PLANO, Texas, Jan. 23, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Miss Vickie's® names AJ Shear of DiBella's Subs
as the grand prize winner of the brand's PartnerChip program,
earning the small business a $50,000
prize. The announcement celebrates the culmination of the program,
launched last year by Miss Vickie's
and PepsiCo Foodservice, to support small- and medium-size
foodservice operators in addressing their biggest business
challenges.
While Miss Vickie's has grown
tremendously over the past 10 years, it continues its commitment to
community and wanted to reaffirm the importance of nurturing local
businesses. With this in mind, the PartnerChip program set out to
equip store operators with the tools they need to continue growing
thriving enterprises.
In May 2019, Miss Vickie's kicked off the PartnerChip program
by identifying six small business finalists, each hailing from a
different part of the U.S., to receive funding for and education on
digital media initiatives – a tactic proven to drive traffic.
PartnerChip finalists include:
- Nate Gilbert, Deli Delicious, a
premium deli sandwich shop with locations around California (California)
- AJ Shear, DiBella's, a family-run sub shop that was started in
Rochester, NY (Great Lakes)
- Mike Arthur, Wingo's, a DC-based
wings shop (Mid-Atlantic)
- Frank Lara, Chompie's, a
family-run New York Style Deli and bagel bakery (Mountain)
- Kelly Bennett, Ruthie's Food
Truck, a Dallas-based food truck
operation serving grilled cheese sandwiches (South)
The brand and PepsiCo Foodservice hosted the finalists at a
Small Business Leader Summit at Frito-Lay headquarters on
October 3-4. The finalists engaged in
digital and social learnings from PepsiCo executives as well as the
company's best-in-class partners like Google during the two-day
summit. Through key learnings, all six finalists received hands on
education in driving traffic across digital and social, learning
directly from the experts. They also received a crash course in the
PepsiCo Foodservice Digital Lab, a first-of-its-kind suite of
capabilities built to connect foodservice operators with the
companies, services, insights, and solutions best-suited for their
specific digital and online needs. The Lab connects customers with
the latest technology and consumer trends impacting the industry,
by combining PepsiCo's wealth of knowledge with cutting edge
insights.
"Miss Vickie's PartnerChip
program is a project of love – we want to set all of our partners
up for success," said Arcely
Moreno-Mosier, senior director of marketing, PepsiCo
Foodservice Foods Division. "It doesn't stop here, it's part of the
commitment we have to helping our PepsiCo Foodservice customers
grow by sharing the best of our capabilities with them. We want to
hear how they're doing in six months and how we can continue to
help them grow their businesses."
Following the event, each finalist leveraged the learnings from
the summit and prepared their own digital media plans. From there,
a distinguished panel of judges evaluated their plans and chose the
most compelling to receive an additional $50,000 towards their business' growth.
DiBella's started as a small, family-run business almost a
century ago with a reputation for quality, value and consistency
that gradually evolved into an Italian import store and deli. Over
time, DiBella's moved away from importing, turning instead to
time-honored baking techniques that would produce the classic sub
roll for which they're famous. Today, that small, family-run
business is 46 stores in six states, still specializing in what
they are known for: Quality, exceptional service and awesome
bread.
"Challenges in the restaurant industry are universal," said AJ
Shear, director of marketing for DiBella's. "What's unique is that
PepsiCo Foodservice and Miss
Vickie's are putting an emphasis on getting us the tools and
resources to deal with those challenges. Our learnings from the
summit and the $50,000 award will go
a long way to help us continue to build our business."
For more information about the PartnerChip finalist and our
program, please visit www.missvickies.com.
About Frito-Lay North
America
Frito-Lay North America is the $16
billion convenient foods division of PepsiCo,
Inc. (NASDAQ: PEP), which is headquartered
in Purchase, NY. Learn more about Frito-Lay at the corporate
website, http://www.fritolay.com/ and on
Twitter http://www.twitter.com/fritolay.
About PepsiCo
PepsiCo products are enjoyed by consumers more than one billion
times a day in more than 200 countries and territories around the
world. PepsiCo generated more than $64
billion in net revenue in 2018, driven by a complementary
food and beverage portfolio that includes Frito-Lay, Gatorade,
Pepsi-Cola, Quaker and Tropicana. PepsiCo's product portfolio
includes a wide range of enjoyable foods and beverages, including
22 brands that generate more than $1
billion each in estimated annual retail sales.
Guiding PepsiCo is our vision to Be the Global Leader in
Convenient Foods and Beverages by Winning with Purpose. "Winning
with Purpose" reflects our ambition to win sustainably in the
marketplace and embed purpose into all aspects of the
business. For more information, visit www.pepsico.com.
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SOURCE Frito-Lay North
America