The Challengers – Jennifer Tremblay, Founder & CEO, Somm

We run a regular series here at EQ that we call The Challengers. After all, we're a Challenger Bank, and we want to showcase some other incredible people who we feel live and breathe what it means to be a Challenger. This month, we talked to Jennifer Tremblay, Founder and CEO of Somm, an intuitive wine recommendation app that’s like having a sommelier in your pocket.

Tell us a bit about Somm. What is it, and how does it work?

Somm is a lifestyle app. We’ve created something that is unique to the Canadian market. It’s really about unlocking the world of taste. What you’ll find right away when you download the app is this intuitive and beautifully designed recommendation engine, which is designed to take the guesswork out of wine. I think we can all anecdotally relate to wandering around the LCBO, not sure what to grab, or picking by the label. With Somm, you don’t have to do that anymore. It’s all based on what you’re doing and wired to work the way you’re naturally going to think about your purchasing decision. In September of last year, we launched our Somm Cru and Grand Cru programs, which is all about marrying a partner-driven physical experience. So, if you join Somm Cru and Grand Cru, which is an in-app membership, you can show up at any of our restaurants, hotels, or wineries and unlock these amazing premium experiences that are curated by Somm.

Can you describe that moment for you when you knew Somm was something that would transform the way people consume and purchase wine?

To be honest, Somm was originally built for me and my friend base when we first got started. We all related to that shopping experience I described where you’re aimlessly wandering around the LCBO and you’re not sure what to grab, or you’re sitting down at a restaurant with a massive wine menu and you’re not sure what’s going to go best with your food. And sometimes sommeliers aren’t always the most approachable. We really wanted to make that easier, and make people experience and discover products that are just unbelievable. There is a lot more out there than what you find on the shelves at the LCBO, so teaming up with wineries and agencies is a really great way to open people’s eyes to this whole other world of wine and by nature of that, culinary experiences. I think that the timing of that realization and starting Somm originally as a passion project – of course now it’s grown into something so much more than a passion project – it happened at the right moment. When we started talking to restaurants hotels, and different players in the food and beverage industry, it was the first summer of Covid. Of course, at this time, their businesses, especially the ones in Ontario, had been crushed with Covid and different policies and regulations. They were really looking for good sustainable technology solutions that were there to build their business and build it for the long term in a sustainable way. This all just happened at the right time, to be honest. And now, our road map is about becoming the “Spotify of taste”, and really owning that entire category. Wine is just the starting point.

You went for a grassroots approach to marketing Somm at first. Can you tell us a bit more about that and how it led to such incredible download growth over such a short period of time?

I’m a big believer in partnerships, and we were working with some of the best restaurants, trending hotels, great wineries, right from the early days. Leaning into this organic partner-driven approach, creating a true community that has a highly engaged group of people that are either following us on social, engaging with us through the app or through feedback and surveys, it’s all about organic growth and partnerships. We also had some tremendous attention from the media and press world, and we ended up earning quite a bit of wonderful coverage and collaborated with great journalists. We really built out the network from there, and it kind of just grew on its own which is tremendous, and I’m so grateful.

As a challenger, what's the best part about having a smaller team?

We have a small team that is very close to us, and everyone wears a lot of hats. I think as an early-stage company in the tech world, you have to stay super agile, super nimble, and go with where the market wants you to go. That is just a lot easier to do when you are lean, and you don’t have all the departments and red tape to navigate. Even as we do grow and hire across the company, that’s something we are going to try to keep within our culture; remaining nimble and scrappy, willing to move on a dime and pivot. That’s the way we have to scale and grow.

Who is a challenger you admire, and why?

One of the things that is really important to me and everyone we work with is gender equality. This is all the way down to not only the way we recruit, and how we hire, but how people are compensated. Removing the gender pay gap is something that’s always been near and dear to my heart, even before I went into the technology space. One of the challengers that I’ve looked up to in the past is Marc Benioff from Salesforce. He was one of the first big tech CEOs to eliminate the gender gap in his company. It’s actually a very easy problem to solve, and it’s something we embrace wholeheartedly, and I’m actively involved in. We have a majority female team overall, which is something I’m super proud of, and we also have a majority female technology team. That is extremely rare, and it’s something we’re all proud of as we grow. Maintaining that diversity is going to be very important to our future success.