Gross To Net

Gardar Stefansson is an Icelandic food entrepreneur who has spent his career turning unlikely starting points into real businesses. His first company used geothermal hot springs in Iceland's Westfjords to make sea salt — an idea born from his master's thesis at Aarhus University in Denmark. After exiting the salt business, he and two co-founders launched what became Good Good, now the fastest-growing jam brand in America. The company started as a stevia sweetener brand that wasn't selling, pivoted into no-added-sugar jams after cooking batches in Gardar's kitchen with his aunt (who has Type 2 diabetes), and grew into a brand carried in over 15,000 US retail locations across Walmart, Costco, Whole Foods, HEB, Kroger, and more — all with a team of about 15 people.

In this conversation, George and Gardar talk about what it means to build a global CPG brand from an island of 380,000 people, why Good Good entered the US market "backwards" through conventional retail before natural, the real social cost of being a founder who is also the face of the brand, and how a bet with his marketing team led to Gardar running the full Austin Marathon dressed as a jar of strawberry jam. They also get into company culture across time zones, the role of AI in small CPG operations, and why karaoke might be the most underrated team-building tool in business.

Find Gardar and Good Good, on Amazon, Thrive Market, and in stores nationwide. Follow Gardar on LinkedIn  and Good Good on Instagram at @goodgoodbrand. And stay tuned for the Yellowbird x Good Good "Wing Jam" collab — details coming soon.

Robby Sansom is the co-founder and CEO of Force of Nature, a regenerative meat company based here in Austin that's now in Whole Foods nationally and 1,475 Publix stores. Before that, he was one of the first hires at EPIC Provisions, where he helped build the company from a scrappy Austin startup into a category-defining brand that General Mills acquired in 2016. Robby and I were on a panel together recently and I immediately knew I needed him on the podcast because the format was too constrained for the depth of what he has to say about our food system. We get into the real math behind regenerative agriculture — like the fact that it takes 500 years to create an inch of topsoil and the U.S. loses 2 billion tons of it every year — why most certification labels are misleading consumers, and why Force of Nature's beef at 75 cents an ounce is actually cheaper than a bag of Ruffles. The moment that stuck with me most: when I asked Robby whether regenerative agriculture can scale, he said he rejects the premise of the question entirely. The current system isn't the baseline. It's the one that's failing.

Follow Robby on LinkedIn and Force Of Nature on Instagram at @forceofnaturemeats. Check out Force of Nature at forceofnature.com and sign up for their newsletter — even if you never buy anything, the education alone is worth it. And if you're digging Gross to Net, subscribe, leave a review, and tell someone who needs to hear conversations like this one.

This week I was joined by the hilarious, energetic, extremely talented Ryan W Garcia. Ryan is an actor, a coach, a podcaster, and kind of a big deal as an influencer and official Try Guy.

Ryan's exuberance is infectious and he is constantly knocking on a lot of doors. We talked about the business of show business, his mindset and staying power, and his neverending quest for energy and connection.

I hope this episode is as joyful for you as it was for me! 

Follow all of Ryan's exploits on Instagram @muchosgarcias and go check out his amazingly entertaining podcast Big Theatre Kid Energy RIGHT NOW!

Today I talked with Claire Bays whose positivity and motivation rubbed off on me and it will rub off on you too.

Claire is a fitness coach, influencer, podcast host, and MC, just to name a few of the things on her plate. But it wasn't always this way. Claire spent the last decade overcoming challenge after challenge, including celebrating close to 5 years sober.

Claire tries to keep things simple for herself and her coaching practice is all about showing others how possible it is to live a full, vibrant life—simply.

You can follow her journey and her coaching (and her WWE pro wrestler fiance!!) on Instagram @clairebays.

I talk with Chris about pivoting from a culinary career into making hummus for farmer's markets, to borrowing money from his dad to build a hummus factory, to shutting down his hummus factory to move in with his copacker.

Ithaca Hummus has lit the world of hummus on fire and Chris hasn't taken any VC money to do it. I love talking to interesting people who have unique stories and world views and Chris Kirby absolutely does not disappoint.

BY THE WAY, Chris just launched Guillermo's Salsa as Founder and CEO alongside Guillermo from Jimmy Kimmel Live! Me and Guillermo share a birthday AND a love of spicy food and the salsa is quite nice.

Tune in, like, subscribe, all that fun stuff. And make sure you follow Chris Kirby on LinkedIn as well to see what else he gets up to.

Greg Esslinger used to be a Supplier Manager at UNFI. In fact, he was MY Supplier Manager at UNFI when Yellowbird was a fledgling brand. We were both learning the industry at the same time from completely different angles. 

Greg opted out of big distribution years ago to prioritize time with his family and meaningful work over climbing a corporate ladder that ultimately wasn't filling his cup more than draining it.

Tune in for a candid talk about what your distributor partners are optimizing for and some of the things you should look out for.

Follow Greg on LinkedIn for regular deduction tips.

David is the founder of Seed Ranch Flavor Co. and Grown As* Foods. Previously in the renewable energy sector, he never seems to stop moving. 

That penchant for moving takes him all over the world. And he's using his business spend to travel there, in style, for almost free.

Check out David's story here and then head over to the Gross To Net Substack to see the points travel plan that David built JUST FOR ME. If you're a business owner looking to make the most of your travel rewards, hit him up at [email protected].

Tim Otto started his first business when he was 12, incorporated at 16, and sold it at 25. He had attained material wealth in his mid-20's but was burnt out.

When Tim met Alex (now his wife) he was finishing his MBA while she was in her first year of dental residency. Alex Otto had the seed of an idea that ultimately turned into Alcan Dental Cooperative: their answer to PE consolidation of dental practices.

Private equity has eaten dentistry. 34% of practices are now owned by DSO's, up from 2% in the 1990's. Alcan is an ownership model that keeps actual dentists in the ownership seat while providing the services and financial support of traditional PE-owned DSO's. The dental industry is about 20 years behind the medical industry in the US as far as PE consolidation goes. If we're not happy with how the medical industry works today, we won't be happy with how the dental industry works in a few decades if we don't change the incentives. Tim and Alex are doing just that.

Tim and Alex also started Kids Tooth Team Outreach which is a mobile dental clinic providing free dental care to kids all across Central Texas. The dynamic duo realized that one of the major hurdles to care was geographic access to dental practices, not just financial access. To date, they've delivered almost $800k worth of free dental care to kids.

Join me for a great conversation that will have you rethinking what it means to make a positive impact.

Mason was a chemical engineer at UT who started an environmentally-friendly lawncare service and discovered his lifelong addiction to entrepreneurship. Among other amazing accomplishments, Mason founded Greenling as a very early grocery delivery service and hit #3 on the Inc 5000 list when he was running Cece's Veggie Co. 

Now Mason and his wife Jess run Small Potatoes which an anti-PE incubator for amazing early to mid stage CPG food brands. He also writes The Puzzle which is Mason's exploration of, as he says, building meaning from the ground up.

Follow Mason and also give us a 5-star rating on your podcast app! It helps a whole lot. Check out the Gross To Net Substack for more groundbreaking content.

Lauren Vogel is an Alabama-based yogi, marketer, and writer who, with her partner and co-founder, is building and running a community yoga app called Zentric. She's building small and following positive energy at every turn.

Tune in for a great conversation and follow Zentric on Instagram for flows and meditations.