Consumer VC

By Mike GelbBusiness Investing

Consumer VC episodes

August 18, 2022Clément Pointillart (Verlinvest) - How do you examine brand equity, Why rummaging through the trash made him interested in consumer and Does product innovation matter in CPG
Our guest today is Clément Pointillart, Executive Director at Verlinvest. Verlinvest is an international, evergreen investment company with over €2bn assets under management backed by families who have together built some of the world’s largest consumer brands.Their portfolio includes Oatly, Who Gives a Crap, Vita Coco and Hint. Clement leads the Verlinvest US office and am part of the Consumer Products and Retail practice. We discuss how he examines brand equity, if product differentiation really matters, and how he thinks about grocery distribution strategy. Without further ado, here’s Clement.
What attracted you to consumer investing?
How did you end up joining Verlinvest?
How do you evaluate if a company has brand equity? And how do you spot and predict a consumer trend early?
Product differentiation
Only long-lasting
How do you analyze product differentiation? Does it matter?
How do you think about distribution? Even though conventional grocery is introducing organic/better for you options, does it make sense for all better for you products to go into conventional grocery?
What are categories that you’re particularly excited about?
What are signs that a premium product could achieve mass adoption?
How do you analyze price for better-for-you products and if they are priced properly?
How should a brand focus on international expansion?
Mission that is clear, authentic, and bring in status quo
When does it make sense to
What does a successful outcome look like to you?
Does a brand have to have a mission in order for you to be interested?
People spending more time at home, purchasing an e-bike
What are the differences between VC and growth equity investing?
What’s one thing you would change about growth investing?
39 min
August 16, 2022Jonathan Wolfson (Brainiac Foods) - What nutrients have been missing for kids and how he’s changing it
Our guest today is Jonathan Wolfson, who is a serial entrepreneur and founder of Brainiac Foods. Brainiac Foods produces brain-boosting snacks with the nutrients young minds need. We discuss his framework for founding a company and the origin story of Brainiac and what he thought was missing from the market and his approach to building product and new SKUs. Without further ado, here’s Jonathan.
And there you have it. I hope you all enjoyed that.
Before founding Brainiac, you’ve been a very successful serial entrepreneur. What’s your framework from brainstorming ideas to committing to found a new company?
Why did you decide to found Brainiac?
Very science-led that’s focused on what the brain is made of
Would you allow your kid?
Could they do adulting? Because
Supply chain challenges have been pretty enormous
What nutrients is the brain made of that are different to the rest of the body? How do you think about nutrition?
There’s been lots of innovation within food to make snacks and meals healthier. What do you think was missing from the market?
What were the first steps you took when founding Brainiac?
What age demographic are you targeting and where brain food might be the most beneficial?
How did you conduct market feedback since this seems like a new category requiring education for the consumer (parent)?
What are the benefits of brain nutrition-oriented food?
How did you approach your sales channel mix from the beginning? Did you start out as digitally native and then decide to move into retail?
How do you approach new SKU development and product expansion?
What was it like raising from VCs? What was their response?
Investing in CPG products tends to be out of style with VCs. What do you think made Brainiac so interesting as a company?
How do you think about competitive advantages for Brainiac vs new entrants?
What’s so far been the biggest challenge when founding Brainiac?
You’ve been successful both as a B2C founder and a B2B founder. What are some of the challenges when founding a B2C company?
What’s one book that has inspired you personally and one book that has inspired you professionally?
Free Solo
Notebook and plan everything to a notebook
What’s the best piece of advice that you’ve received?
What’s one piece of advice for founders?
35 min
August 09, 2022Susan Lin (Felix) - What consumer-driven means, what are real competitive advantages for companies, and why Felix raised $600 million
Thank you Oksana Stowe for the introduction to our guest today, Susan Lin. Susan is a Partner at Felix Capital. Felix Capital is one of the premier consumer investors based in the UK. Some of their investments include Goop, Oatly, Peloton, Seller X. We discuss what consumer-driven means and how that’s even spilled over to B2B, difference when scaling a european company vs. U.S., what are real competitive advantages for companies, and why Felix recently raised $600 million
What was your attraction to entrepreneurship and venture capital?
How do you think about investing in consumer-driven companies today?
What do you think about
How do you spend your time? Do you have a thesis?
Congratulations on raising $600m! We’ve seen this trend in consumer that as funds get larger and larger, investing in consumer brands becomes less of a focus. Will this be the case with Felix?
Why did you decide to join Felix Capital?
What’s different about the European venture ecosystem vs. U.S.?
What are your thoughts on the fundraising market of today?
Where are some of the trends and opportunities you’re seeing in Europe?
What do you make of this current market?
What’s one thing you would change about VC?
What’s one book that has inspired you personally and one that inspired you professionally?
When breath becomes air
What’s the best piece of advice that you’ve received?
Authentic self
34 min
August 04, 2022 Ollie Forsyth (Antler) - The New Creator Economy, Web3 and what social platforms are most vulnerable right now
Our guest today is Ollie Forsyth, Global Community Manager and Investor at Antler. The global venture capital firm enabling and investing in the world's most exceptional people from the earliest stages. Ollie recently published a piece called “The New Creator Economy: A guide on Web3 creator platforms”. We focus our conversation on his learnings while researching this paper and as you can imagine the future of the creator economy and Web3.
32 min
August 02, 2022Mike Asem (M25) - Why the midwest the perfect place to launch and invest in consumer startups, diversity report insights and creating a VC board game
Our guest today is Mike Asem, General Partner of M25. M25 is an early-stage venture firm based in Chicago, investing solely in companies headquartered in the Midwest. We discuss what movie got intrigued by venture capital, what’s misunderstood about investing in the midwest and the consumer landscape in that region, and his learnings since publishing M25 diversity report. Without further ado, here’s Mike
What was your attraction to entrepreneurship and venture capital?
How did you found M25? What’s your thesis?
Was in the nano space
Purdue research foundation
Worked with portfolio companies
Angel portfolio
Established yourself as a former
Many tech VCs have steered clear from investing in consumer brands. Why do you still think there’s an opportunity?
What makes a consumer brand interesting to you?
How do you approach looking at consumer trends and trying to understand consumer behavior?
We talk about brands that are venture-backed have to appeal to the masses and not just the top 1%. How do you measure that when you’re in due diligence?
If it plays in Peoria
Lori Coulter - Summersalt
M25 releases a diversity report. Can you explain the origins of how this began and what it includes?
What’s your outlook as well for Chicago as a venture ecosystem and the midwest?
What’s your thesis around consumer healthcare?
Why did you decide to create Unicorn to the Moon?
What’s one thing you would change about venture capital?
What’s one book that’s inspired you personally and one book that’s inspired you professionally?
Eboys - Benchmarks early days
32 min
July 26, 2022Jeff Nobbs (Zero Acre Farms) - How he's changing cooking oil for the better
On today’s episode we’re talking about cooking oils. Thank you Craig Shapiro for the introduction to our guest today is Jeff Nobbs, who is the founder and CEO of Zero Acre Farms. Zero Acre Farms is on a mission to remove destructive vegetable oils from the food system. Zero Acre Farms is an oil that’s instead made from fermentation.
Some of the questions I ask him:
When did you start to care about health and the science of nutrition?
You’ve started quite a few businesses before and you’ve been very successful. When did you start thinking about alternatives to vegetable oil?
What is the origin of vegetable oil?
How did you land on microorganisms and fermentation? What were other processes you were considering? Can you walk us through the process?
What’s been the challenging part on the R&D side? How do you think about your competitive advantage?
Why did you choose to raise $37 million? How were you able to raise it? What resonated with investors? What’s the most expensive part to Zero Acre Farms? Have you seen tech investors shift away from investing in CPG or only in CPG where there isn’t product innovation?
How do you approach the price point? With innovation comes a premium. How do you think about premium pricing vs. maximum impact?
There’s kind of a bifurcation within better for you products – do you value products that are better for the planet or products that are better for your body, It’s hard to create products that can fill both those requirements. How do you think about it since you’ve been an entrepreneur within health and wellness for a long time?
What were some of your lessons learned since you started a CPG brand before and a restaurant before that has impacted how you think and operate Zero Acre Farms?
What’s the company you most admire (Craig Shapiro asked this question)? How do they impact you?
What is the vision for Zero Acre Farms? What will be the most challenging to fulfill that vision?
What’s one book that has inspired you personally and one book that’s inspired you professionally?
The Three-Body Problem
Think and Grow Rich
The History of the World
What’s the biggest piece of advice to founders?
36 min
July 21, 2022Mark Achler (MATH Venture Partners) - How to Exit Right
My guest today is Mark Achler, who is a serial entrepreneur and Managing Partner at MATH Venture Partners. Recently he published his book that he co-wrote with Mert Iseri called Exit Right. which is about how to position and think about a successful exit way before it happens. So on this episode, we discuss how to Exit Right.
What were your biggest learnings from those interviews in “Exit Right”
Trust - we wish CEOs would come to us before
Is there misalignment between VCs and founder/CEO
How should you go about picking the right investors?
Seems like there’s kind of a one way street when it comes to acquisitions with VCs and founders. It’s ok if the VC thinks about it and as it analyzes investing in certain companies, what an exit could look like, but founders aren’t allowed to talk about it or bring it up at all when they pitch because it means they “aren’t focusing on the growth of the business”. Do you both think there is a disconnect and a certain awkwardness that exists in these discussions?
When should founders start to think about building relationships with corporate development teams?
What were your learnings after you conducted these interviews and conduct this research project?
In the FAIR framework, you emphasize how culture and values are critical for success. But it’s hard to know if the culture is the right culture for the team. How do you suggest founders understand the culture of the potential acquirer?
On the fit question, what do you think about culture? How do decisions get made? What are your values? Is there a place where you want to live?
Waterfall distribution - how much money goes through which share of class
Should founders accept money from corporate VCs?
We also talk about being aligned with your VCs. Of course, VCs are looking at a particular exit horizon. It could range from 5-10 years. Of course, it’s hard to know how the company is going to pan out and when you should start shopping for exits when it makes sense. How do you make sure you have alignment as a founder when you’re approaching VCs?
How do you make sure it’s not a phishing expedition?
I had on a founder who was building the business for acquisition and what that meant to him was growth at all costs, but it didn’t happen and he had to pivot to make the business sustainable and profitable. When you do build relationships with corporate development, should that impact how you build your business?
What are ways founders can ensure they aren’t going on a fishing expedition?
What are common mistakes founders make in the diligence process?
What’s one book that has inspired each of you personally and professionally?
What’s one piece of advice that you have for founders?
45 min
July 19, 2022Justine Palefsky (Kindred) - How she created a travel community that led to a house swapping platform, how to construct a marketplace where your supply equals your demand, and approach to monetization
Our guest today is Justine Palefsky, Co-founder and CEO of Kindred. Kindred is the trusted home swapping network and harnesses the power of community to allow you to travel more for less. We discuss the opportunity within travel and house swapping and how to construct a marketplace where one unit of supply equals one unit of demand
What is Kindred?
How did you both meet?
Did you both always have the intention of founding a business?
When was the aha moment that led to Kindred?
How is Kindred different from other home swapping sites?
What was your first test to test this theory that people would be open to a house-swapping community?
Why did you think you both would make good co-founders for this business?
How did you first construct Kindred? It started off as a private Instagram group, right?
What did you learn from that experience?
How did you think about the marketplace dynamics in this type of business?
How did you decide how to monetize since this is actually quite a complex business?
Once you’re part of this private community, how do you incentivize people to actually house swap?
Monetization. How did you approach?
How did you approach fundraising?
What are typical demographics?
How do you approach customer acquisition?
What was your approach to fundraising?
When did you begin fundraising?
What were the biggest reasons for passing?
What did investors like the most about this business?
Now that the world is beginning to open back up, how do you think about change in consumer behavior and scale?
Were people doing house swaps during the height of the pandemic?
What’s one thing you would change about fundraising?
What’s one book that inspired each of you personally and one book that inspired each of you professionally?
Undaunted Courage by Lewis and Clark
The Courage to be Disliked
What’s the best piece of advice you’ve received?
34 min
July 14, 2022Juan Pablo Cappello (Nue Life) - Ketamine and psychedelic therapy, what’s wrong with current healthcare incentives, and picking the right investment partners
Our guest today is Juan Pablo Cappello, founder of Nue Life. Nue Life is a mental wellness company that offers in-home ketamine therapy. This was a fascinating conversation about where our current healthcare system has failed us with the wrong incentive structure, new alternative therapies, his own mission and inspiration, and what the goal is for Nue Life.
Some of the questions I ask Juan Pablo:
When were you first exposed psychedelics and ketamine?
What inspired you to found Nue Life?
How did you develop a program?
What are some of the regulation speed bumps that you’ve had to go through in order to launch?
What’s the business model? How much do you charge? How long is the program?
What was your approach to acquiring new customers?
Do you see your customers going through your program multiple times / on going or is it a quest to always bring on new customers?
What’s been your approach to scale?
What’s been your approach to raising money?
Shat was your attraction to entrepreneurship?
What were your learnings from starting Patagon, the first online bank in LatAm?
What’s one thing you would change about venture capital?
What’s one thing that’s misunderstood about psychedelics?
What’s one book that inspired you personally and one book that inspired you professionally?
What’s the best piece of advice that you’ve received?
53 min
July 12, 2022Luke Vernon (Ridgeline Ventures) - Why family offices are great investment partners for brands, investment timelines and do brands need product innovation to succeed?
My guest today is Luke Vernon, Managing Partner of Ridgeline Ventures. Ridgeline Ventures is an independent investment group that provides founders and brands a unique alternative to traditional investment firms. Some of their investments include Cotopaxi, Bobo’s, OROS, and Pro’s Closet. Previously he was the CEO of Eco products, which he grew from $1mm to $80mm. We discuss his learnings as an operator, why he invests in consumer brands where other investor interest has softened, the benefits of being a family office and how he thinks about investment timelines.
What were three of your biggest learnings growing Eco Products from $1mm to $80mm?
Since you also started Luke’s Circle and helps companies find talent, what is the key to hiring the right people?
After Eco Products sold, what eventually got you thinking of becoming an investor?
How did Ridgeline Ventures form?
Why doesn’t Ridgeline take outside capital?
There’s been alot of funds that have pivoted or moved away from investing in consumer brands. What are the opportunities that you’re focused on?
What’s your due diligence process?
Pricing strategy in each channel
How to scale the operations of the business
How long does it take to scale?
Food manufacturing
Self manufacturing
Great vehicles to finance CAPEX
What were some of your learnings during COVID?
How can a board provide value to a company?
What’s one thing you think is overlooked when investing in consumer businesses?
What’s one book that inspired you personally and one book that inspired you professionally?
Endurance by Ernest Jackelin
Blue Ocean Strategy
What’s the best piece of advice that you’ve received?
38 min

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Consumer VC takes a look into early-stage consumer investing and venture capital. If you are interested in learning about consumer trends, have a b2c business and interested in learning about the…