ICYMI: What the Heck is a Tasting Panel

Inside Trader Joe's

Trader Joe's

Arts, Nutrition, Health & Fitness, Food

4.7 • 4.2K Ratings

🗓️ 28 August 2023

⏱️ 9 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Did you know that every product on the shelves at your neighborhood Trader Joe’s goes through a rigorous tasting process before we decide to sell it? Rigorous tasting? What the heck does that even mean, Trader Joe’s? In a nutshell, it means we don’t just offer something for sale because we can; we only offer those things that taste great and represent a great value. To make those decisions, we taste everything – and tasting is, perhaps surprisingly, not the same as eating. It’s careful, it’s considered, it’s… rigorous. Tune in to the latest in our series of bite-sized episodes, ITJ ICYMI, to get a taste for yourself.

Transcript (PDF)

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	We're in the kitchen here at the Trader Joe's mother ship in Manrovia, California.
0:06.1	This is where we usually conduct our Trader Joe's tasting panels.
0:10.2	What's a tasting panel you ask?
0:12.2	We'll explain, because this is another ICYMI, in case you missed it, many episode of Inside
0:18.1	Trader Joe's.
0:19.4	Why are we whispering?
0:27.5	ICYMI, what the heck is a tasting panel?
0:31.0	You know, the tasting panel at Trader Joe's is a vitally important, critical, mission-making
0:38.4	piece of work we conduct every week.
0:42.2	The tasting panel is the thing that every single product we sell in our stores has in
0:49.8	common.
0:50.8	To put it bluntly, we don't sell anything unless it passes the tasting panel.
0:57.5	Wait a minute.
0:58.5	How is that different from what happens at every other grocery store?
1:02.2	And what does it mean to pass the tasting panel?
1:05.8	Passing the tasting panel means that a super majority, 70 percent or more of the Trader
1:12.3	Joe's tasting panel panelists have voted in favor for us, Trader Joe's, to offer you
1:19.8	our customers the product in question.
1:22.9	How that's different from the whole other grocery industrial complex is that, well, they
1:29.0	don't do that.
1:30.8	They might be mildly interested in what something tastes like, but they're really more programmed
1:36.0	around how much money they can make through cooperative advertising and slotting fees
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Trader Joe's, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Trader Joe's and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.