The Barcode Podcast

The Barcode Podcast is presented by Titanium CPG Insurance. Titanium protects forward-thinking consumer brands with a range of commercial insurance products and risk management services designed specifically for natural and organic food and beverage companies. Learn more at titaniumcpg.com

It is SO exciting when you create a product that never existed before, and people love it enough to start buying it. But with that excitement comes a host of challenges - how do you find and stay focused on your North Star values as your company grows? How do you balance scaling your business and leading the people who are doing the work that helps you scale?

We’re talking through those issues and more in my conversation with our guest today - Ben Frohlichstein. Ben and his co-founder Stacey Marcellus are the co-CEOs of Cappello’s where they create grain-free pizzas, pasta, and cookie dough for food lovers everywhere.

Show Notes: https://barcodestartup.com/ben-frohlichstein

Startups often believe they need to invest time and dollars in marketing, but when you press founders on what that means, you often receive blank stares and meandering non-answers. 

Our guest for this episode is Sierra Cook, marketing and brand consultant. Sierra led marketing and brand management teams at major CPG firms including Anheuser-Busch InBev, where she led the Bud Light Platinum brand platform; Implus Fitness, where she managed the TriggerPoint, Harbinger, and Perfect Fitness brands; and Big Red, where she shepherded the relaunch of the Xyience Energy Drink brand following its acquisition from UFC. We discuss in front of a live audience how to think about specific marketing activities that will have a near-term payoff for your emerging brand and how to think about marketing as you scale your business. 

The Barcode Podcast is presented by Titanium CPG Insurance. Titanium protects forward-thinking consumer brands with a range of commercial insurance products and risk management services designed specifically for natural and organic food and beverage companies. Learn more at titaniumcpg.com

The Barcode Podcast is presented by Titanium CPG Insurance. Titanium protects forward-thinking consumer brands with a range of commercial insurance products and risk management services designed specifically for natural and organic food and beverage companies. Learn more at titaniumcpg.com

A few years ago, Katie Forrest and Taylor Collins were faced with the enviable, but still vexing problem of having created a new product that was flying off store shelves. They were growing quickly and needed help in managing that growth. 

They turned to their friend and our guest today on The Barcode Podcast, Robby Sansom. Robby is one of those behind-the-scenes, unsung heroes of CPG that just gets stuff done. We’ll talk with Robby about what he did to help grow EPIC from a handful of people working with the founders to their eventual acquisition by General Mills. We’ll also talk about his new venture, Force of Nature Meats and how they are hoping to revolutionize food production through sustainable agriculture.

For links and a complete transcript, visit barcodestartup.com/podcast

As a consumer product goods company, one of the most important relationships you can have is with your co-packer or contract packer. This firm produces finished or semi-finished goods to your specifications. Because this is something that can make or break your business, we wanted to revisit this live Barcode meeting from a couple of months ago where we go into the ins and outs of using a co-packer in detail.

To accompany this episode, we have a cheat sheet of questions you can use to make sure you’re thinking through the details of this co-packer relationship. To download the worksheet, visit https://barcodestartup.com/003-how-to-find-and-work-with-co-packers/

Welcome to The Barcode Podcast, where our sole purpose is to educate and equip emerging consumer brands so they have the knowledge and tools they need to thrive in the marketplace. Today, we’re revisiting one of our Barcode events from a few months back.

Our guest in this episode is Tucker Max. Tucker is an author and the co-founder of Scribe Media - a company that helps people write and publish their books. Prior to founding Scribe, Tucker had a couple of memoirs on the New York Times bestseller list and knows a thing or two about our topic today - getting the word out about your brand.

So often, I advise early-stage consumer product companies who believe that if they can just get the right publicity, the right article in the newspaper, or become one of Oprah’s favorite things - all of their issues with their business will be solved. But as Tucker shared with our live audience, and as you’re about to hear, it’s just not the case. People care about how your product will solve their problems.  

And a quick note, this is a recording of a live event...and the guest is Tucker Max...so there is some colorful adult language throughout the conversation. Just giving you a heads up in case you need to grab some headphones before you listen.

Complete transcript available at https://barcodestartup.com/002-tucker-max-getting-the-right-attention-for-your-brand/

There are lots of reasons why people go out on a limb and create a startup. Conversely, there are relatively few possible outcomes of a startup. You’re either going to fold, hold, or get sold. In most cases that I see, founders imagine eventually selling their company to a strategic acquirer or a private equity firm.

A fundamental principle here at Barcode–and one that I think translates well to other areas of our lives–is “begin with the end in mind.” A few months back, we did a live Barcode workshop addressing this important issue: how do you architect a successful exit years before the exit MIGHT happen?

For a complete transcript, visit https://barcodestartup.com/001-architecting-a-successful-exit/

Welcome to The Barcode Podcast! Our sole purpose is to educate and equip emerging consumer brands so they have the knowledge and tools they need to thrive in the marketplace. We’re here to give early stage and growth stage consumer brands the unfair advantage that the right information can provide. Especially when you’re out there hustling to get your product into the hands of the right consumer. 

For more than three years, our free monthly startup workshops in Austin have allowed us to build a tight-knit community of consumer packaged goods founders and entrepreneurs with best-in-class insights, access, and guidance. But we’ve been wanting to give more founders this information and expand our Austin CPG community.

With this podcast, we’re doing just that - taking our educational programming and sense of community to the podcast airwaves. You don’t have to be in Austin at our monthly meetings to get the critical information you need to help grow your business and brand. If you want to be more engaged with our community, go to barcodestartup.com for more info.