Getting the listing is exciting. I know it is. It's one of the best moments in this industry, and it absolutely should be celebrated.

But here's what nobody really talks about: what happens six months later.

Because getting listed is one thing. Staying listed is a completely different game. And the brands that are still on shelf years from now are paying attention to a metric that most food and drink founders either ignore or have never really looked at properly.

That metric is repeat purchase rate. And I think it might be the most important number in your business right now.

What's actually happening underneath the surface

Here's what happens with a lot of established food and drink brands. You're working extremely hard. Doing markets, pop-ups, running ads, pitching buyers. All of this energy is going into one thing: finding new customers, new stockists, new sales. And on the surface, that looks like growth. The numbers go up, you get a new listing, you feel like you're moving forward.

But underneath all of that, there is a question you might not be asking yourself. Are the people who bought your product last month coming back this month?

I had a client who is a really good example of this. Their sales were going fine for years. They thought they were thriving, so they never really looked at their repeat purchase data. Then sales started to decline. Slowly at first, then more and more. And it was only at that point that they actually looked at the numbers.

What they found was that repeat purchase had already been declining for a while. The problem wasn't their marketing or their distribution. It was their product. Their taste profile wasn't strong enough compared to what their competitors were offering. Customers, one by one, were just choosing someone else. By the time they noticed, they had a lot of catching up to do.

To be honest, that's the founder trap. Repeat purchase rate is a leading indicator. It tells you what's coming before your sales figures do. If you wait for the sales to drop before you start paying attention, you're already behind.

What the data actually says about customer retention

Bain and Company published research in the Harvard Business Review that it costs five times more to acquire a new customer than to keep an existing one. This is one of the most replicated findings in marketing research. Think about what that means for your business. Every pound you're spending trying to find someone new, you could be spending a fifth of that keeping the customers you already have.

And it gets better. Wharton Business School found that the probability of selling to an existing customer is somewhere between 60 and 70 percent. But the probability of selling to a brand new customer is between 5 and 20 percent. So your existing customers are three to four times more likely to buy from you again. And repeat customers spend on average 67% more than new customers. So not only are they easier and cheaper to sell to, they spend more when they do.

If your customers aren't coming back, you're not growing. You're filling a bucket with a hole in it.

The stat that changes how you think about your second sale

A first-time buyer of your food or drink product has roughly a 25% chance of buying again. That's 1 in 4. But if you get them to a second purchase, that probability jumps to 50%. Suddenly you've gone from 1 in 4 to 1 in 2, just by getting them to come back once.

The second purchase is a critical moment. If you get someone to return once, you've fundamentally changed the relationship. You're no longer a brand they tried. You're a brand they trust. And that second purchase doesn't come from your ad spend. It comes from your product. From whether it actually delivered what they expected.

What this means when you're in retail

A lot of food and drink founders assume that once they've got the listing, the job is done. You've got the shelf space, now you just need to keep pushing. But what retailers are actually watching is not just whether products leave the shelf. It's repeat purchase rate.

Research from the University of East Anglia, based on a major co-produced project with Tesco, found that 63% of food and drink suppliers who worked on improving their repeat purchase rate said it was invaluable in helping them avoid being delisted. That number matters.

And Circana, one of the biggest FMCG data companies in the world, published research earlier this year saying that when presented to a retailer, a story built on high loyalty, strong repeat purchase rate, and increased basket value is far more persuasive than a simple sales pitch. So next time you're preparing for a buyer meeting, think about whether you can tell that story.

McKinsey's research on the best-performing consumer goods brands points to the same thing: the brands holding their listings are the ones focused on SKUs with a 60 to 70 percent repeat purchase rate versus their category benchmark. That's the goal. That's the number you're aiming for.

So what's the shift here?

It's not about abandoning acquisition. Of course you still need new customers. But most food and drink founders have the balance completely upside down. They pour everything into finding new people and then wonder why growth feels so hard, why every month feels like starting from scratch.

Bain and Company also found that increasing customer retention by just 5% can increase profits by anywhere between 25 and 95%. That's not a massive shift. But the compound effect is huge. When customers come back, they spend more. They tell others about your product. And that word of mouth is the cheapest, most effective acquisition channel you'll ever find.

Right, here's your challenge for this week. Go and find your repeat purchase rate. If you're selling direct to consumers, look at how many customers from last month placed another order within 60 days. If you're in retail, ask your buyer or check the data if you have access to it. Then put that number next to what you're spending every month on acquiring new customers. Your ads, your activations, your market stalls, your influencer campaigns. Add it all up.

That contrast will tell you more about the health of your business than any other metric. If you're spending thousands every month to find new customers but your repeat purchase rate is sitting at 15 to 20%, you have a leaky bucket. And right now, you're just pouring more water in from the top. But that's your starting point. Know your numbers first.

And what actually drives repeat purchase rate?

This is so important. If repeat purchase rate is the metric that matters, the next question is: what actually drives it?

The answer is taste. It's not branding, not packaging, not your health benefits, not convenience. Most food or drink brands struggle with this because it's the thing nobody wants to say out loud. But if your product doesn't taste good enough, no amount of marketing spend is going to fix your repeat purchase rate. You're just spending money to accelerate the moment someone decides not to come back.

If you want to get that number up, the work starts with your flavour profile. Getting really clear on the right flavour direction for your product and your consumers is one of the most valuable things you can do right now. That's exactly what the Choose Package is designed for: a structured, science-led process to find the flavour that makes your product taste genuinely great and gives your customers a reason to come back. If you want to explore whether it's the right fit, book a free 30-minute consultation here. We'll have a proper conversation about your product and work out what makes sense as a next step.

Right, let's bring it all back together. Getting listed is a real achievement. But the real game starts the day your product hits the shelf. Acquisition matters, but retention is where the money is.

Repeat purchase rate is the metric that tells you whether your product is actually earning its place. Go and find your numbers. And if you want to drop them in the comments, I'd really love to see where you're at.