On this episode, we're joined by Rachel Krupa, Founder of The Goods Mart, the better-for-you convenience store that's reimagining what a 7-Eleven can be. Rachel is also the founder of Krupa Consulting, the CPG and wellness PR agency she's run since 2010, working with brands like Thrive Market, Our Place, and Goop Kitchen.

We dig into how Rachel went from running her PR agency to opening a convenience store after founders kept telling her they had no strategy for the convenience channel and The Goods Mart's core bet: a tightly curated shelf of better-for-you brands, no GMOs, no artificial colors or flavors, and accessible pricing so the store never feels precious.

Rachel walks through what she actually looks for in a brand, the packaging iterations every product goes through before it scales, and why a small-format store surfaces feedback that velocity numbers alone can't.

We also get into the curation business that now drives much of The Goods Mart, placing emerging brands in hotel minibars and corporate pantries for clients like the Fifth Avenue Hotel, the Waldorf Astoria Beverly Hills, and OpenAI New York. Rachel shares her honest take on fundraising, her grocery consulting work, and the brands she can't stop watching.

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Episode Highlights:

🏪 From PR agency to convenience store
🥫 The better-for-you gap in convenience retail
🎨 Brand pillars and the case for curation
🛠️ Building the first store with no playbook
☕ Accessible pricing and $2 coffee
🚫 Why The Goods Mart charges no slotting fees
💸 Getting creative with revenue instead
📦 The packaging iterations every brand faces
📊 Small-format stores and real-time customer data
🏨 Curating hotel minibars and corporate pantries
🏬 Consulting on grocery concepts like Flow Grocer
👀 The flat drinks and gummies she's watching

---------------

Table of Contents:

00:00 – Intro
00:51 – Origin story: from PR to convenience store
02:55 – Brand pillars and the case for curation
04:49 – Building the first Silver Lake store
06:38 – Accessible pricing and everyday value
07:48 – Being first to carry emerging brands
08:37 – Why The Goods Mart charges no slotting fees
10:58 – The financial model without slotting fees
12:14 – The curation vertical and COVID pivot
13:50 – Small-format stores and real-time data
16:15 – What brands need buttoned up before pitching
18:56 – Why it's not a shoppy shop
20:19 – Everyday low price over promotions
22:08 – The new Williamsburg flagship
24:15 – Operating in LA vs New York
25:34 – Hotel minibars and corporate pantries
29:17 – Fundraising and consulting for grocers
31:08 – Brands and trends she's watching

---------------

Links:

The Goods Mart – https://www.thegoodsmart.com/
Krupa Consulting – https://www.krupaconsulting.com/
Follow Rachel on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/rachelkrupa/
Follow me on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/adam-martin-steinberg/

For help with CPG production design - packaging and label design, product renders, POS assets, retail media assets, quick-turn sales and marketing assets and all the other work that bogs down creative teams - check out KitPrint.

Shout out to my friends over at Glimpse, the go-to partner for automating retail-related back-office operations and unlocking margin trapped in invalid fees and manual processes.

Are you in the market for a new flexible packaging partner? Check out HD Packaging. Third-generation, family-owned and built for the needs of category leaders like Newman’s Own and A Dozen Cousins. Faster launches, lower costs, and no artwork fees. 

On this episode, we're joined by Ashley Cameron, Founder & CEO of Love&Cookies - the clean-label frozen gourmet cookie dough brand you bake straight from the freezer in  ess than 15 minutes. 

Ashley was a labor and delivery nurse with no CPG background before her cookies landed on H-E-B shelves. Baking with her son Charlie during his recovery turned into a clean-label product built on a simple insight: freeze the dough and you no longer need preservatives or shelf stabilizers. 

Ashley shares how a customer pushed her to enter H-E-B's Quest for Texas Best, which she won six months after opening her Lakeway store, catapulting her into 250+ H-E-B locations.

We get into hard pivots, co-packers' resistance to run her stand-up pouch which led Ashley build her own manufacturing facility and the tough call to eventually move to a co-packer.

Ashley walks through resizing each cookie by half an ounce to make pricing work, and closing three brick-and-mortar stores to put capital behind retail.

Ashley also breaks down the packaging decisions that set the brand apart, from color-coding every flavor (because most stockers were merchandising by color) to dropping her kids' names off the cookies to lift velocity.

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Episode Highlights:

🍪 Baking with her son after a Kawasaki diagnosis becomes a brand
❄️ Why freezing the dough replaces preservatives and shelf stabilizers
🏆 Winning H-E-B's Quest for Texas Best six months after opening
🏭 Building an in-house facility when no co-packer would take her
🔄 The hard pivot from own factory to co-manufacturer for margin
🎨 Color-coding every flavor so stockers and shoppers find it
💸 Resizing the cookie half an ounce to fix distribution pricing
🏷️ Dropping the kids'-names branding to lift velocity
🛒 Live demos and the BOGO that cleared the shelf in three days
🔪 Closing three brick-and-mortar stores to fund retail growth
🤝 The key hires that put the business on solid footing
💰 Scaling on under $500K, then a seed round toward profitability
👀 The clean-label white space she's watching next

---------------

Table of Contents:

00:00 – Intro
00:56 – Origin story and Charlie's diagnosis
02:26 – Designing a clean-label frozen cookie dough
03:46 – Opening the store and finding Quest for Texas Best
04:32 – Scaling the recipe and sourcing at volume
05:57 – Nailing the 13 to 15 minute bake
07:24 – Building an in-house manufacturing facility
10:03 – Outgrowing it and pivoting to a co-manufacturer
12:04 – Packaging design and color differentiation
15:53 – Removing barriers at the freezer door
16:29 – Pricing strategy and resizing the cookie
18:57 – Inside the Quest for Texas Best pitch
22:11 – Dropping the cookie names for velocity
24:24 – Driving trial with demos and BOGOs
26:09 – Closing the brick-and-mortar stores
28:22 – Key hires that steadied the business
30:45 – Financing growth and the seed round
33:47 – Why the whole store is your competition

---------------

Links:

Love&Cookies – https://cookiesilove.com/
Follow Ashley on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/ashley-cameron-534b00238/
Love&Cookies on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/company/getloveandcookies/
Follow me on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/adam-martin-steinberg/

For help with CPG production design - packaging and label design, product renders, POS assets, retail media assets, quick-turn sales and marketing assets and all the other work that bogs down creative teams - check out KitPrint.

Shout out to my friends over at Glimpse, the go-to partner for automating retail-related back-office operations and unlocking margin trapped in invalid fees and manual processes.

Are you in the market for a new flexible packaging partner? Check out HD Packaging. Third-generation, family-owned and built for the needs of category leaders like Newman’s Own and A Dozen Cousins. Faster launches, lower costs, and no artwork fees. 

On this episode, we're joined by Chrisi Hammer, Co-founder and CEO of Sunshine Buns, the frozen cinnamon roll brand built upon a family recipe her mom started perfecting in the late 1970s. 

Chrisi brings an interior design background to CPG, and it shows up in everything from the packaging to the trade show booths.

We get into how Sunshine Buns went from home deliveries out of Chrisi's kitchen to thousands of doors in under two years, and why owning a commercial kitchen and storefront first gave them hundreds of hours to perfect the product. Chrisi breaks down the packaging journey, how she rebuilt the entire pack into a box that fits the frozen breakfast set while keeping the hero image consistent after being told at ExpoWest they were a breakfast product not a bread.

We dig into the retail strategy putting them on track for roughly 4,500 doors by year end  how their broker at Critical Mass Group reverse-engineered a mass-market price so the product could actually move, and hiring fractional operators from bigger brands early.

---------------

Episode Highlights:

🌅 The family recipe born from a 1970s cinnamon roll
🚪 From 750 doors to 4,500 by year end
🏠 Home kitchen to commercial to co-packer
🧪 Why cinnamon roll dough is so finicky
🎨 Bringing an interior design eye to the brand
📦 The rebrand from bread bags to breakfast box
🛒 Owning one spot on the shelf before expanding
💰 Pricing for volume instead of chasing margin
🏬 Using the retail store as live R&D
🧊 Why frozen is hard and worth it
🎪 The Expo West booth that stopped traffic
👀 The brands reinventing the frozen aisle

---------------

Table of Contents:

00:00 – Intro
00:59 – Origin story: Mema's recipe
03:33 – The parking lot decision to start the business
04:48 – From 750 doors to 4,500 by year end
05:45 – Home kitchen to co-packer and the science of the dough
09:39 – Building the brand with an interior design eye
11:40 – Bags to boxes: the packaging rebrand
14:20 – Keeping the pack simple: no oven, ready fast
15:51 – Advice: own one spot on the shelf first
17:51 – Pricing strategy for the frozen set
19:36 – Reverse-engineering price with their broker
21:52 – The Orem storefront as R&D
24:56 – The corporate store playbook
26:22 – Convenience as the differentiator
28:31 – Why frozen is hard and worth it
30:09 – LinkedIn, influencers, and Hummingbirds
32:57 – The Expo West booth that stopped traffic
37:19 – Building the team and fractional hires

---------------

Links:

Sunshine Buns – https://www.sunshinebuns.com/
Follow Chrisi on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/chrisi-hammer-b7b954326/
Sunshine Buns on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/company/sunshine-buns/
Follow me on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/adam-martin-steinberg/

For help with CPG production design - packaging and label design, product renders, POS assets, retail media assets, quick-turn sales and marketing assets and all the other work that bogs down creative teams - check out KitPrint.

Shout out to my friends over at Glimpse, the go-to partner for automating retail-related back-office operations and unlocking margin trapped in invalid fees and manual processes.

Are you in the market for a new flexible packaging partner? Check out HD Packaging. Third-generation, family-owned and built for the needs of category leaders like Newman’s Own and A Dozen Cousins. Faster launches, lower costs, and no artwork fees. 

On this episode, we're joined by Steven Kessler, Chief Sales Officer at Beyond Brands, the natural products consulting collective that acts as an outsourced management team for emerging CPG brands. 

Steven co-founded Steaz, the organic green tea brand behind the first USDA Organic certified soda, and scaled it across the natural channel and into Costco and Target before a 2016 exit to Novamex.

We dig into the Steaz journey, from spotting that carbonated soft drinks were sliding and deciding to carbonate green tea, to landing early yes's from UNFI and Whole Foods because nobody had done it before. We walk through the pivot to cans after a Whole Foods buyer told him to get rid of the bubbles, and the freight and sustainability math that made the switch obvious.

Steven gets candid about the "top line, baby" years, when he and co-founder Eric Schnell chased quarterly numbers and handed out discounts to push purchase orders until their investors finally cut them off. We talk about the turn toward a path to profitability, why margin and EBITDA decided the exit, and what acquirers like Novamex actually look for: trajectory and profit, not just a great product.

On the Beyond Brands side, Steven breaks down the fractional sales model, the channel, geography, and money framework he uses to slow founders down, and how to think like a retailer who treats every inch of shelf as real estate. He also shares the brands and categories he's watching right now.

---------------

Episode Highlights:

🍵 Carbonating green tea to build a healthier soda
🏪 Why UNFI and Whole Foods said yes fast
🥫 Ditching glass bottles for cans (freight and sustainability)
📈 The "top line, baby" growth-at-all-costs trap
💸 When investors finally cut off the money
🧮 Turning toward margin, EBITDA, and profitability
🤝 Selling Steaz to Novamex in 2016
🎯 What acquirers really look for (trajectory and profit)
🧑‍🏫 Coming back to advise their own brand
🧭 The channel, geography, and money framework
🪑 Fractional sales vs hiring a $200K VP
🛒 Retail as a real estate game
👀 The brands and categories Steven is watching

---------------

Table of Contents:

00:00 – Intro
01:14 – What Beyond Brands does
03:38 – The Steaz origin story
05:17 – Creating a healthy green tea soda
08:19 – The pivot to cans with Whole Foods
10:27 – Top line obsession and when investors pulled back
14:24 – Turning toward a path to profitability
15:46 – Deciding to sell, and why Novamex
17:58 – Preparing for an exit and what acquirers look for
19:36 – Coming back to advise their own brand
22:55 – The Beyond Brands fractional model
24:59 – Channel, geography, and money
27:32 – Fractional sales vs hiring a broker
30:55 – Questions to ask a fractional partner
32:41 – Being a good distributor partner
34:23 – How retail buyers really decide
37:29 – Cracking an off-cycle category review
39:02 – Brands, trends, and where to follow

---------------

Links:

Beyond Brands – https://beyondbrands.org/
Follow Steven on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/steven-kessler-aa9b445/
Beyond Brands on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/company/beyondbrands/
Follow me on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/adam-martin-steinberg/

For help with CPG production design - packaging and label design, product renders, POS assets, retail media assets, quick-turn sales and marketing assets and all the other work that bogs down creative teams - check out https://www.kitprint.co/.

Shout out to my friends over at Glimpse, the go-to partner for automating retail-related back-office operations and unlocking margin trapped in invalid fees and manual processes.

Are you in the market for a new flexible packaging partner? Check out HD Packaging. Third-generation, family-owned and built for the needs of category leaders like Newman’s Own and A Dozen Cousins. Faster launches, lower costs, and no artwork fees. 

On this episode, we're joined by Chris Fenster, Founder and Executive Chairman of Propeller Industries - the embedded finance and accounting partner behind some of the most iconic emerging consumer brands of the last 18 years. 

Propeller has served more than 1,000 companies, including over a dozen unicorns, with a team of 250+ across three continents.

Chris breaks down why the 40% margin founders pitch often lands closer to 12 to 18% once promos, slotting, and trade deductions come out of revenue, and why margins counterintuitively fall before they rise as brands push from natural into grocery and club.

We get into the working capital death spiral, the gap between paying your co-packer and getting paid by the retailer, and the two failure modes Chris sees most: founders who size their raise off the P&L and forget the balance sheet, and brands that sprawl across too many SKUs and channels. He walks through the focus question every founder should ask, when to fund losses with equity versus layer on debt, and how to handle vendors when cash gets tight.

Chris also shares the Billion Dollar Beverage Blueprint behind Olipop, Poppi, and Liquid Death, the four stages of finance hires from zero to 100 million, why the independent board member is an underused secret weapon, and what changes after a 100 million dollar raise.

---------------

Episode Highlights:

🚲 From bike shops to founding Propeller in 2008
📉 The 40% gross margin myth (and the real number)
🔀 Why CPG margins fall before they rise
💸 The working capital death spiral, explained
🎯 Focus vs sprawl ($20M one SKU vs $30M many)
🏦 Funding losses: equity first, then debt
🧱 The "back against the wall" efficiency mindset
🥤 The Billion Dollar Beverage Blueprint (Olipop, Poppi, Liquid Death)
🪜 The four stages of finance hires (0 to $100M)
🤝 Why the independent board member is a secret weapon
⚠️ What really changes after a $100M raise
🛏️ The Casper cautionary tale and the risk ratchet

---------------

Table of Contents:

00:00 – Intro
01:19 – The accidental path to founding Propeller
06:43 – The 40% gross margin myth
09:36 – Why CPG margins fall before they rise
13:06 – The working capital death spiral
16:01 – Focus vs sprawl ($20M one SKU vs $30M many)
19:33 – What to do when cash gets tight
22:03 – Funding losses: debt vs equity
23:51 – The 'back against the wall' mindset
25:24 – The Billion Dollar Beverage Blueprint
32:10 – The four stages of finance hires
38:43 – Founder and CFO fit, and when it breaks
44:00 – Minimum financial literacy for founders
46:38 – The independent board member secret weapon
47:50 – What changes after a $100M raise
52:10 – The Casper cautionary tale
56:34 – Why Chris speaks up now, and where to find him

---------------

Links:

Propeller Industries – https://www.propellerindustries.com/
Follow Chris on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/chrisfenster/
Follow Propeller Industries on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/company/propeller-industries/
Follow me on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/adam-martin-steinberg/

For help with CPG production design - packaging and label design, product renders, POS assets, retail media assets, quick-turn sales and marketing assets and all the other work that bogs down creative teams - check out https://www.kitprint.co/.

Shout out to my friends over at Glimpse, the go-to partner for automating retail-related back-office operations and unlocking margin trapped in invalid fees and manual processes.

Are you in the market for a new flexible packaging partner? Check out HD Packaging. Third-generation, family-owned and built for the needs of category leaders like Newman’s Own and A Dozen Cousins. Faster launches, lower costs, and no artwork fees. 

On this episode, we're joined by Brad Woodgate, Founder and CEO of the No Sugar Company, Joyburst, and Wellnx Life Sciences - the serial entrepreneur behind six companies and billions in lifetime sales. 

Brad has spent 25 years building across supplements, snacks, and beverages, turning a thirty-thousand-dollar start into a self-funded portfolio.

We start with the full origin story, from launching Wellnx Life Sciences in 2000 and scaling it to roughly 150 million a year, to the 2008 collapse that brought nine-figure lawsuits, mass layoffs, and a near-death rebuild. Brad breaks down the patterns that carried across every brand since, starting with his belief that in business there is no such thing as no, only not now.

We get into his unusual club-first go-to-market, why he launches at Costco and Sam's instead of graduating into them, and how in-store demos became his most powerful marketing tool. Brad walks through the real mechanics of club margins, minimum order quantities, and the buyer and shopper differences between the two.

---------------

Episode Highlights:

🚀 Building six companies over 25 years
⚠️ Surviving the 2008 collapse and nine-figure lawsuits
🔁 Why "no" really means "not now" in retail
🤝 Skillful persistence vs persistently annoying
🛒 Starting at club instead of graduating into it
🆚 Costco vs Sam's, the buyer and the shopper
💰 Planning around club's lower margins
📊 Demos as his most powerful marketing tool
🧪 Cracking soluble creatine for Kreo Joy
🥤 Why protein soda gets won on taste
📈 Joyburst's self-funded growth curve
📺 The reality show that birthed Mighty Minis
🔮 Implementing AI across ops and forecasting

---------------

Table of Contents:

00:00 – Intro
01:11 – Building six companies: the origin story
04:18 – The 2008 collapse and nine-figure lawsuits
08:06 – Patterns for winning in retail
09:30 – Skillful persistence vs being annoying
11:35 – Storytelling that gets buyers to grow their category
12:53 – Why he starts in the club channel
15:12 – Costco vs Sam's: buyer and shopper
16:54 – Planning around club's lower margins
19:38 – Running demos at scale
21:13 – Cracking creatine in a soda (Kreo Joy)
24:55 – Where the protein soda category gets won
27:47 – Joyburst's self-funded growth curve
31:17 – Splitting time across six companies
33:25 – The reality show behind Mighty Minis
36:11 – Implementing AI across ops and forecasting

---------------

Links:

Joyburst – https://joyburst.com/
No Sugar Company – https://thenosugarcompany.com/
Follow Brad on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/brad-woodgate-b30b8113/
Follow me on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/adam-martin-steinberg/

For help with CPG production design - packaging and label design, product renders, POS assets, retail media assets, quick-turn sales and marketing assets and all the other work that bogs down creative teams - check out https://www.kitprint.co/.

Shout out to my friends over at Glimpse, the go-to partner for automating retail-related back-office operations and unlocking margin trapped in invalid fees and manual processes.

Are you in the market for a new flexible packaging partner? Check out HD Packaging. Third-generation, family-owned and built for the needs of category leaders like Newman’s Own and A Dozen Cousins. Faster launches, lower costs, and no artwork fees. 

On this episode, we're joined by Mason Domecq, Founder of DIVINI, the Scottsdale honey kombucha brand that's about to take over Sprouts in the Southwest. 

We get into the formulation that makes the product scalable: ferment the kombucha base to zero sugar, then add back honey, fruit juice, nootropics, and a probiotic strain.

We dig into why he chose cans over glass and went after people stuck on energy drinks and soda rather than the high-end Whole Foods shopper, the recent rebrand that helps the cans jump off a crowded shelf, and Mason's pricing strategy and philosophy.

We also cover the community-first playbook of music and art events, how a cold LinkedIn DM to category managers led to an imminent Sprouts launch in his Phoenix backyard, and what building in public actually did for the brand.

---------------

Episode Highlights:

🍯 Borrowing a SCOBY from a family friend's table
🧪 Fermenting to zero sugar then adding honey back
🏭 Cold-calling the first brewery to white label
🥫 Why cans beat the $6 holistic bottle
🎨 Rebranding so the product sells itself on shelf
💰 Pricing from landed cost to a $4.49 Sprouts MSRP
🎶 Building a community through music and art events
🛒 Cold-DMing category managers into a Sprouts launch
🚚 The local playbook to hit 160 to 200 doors
📈 Going from a pre-seed round to a seed raise
📱 Building the brand in public before a polished product
🔭 What's next: more flavors and grab-and-go formats

---------------

Table of Contents:

00:00 – Intro
00:51 – From investment banking to brewing kombucha
03:35 – The recipe that started DIVINI
04:36 – Quitting the day job and the first commercial run
06:01 – Formulating honey kombucha (and why honey is tricky)
07:36 – Finding the first brewery and white labeling in
10:59 – Why cans, and recategorizing functional health
12:29 – Packaging that sells itself on the shelf
14:51 – Knowing when it's time to rebrand
18:03 – Pricing and building the margin model
20:39 – Building community through music and art events
22:51 – The accessibility gap they had to fix
23:56 – Landing Sprouts through a LinkedIn DM
26:53 – The local distribution playbook
28:07 – Fundraising and scaling production
30:03 – Building the brand in public
32:49 – Product roadmap and what's next
34:27 – Where to find DIVINI

---------------

Links:

DIVINI – https://www.livedivini.com/
Follow Mason on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/mason-domecq-2a3b34192/
Follow me on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/adam-martin-steinberg/

For help with CPG production design - packaging and label design, product renders, POS assets, retail media assets, quick-turn sales and marketing assets and all the other work that bogs down creative teams - check out https://www.kitprint.co/.

Shout out to my friends over at Glimpse, the go-to partner for automating retail-related back-office operations and unlocking margin trapped in invalid fees and manual processes.

Are you in the market for a new flexible packaging partner? Check out HD Packaging. Third-generation, family-owned and built for the needs of category leaders like Newman’s Own and A Dozen Cousins. Faster launches, lower costs, and no artwork fees. 

On this episode, we're joined by Isabel Washington, Founder & CEO of Laurel's - the canned latte brand made, built for people who actually look forward to their RTD coffee. 

Isabel spotted the gap while working at McKinsey, noticing that roughly 90% of the RTD coffee aisle was non-dairy, ultimately leaving in early 2024 to build the dairy-forward latte she wanted to see on the shelf.

We get into formulation, why decaf was the wrong white space, why every can lands at 80mg of caffeine instead of the category's usual 200, and why she bet that taste, not convenience, was the real gap in RTD coffee.

We also dig into the realities of an A2 dairy supply chain, the white can and cow on the front that made people think it was canned milk, and why the most important job of a label is communicating one attribute clearly, not ten.

Isabel shares how Laurel's got into Erewhon, what buyers really want (incrementality and a real promo plan), how UNFI Up Next and KeHE Elevate help young brands, pricing strategy, and the investor catch-22 that comes with scaling.

---------------

Episode Highlights:

☕ Spotting the gap: 90% of RTD coffee is non-dairy
🥛 Why 100% A2 dairy, and what makes it gut-friendly
⚡ Building for 80mg caffeine, not 200
🏭 From kitchen espresso shots to a real co-packer
🐄 A2 supply chain risk and the Alec's Ice Cream drama
🎨 Why the can is white (people thought it was canned milk)
📦 Packaging advice: nail the one attribute that matters
🚀 Just launch, then iterate (40 demos in her first 40 days at Erewhon)
💰 The category price ceiling and making the unit economics work
🛒 How Laurel's got into Erewhon (they just applied online)
📊 What buyers want: incrementality, not another me-too SKU
🚚 UNFI Up Next and KeHE Elevate for emerging brands
👀 Brands Isabel is watching right now

---------------

Table of Contents:

00:00 – Intro
01:05 – Origin story: from McKinsey to the RTD coffee gap
05:21 – Early R&D and why decaf was the wrong bet
07:36 – Why 80mg caffeine, and taste vs convenience
09:11 – From kitchen espresso shots to a co-packer
10:30 – A2 dairy supply chain and the Alec's drama
14:07 – Why the can is white
17:00 – Packaging advice: the one attribute that matters
18:36 – Just launch, then iterate
22:33 – Pricing and the category price ceiling
25:55 – How Laurel's got into Erewhon
26:48 – What buyers want: incrementality and support
29:25 – Distributors: UNFI Up Next and KeHE Elevate
32:30 – Being a true partner to your distributor
36:52 – Velocity vs expanding distribution
40:53 – National vs regional, and the investor catch-22
42:24 – Brands Isabel is watching
45:42 – Where to find Isabel and Laurel's

---------------

Links:

Laurel's – https://drinklaurels.com/
Follow Isabel on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/isabeldwashington/
Laurel's on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/company/drinklaurels/
Follow me on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/adam-martin-steinberg/

For help with CPG production design - packaging and label design, product renders, POS assets, retail media assets, quick-turn sales and marketing assets and all the other work that bogs down creative teams - check out https://www.kitprint.co/.

Shout out to my friends over at Glimpse, the go-to partner for automating retail-related back-office operations and unlocking margin trapped in invalid fees and manual processes.

Are you in the market for a new flexible packaging partner? Check out HD Packaging. Third-generation, family-owned and built for the needs of category leaders like Newman’s Own and A Dozen Cousins. Faster launches, lower costs, and no artwork fees. 

On this episode, we're joined by Jason Wright, Founder and CEO of WILDE Protein Snacks - the brand that figured out how to turn chicken breast into a thin, crispy chip (and now crackers!) and has since grown into a $100M+ business across 20,000+ retail doors. 

Jason walks through the full journey - from a failed meat-based protein bar to the eureka moment at the bottom of a potato chip bag, through R&D at Colorado State's meat science lab, a disastrous test run at a pork rind facility, and the moment that inspired WILDE's now-patented production equipment.

We get into why WILDE had no choice but to vertically integrate and what it took to build a 55,000 sq ft facility in Kentucky during COVID - WILDE is now opening a 130,000 sq ft plant. 

Jason also breaks down pricing strategy, why demos remain the top velocity driver, and how TikTok creators are scaling a "disbelief" marketing message.

We also dig into WILDE's innovation pipeline - the hard lesson from discontinuing a pork chip, and why the brand is now focused on formats. Crackers just hit the shelf, a tortilla chip is coming later this year, and a pita chip is on the horizon.

---------------

Episode Highlights:

🥣 From granola founder in NYC to chicken chip inventor
🧪 R&D at Colorado State's JBS-built meat science lab
🏭 The pork rind facility disaster and what came next
🔧 A bulldozer-inspired idea that led to patented equipment
⚠️ IP leakage at a co-man (Conagra, Tyson, Hershey)
🏗️ Building a 55K sq ft facility during COVID - and now a 130K sq ft plant
🎨 Naming the brand after Oscar Wilde (and the trademark fight)
🛒 How Whole Foods pioneered the protein snack set
🚀 Demos as the #1 velocity driver (and scaling TikTok creators)
💡 The "I Can't Believe It's Not Butter" marketing philosophy
🧀 Launching the WILDE cracker (chicken breast + four cheeses)
🎯 Why WILDE is now focused on formats, not proteins
👀 Innovation roadmap: tortilla chips, pita chips, flat pretzels

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Table of Contents:

00:00 – Intro
01:00 – Origin story: Feed Granola and health food in NYC
03:17 – The failed meat-based protein bar
06:57 – R&D at Colorado State's meat science lab
08:03 – The pork rind facility disaster
09:30 – The bulldozer moment and patented equipment
11:00 – Why WILDE had to vertically integrate
12:01 – Co-man in Virginia and IP leakage risks
14:00 – Why Kentucky and how they financed the build
18:11 – Brand identity and "protein chips" framing
20:07 – Naming the brand after Oscar Wilde
22:17 – Pricing strategy and retail expansion
24:05 – Landing at Whole Foods and the protein snack set
26:27 – Driving velocity: demos, TikTok, and disbelief marketing
29:25 – Distribution: UNFI, KeHE, going direct
31:03 – Pork chip lessons and the pivot to formats
35:51 – New product launch challenges
39:12 – Fundraising tips: seed vs. growth stage

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Links:

WILDE Protein Snacks – https://www.wildebrands.com
Follow Jason on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/jason-wright-ceo/
WILDE on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/company/wilde-protein-snacks/
Follow me on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/adam-martin-steinberg/

For help with CPG production design - packaging and label design, product renders, POS assets, retail media assets, quick-turn sales and marketing assets and all the other work that bogs down creative teams - check out https://www.kitprint.co/.

Shout out to my friends over at Glimpse, the go-to partner for automating retail-related back-office operations and unlocking margin trapped in invalid fees and manual processes.

Are you in the market for a new flexible packaging partner? Check out HD Packaging. Third-generation, family-owned and built for the needs of category leaders like Newman’s Own and A Dozen Cousins. Faster launches, lower costs, and no artwork fees. 

On this episode, we're joined by Bar Bruhis, Founder and CEO of Boostcous, the gluten-free, high-protein couscous brand that packs 18 grams of protein and 11 grams of fiber into a five-minute meal. 

Before going all in on Boostcous, Bar spent a decade in SaaS and DTC, running day to day at KnoCommerce and helping start Sumo.com.

Bar walks through the two-year formulation grind: roughly a hundred failed kitchen batches, a promising overseas manufacturer that collapsed the moment tariffs hit, and the decision to rebuild the supply chain and vertically integrate production in the US.

We dig into how Bar funded the first run for under $50K, the signal that made him leave KnoCommerce to go all in, the five customer segments, and why he personally texts and calls one-star reviewers.

We also talk about cracking paid ads with a founder video he spent 70 hours making, going viral through Snaxshot and the New York Times, finagling his way into ExpoWest for free, and the aisle-placement that puts Boostcous next to rice and quinoa instead of pasta.

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Episode Highlights:

🥣 Why regular couscous is just a carb bomb
🧪 Two years and 100 failed kitchen batches
⚠️ How tariffs killed the overseas manufacturing plan
🏭 Vertically integrating production in the US
💸 Launching for well under $50K
🚀 The signal that made him leave KnoCommerce
👥 The five customers he never expected
📞 Why he texts and calls one-star reviewers
🛒 The first 500 orders sold from his garage
📈 Going viral via Snaxshot and the New York Times
🎬 The 70-hour founder ad that cracked paid
🛍️ Finagling his way into Expo West for free
🤖 Building the company AI-first

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Table of Contents:

00:00 – Intro
00:50 – Origin story
02:55 – The product: 18g protein, 11g fiber, three ingredients
03:25 – The two-year formulation journey
05:22 – Tariffs blow up the plan, rebuilding in the US
07:12 – Moroccan vs Israeli couscous
10:18 – Funding the first run (write it to zero)
12:28 – The signal to go all-in and leave KnoCommerce
14:17 – Who the core customer actually is
17:08 – Finding your real customer fast
19:05 – The first 500 orders from Bar's garage
20:04 – Brand identity and naming Boostcous
22:58 – Cracking paid and going viral
25:01 – The 70-hour founder ad
26:44 – Expo West strategy
28:48 – First retail doors and velocity learnings
33:05 – Building the company AI-first
35:42 – Product roadmap and flavors
37:14 – Where to follow along

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Links:

Boostcous – https://boostcous.com/
Follow Bar on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/barbruhis/
Boostcous on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/company/boostcous/
Follow Bar on X – https://x.com/Bbruhis
Follow me on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/adam-martin-steinberg/

For help with CPG production design - packaging and label design, product renders, POS assets, retail media assets, quick-turn sales and marketing assets and all the other work that bogs down creative teams - check out https://www.kitprint.co/.

Shout out to my friends over at Glimpse, the go-to partner for automating retail-related back-office operations and unlocking margin trapped in invalid fees and manual processes.

Are you in the market for a new flexible packaging partner? Check out HD Packaging. Third-generation, family-owned and built for the needs of category leaders like Newman’s Own and A Dozen Cousins. Faster launches, lower costs, and no artwork fees.