October 7, 2024 • 7 mins
Watch Carol and Tim LIVE every day on YouTube: http://bit.ly/3vTiACF.
Bloomberg Businessweek Senior Reporter Amanda Mull discusses Bogg Bags, the colorful, perforated plastic bags that are projected to hit $100 million in sales this year.
Hosts: Carol Massar and Tim Stenovec. Producer: Paul Brennan.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio news. These is Bloomberg Business
Week with Carol Messer and Tim Stenebek on Bloomberg Radio.
There's no better way to introduce our next guest than
just read from her latest.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
It's pretty amazing.
Speaker 1 (00:20):
I kind of do this all the time with AMANDAM
mall scan the crowd at any soccer.
Speaker 3 (00:23):
Wait, wait, we need like table reads of all of
her stories. We're just going to start doing that, But
go ahead, go ahead, okay.
Speaker 1 (00:28):
Scan the crowd at any youth soccer or softball tournament
in America, and you're likely to find that many of
the moms cheering on their kids have brought along a
similar array of gear folding nylon camp chairs, a rainbow
of enormous Stanley insulated cups, collapsible wagons with off road wheels,
and a menagerie of boxy, bright tote bags that look
to be constructed from the same pliable, perforated plastic as.
Speaker 2 (00:52):
How do I not have one of these? Well?
Speaker 1 (00:53):
How okay these are?
Speaker 4 (00:55):
Dog?
Speaker 2 (00:55):
Does Rebecca have one?
Speaker 1 (00:56):
No?
Speaker 2 (00:56):
I've never heard of these?
Speaker 1 (00:57):
All right, Okay, maybe it's because my kids aren't old
enough to be in these youth sports scenes, I had
no idea what these things are, but they are big business.
Amandimla is a Bloomberg BusinessWeek senior reporter. She writes about
the big business of bog bags. It's my alliteration there,
she joins, us from New York. What are these things, Amanda?
And what does it say about Carolyn me that we
have no idea what these things are?
Speaker 2 (01:18):
To be careful, we can cut your mic at anytime.
Speaker 4 (01:21):
Well, it says mostly that you live in New York City.
Speaker 1 (01:24):
Okay, this is close by.
Speaker 4 (01:27):
No, these are mostly super super popular in the suburbs,
and they're they really over indexed in.
Speaker 2 (01:33):
The suburbs foreheads like, Okay, they were.
Speaker 4 (01:38):
Actually the company was started very very near to the
city though in northern New Jersey. They are big, hyper
usable tope bags. They're very very lightweight, and they are
especially popular among nurses, healthcare workers of all types, teachers,
and moms. They you can put a ton of stuff
(01:58):
in the full size version. They sit up when you
put them in a like in the passenger seat of
a car, or on the ground at a you know,
youth soccer game or at the beach. So they are
just like hyper utilitarian, hyper functional tots that have really
really caught on almost entirely based on word of mouth.
Speaker 1 (02:17):
They look like they literally look like bags made of crocs.
Speaker 4 (02:20):
They are perforated, you can you can put little accessories
in them, you can customize them, which is also a
big appeal for a lot of people.
Speaker 1 (02:28):
That Bevy Bevy.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
Who is who is the wonder mom behind all of this?
Speaker 4 (02:35):
Her name is Kim Vaccarella. She is a mom from
New Jersey. She was an accountant in a real estate
office before all of this happened, and she was the
mom of kids who played sports, and she wanted a
bag that could hold like just a ton of like
unwieldy stuff to take to their games, to take to
(02:56):
the beach, to just sort of take everywhere. And she
couldn't really anything that was, you know, that fit all
of the criteria that she was looking for, so she
decided to design one herself. She didn't have any background
in design, her husband is not in the industry. She
knew a couple of women who worked in the city
who worked in the apparel industry, so she asked them
(03:17):
for some pointers, for some recommendations, but she did the
whole thing from scratch. She still owns the company. It's
an entirely sort of like self made business.
Speaker 1 (03:26):
But at the same time, it hasn't been like a
rocket ship up. It's been a long and winding road
with some pretty significant speed bumps. She kept at it, though.
What were some challenges that she's faced just in the
last gosh more than ten years since she's been working
on this right.
Speaker 4 (03:41):
She first prototyped the bag in the late two thousands,
and she started ordering like a couple hundred at a
time to sell in like local northern New Jersey boutiques,
and she did pretty well with that, she told me,
and she wanted to bring the bag to like a
larger selection of retailers and pitch them. So she and
her has been used like most of their savings to
(04:02):
make an order of like an entire container full of
bags that came over from the manufacturer overseas, and when
they got here they were damaged. So she ended up
donating the entire lot to Hurricane Sandy recovery that the
hurricane hit the Jersey shore. A few months later, she
decided that she was in over her head and wound
(04:23):
down the business, and she and her husband found a
good a good cause to send these two so they
could write them off and you know, sort of try
to recover financially from all of this. And then the
people who received them, as you know, they were they
were full of supplies for for people who were recovering
from sandy. And a few month months later, when things
started to get closer to normal for some of these
(04:45):
people who received them, she started getting calls. People wanted
more of them. They they loved the bag that they
had received, and their their sisters or aunts or cousins
or coworkers wanted their own. So she started the business
back up.
Speaker 1 (05:00):
I feel like ordering.
Speaker 3 (05:02):
Incredible clos I think it like you pay it forward, right,
You just do something you know, you have bad luck,
you do something really good, and then eventually, like maybe
it actually comes back to you.
Speaker 2 (05:11):
It's really wild.
Speaker 3 (05:12):
It reminds me like, you know, something that could become
so ubiquitous, like the ll being canvas bags that I
feel like everybody uses.
Speaker 2 (05:19):
For anything and everything. So where is she now? What
kind of growth has she seen?
Speaker 3 (05:23):
Who?
Speaker 2 (05:23):
Where can we get them?
Speaker 3 (05:24):
Where can I get one? Where can Tim get one?
Like just tell us a little bit more like where
where's it going?
Speaker 4 (05:30):
Right?
Speaker 1 (05:30):
Well?
Speaker 4 (05:31):
The business grew like slowly but surely until the pandemic hit,
and then during the pandemic she sort of had another
like crazy spurt in growth because people who were going
back to work, healthcare workers and teachers in particular, really
really liked them. And the bags had caught on in
Peloton Facebook groups that had a lot of these particular
(05:53):
types of workers in them, and when Peloton took off
during the pandemic, so did these Facebook groups. So this
recommendation moved by word of mouth. In twenty nineteen, before
the pandemic, they sold about three million dollars worth of bags.
They are on pace for one hundred million dollars sales
this year.
Speaker 2 (06:08):
God, is it just it's not just bags anymore?
Speaker 3 (06:12):
Right?
Speaker 1 (06:12):
Funded?
Speaker 2 (06:13):
It's not just oh, it's.
Speaker 4 (06:14):
Still yeah, it's still self funded. They have about fifty
employees now. It's still based in northern New Jersey. They
have they have mostly just bags, but they sell some
accessories to to customize the bags, but it is largely Yeah,
they have Yeah, the little things that you can poke
into the holes bag are very very popular and they're
(06:37):
always coming out with more of those. But yeah, they
have experienced just sort of meteoric growth. And there she
told me that there's been no like single moment that
really changed everything. There was no like viral TikTok, there
was no like celebrity endorsement. They don't pay for much advertising.
It is almost as yet no no, And I based
(06:59):
on like of my research, this is true, Like there's
no like outside force that made this happen except moms
and nurses and teachers recommending them to each other and
finding a lot of utility.
Speaker 3 (07:11):
And I love that you can just kind of like
rinse it down. I love things that you can just
rinse it down really right, unbelievable.
Speaker 1 (07:19):
You want to say, yeah, are they going to get
bought by crocs? Do they do? They go public? What
happens here just twenty seconds?
Speaker 4 (07:26):
You know, she is really intent on continuing to grow
the business for right now. But I'm sure if she
wanted to sell, she could do it, no problem. They're
sold everywhere from Bloomingdale's to Best Pro Shop right now.
Speaker 2 (07:37):
Oh my god, do you have one?
Speaker 4 (07:42):
I don't have one. No, I don't have any kids.
Speaker 3 (07:45):
Okay, yeah, but you don't have to as we know,
and Mandimal, this is we just love talking to you.
Mendo Mall of Chris Bloomberg, business Week's senior reporter, joining
US
Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio news. These is Bloomberg Business
Week with Carol Messer and Tim Stenebek on Bloomberg Radio.
There's no better way to introduce our next guest than
just read from her latest.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
It's pretty amazing.
Speaker 1 (00:20):
I kind of do this all the time with AMANDAM
mall scan the crowd at any soccer.
Speaker 3 (00:23):
Wait, wait, we need like table reads of all of
her stories. We're just going to start doing that, But
go ahead, go ahead, okay.
Speaker 1 (00:28):
Scan the crowd at any youth soccer or softball tournament
in America, and you're likely to find that many of
the moms cheering on their kids have brought along a
similar array of gear folding nylon camp chairs, a rainbow
of enormous Stanley insulated cups, collapsible wagons with off road wheels,
and a menagerie of boxy, bright tote bags that look
to be constructed from the same pliable, perforated plastic as.
Speaker 2 (00:52):
How do I not have one of these? Well?
Speaker 1 (00:53):
How okay these are?
Speaker 4 (00:55):
Dog?
Speaker 2 (00:55):
Does Rebecca have one?
Speaker 1 (00:56):
No?
Speaker 2 (00:56):
I've never heard of these?
Speaker 1 (00:57):
All right, Okay, maybe it's because my kids aren't old
enough to be in these youth sports scenes, I had
no idea what these things are, but they are big business.
Amandimla is a Bloomberg BusinessWeek senior reporter. She writes about
the big business of bog bags. It's my alliteration there,
she joins, us from New York. What are these things, Amanda?
And what does it say about Carolyn me that we
have no idea what these things are?
Speaker 2 (01:18):
To be careful, we can cut your mic at anytime.
Speaker 4 (01:21):
Well, it says mostly that you live in New York City.
Speaker 1 (01:24):
Okay, this is close by.
Speaker 4 (01:27):
No, these are mostly super super popular in the suburbs,
and they're they really over indexed in.
Speaker 2 (01:33):
The suburbs foreheads like, Okay, they were.
Speaker 4 (01:38):
Actually the company was started very very near to the
city though in northern New Jersey. They are big, hyper
usable tope bags. They're very very lightweight, and they are
especially popular among nurses, healthcare workers of all types, teachers,
and moms. They you can put a ton of stuff
(01:58):
in the full size version. They sit up when you
put them in a like in the passenger seat of
a car, or on the ground at a you know,
youth soccer game or at the beach. So they are
just like hyper utilitarian, hyper functional tots that have really
really caught on almost entirely based on word of mouth.
Speaker 1 (02:17):
They look like they literally look like bags made of crocs.
Speaker 4 (02:20):
They are perforated, you can you can put little accessories
in them, you can customize them, which is also a
big appeal for a lot of people.
Speaker 1 (02:28):
That Bevy Bevy.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
Who is who is the wonder mom behind all of this?
Speaker 4 (02:35):
Her name is Kim Vaccarella. She is a mom from
New Jersey. She was an accountant in a real estate
office before all of this happened, and she was the
mom of kids who played sports, and she wanted a
bag that could hold like just a ton of like
unwieldy stuff to take to their games, to take to
(02:56):
the beach, to just sort of take everywhere. And she
couldn't really anything that was, you know, that fit all
of the criteria that she was looking for, so she
decided to design one herself. She didn't have any background
in design, her husband is not in the industry. She
knew a couple of women who worked in the city
who worked in the apparel industry, so she asked them
(03:17):
for some pointers, for some recommendations, but she did the
whole thing from scratch. She still owns the company. It's
an entirely sort of like self made business.
Speaker 1 (03:26):
But at the same time, it hasn't been like a
rocket ship up. It's been a long and winding road
with some pretty significant speed bumps. She kept at it, though.
What were some challenges that she's faced just in the
last gosh more than ten years since she's been working
on this right.
Speaker 4 (03:41):
She first prototyped the bag in the late two thousands,
and she started ordering like a couple hundred at a
time to sell in like local northern New Jersey boutiques,
and she did pretty well with that, she told me,
and she wanted to bring the bag to like a
larger selection of retailers and pitch them. So she and
her has been used like most of their savings to
(04:02):
make an order of like an entire container full of
bags that came over from the manufacturer overseas, and when
they got here they were damaged. So she ended up
donating the entire lot to Hurricane Sandy recovery that the
hurricane hit the Jersey shore. A few months later, she
decided that she was in over her head and wound
(04:23):
down the business, and she and her husband found a
good a good cause to send these two so they
could write them off and you know, sort of try
to recover financially from all of this. And then the
people who received them, as you know, they were they
were full of supplies for for people who were recovering
from sandy. And a few month months later, when things
started to get closer to normal for some of these
(04:45):
people who received them, she started getting calls. People wanted
more of them. They they loved the bag that they
had received, and their their sisters or aunts or cousins
or coworkers wanted their own. So she started the business
back up.
Speaker 1 (05:00):
I feel like ordering.
Speaker 3 (05:02):
Incredible clos I think it like you pay it forward, right,
You just do something you know, you have bad luck,
you do something really good, and then eventually, like maybe
it actually comes back to you.
Speaker 2 (05:11):
It's really wild.
Speaker 3 (05:12):
It reminds me like, you know, something that could become
so ubiquitous, like the ll being canvas bags that I
feel like everybody uses.
Speaker 2 (05:19):
For anything and everything. So where is she now? What
kind of growth has she seen?
Speaker 3 (05:23):
Who?
Speaker 2 (05:23):
Where can we get them?
Speaker 3 (05:24):
Where can I get one? Where can Tim get one?
Like just tell us a little bit more like where
where's it going?
Speaker 4 (05:30):
Right?
Speaker 1 (05:30):
Well?
Speaker 4 (05:31):
The business grew like slowly but surely until the pandemic hit,
and then during the pandemic she sort of had another
like crazy spurt in growth because people who were going
back to work, healthcare workers and teachers in particular, really
really liked them. And the bags had caught on in
Peloton Facebook groups that had a lot of these particular
(05:53):
types of workers in them, and when Peloton took off
during the pandemic, so did these Facebook groups. So this
recommendation moved by word of mouth. In twenty nineteen, before
the pandemic, they sold about three million dollars worth of bags.
They are on pace for one hundred million dollars sales
this year.
Speaker 2 (06:08):
God, is it just it's not just bags anymore?
Speaker 3 (06:12):
Right?
Speaker 1 (06:12):
Funded?
Speaker 2 (06:13):
It's not just oh, it's.
Speaker 4 (06:14):
Still yeah, it's still self funded. They have about fifty
employees now. It's still based in northern New Jersey. They
have they have mostly just bags, but they sell some
accessories to to customize the bags, but it is largely Yeah,
they have Yeah, the little things that you can poke
into the holes bag are very very popular and they're
(06:37):
always coming out with more of those. But yeah, they
have experienced just sort of meteoric growth. And there she
told me that there's been no like single moment that
really changed everything. There was no like viral TikTok, there
was no like celebrity endorsement. They don't pay for much advertising.
It is almost as yet no no, And I based
(06:59):
on like of my research, this is true, Like there's
no like outside force that made this happen except moms
and nurses and teachers recommending them to each other and
finding a lot of utility.
Speaker 3 (07:11):
And I love that you can just kind of like
rinse it down. I love things that you can just
rinse it down really right, unbelievable.
Speaker 1 (07:19):
You want to say, yeah, are they going to get
bought by crocs? Do they do? They go public? What
happens here just twenty seconds?
Speaker 4 (07:26):
You know, she is really intent on continuing to grow
the business for right now. But I'm sure if she
wanted to sell, she could do it, no problem. They're
sold everywhere from Bloomingdale's to Best Pro Shop right now.
Speaker 2 (07:37):
Oh my god, do you have one?
Speaker 4 (07:42):
I don't have one. No, I don't have any kids.
Speaker 3 (07:45):
Okay, yeah, but you don't have to as we know,
and Mandimal, this is we just love talking to you.
Mendo Mall of Chris Bloomberg, business Week's senior reporter, joining
US
Hosts And Creators
Tim Stenovec
Carol Massar
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