partner Bruce Kramer, 57, an engineer and home brewer from West Chester, decided in 2016 to change its name from The Bacon Jams. That was in anticipation of broadening the product line beyond pork products.

TBJ has since launched a line of maple sugar rubs, seasoning salts, and a sweet-and-savory non-bacon spiced tomato jam that is co-branded with Philabundance, the hunger-relief nonprofit that receives proceeds from sales of the spread.

A major score was getting TBJ bacon jam on shelves in all 4,500 Walmart Supercenter stores as of August 2018. The company of four full-time and two part-time employees said it is profitable with $3 million in total revenue, $184,000 in short-term debt, and $23,557 cash on hand as of March 1. It has sold about 500,000 jars of jam, 70 percent through wholesale, 20 percent at events, and 10 percent through ecommerce, said Oraschewsky, who is slated for a QVC appearance on Wednesday between 4 p.m. and 7 p.m.

The growth has TBJ’s early customers worried about losing the advantage of being a rare carrier of its bacon jams. TBJ responded by creating three varieties exclusively available at independent specialty stores, which Oraschewsky acknowledged as “the foundation for the business” before its jams got into Walmart, Acme, and ShopRite.

Sounding every bit the salesman he needs to be to achieve success in the wilds of food retail, Oraschewsky framed TBJ’s new solicitation for investors as an opportunity for the company’s small wholesale customers to capitalize on future sales, even if those purchases aren’t made in their own stores.

“This is a way for them to hedge their bets," Oraschewsky said. "... This is like, ‘Hey, you believe in us, you’re helping us, and we want to allow you to be part of it, to be really part of it with a share.’ ”

Family-owned and Philadelphia-based foodery DiBruno Brothers has been carrying TBJ bacon jams for a little more than two years, ever since Hunter Fike, cheese category manager, got a taste. They “checked off a lot of the boxes we look for,” he said, including being made by a local company. Also, TBJ bacon jam “works as a cheese pairing,” each 9-ounce jar containing a half-pound of bacon. Fike estimated that DiBruno sells “a few” 12-jar cases a month.

“It’s certainly frustrating that a brand we helped build and gain recognition becomes available at Walmart,” Fike said. “That’s just a part of business, it’s not something we begrudge. We just need to be mindful we’re not too drastically priced from Walmart."

As of earlier this week, nobody from TBJ had approached DiBruno Brothers about the new capital campaign.

“I feel like I’d be willing to invest on my own regardless of whether DiBruno does,” Fike said, contending that among carnivores “everybody likes bacon.”

That’s despite reports such as one by CNN last week citing a study by the United Kingdom’s National Health Services that linked an increased risk of colorectal cancer to daily consumption of even a thin slice of bacon.

“We take health and sustainability very seriously,” Oraschewsky said when asked about health concerns around bacon. “We use uncured bacon, which is more traditional and minimally processed. ... We also use antibiotic-free, humanely raised and vegetarian-fed pork. All things that are better for the consumer’s body and conscience.”

Competition worries him more than people eliminating bacon from their diet, Oraschewsky said.

“Anyone can make [bacon jam], and there’re no patents in food for a recipe,” he said. “A bigger company could do it. ... And if they don’t bring us into the fold either as an allied partner or purchase us, then we could see serious competition in the category.”