[00:00:10] Ray Latif: Hello, and thanks for tuning in to Taste Radio, the number one podcast for the food and beverage industry. I'm Ray Latif, the editor and producer of Taste Radio, and I'm with my co-hosts for this episode, Mike Schneider, Shauna Golden, and Brad Avery. In this episode, we're once again joined by LDR Ventures co-founder Maxine Kozler for the latest edition of The Maxi Minutes, in which she shares valuable lessons and insights from the perspective of an early stage investor. Just a reminder, if you like what you hear on Taste Radio, please share the podcast with friends and colleagues. And of course, we would love it if you could review us on the Apple Podcasts app or your listening platform of choice. Welcome, welcome, welcome Shauna Golden. Shauna is the editorial assistant for BevNET and Nosh, has been with us for a few months, and has been doing a bang up job at her job. Shauna, how are you?
[00:01:12] Maxine Kozler: Thank you, I'm good.
[00:01:13] Ray Latif: It's really interesting because, you know, for a first timer on Taste Radio, I'm sure you know a little bit what to expect because you've listened to literally every single episode of the podcast, but it's still probably a little weird, you know, kind of feeling your way through.
[00:01:28] Maxine Kozler: Little strange. Never been on a podcast before, but I'm excited to be here. Excited for what's going to happen.
[00:01:35] Ray Latif: What's going to happen? Who knows? Tell us a bit about, tell our audience a bit about yourself, your background, what you were doing before you came to BevNET.
[00:01:43] Maxine Kozler: Yeah, sure. So I have an undergraduate and graduate degree in print journalism. I finished at BU about two years ago with that, with my graduate degree. And I worked in hard news before this, I was working for a news station in Boston on the digital side. So I'm definitely new to the business journalism world. But I've been learning a lot. And I really like it. I'm glad to be in this industry versus hard news. I think I really like it here.
[00:02:12] Ray Latif: Yeah, yeah. You know, I think when we hire new people at BevNET, the big question is always, are they going to make it here? Are they a BevNET-er? And I think you've proven yourself as a BevNET-er, Shawna. I'm really happy you're with the team.
[00:02:27] Maxine Kozler: Thank you. That means a lot.
[00:02:29] Ray Latif: I knew that Shawna was a BevNET-er the moment that we were walking down the streets of New York City. And she's like, stop mic walking, stop mic walking, because I walk really fast. And she like had a name for it. She's like, I can keep up, but just stop. It's easy for you to just get in and start trolling us. I love it. What does Mike walking look like? I know our listeners obviously can't see this, but what does that entail?
[00:02:51] Maxine Kozler: I feel like just like really speed walking and then like turn it up five notches.
[00:02:57] Ray Latif: You have to walk with mad purpose. So like that's running, isn't it?
[00:03:01] Maxine Kozler: Essentially, especially when I have little legs trying to keep up. I'm only 5'2 over here.
[00:03:07] Ray Latif: But was a trail blazed for you? Were there any dogs in the way or any people? Like you could just walk wherever you wanted. My job was to make the path clear for you.
[00:03:16] Maxine Kozler: There was a nice clear path. I did appreciate that.
[00:03:18] Ray Latif: It was like rolling out the red carpet. Sure. Simpler. Is there such a thing as Brad walking? What would that look like? Brad? I go at a good strut. I like a strut. Struts. I love it. Brad Struts. The Brad Struts. You gotta be a swagger. Yeah. What about a mosey? Anyone mosey anymore? Isn't mosey something like that you would do like in old country western movies? Like they're moseying all along, you know? You mosey into the saloon and you sit down and you're Ask for a drink.
[00:03:54] Maxi Minutes: Yeah, I think it's kind of, it's both relaxed, but also like confident. It's a relaxed, confident walk. And sort of like, like you said, you just, you come in and you're like, all right, I'm here.
[00:04:04] Ray Latif: Oh, I like that. I like the way you put that, Brad. It's somewhere between sashaying and falling down. I don't know about that, but I like, I like the idea of Brad Moseys into a bar. Now, if you're going to shoot someone, that's when you strut into a bar. Okay, well, um, we may cu Yeah. Don't know if we're going to include that in the final cut, but who knows? We'll see. If anyone has any questions, comments, or concerns about what I just said, just email us at askatasteradio.com. Okay. Moving right along. You know, it's interesting. There's a, there's a very famous person on YouTube named Emma Chamberlain. I had no idea who this person was until I found out that she'd started a coffee company. This coffee company just pulled in $7 million in new funding and also attracted some high-profile industry veterans, including our very own, I say our very own, but the incredible Ken Sadowski, the beverage whisperer himself. Shauna, you covered that story for BevNET. Who is Emma Chamberlain and what's the deal with her coffee company?
[00:05:16] Maxine Kozler: So, Emma Chamberlain is a YouTuber, she now has, I believe over 11 million subscribers. She started on YouTube in 2017, making videos, sort of just her doing everyday things, making coffee, hanging out with her friends, going thrifting. I guess her authenticity is really what resonated with her audience. And so, because coffee was something she really cared about, she decided to found her own coffee company, Chamberlain Coffee in 2019. The goal of that was to cater to the Gen Z audience, sort of make specialty coffee more accessible. to the Gen Z generation. So their 7 million fundraise that they just recently got will go toward sort of getting a bigger presence in retail. It's one of the things they're focused on right now. I talked with the CEO and he hopes to be in 250-ish retail stores by the end of the year. And then they're also building out their D2C.
[00:06:14] Ray Latif: So last at Expo West, we saw Emma Chamberlain. And my acid test is always, you know, I send pictures to my kids and they're like, Dad, How did you meet Emma Chamberlain? I just was like, guys, I'm a Z-list celebrity. You're a Z-list celebrity. A Z-list celebrity, that's what I tell them. I was like, she has a coffee company, guys. Come on, we're in the industry. We got to see Emma Chamberlain, but Emma Chamberlain's coffee product is so much better than I expected it to be. I was thinking, okay, she's a YouTuber, she's new to the industry, and she's trying this whole new thing, you know, this idea of almost tea-steeping Coffee and Haus was like, okay, how good can it be? It's great. I wanted to hate it as a purist, a coffee purist, and I love her coffee. Yeah, I like the instant sticks. You know, there's not enough instant coffee sticks out there in my opinion. I feel like that's still a category or segment of the coffee space that's underrepresented and that's really great for me. I love taking those things on the go. It's definitely tough to tackle convenience and coffee the way that she's doing it. Like my hat is off. I think probably $7 million well invested and I would expect them to do great things with it. Now, the most important question, and maybe this is just for me, if I start watching her YouTube videos and start drinking her coffee, will people start looking at me as like this young chap who understands millennials and Gen Zers more than I had in the past? Should I not have used the word chap? I don't think so. I'm talking to myself now. Forget it. Whatever. I'm done.
[00:07:48] Maxine Kozler: You know what? I say go for the experiment. Let's find out.
[00:07:52] SPEAKER_??: Okay.
[00:07:53] Maxi Minutes: You know, you need to just start going around and just start dabbing. I think they all still do that. Wow. I think they do that. Definitely.
[00:08:00] Ray Latif: So you need to, first of all, mosey, dab, and then you can be a chap. So there are people who are listening who are not gonna know what dabbing is. Somehow I know what dabbing is. That's not true. Everyone knows it. I don't know. I don't know. If you don't know what dabbing is, email us and we'll explain what dabbing is. We'll send you a YouTube video. Should we? Come on. Ready? No, don't do it.
[00:08:24] Maxi Minutes: All right. This is where the listeners wish they could have video of Mike dabbing right now.
[00:08:32] Ray Latif: We have it, so we can just throw it on our reels. We'll put that on the Instagram, on the TikTok. Put it on the TikTok. Yeah. What's the new social app? Is there a new one? Yeah, there is a new one that all the kids are getting onto today. It's called Be Real. And it wants you to like, at a certain time of day, it commands you to do some piece of social media and you have two minutes to do it. And then it puts all of your friends stuff together. It's like a co-creation sort of thing. a social media app that commands you to do something. I don't think I'm gonna join that. It's called Be Real, and there's nothing real about it, essentially. It's like whatever you're doing at that time. So you could be making Shakshuka. You could be watching, I don't know, have you watched that show? I was watching Outlaws last night when it asked me to do something, and I don't have any friends on it, though, so there's really no payoff right now. If you ignore it, do you get punished? Oh yeah, I got 1,000 volts.
[00:09:32] Maxine Kozler: What does that mean?
[00:09:33] Ray Latif: It was basically like getting struck by lightning.
[00:09:36] Maxine Kozler: Oh, love that.
[00:09:37] Ray Latif: No, there's no punishment. You just don't get to have the experience with your friends, Brad, come on. They can be anywhere in the world, and it's demanding that at that moment, they tell you where they are, and I don't know, it's kind of creepy.
[00:09:51] Maxi Minutes: Yeah. I was just like, maybe there's some sort of like social ranking, like you have like points, and it's like, oh, you didn't do it today, so you're just like, you're going down, like you don't, then you just, you lose status, and then your friends won't talk to you.
[00:10:04] Ray Latif: You know what, Brad, there is, and I'm negative 436 right now, that's what I got from, Thought you just said you had a thousand volts. Anyway, I have a feeling that people are just going to go out in droves listening to this podcast. All of a sudden, the Be Real folks are going to be like, wow, we have like 10,000 new signups and where did it all come from? Was that Taste Radio podcast that all the kids listen to, you know? You're welcome. I suddenly make like three friends on Be Real. Let's hope you have at least three by the time this is published. I found out about it through Vanessa Pham, who's one of the awesome founders of AumSum, who recently got into Whole Foods, different story. Congratulations to them. I love that brand so much. But she had posted on her Instagram story that you could be friends with her, but I didn't have the heart to put her through that.
[00:10:55] Maxi Minutes: I am actually curious though, because it does feel like sort of... TikTok marketing has finally sort of reached its, you know, understanding, you know, brands kind of know what they're doing now with it. And now they're something else is coming along. And it's like, well, how's the marketing going to work for this one for, you know, if you're if you're a company, if you're listening to this, and you're thinking, how do I get on there? It seems like we just finally sort of, you know, master TikTok. And now it's like, ah, you're just back at the bottom of the mountain again.
[00:11:21] Ray Latif: But once the brands get on it, they tend to ruin the platforms. It's true. Some brands come on and you'll get the large brands who have all kinds of creative layers and lawyers and all that stuff to go through before and then everything becomes an ad and then people look for the next thing. you know, that happened with Twitter, it happened with, it's happening with Instagram. And like, I think I give Instagram a lot of credit for staying a bit more pure and not like the ads that Instagram has put out are not terrible. I mean, the way that they're doing ads, it's not as, as intrusive as it used to be on Twitter in the early days when, when brands started coming in and doing their thing. But I also noticed that not one of you said, Hey, Mike, let's try to be real. Let's be friends. Well, because you already described this thing as like some sort of dictator for your life on a, I mean, who would want to, I don't need that as an app. I already have that in my life. I won't go into further detail, but I mean, come on, I don't need that. I'm just saying what I think the oddness of it is, but I'm sure there's, I mean, people are doing it. So it must be fun on some level that I don't understand yet. So maybe we should try it. Okay. As I mentioned, if we start to see people signing up for or trying to be Mike's friend on Be Real, we'll know that this was a worthwhile conversation. If not, we'll never mention Be Real again on this podcast or probably ever. Shauna, have you seen it yet?
[00:12:45] Maxine Kozler: I've never heard of it, honestly. I'm not even on TikTok right now because I got too addicted and then I had to delete it off my phone.
[00:12:53] Ray Latif: I can understand that. Like you start death scrolling on TikTok, like two hours later, you're knee deep in whatever your favorite thing is. And then you're like, oh my God, where did, where did those two hours go? And I mean, for me, the most recent TikTok obsession is this woman called Tanara. She's Tanara Double Chocolate on TikTok. And she, trolls people who think they're creative cooks. And it is the funniest thing I've ever seen. But I mean, like, I, I spent a lot of time on that. TikTok is great. It teaches you things. The algorithm is phenomenal. So that's where brands really have an opportunity. If you know what the trends are, and you actually get involved in the trends and make great content, you can win on TikTok. But the minute you start to try to make it into something that it's not meant to be, that's when these platforms get ruined. And that's what I always worry about. Well, I think I spend too much time on Instagram. I am wary of even looking at the amount of time. You know how they have within the app, they have in the settings, you can find out how much time you spend on Instagram this like during the day or during the week. I am I don't even want to think about looking at that. But here I am back on Instagram looking at an account with the handle Drinkhouse, D-R-I-N-K-H-A-U-S. And I'm looking at it because, well, we're not going to be seeing any new posts from this account anytime soon. That's because House, which is a promising or was a promising brand of low ABV aperitifs, is closing its doors. There's a lot more to that story or to what I just said. Brad, you've penned a couple articles about the news. What happened to House? Again, a brand that a lot of people seem to like and thought highly of. And how is the brand navigating its next steps?
[00:14:47] Maxi Minutes: Yeah, it actually came as a shock to a lot of people earlier this month. This co-founder and CEO, Helena Price Hambrecht, posted on Twitter and social media about the closure, stating that they had failed to secure funding and had to shut down, had no other choices. They were just simply out of cash. And so they were going through a somewhat obscure, although not quite obscure. It's more of a less talked about bankruptcy process called an Assignment for Benefit of Creditors or an ABC, which rather than going through a federal process like Chapter 7 or Chapter 11, an ABC is more discreet. And it's essentially an expedited M&A process where a third party trust is going to sell the brand to the highest bidder in order to pay back creditors. Now, it sort of was a surprise because, as you said, Ray, House was a really promising brand, had a lot of buzz, and had just signed a big distribution contract to cover half the country in retail after being a D2C brand. It was also kind of a surprise because the low and no alcoholic beverage movement is gaining traction, and House was sort of seen at the forefront of that. I spoke with Helena after the news broke, and she was very open about and very transparent about what happened. So they were about to close a big round from a major alcohol company, and the problem is that they basically paid last payroll. They needed the cash now and had simply run dry, and they weren't able to expedite the financing process any faster. they were basically out of options. And that's where this ABC option came in as a way to sell the brand, pay the debts, and ideally give it a shot that a big alcohol company might want to acquire it and keep it going. Or it could just get bought and scrapped for parts. We don't know, but that's out of her hands at this point.
[00:16:48] Ray Latif: Well, as you mentioned in your story, Brad, the alcohol conglomerate that was going to invest in the round was Constellation Brands. That was for approximately $10 million. Their investment would have been $10 million. Yeah, that's a big chunk of change to not have. And certainly if you are on your last dollars and then don't have anything else to pay your employees, that's got to be a really, really tough decision to make. make it they did. And again, it's, you know, it's strange because with all the excitement that we're seeing around no and low ABV cocktails and aperitifs and products like houses, I don't know if it's a warning sign or if it's just sort of, you know, a blip in how this trend is evolving right now. It's an odd story because house caught fire, which is what you want. And in this case, well, house burned down. They had the things that they wanted happening and then they couldn't, they didn't have the funding to get to next level. And that's kind of scary, isn't it?
[00:17:52] Maxi Minutes: Right. And I don't know exactly, you know, where, where the funding went initially, but, you know, obviously they had just onboarded trucks to start distributing nationwide. And so I think there's a bit of, you know, growing too fast there as well as is always something to be concerned about. Reportedly, they had an eight figure revenue run rate online, but It seemed like, you know, a case of expansion that just, you know, you couldn't keep up. I think they were at about roughly 30 employees or so full time. And, you know, at the time I spoke to her, they were down to about five, including herself. And she was saying how she's going to, you know, be in the warehouse, packing up the final orders until they shut down entirely. But I think, like you said, Micah, you know, it's an uncontrolled blaze. And Ray, to your point about, you know, what it means for the category, when I spoke to Elena, I think her concern was more overall with the economy and what's going to happen to a lot of startups, irrespective of the category. It's sort of just possibly safe affairs as venture funding is getting a lot more cautious and harder to secure for a lot of brands. So that seems to be sort of the macro issue that is going to affect not just CPG, but I think all industries, depending on what happens with just inflation and whether or not we hit a recession. And the market opportunity, it's right in front of you.
[00:19:12] Ray Latif: This seems like the right time right now to take advantage of it. You've gotten this far and the question is always, what path do you take? And they went for it.
[00:19:24] Maxi Minutes: Yeah, but I don't know that it necessarily says much of anything about the low ABV trend. However, you know, I think there's still a lot of momentum there. And there's no reason, at least from what I've seen, to suspect that this might be a canary in the coal mine for the trend itself. It is, however, a concern for all startups.
[00:19:45] Ray Latif: Well, I would love to hear from Constellation Brands about why they pulled out of the deal. I don't know if we'll ever get that story, but if we did, I feel like we would have a better sense of how conglomerates are analyzing this trend of low and no ABV cocktails, ready to drink beverages, and what they think about the future of this category, of this budding segment. I guess we'll just have to stay tuned. I guess we'll just have to continue to read BevNET. on a regular basis. That's just a little nudge for listeners who are not yet insiders to become just that. Very easy to do so. Go to BevNET.com slash insider. You can become one for $49 a month or $375 a year and get access to everything that we publish, all our content on BevNET and Nosh. As I've said before on the podcast, I think it's a no-brainer. Go ahead and do it. Do it right now, Ray.
[00:20:44] Mike Schneider: Do it right now. There you go. Vibrant Ingredients is the natural ingredient partner powering food and beverage innovation, delivering flavor, function, and protection through a science-backed portfolio. Vibrant delivers purpose-driven solutions that help brands create extraordinary experiences. Discover what's possible with Vibrant today. Visit vibrantingredients.com.
[00:21:34] Ray Latif: You know, I don't think we've written about this product just yet, but it is Shauna Golden's favorite new soda, maybe just beverage in general. We'll just call it her favorite everything in life right now. And that's Coca-Cola's new Dreamworld product. This is their new variant, which according to a press release and according to a company spokesperson who was quoted in that press Coca-Cola Dreamworld, quote, taps into Gen Z's passion for the infinite potential of the mind by exploring what a dream tastes like. Now, this is another place where we knew Shauna was a Bevanetter because in our Slack channel, she slacks about this stuff and she's like, what the censored does imagination taste like? Now it wasn't as bad as Mike makes it out to be there wasn't it was awesome. It was a four letter word, but it didn't begin with F or S. So there's that.
[00:22:33] Maxine Kozler: Okay, so I first of all, I would like to say that I kept it PG in my comments. I just really want to know what imagination tastes like. I know that it's so it's the last release in their Coca Cola creation series for this year. Earlier this year, they released a bite cola that was quote-unquote pixel flavored. They also really launched a collab with Marshmello, the Gourmet nominated artist, but surprisingly that was like strawberry flavored so I just had a lot of questions.
[00:23:06] Maxi Minutes: Marshmello doesn't taste like marshmallow?
[00:23:08] Maxine Kozler: No. I know Brad brought this up as well because...
[00:23:12] Maxi Minutes: I was upset. I was like, but marshmallow cola sounds good. In the creation series, they did have also starlight, which they said tastes like space. And I will totally admit, I drank a lot of it because I really liked it. And I kind of think it had a hint of toasted marshmallow to it.
[00:23:32] Ray Latif: It tasted like outer space is what you're trying to say.
[00:23:35] Maxine Kozler: So outer space tastes like marshmallows? Is this where we're going?
[00:23:41] Maxi Minutes: I think the idea they had was more of like a campfire type of vibe. That was kind of what they were going. It's like looking under the stars. But I also just think the DJ Marshmallow or the artist Marshmallow should have been also marshmallow flavored. Is he teaching Marshmallow? I don't know. You know, see, like we were talking about generations earlier and like I'm I'm like a younger millennial, but I'm just it's such a remove like five years from Gen Z that everything they like is alien to me. It's like just that little difference, like that little divide makes such a huge difference.
[00:24:14] Ray Latif: I guess so, because, well, I don't know, maybe you like Starlight Coca-Cola. And since, you know, Shauna loves Dreamworld so much, maybe that's maybe that's what's happening here. They're trying to hit both ends of the spectrum. Shauna Golden't like Dreamworld, folks. I just want to put that out there to make that very clear. That's no offense to Coca-Cola. I like Maeve better than Starlight. Have you had it, Shauna?
[00:24:40] Maxine Kozler: No, I have not. So, jury's out on that one until I try it.
[00:24:45] Maxi Minutes: I was looking for it the other day. I don't know where I can get it locally. So I'm like, the moment I see it, I'm buying it, trying it.
[00:24:52] Maxine Kozler: I will say I saw it in Stop and Chop in Framingham, and I almost went for it, but I wasn't ready yet.
[00:24:58] Ray Latif: the Framingham, that's th new beverages that pay a you're ever traveling out the city, make your way Massachusetts. There you g Yeah, OK, so I looked up Marshmello, who spells his name without the W at the end. He's an electronic music producer and a DJ. And he wears, he wears, if anyone knows Deadmau5's helmet. Come on, you guys. Seriously, you don't know who Marshmello is?
[00:25:28] Maxine Kozler: That's why he's called Marshmello.
[00:25:30] Ray Latif: Oh, OK. All right. Well, I know who Marshmello is. You know, I just respect the older folks here on the podcast who may not know who these folks are, like Emma Chamberlain and Marshmello and all these. I don't know who these people are. I know who's the celebrity Mike Schneider is.
[00:25:49] Mike Schneider: He's the celebrity Mike Schneider.
[00:25:51] Ray Latif: Mike from Taste Radio is. Exactly. All right. I want to talk about some new products that have crossed my desk and are just outstanding. You know, I'm a huge fan of a new product called Chunk Nibbles, or at least it's new to me. It is a brand of snacks, and they are made with a whole bunch of traditional snacks that they basically just blend together. The one I'm holding in my hand is their original. It's Chunk Nibbles. Chunk Nibbles. Chunk Nibbles. This one is made with pretzels, salted nuts, and corn squares with a sweet coating. Each one of them almost looks like, or each nibble, almost looks like a Rice Krispie treat. You can see it. I'm going to show my colleagues here. and you just dive right i right there. So simple. S have a s'mores variety th it's made with pretzels m that salted nuts, corn s also with a graham crackers coating. Fantastic stuff. to see this because Ray h And they have a nice photo of the founder and his family on the back. They donate a percentage of every sale to Blue Star Service Dogs, which rescues dogs from high kill shelters and trains them to be service dogs for military combat veterans who suffer from PTSD or TBI. Very cool stuff. Chunk Nibbles. I would pick this up day and night. I hope to see this in CVS soon so I can buy more. Until then, I'll just have to ration what I have. Mike, what's in your hand? The new RTD, new in supply. Oh, look at that. New in coffee supply. Ray, this is cold brew. It's awesome. They finally made the jump to RTD. And I've been wondering about this. They made the jump. Did you try it? It's not open yet. Did you try that yet? I haven't opened it yet, Ray. I was waiting for the show. Okay. How is it? Greatly differentiated. It's so smooth, it's really tasty, and it's got a very robust aftertaste too, which is not like most cold brews. Finish nice and smooth. This one hits you a little bit at the end. I like it. It's been a while since I've tasted a cold brew that really sort of is differentiated from anything else that's out there. And I think that was the problem with cold brew when at first, well, I guess when everything started to become cold brew is that it's like, well, what's really different about your brand of product? So interesting timing to launch a new one. And I'm excited to try that when I get into the office. Hey Mike, I have one of your favorite types of new products. That is an unlabeled secret vial type product. Secret vial! Secret vial. But I know what's in here. It's the new Frizzante, which is a canned sparkling variety from Philia. Philia is a female-founded non-alcoholic aperitivo brand. and they talk about how it was made with the sober community at the forefront. Philia is spelled F-I-G-L-I-A. So this is very much intended to be a non-alcoholic Campari type product. And so their Frizzante is their ready-to-drink variety that I'm going to try right now. Wow, that's really good. It's definitely not like a Campari and soda. This has a much more cinnamon flavor on the palate, but I can definitely see this as being sort of a non-alcoholic alternative. I'm drinking on a Wednesday, for example. Now, this has not, as far as I know, made it to market yet, but it will be on the market soon. But if you want to learn more, you can always go to drinkphilia.com.
[00:29:35] Maxi Minutes: So this week I tried, from Altitude Beverage, they had a new line of non-alcoholic cocktails, and gave a try to a couple of those. I believe the line included a Blue Hawaiian, a Mountain Mule, and a Paloma. I tried those first two, and I gotta say, I was surprised by how, you know, I expected to just kind of try a little bit of it, and I was, you know, drinking that Blue Hawaiian, and I was like, damn, I'm gonna keep going with this. I believe it has 20 milligrams of CBD per can, 12-ounce slim cans, if I'm remembering correctly. I don't have it in front of me, but a good use of ingredients, I thought. You could create something that's... No, it's not the alcoholic version of these drinks that you know, but it certainly takes on its own kind of sweet, but it's more sophisticated flavor. So I thought it was a pretty strong delivery of a non-alcoholic mocktail.
[00:30:27] Ray Latif: Another interesting entry into the whole idea of replacing alcohol with CBD as the functional ingredient, if you will. Does CBD take the edge off for you, Brad, or does it do anything for you?
[00:30:42] Maxi Minutes: I don't know. Honestly, sometimes sometimes I can't tell if it's actually happening or if it's like placebo effect and it's just my my personal reaction with it. You know, I know plenty of people who swear by it that it really does help them. And just, you know, personally, when I've had it, I don't know if I've ever noticed a like immediate effect, maybe it does work. I mean, sometimes it can kind of relax, but I think there's even a benefit to just sort of having a feeling of like, this is going to relax me and you drink it and you feel a bit more relaxed regardless. So whether it had a physical effect or not, it's, you know, doing the job. Well, you know, firsthand about my sensitivity to cannabis.
[00:31:19] Ray Latif: So you You were there that fateful night at the Rose Cafe. And I mean, I find like 25 milligrams of CBD takes the edge off for me, but I'm, as you know, sensitive in more ways than one. He's a kind soul. Yes. Right. One more to mention before we get off to our interview. Just want to say thanks to Willa's for including us as testers of your latest barista oat milk. They've sent us some secret vial stuff, formulations A, B, and C that we've been testing out and whichever one they choose is going to be a tasty entry to the market. Excited to try that when I get into the office as well. Have Super Barista Amanda Huang make you a latte with that one, Ray. Ah, that sounds like a damn good idea. Dammit, I cursed again. Now twice. Gotta stop doing that. Love it! Keep going! Fuckin' A, Ray!
[00:32:16] SPEAKER_??: Woo!
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[00:33:08] Ray Latif: All right, it's time to get to our interview with Maxine Kozler for the latest edition of The Maxi Minutes. In this edition, we talk about what to include in your quarterly reports, how to most effectively work with outside agencies, and how to get existing investors to buy into your next round. All right, I'm back with Maxine Kozler for the sixth edition of The Maxi Minutes. Maxi, so great to see you once again.
[00:33:38] Brad Avery: Great to see you, Ray. I'm so glad we got to part six already.
[00:33:41] Ray Latif: I know. It seems like this year has been flying by, but, you know, in a pretty good way. I mean, if things are flying by, it means you're busy and you're getting a lot of stuff done. At least I assume that's true.
[00:33:51] Brad Avery: There is a lot happening, that's for sure.
[00:33:54] Ray Latif: Yeah. You know, we have a lot to cover in this episode, and I think there's a lot of questions that are going to be covered in these topics that are always brought up in conversations I have with entrepreneurs. And the first one is really about quarterly reports. Obviously, you want to keep your investors up to date and abreast of everything you're doing. And one of the best ways to do that is regular reports. In a quarterly report, however, there's a question of what do I need to include? What details do investors want to hear about my business and how we're progressing? Can you share your advice?
[00:34:30] Brad Avery: Absolutely, I would love to. You know, as the years go on and we have more and more investments, just really looking at as an investor, you know, what do I need to hear? How often do I need to hear it? You know, sometimes you're really deep diving with a company and sometimes you just need to get that update to make sure they're okay and see if there's anything you need from you. basically just, are you achieving? Did you set out a plan? Did you make plan? And if you didn't, like sometimes that happens, but just make sure we know why. And as I've kind of touched on before, if you know why it didn't work, and how you're going to shift and what you're going to do differently, then I'm okay. Things like that happens. But it's just important to me that you know why. But, you know, we definitely want to see numbers. We want to see what your projections were and how did you do with that. You know, I'm okay if there's month over month growth. It doesn't have to hockey stick every month. It's not going to or every quarter. And again, if it even did do a hockey stick in growth or decline, you know, I just want to know that you know what happened and what you can do about it. Just small tips like, you know, we had great success with this promotion, or, you know, we really drew traction to the website. Those words are not very concrete in terms of what percent of growth, you know, how much more did you make? These are positive words, but they're really not telling me how the business is doing. You know, if you had a hundred people come to the website last month and 200 this, that's not really great, even though you might've doubled your numbers. So we want to see something more than just, you know, we did well, it was a success. So we want to make sure with your marketing efforts that you understand how they performed and what was the cost to do them and what was the return on that cost.
[00:36:26] Ray Latif: And who you're working with as well, from a marketing perspective, did you add a new agency? Are you working with a digital marketing partner now? And, you know, I think some of that information hopefully would already be known to investors, but in those cases, investors might be able to offer some perspective on more effective ways, more efficient ways. to align with folks like that and what objectives you're trying to achieve when you are working with outside agencies, which I know is something that you have a lot of perspective and, frankly, opinions on, and I'd love for you to share them with us.
[00:37:03] Brad Avery: Absolutely. I feel like this is one of the toughest areas for especially, I mean, anyone for any business, but definitely for early stage founders and first time founders hiring that outside agency. First, just finding them like it is great. They are reaching out, I find, to investors to get recommendations, but definitely seems like most recommendations are coming from fellow founders, which is good because if you talk to someone that someone's already worked with, I think getting really clear up front, you know, what is the expectations? What is the deliverable? And then really staying on top of that agency, working hand in hand, because you need to learn what they're doing anyway. You know, you should know it. You should understand what they're doing. And you don't want them to get too far down a road where something's not working or something's working and you want to shift and take more advantage of it. It's tough when you've never done the job of people you're hiring to do, whether it's digital marketing or PR, or as we talked about, like demoing or merchandising. If you don't know what the job is because no one on your team's ever done it, so that's kind of why you're hiring an outside agency, it's also a little hard to check up on them. and see what they're doing. But I have seen a fair amount where we're getting a report one quarter and they're excited that they signed on some new agency. And then by the second quarterly report, they've already let them go and they're looking for someone new and looking for recommendations. So I definitely applaud if it's not working, get out quickly. And three months is usually the timeline for trials with a lot of these agencies. But yeah, having someone on your team internally, having an advisor, having an investor who has expertise within those areas, helping you to manage your agency relationship is really key. And it's going to save a lot of time and a lot of money. But overall, with the agencies, you just got to keep an eye on performance. Are they performing? Are there clear measurables that they have to meet? And are you working with them on a constant basis to make sure they're being met?
[00:39:14] Ray Latif: And I would assume that it helps with convincing investors to buy into follow-up rounds as well. You know, if you're an investor in a seed round, you might be more encouraged to invest in a Series A if you feel like the experience, the expertise is there. Am I right?
[00:39:31] Brad Avery: Oh, it helps tremendously. So as an investor looking at going into future rounds for a company, and then going through the due diligence, looking at their performance, let's say for the last 18 months, it's going to really hold a lot of weight with me if there is an experienced person from that industry part of the team who's going to tell me that their performance has been industry standard that this is exactly you know what it should look like and what growth should look like and how much it should cost and why they're raising the money because in this industry that's what it takes. So someone letting me know if I'm not an expert in the industry, that this is par for the course for that industry, that's gonna help a lot. Basically, whatever they're doing, are the results something that are promising? And with the additional monies raised, do they know exactly how to spend it to achieve growth in that industry?
[00:40:31] Ray Latif: What about innovation? Because again, I think a lot of entrepreneurs will point to the fact that they have a differentiated product or brand based on an innovative formulation, ingredients, products, what have you. Is that enough to convince someone like yourself, even if the sales and revenue numbers aren't there just yet, would innovation give you enough confidence to invest in another round, in a future round?
[00:40:59] Brad Avery: Honestly, not really. First of all, and especially the world, you know, and that I'm involved in food and beverage. Everything is innovation at this point. Everything is brand new. Everything's a new ingredient or a new process or a new supplement or a new health benefit. The market is just flooded with innovation. I'm seeing both innovation just costing that much more and taking that much more time to get out there and to prove itself. you know, depending on what you've made, but the innovation is going to make you need to be an even more patient investor. And I think there's definitely market confusion. I think the consumer is so overwhelmed going in and saying, well, you know, do I need the collagen? Do I need the mushroom? Am I trying to boost my iron? Do I need more fiber? It's a crowded market. It's confusing. And the innovation is taking longer to prove itself. I mean, that's kind of part of it. The more innovative you are, the longer it's going to take to educate the public. One of the other challenges that I'm seeing with innovation is even if you're a couple of months ahead and you've come up with something brilliant, there's several people right behind you just a few months away.
[00:42:15] Ray Latif: Well, you know, aside from experience and perhaps not being as motivated by innovation, you know, what are some other reasons that you would be interested in investing in a subsequent round for a brand?
[00:42:30] Brad Avery: They're meeting their numbers, that they're close to their financial projections. The way they've managed the money they had to date was very, very economical and feasible. They tested things and then very quickly made decisions based on it. They didn't go down a lot of paths, burning money on stuff to try out. If I see someone's been very smart with the way they've spent and they achieved based on it, and you see there's truly product market fit, and the next round is going to be growth that's just going to be very smartly spent and executed, then yeah, I'm going to stay on the ride.
[00:43:11] Ray Latif: I like the way you put all that. You're so eloquent and sophisticated in how you communicate, Maxie. I think at the end of the day, people are reading between the lines, do not waste money.
[00:43:23] Brad Avery: That's essentially it. Yes. And I did have a fellow investor share with me recently that when she was really grilling someone, can you create a demand cost effectively in their marketing? And they really didn't have a great answer. And She said, well, you know, how would you expect me or any other investor to come in and put money in when you can't clearly tell us how you're going to cost effectively or even effectively, you know, create demand and spend on especially marketing and awareness. And the person said to her, oh, well, you know, it's angel investing. You win some, you lose some.
[00:44:05] Ray Latif: Oh, geez.
[00:44:06] Brad Avery: So don't ever say that to an investor, please.
[00:44:11] Ray Latif: Sometimes you lose 50 grand, sometimes you lose 40 grand. It's no big deal. It's all monopoly money to you anyway, isn't it? No, geez. Definitely do not say that to an investor, folks. I thought that would have been obvious, but I guess not.
[00:44:28] Brad Avery: Occasionally one gets through, but yeah, no, mostly the founders are so wonderful and so sincere and trying their best, but this is real people's money that, you know, they have faith in you and, but they, they want to see that you're really following a really tight conservative plan.
[00:44:46] Ray Latif: 100%. Maxie, once again, always just so full of wisdom and great advice. Thank you so much again for joining us. I know we'll be back for episode seven, lucky number seven of The Maxi Minutes soon. Thank you so much again and talk to you in a bit.
[00:45:05] Brad Avery: Thank you, Ray. We'll have to do something extra special for part seven. Definitely.
[00:45:12] Ray Latif: All right, that brings us to the end of this episode of Taste Radio. Thank you so much for listening and thanks to our guest, Maxine Kozler. As always, for questions, comments, ideas for future podcasts, please send us an email to ask at Taste Radio. On behalf of the entire Taste Radio team, thank you for listening, and we'll talk to you next time.
