shopping
YOGURT POTATO CHIPS?
CHEESE CURD WAFFLES?
Universal Yums lets subscribers sample international snacks
WRITTEN AND PHOTOGRAPHED BY WILLIAM WESTHOVEN
S
nack-by-snack, Eli
Zauner and Monique
Bernstein ditched the
corporate career ladder
to chart a rapid course in
the growing subscription
box industry.
The Montclair millennials fell in
love five years ago while working for
consumer products giant Proctor &
Gamble in Cincinnati. Three months
after their first date, they launched
Universal Yums, shipping monthly
boxes of sweet and savory snacks
from around the world to U.S.
customers who want to sample
exotic flavors in their own home.
“We started out of our apartment
with $4,000 in savings,” says
Bernstein, 30. The company proj-
ects $21 million in revenue in 2019.
“We were 21 and 24 when we
started,” says Zauner, 27, who had
been working at P&G for only three
months when they met. “P&G is a
great company to work for. But not
for us,” Bernstein says.
With the couple swapping familiar
P&G brands like Pampers, Pepto
Bismol and Bounty paper towels for
popular brand-name snacks from
around the globe, the business quick-
ly grew from $10,000 in sales in
2014 to $700,000 the next year, and
$7 million in 2017, selling foreign
snacks like haggis-flavored chips
from Great Britain, salted sour-
pineapple candy from Thailand
and Choco Pies from Korea.
“We were on this great career
path, with established brands,”
18
SPRING 2020 MONTCLAIR MAGAZINE
“THE NUANCE TO OUR IDEA IS THAT
TRYING FOOD IS AN OPENER TO
EXPLORING OTHER CULTURES.”
MONIQUE BERNSTEIN
Bernstein says. “And Eli and I were
like, ‘We’re going to go sell snacks
from around the world on the
Internet.’ And people were like,
‘Why?’”
“With my parents, they were feel-
ing a bit like why on earth did you
just go to college for four years to
study mechanical engineering, and
then you’re starting a business selling
snacks?” Zauner says. “But they
understood, because they owned
businesses themselves.”
Bernstein’s father was strongly
opposed to the venture “until he did
our tax return,” she says with a smile.
How it works
Each month, customers receive a
selection of packaged snacks from a
different country, along with a maga-
zine offering background, games, rec-
ipes and fun facts about the products
and their origin.
Snack boxes can be ordered in
three sizes, from $15 to $40 per
month. The company currently
ships about 80,000 boxes a month,
Zauner says.
Nations on the monthly subscrip-
tion list have included Brazil, Turkey,
Poland, Italy, Pakistan,
Israel, Ukraine, Thailand and more.
“We found people really love
Italy and France,” Zauner says.
The least popular?
“Oh, there were a few of them,” he
says with a laugh. “The most recent
one we did was Taiwan, and not that
we won’t go back again, but it’s
always a balance for us as to how
authentic we make the boxes.”
Consumer feedback told them:
“More than half that box was a
stretch for some customers,” he says.
But overall, their startling success
led them to relocate in 2017 to a
21,000-square-foot Parsippany
warehouse that would provide better
distribution routes and allow them
to become their own importers.
In January, they doubled their cur-
rent space with a move to Roseland.
The expansion likely will add to the
30 full-time jobs their business has
created in the expanding subscription
box industry, estimated to hit about
$10 billion in sales in 2019.
Future plans include a 2020 wed-
ding and launching an online direct-
order service. They also plan to open
a retail store next year in Montclair. ■