Jason Wright - Scaling WILDE Into a $100M+ and 20,000+ Door Brand

all right

welcome to shelf help Today we're speaking with

Jason Wright founder and CEO of Wild

Brand that figured out how to turn chicken

breast into a thin crispy chip

um prior to prior to wild Jason started

Feed Granola I think in new in um New York City

back in early 2

scaled it up a bit as kind of probably his first

uh kind of foray into CPG to a certain extent

then she moved out to Boulder

started tinkering with some meat based snacks

that I think at the Colorado State

Meat Science and farm which

I want to dive into a bit

and then eventually

had kind of a Eureka moment that ultimately LED to

and I think since I think about about five years or so

grown to mid eight figure business across 20000+ doors

and the process of building out a really big facility

which we're going to touch on

yeah really great journey

really excited to dive into it um yeah Jason

maybe just first off just for maybe the listeners that

aren't as familiar with wild the love it just get

quick lay of the land just in terms of

how the origin story why behind the brand

core products in the lineup and then

we'll take it from there

yeah man Adam listen

first thank you for having me it's a pleasure to be here

yeah um

so where do we start wild so you touched

on a little bit of my my background with feed granola

launched that granola company 2,005 in New York City

was really the first time I'd been introduced to health

food when I lived there and

and I kind of just got fascinated with how

health food and clean eating made you feel good

so I launched granola I Learned a lot

didn't have a lot to show for it

um but it really is what LED me to wild

and just at a you know high level

wild was born at the bottom of a potato chip bag

I was eating a bag of potato chips

one night I love potatoes I love French fries

but I hated the way they made me feel afterwards

and it wasn't from like a physical

like or from a from a

you know it wasn't how you look it was more about

it literally

made me feel and all carbs made me feel like this

like I'm on

some type of drug like I just don't have a clear head

and so I wanted to replace the potato with chicken

breast and I kind of made that my mission

because I've always done well on a high

protein low carb diet I should really say a lifestyle

I've been doing this for

I don't know 30 years now and so that was

that was the birth of wild the idea I started tinkering

around with like ways of how I thought I could do it in my kitchen

and then I got introduced to

Colorado State University there in Fort Collins and uh

and JBS had built them a big meat science kind of lab

and I started

going up I made a connection there with the um

with the dean and some of the professors

and I started going up and paying to use the lab

some of the students would help and we just started um

working on how would we bring wild from an

idea to a reality and and we can go

deep as you want to go and there's a lot of twists

and turns and

but that's really at the high level

of how we got started

diving into the formulation and an R&D stuff a bit more

I think like original

the product actually wasn't

a chip at all it was like a jerky grain seed

protein bar ish that didn't quite hit the Mark

assuming I got that right like

how long did you give the bar before you

decided to scrap it and like how did you know it was time

yeah no listen I um I'm glad you brought it up

I don't always tell the story if I'm just telling it you know off the top of my head but yeah if we

back up

so after New York I moved to Austin Texas

and that was really the idea of wild was in Austin

and there um I was training for a Marathon

and I got to taking

a jerky on my run because as you ramp up in miles like

I needed something to eat and

I still had a love for granola and so on a

you know on a run one day I thought

Jerky's very hard to eat you know you got a package

I wanted something in a bar format

some people would say well that existed

Jay that that's called a stick

but I don't know I didn't want a

stick I wanted something in my head that looked like a

combination of jerky and kind bar yeah

that was a lot harder than than than I thought

fast forward we launched wild as a meat based

protein bar epic had had hit the market

it's funny because I worked out at a local um

now I think it's called Lifetime Fitness

but back then it was pure fitness

and it was right beside of Whole Foods

headquarters on Lamar and I was leaving

there one day and I'd started working on the bar

idea and I was leaving

there and they had a little juice bar

and they had a bar they had protein

bars in there and there was an animal on a package

and I kind of knew exactly what it was I was like holy

heck somebody's already far

you know they're already way down the road on what I'm thinking

and little did I know I was gonna

package over and see Austin Texas

and so my wife and I went right home and I said hey we uh

we gotta leave

like I got bad news like there's a bar that's in town

already ahead of us

and so we packed up and we went to Boulder but

we launched uh we launched um

the bar in 2,016 and there was like Mighty Bar

there was Crave Bar

uh huh there was there was other bars Tonka Bar

and to be honest the bar category

as a meat based protein

I owned it and it was very small

no none of the other brands were getting traction

including wild

and and we went the avenue of trying to bake it

and that really I mean tell

talking about not knowing

what you didn't know it did not

make for a great product taste wise texture wise and I

remember after the first board meeting

I knew I was in trouble and and I was thinking

how in the hell am I gonna pivot

outside of this and and to be quite honest

if we really want to go deep in the story

I was in a depressed state and I was crushing

potato chips and French fries and I had turned

I was no longer the J of high protein low carb

I was in a funk and I was eating comfort

and at the bottom of that potato chip bag I said I can't do this anymore

like there's gotta be a better way

and that's when I thought about could I replace

the potato with chicken breast

so the bar didn't last long I think you know revenue

wise we only got to borrow about 2 million in revenue

not a lot

forward a little bit you're at you're working at

Colorado State

working on R&D stuff like how long did it actually

take from

I guess get to a product you felt was ready to go to market and

like what did you start with and like

you know what did the kind of key

I don't know iterations look like along the way

yeah man listen it's a

it's a hell of a journey so buckle up

you know wild is two phases

so there's a I bring fresh chicken

breast in and you got bone broth and you got egg white

and you do what I call you know we we we uh

crafted in what I call a wild

potato because then on the other side I got a slice

I gotta crisp it I gotta season it I gotta bag it

so early on I kind of had an idea that we were gonna

find um you know a USDA facility

that could help us with bringing

taking fresh chicken breast bone broth egg white

tapioca flour turning into what I call the wild potato

then we were gonna partner with a pork rind facility

and we were gonna finish it there

okay and I I went down that path in 2,017

we raised some capital

you know which was a big

story because I had to tell the current a

investors hey we're gonna transition and pivot to this

other product because we don't believe the current

product that we went to market with is gonna

be the the winner so anyway we raise money

we we tell everybody we're gonna manufacture

in a pork rind facility we go down and test in a large

pork rind

facility that produces probably all of your pork rinds

you might find in Whole Foods

you know you might find in in sprouts and other places

a

premium pork grind and we tested and it was a disaster

we Learned very quick that how they do it

we were never gonna be able to do it that way

we made a big mess and

we had some upset

people that ran that manufacturing facility

we we basically shut down one of their uh cookers

and because we shut it down meaning

that our product just got stuck

inside and we couldn't get it out the one thing that we

came away with is one of the guys down there named

and I won't name it but they named a manufacturer

of cookers that we should go call ASAP

and so we did that and I had to go back to the

investors and say guys listen we we

we're not gonna be able to do what I

thought we were gonna be able to do

we're gonna have to do this ourselves and so

we luckily I had a group that was

bleeding me bleeding the idea right and so

we go to

the name of the manufacturer we sat down with them

out in California outside of Oakland and we uh

we go through what you know I wanted to accomplish

we also I go there with a prototype

working with a machine shop

and I tell this story and I'll tell it here

I'm fine sharing it so when I go back to Boulder

from the pork rind facility

I got a German shorthair pointer

and she and I always would go out to to Fritz Farm

we would go out to she would run out there and

um and anyway we were going out and it's about 30

maybe 20 minutes outside of Boulder

and long story short we stopped at a stoplight

there happened to be construction

going on beside me there was bulldozers

going up and down they were gonna expand the highway

and as I was watching that track I had an idea

so I go to a machine

shop I asked them to create something

I take it out to this this manufacturer

and I said I'm trying to do this

inside of one of your cookers and that LED me

to building

our first piece of equipment which today we have a Pat

so that's awesome that's very cool yeah

just built are in the process of

building or maybe got to finish up now building

plus square foot

facility you're going to be making a whole lot of

wild chips

a lot of CPG founders and operators and

investors or what not would probably tell

you know not vertically integrate this early

not you know invest a lot of your capital in the cap

ex that kind of stuff obviously you're

decided to go a different route obviously

it seems to be working

really well for you guys so for like what's um

I guess what were the key factors

that push you to build

versus go the co packer out at the current

stage of the business

well you know you bring up a lot of great points

I'm gonna take us back to after the the Port Ryan

facility so we're we're we do go into a co man

so we uh

we build our first piece of equipment and exactly

what you just brought up we were not ready to go do it ourselves

we did not have that on our radar we

we said hey we better go find somebody with some space

and we can put this you know and and

install it in their building

and we found that we found that in Martinsville Virginia

which happens to be iconic or known for a racetrack

and back in the old days it was known for I think furniture

and so long story short

this big jerky manufacturer there had space

we installed our equipment and that was our plan

that was our plan we were gonna get them to scale

you know phase two of wild

in phase one of wild

we were working with a manufacturer in Chicago

so we were gonna do you know wild

potato in Chicago we're gonna ship it to Virginia

and and cook it off and and uh

and and season it and bag it

it it was so much technology

and stuff that we were learning and and new ways

of doing something that we were showing everybody

and they were working

with Conagra they were working with Tyson

they were working with crave

who was owned by Hershey at the time

and our secrets were getting out very fast

okay and and and and we this was all new new

you know ways of doing this and

what we found ourselves

doing is we were actually doing it me and my business

partner Philippe

and and we were living in Virginia in a hotel

but two restaurants you want to go to that's it

and

and we were being charged a lot I mean with the toll

fees like it was a very you know we we were not

it was not survivable we were

we were going to go under if we'd stay there

so we had enough proof of concept in 2,019

that our investors said

if we're going to really do this guys we're going to have to go do it ourselves

okay and

and so in 2,019

we made the decision of let's go find a building

let's bring both to one place

we knew we ran the model we knew we'd

save a lot we could do it ourselves we could

control quality

and back in those days

we had so much to learn product was not great you know

early days I apologize anybody listening that that

that had

wild in the early days like you know it was just a huge

learning curve

but 2019 we start looking and 2,020 we find

well I'll back up I will I do I think this is

important piece of the story the reason we locked

looked

in the Midwest is because if you looked at like Ohio

Kentucky and even Indiana

you would start to see that if you're going to do one building and you need to get to like

East Coast West Coast Northeast that

you know you really kind of need to be centrally

located and if you think about it Kentucky's

super centrally located one of our board members

had done a study he he's the CFO of another

big brand and they had done a a large study

on where they should build

their manufacturing facility

and they landed in Ohio which is about an hour from me

State Line

and they were very close to picking Kentucky

and so we got some piggyback on that and so we started looking in Kentucky

fast forward we found the right situation here

we started building

in 2,020 we opened our facility in 21

we brought all the equipment in

and then we were off to the races now I'll tell you

yes your question was about

how do we make the decision to go and do it ourselves

we did not have a choice Adam

right we were either going to

bleed out or we had to

like we had to bite the bullet and go do it

and so that was what LED us to opening that facility

and that was a 55,000 square foot facility

and today we're opening that 130,000 square foot

what what did like the I guess the financing

yeah so the first one we had no credit

we had to go do it all ourselves I had to raise equity

yeah and the first one's a 50,000 square foot facility

and I'll tell you something that

that I didn't think about on this one but on that one

we so

the guys that built the building for us are are now

investors of ours and they built all of our buildings

and they were well um they worked close with the um

the governor and they worked close with the state

they built a lot of buildings for the Bourbon industry

but the beauty of doing it in 2020

was we were in covid and no one was coming around

inspectors were not coming around uh

thing suspects

inspectors uh so so what I'm saying is that we

we built the building we got everything up to code

you know we work with major

mechanical and electricians

but we didn't have any like ropes

we just built it quickly we were in it

and I think the building

inspector finally came over we were actually running

product when he gave us all of the necessary

documents the occupancy and stuff

and so fast forward to this time around

we had to go through the whole nine yards

submit drawings

you know and it's a much more sophisticated build out

but we had a huge

learning and we had some some roadblocks and some redos

and that just cost us time

but back to your question on the finances this time

around we had some credit

you know wilds north of 100 million

and so we were able to go out and get a lot of finances

you know equipment financing equipment lease

so we had to raise less

now you still have to raise

money to pay the payment right but but we had to raise

less or we had to take

less equity this time around to build out the facility

we were able to work with

Store Capital which is a great partner of ours

that does a lot of

what we call fit up they end up buying the real estate

from the guys that we knew that built it and then

with that they were able to roll in a lot of our

installation cost

so that was the difference between this

time around but if you just take in

and not talk high numbers but what we built

the first building for

and and and what we did is probably

text to 12 x to calls the big building wow

standpoint wild is definitely one of the more

say visually

distinct brands in the the better for you snack aisle

let's say like thinking back to those

early days when you're building out and getting

at the brand identity voice tone and everything

how the brand

presents itself and looks on the shelf what was

kind of top of top of mind for you

you know I'll tell you that

I'm glad you asked that this was what we went to market

with

okay and I did not know what I was doing

and and I'll tell you that we

you know we we we went to Whole Foods and

and we went to sprouts and we did a lot of demos

and we listened to the customer and um

and what I Learned quickly is people

really responded to protein chips not chicken chips

yeah especially with my accent

it probably sound like I was saying something else

and then people were really curious

about how you made it and they were also curious

about um

what part of the chicken you were using

and that was something I overlooked

in 2,019 we decided or 20 I guess we decided to uh

to come out with this bag

you know there's been some iterations

but we started talking about uh chicken

breast egg white bone broth and so really you know

a lot of people think about protein

and a lot of people when we're in a

protein craze they add powder to it

but Wild's foundation is we're built from chicken

breast

you know that's what we start with and really the

idea for wild as we uh

and in the marketing behind it is

we're just trying to take real food and turn it into a snack

that we can all crave and feel good about eating

um we're not trying to take Pop Tarts or Doritos

and just sprinkle protein in it um

that's not that's not what we're

what we're what we're after and so

yeah that's that's that's kind of the

like you know the key behind I think transparency is

just behind the package totally

generally fairly ambiguous and more challenging process

than I think people know or really think about what

what did that process

look like for you coming up with the name wild

you know I wanted a one syllable word

that was important

because we were doing something that was wild

like no pun intended but like uh

you hear people say like that's wild

you know what a wild ride what a wild time

and I thought like what a wild

idea like to do chip or chicken breast

yeah and and so I played around with

trying to figure out ways unique ways to spell wild

doing that through the internet

it LED me to Oscar Wilde

if you know who Oscar Wilde is so Oscar Wilde

um you know very very witty really didn't give

you know two cents about what anybody thought

was very clever in his uh in his ways of of uh

just how he looked at things

and I thought man I love it and and so the name

wild came from the spelling of his surname and uh

and I gotta tell you it took a while to uh

to get that trademark when I first showed up

and started talking to trademark attorneys

they were like you can't trademark a surname

and so we took our time and we had to show

proof of concept proof of use um in the market

that that was actually

attached to a product and not just a surname

we were not trying to trademark surname anybody

from a last name of wild can open a restaurant

you know we do get a little bit

there are other brands out there I've seen

that one is called Wild Tara where they completely

ripped off our name they're owned by General Mills

and they came out with a

Wild Tara and I have to spell it with a E and so

that's a whole separate conversation but

I just wanted to be able to own it

and I like Oscar Wilde and in some of our language

some of the ways we say things

there's a little bit of his wittiness in there

yeah he's a brand new for sure I love that

from a pricing standpoint

as early days when you when you went to market

what did your strategy and kind of process

down your go to market price and then

you know a few years later has

your kind of approach to pricing changed at all

yeah it's a great question

we launched in a 2.25 ounce so if you

remember back in those days

I think two and a half ounce was the pork rinds

um so you had epic and you had 45 0 5 and 2.5 ounce

and that allowed those guys to hit 5 99

so I couldn't do that I had to go 2.25 ounce

and we hit five 99 at Whole Foods um sprouts

and that was our strategy we wanted

we didn't think you could be over six bucks

and as people got into the brand and fast forward

we came out with a 4 ounce which sets at 7 99

we also came out with um

small bags and multi packs so a four pack at like 9 99

but in the early days we really relied

on that 2.25 and you can still find that 2.25 today at all

airports so that's our airport uh

strategy I think they sell that for like

nine 99 or 8 99 in airports

but um but our strategy early on matter of fact

that was the 2 2 5

so if you look it up like that says 2 2 I know it's

true backwards but it's two two five

and that was it now I changed this and went to a pillow bag

because when we left the manufacturer down in uh

Virginia we lost

that was not part of our equipment we didn't own that

okay they had a piece of equipment that we were using

but we went to a pillow bag and then that

that uh but that was our strategy early on

you mentioned Whole Foods and sprouts I think

you landed on the shelf there pretty early on

I think I've heard you say you know Whole Foods

kind of pioneered the protein based

protein based snack set

yeah walk me just a bit bit bit

getting on the shelf

like how that first meeting come together

yeah you know it goes back um

so there's a guy David Woods Dave Woods and he's

moved on from Whole Foods now he's over at Crossfit

he lives in Boulder actually he lives

outside he lives I think outside of Denver

but uh he was a friend of mine um I knew him

he was the uh he started out as the regional buyer

for Whole Foods Rocky Mountain Region

and he actually brought in the meat based

protein bar and and then he got promoted to snacks

and he moved to Austin and so he called

and he was like hey Jay we're gonna create this

he was big in the Crossfit he saw the trend before

anyone else saw it

he said we're gonna we're gonna create this

he's gonna call it alternative

snacks but it's really gonna be protein

he said and I'm gonna have pork rinds

and I'm gonna have I'm gonna put you in there

and I'm gonna put a four foot set within salty snacks

and and we were all for it and

and it was just luckily I knew him

he was the timing was right he saw it

he wanted to create this set and um and I cannot

tell you how many times we tried to convince

other buyers to do the same set and and

and it took a while for people to catch on but that set

was doing it did really well for him uh

we eventually got sprouts to sign up and do that set

you know kind of

move all those products near each other

um and then it took forever to get the grocery people

um to start doing that but like we would show them

slides on what the set we thought it should look like

and I never forget we would get laughed out of the room

and you know if you go to Kroger today

there's an actual

four or five foot set where it's Quest Wild

Protein Doritos now you know there's a

simply protein so there's five or six items

that are that are now part of this protein set

but this guy David Woods

kind of saw it you know before anybody yeah

been some of the keys to driving velocity

at Whole Foods and I guess let's just say the broader

natural channel and then any big differences

that you've seen in terms of the things that have the most impact

from a velocity

standpoint between the natural channel and

let's just say conventional you know bigger

you know the Kroger's of the world and you know

the Walmart's of the world let's say yeah man listen I

so demos

has been key for us I know that's old school marketing

thinking yeah and

yeah and I'm full I'm fully aware of that and uh

but but there was a education piece of wild if people

have to get around and I think in marketing

that we have done or we're doing and and internally

what we've come up with in the positioning

that would be brought to life here this summer

I think we finally have figured out how to do this

but before we you know

have that figured out the best way to do it was to

just put a product

in someone's hand and let them try it for themselves

listen we do we do well at Costco

and and and the reason is is because Costco

has trained their consumer to go in and try product

Whole Foods the same way sprouts you know very similar

so um that has been uh you know the big the big

driver of velocity has really been demos

now we're starting to cross over where we've got

a lot of influencers starting to talk about the brand

we've got um TikTok

we're starting to scale a bunch of creators on TikTok

and really they're driving disbelief

they're driving disbelief to their audience that

you won't believe a product made of chicken

breast is gonna eat like a Cheez it

or you won't believe a product made of chicken breast

can eat like a potato chip

and it's all about disbelief I mean listen

I know it sounds weird but man it tastes

wild and we gotta get that message across

and I always tell our our our our

and I know they get tired of me saying this but I'm like listen

guys let's peel something back

if I can't believe it's not butter

did not say I can't believe it's not butter

and they took the approach

of telling you it was an alternative spread to butter

crafted from

I don't know sunflower oil and whatever else

there's no chance it gets

but when you tell somebody

you can't believe in something

they automatically wanna try

to see if that statement's true

yep and I think for wild I've seen time and time again

where people will

be taken back because you say it's made of chicken

and I don't think they're you know

they've never had anything made of chicken

in a snack and so by default your brain just cannot

connect and yeah you just like wonder

but then they try it and they are blown

away and especially on this cracker

Adam I gotta get you samples the cracker is is unreal

I'll take all the samples I can get

the door count beyond natural channel

getting more conventional distributors

are obviously important piece of that what's been the

distributor what is the distributor journey

look like for a while that as the brand has grown and

yeah so in the early days you would

you know traditional U N F I K E

you know route the market

as we started to make a name for ourselves we were uh

starting to um

you know I think

maybe our first direct customer I think was uh

I think was target

we're now direct and you know Costco and Sam's

were direct at Kroger a lot of the accounts have now

went direct

we still work with UNFI and Khe in a big way

they feed sprouts they feed Whole Foods

actually on the West Coast

most of our business in Kroger

is serviced through distributors

where on the East Coast is direct just different

warehouses they have you know east versus west

but you know we have

we have our commercial team now is about fifty

of that I would say that 15 is our sales team

and we've started to build a really great team

the whole team's great but we've like you know you

continue to build out you know I

remember when it was just me and Felipe

and my wife and we were trying to she would go in and

and and be making boxes

that we were gonna ship to Amazon

and and flip and I'd be running the product and

and now to grow and have you know 180 people at the facility

close to 200 now and then

50 on the sales or the commercial team it's a man

look like and like what is the journey your process

to decision to ultimately bring a new skill to market

hey man you you you did your homework I like that uh

listen I uh

I Learned a valuable lesson on that porch

so we launched the pork chip in 2,021

when we made the commitment

what was it was it 20 was it March of 20

when covid really like took effect

and I think that's when they canceled Expo

yeah pretty much March yeah

I made the commitment to launch the pork chip

prior to that Whole Foods and

and then we were supposed to launch the summer

of twenty and then we had covid

and so we we kicked the can

down the highway but long story short

by the time we got to launch the chip was going to be

made of uh pork loin and when covid hit all the

nae pork loin

like you couldn't get it and so the other piece that we could use

this is going deep but wild our process

calls for a really lean

cut of meat so chicken breast check the box pork loin

check the box Turkey breast

check the box well the other piece

that you could use is the ham

and the ham on the pork is super lean

but when you say the word ham people think deli

so I couldn't say great point

you know I couldn't say you know crafted from a ham chip

right yeah I mean it was really

so we were in a bad situation

so we ended up at the last minute calling it premium

cuts of pork

and I think people just thought it was some type of pork

rinds so

the lesson I Learned there was

chicken when you think about it

chicken is one of the most consumed

proteins if not the most consumed in the world

99% digestibility

so it's one of the most healthy if not the healthiest

and no matter what religion you open up or what

belief system you open up

everybody seems to check the box on chicken

they're pretty good with chicken

so I made the decision that day we we disko

pork and I said you know chicken

is what I started that's the foundation of wild like

let's focus on forms let's focus on cracker and

and we can talk about other things that we're focused on but we made that decision

after we discoed the pork chips and we never intend

I never intend

for us going back now we're focused on formats

eating occasions

and one thing I liked about the cracker was

if you looked at the cracker aisle

I thought there was a huge opportunity in white space

and no one had really done a cracker right

and I felt we could and

and I and I believe that with all my heart

that we have launched a special special product um

and early readings on it are like

bigger than I could ever imagine

we've only been in market two weeks but I've got data

and and and post that um we're focused

on launching a tortilla chip at the end of the year

built from chicken breast wow

and then and then we could come back and launch

pita chip built from chicken breast

but when I think about all these products

like I would love to be the um

snack that you turn to we always say here don't settle

don't give up

and I think right now if you look at the cracker aisle

we don't want you to settle for empty snacking

so we're gonna bring something where

taste is not a trade off

but you feel good about it after you eat

and that's really what I want so if you look at that

if you looked at you know go back to that triangle

you know that that everybody

snacks on in the chip aisle go over to the deli

section and that pita chip that everybody snacks on

you know I got my eye on that

and if you go over to the the flat pretzel

category and that flat pretzel that everybody

snacks on I got my eye on that so

that's really we have all those capabilities

now with this new plant and with the what we learn

all the years of the cracker sorry the chip

we applied the knowledge to the cracker the cracker

we Learned something there that now allows me

to to concentrate on dough form

so you know you start with dough on cracker

you start with dough

on pretzel you start with dough on pita chip and listen

it you know if if I could go over with today

I mean maybe I would have started with uh

knowing what I know now I mean maybe maybe

the product looks more like a Pringle

so we just have opened up

another level of knowledge now that allows us to really

come strong with some some great snack um

that you know can compete with the legacy product

or

the keys to a

successful new product launch in just in terms of 1

hitting your budget and then 2 actually launching

on time

yeah so budget wise that's tough man

because I don't know how many times I've had to go back and say hey you know this line that we're building

I'm gonna need a little bit more we're right

not quite done so budget wise

I think some of this stuff so new technology

you don't know what you don't know is you're putting this together

you're installing it and

and you know I'll give you an example

uh with the cracker

we don't we won't know this until we get there

I didn't know it until he actually ran it in real time

but we have

some timing issues and what I mean by that is

you know the cracker coming out of the oven

trying to go into a slurry the way we flavor it um

which is olive oil and seasoning

by the way it was big deal for us to not do a

to do something with olive oil but

if you have any stoppage downstream

you know maybe they're not sheeting

right or something's going on what you learn

is you need an accumulation area kind of like a dam

you need to build up a big quantity

so when you let the dam open

you can just start a steady flow

feeding through the seasoner

and feeding through the baggers and all this can be

steady Eddie

and we did not think through that well and so that was something

that you know kind of bit us and

and we're working through right now but

what was the second part of that question

oh just in terms of that um

other than budget is like the keys

actually launching on time

because it seems like often times that doesn't happen

yeah and then and that didn't happen this time so basically

we were

we were going to be in market we had told everybody

we'd be in market right after Expo and uh

we were the last piece of equipment coming from Europe

was a little bit late and there was a we we

we thought this was gonna be the easiest piece of equipment to one

install and then two get up and running

and it turned out that that was the hardest piece

and we had some plc problems like out of our control

where I don't know if something got damaged in shipping

from Europe but

we had some plc problems and it was not

this is not like equipment that's off the shelf and so

manufacturer had to scramble get us up and going

that went through like four weeks of back and forth

finally we started running but we Learned that um

you know we we we have a

we have a dough that has chicken breast and

bone broth and then four cheeses

we had sticking issues

so long story short we end up launching

in may you know we're we're a month and a half late

we're working with all the retailers

trying to explain our problems

but you know I get it those guys are got hole in the shelf

so it it's that's been that's been a challenge

everybody's working

with us I would tell you once we get it on shelf trial

is being driven a lot by demo right now uh huh

there's a big campaign

coming in the summer with a lot of influencers

that'll hopefully

drive it you know but right now in the early days

the quickest we could do is demo

so you'll see demos at Costco

you'll see demos at Sam's you'll see demos at at uh

Whole Foods and sprouts yeah

raised 1.3 ish million seed

another like one and a half I think in Series a

two years later

and then you did a bigger round I think 20 million or so

Series a uh in 2024 just for some founders

that are on a similar journey

they're getting some traction they've raised

seem like they're on track

to raise some money probably have

the chance to raise a large rounds in the future

just from a the founder's

point of view in terms of kind of tips and tricks

you might give them in terms of how they should be thinking

about you know structuring structuring their pitch

at that more that you know the seed stage versus

raising at more that gross stage at Series a

where you just raise that 20 million bucks you've

obviously got some more historical numbers

that are part of the story like what do you feel like are kind of some of the key differences

between the two to be

successful at both stages if that makes sense

yeah for sure man I think in state in early stages

proof

of concept if you can have it in one or two stores

oh man it validates it so much right

I think that's so important

and I'll tell you one way to get there is we opened up a note

and um

because we didn't get the valuation we wanted

we opened up a note with a cap and we had early people

invest in it and then that converted into the big

round but what it did is allowed us to get some

proof of concept now listen that was on the bar

and I looked back and I don't know how we raised

money on the bar I think epic was hot at the time meat

sticks was hot people were coming with meat bars

there was a lot of talk about it

energy behind it and I think people just believe that you know this is gonna be a big

big idea big category it didn't happen

things like that happen you know and then

and then we went through um

you know some some down rounds

as we were getting to chip to market just because

investors pay for

sales and we were going through a lot of

a lot of you know early capex and early equipment

once you can get proof of concept right

people can see that that you know it it's it's

it's being pulled from the shelf

that's a that's a easier sale then if you really

really need to raise a large amount I think you need to really think about the Tam

the total addressable market

I think you need to really think through

we think about this all the time

one reason it's leading us to eat drive drive

the launch of innovation

that we're coming with is what is the Tam on the product

and you start to look at like

tortilla and you start to look at cracker

and something that is closer to the form

that people are already eating

but but I would I would really do some um modeling on

you know your velocities

and then and then what the potential Tam could be

a lot of these investors are interested

in how big it can be one day right I mean that's what we're

interested in we know the early days are gonna be

struggle

and we're gonna have bumps in the road and that's part of it

but how big can it really be

and I think when you try to tell that story

through proof or data that's gonna go a long way

totally that's really helpful really helpful

well yeah Jason it's been great I appreciate the time

what's the best place for people to follow

along with you and all the expertise

you've got and then where what's the best place you want to direct people to follow

along with the brand these days

yeah man so LinkedIn

I'm pretty active on LinkedIn I haven't been as active

lately

just because I'm buried in a manufacturing facility

but uh

you can always get in touch with me on LinkedIn and then

the the brand um

I would you know Instagram

follow us there most of our announcements

almost all of our announcements are always on Instagram

I think that's probably our

best outlet of information we are

refreshing the website

but you know a lot of people don't visit websites

anymore you know a lot of people

it's all about social TikTok

but for me you know LinkedIn the brand

has a LinkedIn as well and yeah we'll have

some more announcements coming

soon and we look to have a great summer and

you gotta try that cracker

and I'm gonna send you the cracker

cause you're gonna love it perfect I'll take it

it eats like the cracker we grew up on

that sounds perfect

awesome Jason I really appreciate the time I think

I think that's the pod

that I think ultimately LED to to the wild product

probably try to lean on co packer as long as possible

structure look like was that you know lenders

naming is such an important but

look like for kind of nailing

through that journey in terms of

what have you found has been kind of key to

look like that leads

what's in their pitch

in terms of the in the difference between raising

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