Edible-Alpha® Podcast

In Edible-Alpha® podcast #72, Tera talks to Sadie Scheffer, founder and CEO of Bread SRSLY, a gluten-free, vegan sourdough bread company based in San Francisco. Sadie began experimenting with gluten-free sourdough recipes in her apartment back in 2011 in attempt to woo her gluten-intolerant crush. Her baking not only won Jesse’s heart—it also led to a successful wholesale and e-commerce business rooted in values.

In the early days of Bread SRSLY, Sadie offered a rotating menu of sourdough flavors, along with muffins and cookies. But as the company grew organically, she realized her tasty gluten-free sourdough bread was the brand, so best to focus on that. Bread SRSLY moved through a series of production spaces and worked with a co-packer for a few years before landing in the certified-gluten-free, certified-vegan kitchen it holds today.

To complement its strong wholesale business, the company began selling direct to consumer in 2014 and built a loyal customer base. Having an e-commerce infrastructure in place proved fortuitous for the COVID-19 era, which has shifted massive food dollars online. Pre-pandemic, Bread SRSLY’s business was 75% wholesale, 25% e-commerce. Now it’s 50-50.

And yet, despite a huge spike in demand this spring, this values-aligned company put its employees’ well-being ahead of profit, actually dialing back capacity to ensure no shortcuts would be taken on safety. A response team was assembled to plan ahead for various scenarios that COVID-19 could trigger, such as what to do if an employee tested positive. Well, one did, so the company shut down operations for three weeks while the whole team quarantined, receiving pay the entire time. Because of the pre-planning and ongoing engagement with employees, Sadie says shutting down was a stress-free decision and the company is prepared to do it again if necessary.

Over the last few years, Sadie has come into her own as a leader. Of all her CEO responsibilities, she most enjoys cultivating strong teams and empowering others with leadership roles. She has “flattened out” the organization as much as possible to make it less hierarchical, thereby boosting employee engagement. She is especially proud of her sales and marketing team, which, driven by values, recently requested that Bread SRSLY join the Stop Hate for Profit campaign and pull its ads from Facebook and Instagram. The team is also examining how to be more inclusive in its messaging to engage a broader audience, and the company is exploring how to accept EBT dollars online.

As the pandemic drags on, Bread SRSLY is focused on cultivating its growing e-commerce channel, launching its first new product in five years and hopefully moving into a more cohesive kitchen space. But no matter what the future holds, this company, with its highly engaged team and unwavering commitment to values, is built to prosper.

In Edible-Alpha® podcast #71, Tera talks to Adam Bent, co-founder and CEO of Scout Canning, a Toronto, Ontario-based craft cannery launched in December 2018. This impact-driven company is revolutionizing the North American canned seafood market by celebrating a variety of locally harvested species—not just tuna—and shortening the supply chain, both of which help protect fragile ocean ecosystems.

To start, Tera and Adam discussed how the canned seafood market has seen almost no innovation over the last several decades. Canned tuna, in part because it’s so cheap, remains the most popular species consumed from a can—and the second-most consumed seafood overall, behind only shrimp. The problem, as Adam explained, is the fish is predominantly caught overseas, where the supply chain is murky, labor conditions are terrible and ocean health isn’t prioritized.

In co-founding Scout Canning, he and Chef Charlotte Langley, a seafood specialist and chef ambassador for Marine Stewardship Council, aimed to do things entirely differently—with integrity, purpose and a focus on sustainability. They are on a mission to move more seafood to the center of the plate by proving that shelf-stable canned products can be just as delicious and nutritious as fresh and frozen. They present a variety of tasty species to broaden consumer palates beyond tuna, dressing them up in rich oils, herbs and seasonings.

But what really differentiates this company is that instead of importing seafood or buying from commodity markets, Scout Canning sources directly from MSC-certified fisheries and aquaculture operations in North America, ensuring a traceable, sustainable supply chain. Through its engaging branding and top-quality products, Scout educates consumers on the issues plaguing our oceans and their connection to climate change.

Like most every food brand, Scout Canning has been impacted by COVID-19. The products were set to launch at Natural Products Expo West, which didn’t happen, forcing a pivot in distribution and marketing strategy. The company still landed key retail partnerships but also put more muscle behind its e-commerce strategy than originally planned. This has worked out swimmingly so far, with consumers clamoring for the canned seafood and even asking for a subscription option.

The pandemic has also benefited Scout Canning in unexpected ways. In the early days, when consumers feared food shortages and panic-purchased shelves empty, demand for shelf-stable foods like Scout’s skyrocketed. Also, in speaking to our shaken nation, respected media outlets, influencers and culinarians touted canned seafood’s immense value, shining the spotlight on this oft-overlooked category.

Although his brand’s launch looked different than expected, because Scout Canning is still small and nimble, it could change course when necessary and find success. The company is starting important conversations around sustainability and already transforming the stale category it was founded to disrupt. These wins show that, with purpose, resiliency and flexibility, emerging brands can indeed make a major impact, even during the unsteady coronavirus era.

In Edible-Alpha® podcast #70, Tera chats with Paul Evers, co-founder and CEO of Bend, Oregon-based Riff Cold Brewed , about the successful startup’s origin story, the power of a strong brand and upcycling a would-be waste ingredient into a crave-worthy craft beverage.

Unlike most food and beverage entrepreneurs, Paul’s primary priority was to create a brand that really resonated with consumers; next, he decided which products to pursue. With a background in brand-building and creative services, and as co-founder of Crux Fermentation Project, a craft brewery in Bend, he was well-suited to take the emerging cold-brewed coffee category by storm.

After assembling a skilled team of founders that includes a cold-brewed coffee pioneer, Nate Armburst, and his son, Bobby, Paul and Bobby embarked to Colombia to learn all about coffee production from small, independent growers and brewing techniques from local cafés. Their trip was transformative and informed both Riff’s product development and design of its Taproom—the brand’s epicenter of innovation and consumer connections. There, Riff tests out new beverage concoctions on visitors and uses their immediate feedback as R&D.

The Colombia excursion also opened Paul’s eyes to something unexpected that has shifted the brand’s purpose and mission. He learned that after the coffee bean (which is really a seed) is separated from the surrounding fruity pulp, 70% of the coffee fruit is thrown to waste. However, the sweet-tasting pulp, called cascara, is far from worthless: It’s packed with nutrients and caffeine and can be transformed into delicious foods and beverages. But because there’s very little market demand for it currently, cascara winds up in waterways and landfills.

Shocked by this practice and the lack of information about it, Riff sponsored a study, supervised by a senior climate change scientist at Oregon State University, to accurately estimate the magnitude of discarded cascara and its environmental impact. The researchers determined that 100 billion pounds of cascara goes to waste, generating up to 13 million metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent.

Determined to do something about this issue—and simultaneously reduce the footprint of its coffee-making endeavors—Riff began turning cascara into a line of natural energy drinks dubbed Alter Ego (named for being coffee's lesser-known counterpart). The beverages were set to debut at Natural Products Expo West, where the brand would also participate as one of ten semifinalists in New Hope’s pitch slam, but the event was canceled due to COVID-19 concerns. Alter Ego launched online and at retail in the Northwest this spring, and distribution is expanding quickly.

With its eco-forward mission firmly entrenched, Riff joined 1% for the Planet and the Upcycled Food Association and is teaming with fellow cascara product producers to create a cascara trade association. While Paul didn’t start this journey with cascara or even necessarily cold-brewed coffee on the brain, his story is an inspirational example of what brands can achieve when they remain open to all possibilities.

In Edible-Alpha® podcast #69, Tera interviews Brad Rostowfske, founder of Raise the BAR Innovation and director of industry growth at FaB Wisconsin, about the food and beverage supply chain before COVID-19, the current state of affairs and what it could look like post-pandemic. Brad has long recognized the fragility of the system and has been working toward making it more dynamic, interactive and sustainable so it can better absorb shocks like this global health crisis.

As Tera and Brad discussed, several aspects of the food and beverage supply chain weren’t working well pre-pandemic. He noted that grocery stores had been losing $75 billion annually due to products not being on shelf, whether because of out-of-stocks, late shipments or incomplete orders. Manufacturers were losing $50 million. These losses stemmed from squeezes to freight capacity, slow turnaround times at warehouses, the not-yet-rectified disruption of e-commerce and a laundry list of other factors.

Then COVID-19 happened. Suddenly, traditional sales channels were altered, consumer demands skyrocketed, food-buying behaviors shifted and gas prices dropped, exposing the existing cracks in the system and widening them into gaping holes. As a result, many food businesses are now struggling to source ingredients, stick a steady manufacturing schedule, get their products into distribution, get them onto retail shelves or any combination thereof. Meanwhile, consumers are left wondering why the pasta aisles are still so sparse several months into this mess.

But before all this transpired, Brad, along with FaB Wisconsin, had been engaging with key manufacturers, retailers and other stakeholders to map out a macro supply chain and address the system’s many pain points. He noted that no single entity “owns” the supply chain, yet the old-school system is not very collaborative, causing unnecessary snags and inefficiencies for all.

However, if multiple stakeholders up and down the chain worked together, goods could flow much more smoothly. And if there were more transparency and intercommunication throughout the system, those seeking out freight, warehouse, cold-chain or manufacturing capacity could actually find it. Simultaneously, those with excess capacity could fill it instead of wasting money.

Unfortunately, the pandemic has slowed progress on this front, as everyone is focused on keeping their own businesses running. Even so, Brad hopes that lessons learned through this experience can feed into a reimagined supply chain, one that is much less tenuous and can more easily flex to accommodate upheaval. He and Tera compared this vision to power microgrids, in that certain fractions can function semi-independently if needed so a shock to one part of the system won’t totally derail the whole shebang.

They also discussed how the pandemic has introduced new dynamics that will impact the supply chain long-term and therefore must be accounted for in future planning. For example, the sharp increase in online grocery shopping will likely hold, as will people working from home, which changes the channels through which they acquire food. And how will the economic recession impact consumer spending on food overall?

These are all big questions without clear answers, but they make it abundantly clear that the time to reevaluate and re-envision the food and beverage supply chain is now.

In Edible-Alpha® podcast #68, Tera talks with Kate Flynn, cofounder and CEO of Sun & Swell Foods, a Certified B Corporation based in Santa Barbara, California that offers organic whole food grab-and-go snacks and pantry staples. They discuss the challenges and benefits of being a mission-based brand, self-manufacturing and shifting strategies in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Kate and her husband, Bryan, started Sun & Swell in 2017 to fill an unmet need for simple, nutritious grab-and-go snacks made with organic real-food ingredients. Just two years earlier, Kate had overhauled her diet, started eating clean and began feeling better than ever because of it. Frustrated by the lack of suitable snack foods on the market, she and Bryan took to creating their own and sharing them with friends, eventually landing wholesale accounts. Though Kate was initially dead set against continuing to self-manufacture, they struggled to find a fitting co-packer for their precise specs and small volume, so they continued handcrafting their products in rented commercial kitchen spaces.

Though Kate felt great about providing consumers with healthy snacks, she was never quite comfortable with Sun & Swell’s contribution to the single-use plastics problem. A few years into the business, she learned that compostable packaging technology was available but little used, so the brand took a leap and transitioned to the eco-friendlier solution.

They discovered that some of the challenges presented by compostable packaging made it hard to move product through traditional food distribution channels, but rather than abandon it altogether, they opted to limit sales to select channels of distribution, such as e-commerce and corporate offices. Even though this choice has complicated operations, Kate firmly believes that compostable packaging’s ecological advantages make it worth the hassle—and she acknowledges that self-manufacturing has enabled Sun & Swell, which now has its own facility, to go this route.

Self-manufacturing has also proved fortuitous as the coronavirus pandemic has played out. When half of Sun & Swell’s wholesale business froze in March, the company was able to pivot more easily. Along with ramping up their existing e-commerce business, they revamped their product portfolio to deliver all of their snacks in pantry-size bags. They also begin selling their ingredients in bulk as a new product line of ‘pantry staples’. Thrilled with the success of the bulk business and the fact that it allows them to carry out their mission in a bigger way, Sun & Swell is now adding ingredients beyond those used in their snacks, sourcing directly from family farms.

Although Kate wasn’t keen on continuing to self-manufacture in the beginning, she is grateful for the opportunities it affords Sun & Swell, especially in surviving the pandemic and setting themselves up to thrive in the future. Because as she and Tera discussed, nobody knows what the world will look like once the virus threat lessens or how this experience will change consumer shopping patterns long-term.

In Edible-Alpha® podcast #67, Tera chats with Rachael Young, founder and CEO of YAYAYA, an Austin, Texas-based beverage startup centered around the caffeinated plant yaupon. They discuss the ups and downs of bringing such a unique product to market and scaling a beverage business, including the challenges of raising capital.

An ethnobotanist and avid forager, Rachael discovered and fell in love with yaupon a few years ago. Native to a handful of southern states, the plant contains caffeine and is rich in the feel-good phytochemical theobromine. Native Americans used yaupon as a tea-like beverage, calling it “the drink of social wellness.” But once Europeans settled in the U.S., it all but vanished from consumer consciousness—expect among cattle ranchers and farmers in the South, who view the plant as a prolific, hard-to-eradicate nuisance.

After researching brewing methods and tinkering in her kitchen, Rachael developed a delicious beverage that provides a “gentle uplift” as opposed to the jolt delivered by energy drinks. Confident that others too would love yaupon once they learned about and tried it, she launched Texana Tea at Central Market in May 2018—still foraging, brewing and bottling by hand. Aiming to expand beyond Texas, Rachael rebranded the company as YAYAYA and relaunched in May 2019.

Scaling up has had its challenges. Rachael’s first experience with a copacker didn’t go smoothly, and she’s been told several times that the education curve for her product is too high and she’d need $100 million to really make work. Whole Foods Market picked up YAYAYA for its Southwest region, but the March 2020 launch into the chain landed right in the thick of the COVID-19 outbreak. Rachel was also slated to pitch at Natural Products Expo West, but the pandemic derailed that opportunity.

Despite these setbacks, YAYAYA has sold well at Whole Foods, Central Market, convenience stores and other accounts, and Rachael remains as passionate, driven and excited as ever about bringing yaupon to the masses. Given consumers’ shifting shopping patterns amidst the pandemic, she’s also working on building e-commerce.

Next, Tera and Rachael tackled the topic of raising capital and how it can be tricky to find investors whose vision aligns with a founder’s. Entrepreneurs in tech-heavy markets such as Austin also often find that the local investment community isn’t well versed in making money in food. And while there has been progress in investing in female founders, women still have a harder time raising than male entrepreneurs. Tera stressed the importance of financial literacy and knowing all available financing options as key to overcoming these barriers.

In Edible-Alpha® podcast #66, Tera sits down with Matthew Starr, founder of Rally Energy, a caffeinated mint and cough lozenge brand based in Madison, Wisconsin. Matthew has strategically grown his online business from zero to about $10,000 per month in just a few short years, making him the perfect guest to offer guidance right now, as the COVID-19 pandemic is pushing many food entrepreneurs to step up their ecommerce game.

To kick off the conversation, Matthew discussed why, after launching Rally Energy as a retail brand in 2014, he decided to push harder into direct-to-consumer in 2017, aiming to do 50% of the company’s sales online. As he explained, moving a portion of sales to this channel makes it easier to manage inventory and cash flow. That’s because online business can be dialed up or down in relation to retail to better accommodate a company’s needs.

From the jump, Matthew set quantitative goals for Rally Energy, something that many less-data-minded food entrepreneurs hesitate to do. But tangible targets are incredibly important because they help companies build a financial plan and make smart decisions to stay on track. And now that the pandemic has upended “business as usual” for so many food brands, having those quantitative goals to reference can help companies figure out their next moves.

Next, Matthew and Tera talked through how food businesses unfamiliar with ecommerce should go about it, both those just looking to launch a brand and those that had previously sold only at retail. The first order of business is to build a website, which allows entrepreneurs to have honest conversations with themselves about what the brand is, what they want it to be, how they’ll hit their goals and whether they truly have a brand or just a product at the moment. This exercise will likely reveal many question marks, which is perfectly OK, because it’ll help the entrepreneur know what they don’t know and should therefore explore.

Once the company has its legs under it a bit more, it’s time to think about driving attention to its website, along with its listing on Amazon and other online marketplaces. Matthew and Tera discussed effective strategies for doing this in 2020, many of which have changed from the top techniques of 10 or even five years ago. As part of this, companies must really hone their branding and messaging, ensuring that they resonate with the core customer base and align with the conversations that influential voices in the space are having. This is an ongoing process that necessitates engaging with both potential and current customers to find out directly how a brand, message and product are landing.

To wrap up, Matthew emphasized that to launch a brand online successfully and continue to grow sales, it takes time, dedication and solid strategy. This all may appear daunting at first, but it’s entirely achievable. Tune into the full podcast to get more in-depth guidance on how to win at ecommerce.

Watch our Getting Your Food Products Online course for more information on this topic.

In Edible-Alpha® podcast #65, Tera interviews Heidi Huntington, vice president of finance at AVL Growth Partners in Boulder, Colorado, which lends finance and operations expertise to rapidly growing small and midsize companies. Heidi works with food-industry clients on everything from cash-flow reporting and forecasting to revenue-growth planning to debt and equity strategy. Knowing finance isn’t most food entrepreneurs’ forte, Tera asked her onto the podcast to discuss financial strategies for building and scaling successful companies—both in normal times and amidst the upheaval caused by COVID-19.

Heidi started by explaining the various finance-related roles within businesses, including chief financial officer, controller, accountant and bookkeeper. Although many early-stage companies aren’t ready to or can’t afford to fill every position full-time—or they’re based in a small town or rural area where it can be tough to find talent—they can seek outside help, such as AVL Growth Partners, to support these needs.

Having a firm grip on finances is vital as businesses attempt to scale. Heidi helps companies fine-tune their baseline assumptions of revenue and growth trajectory by walking through their P&Ls and dissecting how, when and why cash flows in and out of the business. Oftentimes, companies have less cash on hand than they realize. Because even when products are selling, it can take months for that money to show up in their account, yet they must keep spending cash to manufacture products and fill orders.

Heidi said these exercises are an eye-opener for many entrepreneurs and that they inform which types of distribution opportunities a company can actually handle at its current stage. They also reveal how much money the business really needs to raise from outside investors when the time comes. Knowing this number is crucial, because either raising too much or raising too little capital can come back to bite a growing food brand.

Next, Tera and Heidi discussed some specific costs food companies have, which vary depending on distribution model. Brick-and-mortar, ecommerce via Amazon and ecommerce via a brand’s own website each have their own nuances and timelines for sales converting to cash. They also delved into the differences between debt and equity and discussed why debt, if acquired strategically, can actually be an asset, not a black mark, when courting outside capital. Finally, they talk about why businesses need an operating line of credit to help them weather downturns and unpredictable circumstances such as a global pandemic.

No matter their level of financial savvy, food entrepreneurs will take away key insights from this podcast to help them stay on a healthy track now and in the future.

In Edible-Alpha® podcast #64, Tera catches up with Bryce and Jen Riemer of Riemer Family Farm in Brodhead, Wisconsin, which Bryce’s grandfather started in 1927. The couple began taking over the midsize farm from Bryce’s father about 10 years ago, transitioning from grain-fed beef to grass-fed beef and other pastured proteins while implementing regenerative agriculture practices.

Even though Bryce grew up on the farm, he and Jen, who’ve been together since college, didn’t initially plan on joining the family business. The couple lived in suburban Chicago, where Bryce was a high school guidance counselor and Jen worked part-time will raising their daughters. But once they started selling his dad’s beef to friends, it lit a spark, and they began thinking seriously about how they could make farming work for their family. Finally, they decided to go for it and moved back to Bryce’s childhood home.

Although the couple had a deep respect for his father’s farming career, as early adopters of the Good Food Movement, Bryce and Jen wanted to change things up to better align with their values and conscious consumer preferences. But they knew they needed to do so gradually. So, over the next several years, they worked with the resources at hand, started building a client base, and learned as much as they could about regenerative agriculture. When it made sense, they instilled changes such as establishing pastures, transitioning the cowherd, and adding chickens, turkeys, lambs, and pigs.

Eventually, Bryce and Jen began farming full-time, with their three daughters pitching in and a dedicated, passionate team helping to keep it all running smoothly. His parents live across the street and provide instrumental support for their family and the business. Bryce and Jen are incredibly grateful for their generosity and marvel at how different their journey would be if they didn’t have a multigenerational family farm.

Nowadays, Riemer Family Farm’s grass-fed and pasture-raised proteins business is booming. They do a strong direct-to-consumer business, which is especially advantageous given the COVID-19 pandemic. In fact, building this model out to allow home delivery during COVID-19 has grown their business 200%+. And while Bryce and Jen still feel like students, both have become leaders in regenerative agriculture, often sharing their knowledge with other farmers and interested consumers. They encourage people to come visit their beautiful pastures, which provide habitat for butterflies and migrating birds, and see firsthand how this type of farming is so beneficial for animals, people, and the planet.

Bryce and Jen’s story provides inspiration for any entrepreneur who wants to start a food or farm business that personifies their core values while meeting a consumer need.

In Edible-Alpha® podcast #63, Tera and consultant Bartlett Durand discuss the difficult financial realities facing so many food entrepreneurs right now, as the entire nation grapples with the COVID-19 crisis. Bartlett knows practiced law at a bankruptcy firm and shares how companies can protect their interests when dealt a major blow—such as a hypothetical global pandemic grinding sales to a halt.

First thing’s first: All businesses should draw up a 13-week rolling cash flow forecast to see how much money will be coming in and from where, what bills need paying, expected sales for the next quarter, and so on. This will show how much cash is actually on hand, which will help companies gauge the health of their business currently, as well as their probability of pushing through the pandemic and its economic aftermath.

Whenever a cashflow forecast reveals scary numbers, entrepreneurs may feel powerless, doomed and desperate. But as Bartlett pointed out, in the current situation, when most every business is pinched, food companies actually have a lot of leverage with which to negotiate and advocate for themselves. They should first talk to their creditors, their landlords—even their landlord’s creditors—to try to work out solutions. These entities have good reason to cooperate because doing so protects their interests as well. Companies should also brainstorm new ways to generate revenue during this time and reach out to as many customers as possible to try to make sales.

Of course, after doing a 13-week rolling cash flow forecast, some businesses will realize they’re just not going to make it. In fact, closing up shop may have been a long time coming, but when entrepreneurs are so determined and emotionally invested, they don’t always see it. Now, however, with a global pandemic that’s beyond their control, business owners have a solid out. Bartlett insisted that if it makes the most sense, it is perfectly OK to exit now.

Next, he demystified and destigmatized bankruptcy for small businesses, explaining how it all works and insisting that it’s not a moral failing—it’s simply a legal mechanism to help companies sort out their debt. For those opting to go this route, Bartlett said the first steps are to “start hoarding cash” and hire an attorney. Having a retainer with a lawyer enables entrepreneurs to set aside money to ensure they get proper representation, and if unused can help pay off debts later. Having an attorney also gives the company more leverage with banks. Plus, an attorney can help explain how companies prioritize who should get paid when, from landlords to lenders to vendors.

These are just the highlights of Tera and Bartlett’s conversation, so be sure to devour the entire podcast. It’s packed with easily digestible information that can help all food and farm entrepreneurs navigate these challenging financial times.