Episodes
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Jonathan speaks with Eliza Becton and Sean Grundy, co-founders of Bevi. The beverage industry is one of the least sustainable industries with about ½ of the top 10 plastic polluters worldwide. They saw an opportunity to change the industry from the inside out by creating a sustainable beverage company using smart beverage dispensers in corporate offices. Their machines purify water at the point of use and then mix in a variety of other ingredients to create an array of beverages ranging from still to sparkling with flavor or supplement enhanced options. They can remotely manage quality and logistics for refills and maintenance.
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Christopher Gavigan, co-founder of The Honest Co and CBD brand, Prima joins Jonathan in this episode of Conquer The Noise. They open up the conversation talking about health and how you can decrease the toxicity of your home and the move into what leaders can do to help build their brand while maintaining strong relationships with co-founders and partners.
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In this episode of Conquer The Noise, Jonathan speaks with Arjan Stephens, the Executive VP of Nature’s Path and President of Que Pasa Mexican foods. Nature’s Path was started by his mother and father, Arran and Ratana Stephens in 1967. They started out by opening the Golden Lotus, which was one of the first vegetarian restaurants in Canada. Together, his parents combined creativity, passion, and knowledge to start a natural food store and bakery which ultimately lead to the creation of Nature’s Path - some of the first certified organic products on the market.
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In this week's episode, Jonathan is joined by Derrick Emsley, Founder/CEO of the Earth-First apparel brand Tentree. Emsley describes Tentree as a tree planting company that sells apparel. They create products to represent that vision for the outdoor and active lifestyle consumer. Tentree plants roughly 10 trees per item sold which goes back to the high-school tree-planting program that connected them with a variety of global tree planting projects. The business was designed to build on those relationships with 30+ planting partners and grow their efforts regionally across the world. They’ve created a business that can see continued growth with estimated 25M trees for 2022.
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In this week's episode, Jonathan has Jamie Henn and Duncan Meisel from Clean Creatives and Fossil Free Media. Jamie opens up the episode talking about his 10 years at 350.org where he met Duncan. He went on to start Fossil Free media two years ago. It was born from the desire to take the best tools in communications and digital strategies to fight for climate justice. They provide the support for grassroots groups & coalitions, but we knew that wasn’t enough if there wasn't some way to take on the fossil fuel industries marketing and PR, with millions of dollars spent on fossil advertising.
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In this episode, Jonathan (CCO at Unconquered)has an insightful conversation with Joe Dickson who is a co-founder and CEO at Merryfield - a clean label rewards app for purpose driven consumer packaged goods.
Having spent over 20 years at Whole Foods, Dickson took inspiration from the many farmers and suppliers he built relationships with and started his own farm at home where he practices the same organic farming methods. He describes organic farming as a set of ecological farming practices that focuses on using natural inputs to the land and limiting the use of synthetic chemicals. He also appreciates Whole Foods’ mission of taking a serious stance on GMO labeling as well as organic practices.
The conversation moves to Dickson talking about David Mayer (Co-founder and CEO of Merryfield) who had spent his whole career working in private equity. He explains how Mayer decided to focus his energy and resources on tools to improve wellness for everyday consumers out of his personal passion for wellness. He talks about how the two met over a shared interest in creating a reliable tool that let consumers know that every product has been vetted.
He then talks about how there are organic brands at supermarkets like Walmart but that they are buried among non-clean legacy brands. He says for a consumer who wants to choose better and wants to avoid unnecessary ingredients, it’s really hard to cut through the noise of label claims, the sheer number of products and focus on brands that are really better. When it came to the question of trust, Dickson talks about Merryfield Clean Council - a credible group of experts in GMO and food ingredients who help vett the products and Merryfields standards.. “Education is a huge part of the app” says Dickson further explaining how they selected a group of brands that met standards at a baseline and all of which had a clear purpose. Every brand and product has a page on the app and they highlight credentials such as what organic means in a 1 liner definition to keep it digestible.
Dickson says that all brands want a way to open a trust driven dialogue with consumers and to build the habit of continual purchase. This is where he thinks Merryfield can help brands create a level of trust while it their platform rewards its customers with every purchase to foster long term relationships.
Their marking will focus on user acquisition strategies and success metrics will include the number of users, brands and satisfaction. In order to get new users into the clean label tent, the company will invest in approachability and relatable language with a focus on offering personal benefits.
Jonathan and Dickson talk about how they were on a search for the right celebrity to partner with when they learned of Zooey Deschanel’s personal interest in wellness and clean food. The depth of her personal resonance with the brand’s mission made them realize that there was a much bigger fit than a standard sponsorship deal, and so they brought her in as a co-founder and Chief Creative Officer.
The conversation ends with Dickson’s advice to early career professionals, - “Everyone regardless of age or experience is a bit unsure of themselves and that there isn’t a magic door you cross through into adulthood. Despite the lack of years of experience, you have a lot of insight and perspective to offer,” said Dickson.
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In this week's episode, we dig into the story of Kara Goldin, an entrepreneur and founder of HINT water, an American beverage company producing healthy substitutes for soda, juices, and energy drinks. All their products are sugar-free and meet smart snack requirements.
The conversation starts with Goldin talking through what led her to write her book, Undaunted. Her new book outlines her journey in entrepreneurialism and the qualities that people need to have in order to succeed. The discussion uncovers many insightful learnings Goldin gained through her experience.
Goldin explains how it is important to learn from tough experiences that most people would want to forget and move past. She acknowledges that it can be uncomfortable for one to go back and reflect on their journey but highlights how valuable it can turn out to be . She substantiates this by talking about an early experience with Starbucks when they were removed from Starbucks’ which left her with inventory that had to to be sent back to the warehouse. Goldin believes when bad things happen, they don’t last forever. Continuing her story, she talks about her decision to not work with Amazon because she believed it did not foster direct relationships with customers. As a result, she launched her own store, which allowed her to have meaningful conversations and build relationships with her customers. She believes the subscription program she launched on the site was what made HINT water stand out.
Goldin dives into her founding story where she talks about how her own health issues led to the creation of HINT water. She discovered ingredients in her diet soda that made her stop consuming the products because of the harm it was doing to her. Within a few weeks of doing so, she was surprised to see her skin glow and weight drop. After this, she ventured into the market only to realize everything had some kind of sweetener and decided to make her own products.
The discussion comes to an end with Goldin explaining how the purpose of HINT water was to fill holes in the market that didn't exist. She says she always thought of the worst that could happen and reminded herself to go out and try it. If nothing else, she had the courage to laugh at herself and make the most of her learnings along the way.
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In this episode, Jonathan has a conversation with Merve Doran, co-founder of OLEAMEA, an organic extra virgin olive oil producer based in Turkey. OLEAMEA works with farmers to buy early harvest olives and while practicing sustainable production that relies on the traditions of artisans and local masters.
The conversation starts with Merve talking about her family and how they have been producing olive oil in the southwest region of Turkey for generations. Sensing a gap in organic farming practices, she and her brother decided to invest in their infrastructure through local partnerships. The small region housed about 1000 olive farmers, and they helped them get certified and better understand the business side of farming.
She mentions that many farms in the region are on mountains where no modern machinery can be brought in and explains how this leads to farmers having ample questions on the sustainability of the business. Due to these situational factors, she describes her initial days as a period that focused heavily on consulting, working with engineers & consultants.
Merve began her career in HR and discusses how going after her dream of working with her family's extra virgin olive oil made perfect sense given her family roots.
She explains how OLEAMEA works with farmers to buy early harvest olives from their farms (not their oils) which they then harvest together. This, she says, allows them to control everything from farmers to end products in terms of quality and pricing.
Having never bought olive oil off the shelf, Merve describes her experience of relying on store-bought olive oil during her stay in Milan as highly disappointing. This made her want to push her products to the forefront knowing that the quality and pricing of her products are far better.
She also acknowledges that there is limited knowledge around olive oil quality for consumers so she has aligned her marketing and PR efforts to help educated people. She also highlights how they focus on social media as a way to introduce people to the different uses of the product and that an agency in Turkey is helping the brand roll out olive oil-based recipes of different cuisines from around the world.
The conversation ends with Merve revealing her future plans where she mentions that olive oil is going to be the core and that she will expand into different areas that use the oil.
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In this episode of Conquer The Noise, Mike Lackman (CEO, Trade Coffee) speaks with Jonathan (CCO, Unconquered) about how Trade Coffee offers deeply personalized specialty coffee subscriptions to their customers.
Trade Coffee is a platform that connects the best craft roasters in the country to consumers who want to make better coffee. The company delivers fresh, on-demand coffee by creating deeply personalized experiences for coffee lovers. It offers a highly modular solution with 8 different frequency intervals and quantities to choose from.
Mike explains how Trade Coffee uses an online subscription model to provide their roasters with consistent business. He stresses the importance of ethical standards and how they are Rooted in the philosophy of direct relationships between roasters, farms, and importers. They ensure all stakeholders with living wages and a further investment in those crops.
Their goal is to be able to provide easily accessible and affordable solutions to specialty coffee buyers. The personalization happens through buyers answering a simple quiz followed by an extensive data analysis. According to Lackman, , measuring customer loyalty is one of the most reliable success metrics for the business.
Lackman’s vision for the company is to scale the business to reach a much larger audience and do so without compromising on quality. He explains how focusing on the smallest audience segment is among the hardest things to do. He says that Trade Coffee is one of the few businesses for which a picture is not worth a thousand words because the narrative that data provides is more important.
As for marketing, he says the company advertises to a broader target group as opposed to spearfishing for hyper-targeted audiences. For the team at Trade Coffee, it’s more about identifying interest groups that disproportionately fit with what they’re trying to do and how to get better at catering to them. They heavily invest in influencer marketing as they believe the narrative is key to their story. This strategy has been very valuable for the company says Lackman, explaining how people showed up and understood the pitch better when it was delivered through a trusted source.
The conversation ends with Lackman explaining how he believes it is important to set expectations of what success looks like for the company and trust the organization’s stakeholders in the process. He concludes by saying it is necessary to allow the team to take bets confidently while knowing that some of these might not work.
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In this episode of Conquer The Noise, Jonathan speaks with Hannah Skvarla, co-founder of The Little Market, and Liesl Gerntholtz, the Chief Program Officer. The Little Market works with global artisans to sell handmade and fair-trade products. It empowers female artisans by providing living wages and dignified work to women worldwide by extending their products’ distribution. Established in 2013 as an online marketplace, the nonprofit has grown to include a brick-and-mortar store in California. In just 7 years, the nonprofit has helped create 1 million hours of dignified work for their suppliers.
The nonprofit tries to reach out to most marginalized groups and work with them to bring their products to market. Supporting sustainable income opportunities is at its core, and they believe giving women money directly through appropriate product valuation is where real empowerment comes. In addition, the team aims to position and market all products to different marketplaces and create an ongoing relationship with their artisans.
Hannah Skvarla shares how she met Liesl Gerntholtz at FIDAM and bonded over their shared passion for community and giving back. She then talks about the trip that helped her understand women’s quests for opportunities to work. She learned about the magnitude of existing artisan products and the lack of scalable ways to reach a marketplace. All these eventually led to creating an online marketplace to connect people with ethically made products worldwide.“A living wage is the ability of families to pay for essentials - school, food, rent payment, and some discretionary income. Unfortunately, many jobs don’t allow for these, which mandates people to work longer hours”, explains Hannah. The Little Market addresses this by developing living wage guidance for all countries they exist in. They arrive at this by thoroughly analyzing the conditions in which the products are being made and other crucial factors. Hannah states that the real value is in empowering women economically, i.e., enabling them to earn money and decide how to spend it in a safe environment. This is among the reasons for them to focus on dignified work as a measurement.
Hannah also reveals how despite COVID, 2020 was their best year to date. She explains how the shopping patterns have changed and how people are more conscious about supporting small businesses. She also describes how the nonprofit’s flexible model has been helping them immensely during these uncertain times.
The founder also highlights on multiple occasions how this entire initiative isn’t about “helping people” but genuinely empowering them. The team works hard to create a partnership. They do not see themselves as service providers but enablers who work closely with artisans to educate them on the best practices while preserving traditional techniques. This entire process is built on relationships and transparency at all levels and is mutually beneficial.
Growth for The Little Market is diversifying its portfolio and looking for as many things to sell as possible. This leads to uncovering the challenge Brick-and-mortar throws, especially with shipping costs and the scale of orders making it so hard to ship to many locations. There is also an emphasis on how being a nonprofit has helped them receive the support of some incredible activists, tastemakers, change-makers & celebrities.
Hannah also highlights how marketing is quite challenging given the amount of information to get across and expresses how getting better at storytelling is an important goal for the nonprofit. She also covers the difficulties of navigating through the concept of greenwashing. Hannah stresses that as long as the big brands use terms without monitoring how they’re being used, it will be hard for a consumer to understand what fair trade is.
Lastly, Hannah shares her views on pursuing dreams. She mentions how different experiences can teach people something they might not even realize for the next phase of their career by narrating instances from her own experiences.
Liesl mentions how it’s about working in places that connect with one’s values. She talks about how a lot of her satisfaction has come from feeling like the good she’s doing out in the world is replicated by doing it for the team she works with. She then ties it back to the nonprofit’s value to treat all staff with dignity and how it is the thread that connects everything. She finds learning about things that are completely outside of her comfort zone and wheelhouse very stimulating. The conversation ends with her stating how learning in one’s job and getting out of their comfort zone is excellent. -
We are speaking with Reilly Brock, the former associate creative director at Imperfect Foods. Imperfect Foods is a DTC brand that was founded to fight food waste by finding a home for the imperfect or “ugly” fruits and vegetables that farms couldn’t sell to grocery stores. This is one of Jonathan’s favorite subjects and we will be diving into how you can reduce food waste in your own home, Imperfect Foods efforts to create a sustainable business while talking through the role a creative director has and how Reilly uses creativity to educate consumers.
ReilIy has had an eclectic career from cooking tacos in food trucks to apprenticing through Europe and working at places like Mission Chinese food in SF. Following his passion for food he ultimately found that the lifestyle as a chef wasn't sustainable. Thereafter he pivoted to event planning and content marketing as a way to marry reading, writing and storytelling with his love for food.
After he joined Imperfect, he learned to look upstream. It was eye opening to see all the stuff in the walk in fridge and think about how farmers would have outcomes of throwing away due to not being able to distribute it. All of us make choices about how we use food in our homes. We can all be that bridge between people who care about waste reduction part time and full time. Showing people at home, there’s some common sense ways you can prevent waste before it starts.
His role is the translator and storyteller between different worlds where customers can understand the scope and how we can all push ourselves to make a bigger impact. He talks about how 40% of waste in the supply chain happens in our homes. The top thing is shopping with intention and a plan. If you look at things that go to waste, its impulse buys -- hopeful kale purchasing.
He advises to plan with the shelf life of your ingredients in mind. Prioritizing that over what you feel like eating for dinner. Herbs go to waste and it makes sense; they’re tender, fragile and the recipe usually doesn't’ call for the entire bunch so what do you do with parts you can’t fully use?
He also advises to clean your fridge at least once a month and to get comfortable with rescue recipes that absorb ingredients from other recipes that can collect the motley crew of odds and ends.
Early in his career, he was focused on “asset up” - executing at a velocity to keep telling a story one piece of content at a time. Over time he has realized that it should be strategy-down. It's tough because it takes people. A well-balanced team of strategic, and organizational thinkers, allows for awesome cross channel pushes. It takes more time and energy but allows for more impact. One part of his strategy is he tries to remember it's a two way street - it should be about us learning. When something doesn't get as much engagement, it's a great sign to learn, iterate and adapt. When you get comments from the community, that's free data and learnings as a creative to run with and lean on.
Their open kitchen series is filled with amazing, thoughtful questions which pushed him to learn and solve. What are actual pain points and not just what are my goals for them to hear from them. It's about listening as much as it is a plan. Unfortunately, they don’t teach you a lot about the environment in school. He learned relatively recently what all the numbers on the bottom of plastic bottles mean. Unfortunately, not all plastics are easily recyclable. We learned recently we need to educate people. Knowing what's in what you’re consuming is unfortunately a really opaque landscape.
Democratizing knowledge is fun to do as a mission driven brand. On the flip side, it's frustrating - companies can make it so hard for people to know what to do with materials that are hard or impossible to recycle. It’s on YOU, consumers, to figure out what to do with them. It's hard to have to wade through it all. How do you make the right choice an easier choice to make? Real power is not to choose from a menu of options, but to create a menu of options. The real power is the people who choose what is or is not at the store. Stuff that is fantastic isn’t even making it to the stores when it can/should be sold at retail.
Their sustainability team has been exploring giving people a better default option. We’re currently more or less the only company that makes it free/easy to recycle from your doorstep. Between delivery and packaging, they are exploring ways to cut that down. Insulated liners and gel packs are things you can’t reuse around the house. They wanted to liberate people from gel pack freezer tetris and did an 80/20 analysis. They found it was these that are the biggest headache so after drop off they will take back the packs. The win was making a circular system despite how complicated it was. It requires customers to be meaningfully involved every week. But, a huge win to offer a better default option that closes the loop on a wasteful thing.
They realized a bigger opportunity to make a scalable impact if they could be a full grocery store. They saw it as a chance to be a more meaningful part of customer’s lives and shift from a niche thing to add to shopping experience to being a majority par.
It's a balance to show that we're broadening and enhancing as opposed to changing.What is the throughline and how can I tell some new stories about our enhancements but that the DNA of our company is alive and well and intact. A huge reason food goes to waste in people's homes is due to dates -- dates are conservaate estimates of peak quality, not hard and fast predictions of food safety. Dates are usually designated at the state level. That, plus best buy, use by, sell by. When youre talking about canned beans or dried quinoa, evoo etc -- the date is one piece of data, but it's not the only or most important one. Use your common sense, best judgement and ability to research as well as senses to tell if it's still good to eat.
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In this episode of Conquer The Noise, Jonathan talks with Safia Qureshi, founder and CEO of CLUBZERO. CLUBZERO pioneered an award winning returnable packaging system for food and beverage brands globally. They partner with businesses to make food and beverage on-the-go more sustainable; working towards the ultimate goal of zero waste. They serve customers across the EU and North America, including the world's largest food delivery company Just Eat Takeaway, NextGen Consortium brands (Starbucks, McDonald’s, Coca Cola, Yum Brands, Nestle, Wendy’s) as well as leading food service company Baxter Storey, Cushman & Wakefield and retailer John Lewis & Partners.
With a philosophy of making reusables free and rewarding to use, safe and convenient to return, they’ve achieved a market leading return-rate of 95% vs industry standard of 60%. Safia talks about how they found a solution where they provide FNB outlets (brands, chains, small independents) the ability to give their customers an experience where they can take away their food in reusable packaging that they can return when finished.
Safia talks about how there are startups that will deliver beverages direct to home in glass and how CLUBZERO differs by looking at the to-go experience and connecting tech to all of it. As a brand you can understand where your inventory is and how many times they’re used before the end of life.
The brief she created for herself was: How do we get rid of using something for 20 seconds and replace it with better products designed to last longer and have a better experience? Part of Safia’s approach is an infrastructure play, creating the system for it to function.
Safia talks through the roles of consumers and entrepreneurs. She says that consumers consume and take what they are given. While the role of an entrepreneur is to design what they are given.
To further the point, she explains that we don’t dictate what is in the supermarket -- we buy what we see - and we vote with our dollar to what we want to see more of. So, how do I design things people will want to see more of and vote on?
Her self-developed brief involved the genesis of reusable packaging to have a unique identifier of each object. Their idea is that every item that exists has its own genome. It has a QR code, a unique identifier just for that item. It gets generated and exists in the world and is recorded by our platform. We develop a platform for clients to use their own packaging lines and empower brands to use reusable packaging by providing them guidelines. She continues that they don’t want to own all the world's packaging - they deploy a number of it in every city and then work with brands to create their own. Once that's generated, these packaging items are distributed and set up in any given city. We work on a city-by-city basis and are scientifica about which cities we evaluate. The end goal is to have a drop off point within 5 minutes in any direction. Think like a mailbox. Once that’s done, the customer journey is finished. You can buy from one location and drop off to any location near you.
Safia talks about a new line launching next month for food with Just Eat. This is an opportunity to engage with customers and understand what the other types of packaging are that they can look at for them. She has come in to look at tech, plastic, cpg, and how the recycling world works and it's quite complex and unregulated.
As the show comes to a conclusion, Safia talks about how the world is not a finished project -- if you see something, question it, and if you feel something could be better, go for it. Everything around us is a work in progress
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In this week's episode of Conquer The Noise, Jonathan sits down with Lindsay Mccormack of Bite. Bite is an all-natural, zero-waste, tube-free, 100% vegan, gluten-free and cruelty-free toothpaste tablet on a mission to become the world’s most sustainable personal care company. The company makes non-toxic oral care products – ranging from toothpaste and floss to mouthwash, toothbrushes and whitening gel – and packages in a plastic-free and sustainable way. After being featured on ABC’s Shark Tank and going viral overnight, Bite wants to continue disrupting the oral hygiene market.
The conversation starts off with Lindsay and Jonathan discussing her love of the outdoors and how she is obsessed with the ocean & the mountains. Then transitions into her found story and how she was working as a TV producer when she came up with the idea for Bite. She credits being a producer to helping give her the skills she needs to run her own business.
Lindsay says she never had any interest in being an entrepreneur and kind of fell into it after pursuing her personal passions. She wanted to make a solution for herself by reducing plastic, then she learned about all the artificial and harmful chemicals in oral care products and she became obsessed with it.
They talk through her early process of and using her money to buy a tablet machine. But once she bought it, she thought that maybe she would sell it by making a Shopify site to sell to the zero waste & vegan community. That was the beginning and the path that eventually got her to now.
Early on, they created a video that went viral on Facebook and investors were knocking at the door. They saw success and were automatically profitable. She wondered if taking investment would be a good idea because she wants to put the planet & mission first, and as soon as you take someone’s money you are indebted to them and their priorities. She admits she’s made some crazy choices where they crushed margins and ended up in an out of stock situation because they changed ingredients. They were rewarded at the end, but if they had investors they might not have been able to take these risks.
They are a public benefit corporation and are in the process of becoming certified B Corp. When we first went viral they were looking for a manufacturer which became urgent. They had a hard time finding one because they have unique ingredients and also had to work with glass & aluminum. The aluminium lids were getting crushed in production because the machine is used to plastic tops.
Lindsay and Jonathan talk about how their customers have helped drive a better product. They have pointed out issues with ecocert palm oil, it was a complete reformulation, which as a small company with stock issues, ended up in an out of stock situation. But, within a few months of hard times, when word got out that they were the only non-palm oil toothpaste tablet, they were exposed to a whole new audience
Lindsay talks about how she feels her job is to take a ‘better never stops’ approach - to constantly look for the newest thing and how they can be the first to improve. These types of solutions will only succeed if brands put their money behind it. An example would be their toothbrush. They created a bamboo toothbrush but found out it has nylon in it. Bristles are not 100% plastic free, but are THE MOST sustainable thing at the time. Their goal is to use these and be very transparent with the customers and within 6 months of launching the toothbrush, they found a 100% plastic free material.
As competition gets better, Lindsays says their work needs to improve too -- product quality, constant challenge to be better. For anyone trying to build their business, there will be so many no’s. All you need is one person to say yes and you have to lean in and nurture the relationship.
The better brands that come out, the better it will force you to be - product, sustainability - ultimately its best case scenario to get real solutions. As a small business, people can do a lot, but in order for real change to ricochets across the world, we will need to have big brands change. -
In this week's episode, Jonathan talks with Ryan Lupberger, founder of Cleancult. They are on a mission to redefine cleaning. They offer innovative plant-based products with a refillable, zero waste subscription-based and omni-channel business model to eliminate toxic chemicals and plastic waste from cleaning routines. Since launching in 2019, the brand is now in over 4,000 retail doors and growing rapidly at 300% YoY.
Jonathan and Ryan start with the founding story and how Ryan came up with the idea. Ryan realized there are no FDA regulations around cleaning supplies and believed there is a better way of doing it. He wanted to create the last bottle of soap a consumer would ever use by using refillable glass bottles and milk cartons, while using natural ingredients that you can pronounce, understand and that are actually clean.
Ryan talks about how he fell in love with the better for business movement and how their first 3 models failed, but in 2019 they came across their current model. The first launch of the brand used pods, but they found that the pods got so hard in shipment they became rocks and didn't work. A year later they launched an Indiegogo and needed a higher average order value. All the bottles leaked in their first round of shipments. This is when Ryan started to sweat. It was 2.5 years in, and they hadn’t had traction in sales when they finally got to a lightbulb moment when they looked at the boxed waters of the world and asked, what if we applied this concept to cleaners?
When they started, they prioritized better functionality because people want to be better. It's not that they don’t want green brands, it's that they need to prioritize product excellence over product betterment for the world. The most sustainable way to make cleaning products would be DIY at your house, but they knew not everyone would do that and that's not sustainability at scale. When building, it was prioritizing better formulations and supporting it with better packaging.
When developing the products, Ryan asked himself, “How do we make better solutions that don’t require behavior change?” Sustainability greenwashing is hard to differentiate what's real and what’s not. There’s always going to be a group of customers that are dark green - looking for best environmental sustainability. They matter, but they’re 1% of the market. Ryan talks about how they are not trying to be for the 1%, but the 99%. How do we get a model that really makes a difference to everyone that they can consume very easily?
They tried to create a model that requires the least amount of education possible. DTC is humor, video, color and price. You have to show people what it is. Majority of business is in retail, its bread and butter from a differentiation perspective; many competitors can’t live on a shelf wherein the carton is beautiful/alive and stands out. Cleancult is a refill, and 2 these go together. Trying to create a sustainable system that can go into any traditional retailer; you can go in and understand it with minimal education.
Jonathan and Ryan dig into their startup journey and land on an important topic, where they are based. 35% of the team is based in San Juan. What drew them to San Juan was talent, flexibility, community & R&D environment. The SBIR grant grants 100’s of millions of dollars to start ups for free. Found a great oppy to partner with University of Puerto Rico Maya West to get grant funding and also continue to make it better. Taxes are less of an attraction, more the community/talent.
They joined Mass Challenge in Boston in 2017 which was their last accelerator to get over the hurdle and when they started raising money successfully. They had some grant funding and finally closed the pre-seed round which came down to one person because we struggled fundraising and kept getting no’s until the CEO of Bombas said, let’s do this. He opened up his network and it was the one credible investor that once he lent his credibility, the business credibility became real. They moved up to NYC and now they are back/forth between NY and PR every month.
As the episode winds down, they talk about time management, angel investors and empathy. Ryan believes that empathy is important. Being an entrepreneur is a wonderful journey but there is a lot of pain, frustration and suffering. It will take a decade. Whatever you’re building, it will take a decade. Don’t have to be ready for it upfront. Be ready for the long journey but it doesn’t have to be suffering, and even if it is, how do you remain as mindful as possible.
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In this week's episode, we are speaking with Matt Smith, Sr. Director of PepsiCo Foundation which supports programs designed to improve availability of affordable nutrition. Matt and Jonathan speak on a variety of topics which all take root in his belief that you don’t have to separate business and doing good. We dig into philosophy, poverty, children’s dependence on school meals and how they use Pepsi’s infrastructure to deliver on their mission.
Matt’s journey started when he realized that he did not have to separate work from a greater purpose. He had the opportunity to come to PepsiCo initially focused on environmental sustainability which led him to Food For Good. As his career and life has advanced, he uses his personal faith to help guide his direction. We talk about how he feels a particular responsibility to use his privilege to lift voices and provide change to the larger system.
They talk about how the homeless have always been a focus for Matt. As a college student, he and his friends would invite a homeless person to Subway, pay for their meal and then engage in conversation with them. He ended up calling this organization FEAST - family eats at the same table. Through this experience, he learned that a lot of charity causes dependency instead of empowerment. This was further reinforced when he read the book, When Helping Hurts.
He has continued to honor and ellevate the point of view of the folks he’s serving. Jonathan and Matt talk about how their original name for Food For Good was Project Hope. When they screened the people they were serving, they realized that it was not successful because those screened felt that their lives are not a project, that the name lacked commitment. This feedback helped them ask questions differently to their internal team.
Twenty two million kids require free or reduced cost lunches at school. Of that group, a small fraction, 3-4 million, are getting food when not in school. In the US there are government programs that will fund 2-3 meals a day for after school and they found that people are not accessing those. To help with that demand, Food For Good is working with the government and their own logistics chain to get it to those in need. They discuss how the USDA funds after school food programs through state agencies and into nonprofits or school districts. They started with City Square more than 12 years ago. City Square gets funds, has 100 sites across Dallas but needs help with the logistics. Food For Good bid on those contracts at cost, then call in supplier partners from Pepsico to bring all costs down as low as possible.
When developing the distribution inside the neighborhoods, they needed to talk to partners to understand where the best places to be - i.e. being in a park vs inside the grounds of public housing.
The book, When Helping Hurts, asks, what is poverty? The data shows that people who have experience poverty as psychological terms - embarrassed, ashamed and not empowered. If those who have material things address poverty by giving those same material things to them, it may be the most embarrassing and dehumanizing thing you can do for that person. He realized there are more dignifying and empowering ways to adjust systems from long embarrassing and inaccessible food lines. No Kid Hungry found that missing breakfast makes it harder to pay attention. Those who miss meals perform poorly on tests, have more behavioral issues and are suspended more frequently. Matt wants Food For Good to be a meal which allows a kid to be successful.
They close the episode discussing purpose and passion. Matt believes it starts with purpose and passion is what's visible. When he’s looking for people, he’s looking for people who are rooted in purpose and passion, but also need people who are excellent - an incredible communicator who is also purposeful and passionate, strategic and logistically & innovatively savvy. Expertise and excellence is something we can’t separate.
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In this week's episode, we speak with Ravi Mikkelsen, cofounder of Atmos Financial, a fintech startup. We talk about how Ravi is leading the way as an alternative to using big banks for personal banking. Most of our banking institutions use customer deposits to fund loans that support fossil fuels. Atmos is doing the opposite of that. Once they have built up a sufficient deposit base, Atmos will transform deposits into direct action on climate change, making loans to fund a clean energy economy. They work to support Renewable Energy, Regenerative Agriculture, Electric Transportation and Weather Resilience.
Ravi clarifies that Atmos is not a bank, but a banking startup. They provide FDIC insured bank accounts through their bank partner. Because of that they have more freedom in what they back, giving them more creativity in how they deploy capital. Deposits at Atmos go toward climate action; they’re not just sitting there going to fossil fuels or prisons. They’re going to fund things like regenerative agriculture, more housing, etc
One big driver of banking is convenience. “I go to the bank just down the street and it's just what we’ve always done”, says Ravi. Now, it’s who has the best app and your bank is in your pocket. As a fintech, they provide tech solutions to emulate the convenience - we think it's fast and beautiful and are constantly iterating to improve it.
We talk about how they are using their mission. On the about page, you can see their vision and mission with a letter from the co-founders as well as info on their values which starts with love. Love for the planet and each other. Ravi says that just deploying the tech for the wealthiest in the world won’t cut it and that banking has to take care of societal issues - can’t change the world unless you change it for everyone.
Ravi also talks about another value: urgency with a bias toward action. A forward leaning approach toward moving faster; how do they deploy capital more quickly? They are trying to work with community banks to translate the mindset about deploying more capital. They’re in the process of signing contracts with banks to deploy deposits against climate positive infrastructure. They are starting with banks that have existing lending practices with similar values.
As the conversation progresses, we dig into safety. Safety is paramount to banking - trust is the currency of finance. Both time in the market, working with partners & nonprofits and building security by partnering with FDIC can provide insurance via partner banks. Ravi’s cofounder, Peter Hellwig, worked for New Resource Bank which is a BCorp in San Francisco that was acquired. He has created a lot of relationships over his career and starting with that network has helped them get introduced to partners at Bcorp and 1% For The Planet which they are a member of.
Voting with our dollars is what we most often use as we decide how and where we spend our money. It has a great effect on the local economy and where we bank can have global implications. The world we live in is financed by our deposits. Changing where we deposit can change where you live. As part of their offering, customers can donate a fixed amount monthly or a percentage of that savings rate. On top of that, Atmos gives .11% bonus if you elect to do a monthly recurring donation. They have also just launched one time giving.
When it comes to marketing, Ravi and Jonathan talk about how there is a need to educate potential customers. Most people don’t understand what their money does when they make a deposit. Four of the big banks are the biggest financiers of fossil fuel extraction in the world. Our deposits don’t just sit in a bank, physically or digitally. It gets lent out into the economy. So there’s education around that as well as the solution piece around how you can pivot it to be used for the betterment of society.
Ravoi advises people to go to bankingonclimatechaos.org, to see how your bank is using deposits. They provide a report about the top fossil fuel funding banks in the world. If you go deep it shows the top 60 and you can see into some of those assets and what they hold. There are also a few other transparency tools around private prisons or war materiel.
Carbon offsets are an important part of this. Carbon offset programs however offer a lot of potential problems like if a reforestation program that has gone from native, bio diverse area to a monocrop tree plantation which then makes a net negative in terms of health and in carbon sequestration. Biodiversity gives resilience and health to the area. Some environmental organizations are holding hostage nature preserves for carbon credit programs.
As the episode wraps, Ravi says, “I’m 39 now and started on this climate journey when I was 18. I think I would tell myself to focus on being balanced. It would be taking care of my holistic self - people push so hard and there’s a bit of a burnout period. This is your mission for life and it's a long game, so play it that way. Tell people about the changes you’re making and that you want to see an equitable shift in society.”
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Jonathan and Nick Reinke from Land O’Lakes brand, Truterra, have a conversation about how the company is using software to work with farmers to help offset carbon, create more sustainable farming practices and their new program called,Trucarbon.
Nick is very familiar with farming. He grew up on his family farm in North Dakota which has had 4 generations of family running it. For the last 10 years he has worked in agricultural banking and crop insurance before joining the Truterra team.
Nick talks about how agriculture data is traditionally a one way flow. Farmers provided it but didn’t get any back. But since Truterra has started working with farmers, it's about giving data back to the farmer that’s relevant and informative for them. With Truterra, you can look at things like soil erosion, nutrient efficiency and see where a farm is wasting money as well as where the environment can be improved which creates a business case for environmental sustainability.
Nick emphasises that they don’t recommend any practices specifically. They take the data and tie it to financial mechanisms and environmental impact so they can make the best choices. Farmers inherently know where issues are in their fields; to be able to put that into a piece of tech that can show them where they're losing is key. They have approached this using a trusted network of people because really incredible tech falls on deaf ears if it isn’t coming via a trusted source. Agricultural co-ops are a key part of how they operate and get the message out. We have a whole field team that meets with co-ops; it’s a very in person approach.
The conversation moves into carbon credits as Nick breaks down what they are and how they are used. A carbon credit uses metrics. So one metric ton of CO2 or equivalent like methane is a transactable credit for a company to purchase and leverage that credit against their own carbon footprint. It's incredible how complex the accounting mechanisms are. Does this mean a company can pollute as much as they want and then offload somewhere else? Big picture, it does not.
There’s an opportunity for a farmer to modernize by either sequestered carbon or reducing emissions. Carbon credits create a financial incentive to do both of those things. Carbon credits can include avoided emissions like using a smoke stack scrubber or can alternatively, can include carbon sequestration by removing legacy load carbon from atmosphere and storing it in the soil. Depending on the marketplace and mechanisms, those two things could be viewed as equivalent. A ton of carbon is a ton of carbon, but very different activities pulling carbon out, vs avoiding putting more in have different effects.
Nick and Jonathan talk about the massive system change this all requires. There is some infrastructure in place to help. For accounting mechanisms to work, it needs to be clear that if there is investment in this carbon credit, there aren’t multiple people claiming the same impact, thereby reducing the overall impact on a global scale. They would need to be additive, not a competitive public to private marketplace. How can we simplify, streamline and optimize the marketplace to get maximum possible value back to the grower? The conversation needs to be about overall benefit to farmers beyond just carbon -- deeper insights through data.
For the amount of energy & capital flow -- we're finally starting to connect the dots of risk and realities of climate change. You can remove social good entirely and there’s enough of an argument around mitigation asset movements. A lot of companies have a lot at risk from climate change. The best financial hedge against that risk is carbon mitigation.
As the show wraps, Nicks talks about passion and purpose. Agriculture is a passion lifestyle - you don’t stay involved in all the headaches if you don't have it (passion). The land can be touchy for that reason - that farmer that has been on that land for decades or generations, obviously they care about it being sustainable. There’s new information to be had about what soil health really means - it's a little bit about having a more informed conversation around things like seed population as well as soil health and carbon.
This isn’t a conversation that the entiere farm marketplace is ready for. There’s early adopters and innovators - we’re in that next 15 % of growers who have been observing the early adopters. It's not about appealing to all farmers, it's about supporting that next 15% who are looking for the incentive to do this and take that next step.
In closing, Nick says, “When I talk about farmers needing to be passionate - you need to be passionate and a little bit crazy. You’re a price taker for all elements and are at the mercy of the weather; the only thing you can control is how hard you work at it to give yourself the best chance.” The battle against climate change - it’s a big problem. Agriculture can have such a huge impact. Nick is passionate about trying to be able to translate that impact back to the farm.
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Jonathan sits down with Stephanie Dipisa, founder and CEO of Solara Suncare. Stephanie wanted to create safer and healthier sunscreen after her own personal journey through illness. Out of her 3 children, 2 of them have allergies to chemicals in sunscreens and as she researched it, she learned that these chemicals build up in the body.
Sunscreen is a known endocrine disruptor. The FDA is looking into recognizing that the chemicals are showing up at levels higher than is recognized as safe. Solara Suncare is taking high level, premium zinc and blending with plant defense - 10 active botanicals, to help provide an even better skin feel and experience than traditional zinc products.
As the brand grows, they are seeing a wave of new customers that are proactively looking for alternatives that are safer for their health and environment. They have a strong customer base to begin with but people are proactively searching and looking for alternatives. They have grown through credentialed partnerships and certifications. One important partner they’ve worked with is the Environmental Working Group. They help bring to light questionable ingredients in all types of consumer products. Solara Suncare is one of few brands that has that credential because it's a process where every single ingredient is reviewed.
For Stephanie, it's important that they say they are clean and mean it.
“If we’re concerned about environmental impact, we mean it and are putting dollars and cents behind it,” said Stephanie.
She continues to say that it doesn't matter the size of the impact as long as you’re making that effort. While they are small and new, partnerships like 1% For The Planet are aligning with brands like them. They just joined the 1% FTP network and are looking at nonprofits to align with.
The conversation shifts to ambassadors. Stephanie says that they are mindful of who they partner with as they try to ensure they have diverse representation. They try to find ambassadors that speak in the same voice and offer a level of education. Some examples of their ambassadors would include people who focus on yoga, meditation, healthier eating choices, naturopathic doctors and dermatologists.
Stephanie started out in public relations and credits how her previous career has helped her business grow. She helped channel that experience to build the brand to look different, feel different and have a different POV. As the brand has grown, she has embraced progress over perfection. She believes that some things you do need to have buttoned up. She wanted to make sure people understand what they stand for and how they're different.
Sunscreen is one of the most difficult products in skincare to formulate because of the restrictions on what Solara Suncare will and won't use. From a testing perspective, here in the US, this is an FDA regulated OTC product. She was never making this in her kitchen. During development she went out and picked everyone’s brain to find the right path forward, including working with an independent chemist. She built a panel of experts to help her navigate and find the right manufacturing partners. They own the formulas and it’s taken many years.
Their products use adaptogens - botanicals that have amazing ability to self protect and can adapt in extreme conditions. They have innately protective qualities about them. All of their products cover the full spectrum of UVA, UVB, bluelight and pollution. It's more than just the sun that affects skin. Jonathan and Stephanie talk through the EU guidelines and how the embrace them. Europe has banned over 1600 ingredients and requires that everything on the label must be written and included down to .004%. For Solara Suncare, it was a no-brainer because it’s transparency. The other thing that Europe does differently is the way they test SPF value. In Europe, a third of that SPF number must be proven to cover against the damaging UVA rays. For the U.S.10 is the number you have to hit.
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Jonathan sits down with Gene Foca, CMO of Getty Images in this week's episode of Conquer The Noise. The two talk about Getty’s new program and research report, Visual GPS. Getty launched Visual GPS in 2020 in a first-of-its-kind global research effort completed in conjunction with YouGov. Visual GPS is a ready-to-use guide detailing what today’s consumers care about so brands can better choose visuals that will resonate with them. Their insights detail consumers’ needs and wants and behaviors as they pertain to imagery and explore how consumers are influenced by four of the world’s biggest “Forces”—Realness, Wellness, Technology and Sustainability—and what that means in terms of decision making.
In an effort to quantify the importance of the four key behavioral Forces as identified by the Creative Insights team, and also further contextualize around visual representation, they undertook a custom market research study facilitated by YouGov, surveying more than 10,000 consumers and professionals in 13 languages across 26 countries. Since the inaugural report launched in 2020, Getty Images and iStock have continually updated the research and insights to maintain a finger on the pulse. Through a combination of interviews, observations, and visual analysis, Gene says their creative insights team—made up of artists, curators, archivists, futurists, art directors and visual experts—provides a global view of visual communications across industries, and holds a distinct perspective related to how visual content is created, displayed and consumed.
Gene talks about the abundance of data they can use to inform their expertise. Sustainability has increased in terms of intensity due to the pandemic and they are finding consumers are even more interested in discussing sustainability than ever before. He talks about how they see this impact in visual imagery by users getting away from tropes or cliches.
It’s increasingly important that brands are really careful with their representation and value proposition. It needs to portray their brand, product or service accurately - and if a company doesn't, a single image will cloud their view. They try hard to guide customers in the right direction to help them make sure it's realistic and supporting their proposition in the right way.
Gene talks about how companies respond to changes and purchasing behavior based on how customers spend money. Consumers lead companies to change - 2020 couldn’t be a better example of consumers driving change in a variety of ways. His experience is that companies implement change when the bottom line requires it. They talk about how meaningful change in companies requires time - boards, staff, these kinds of systemic changes require process change and large investment decisions.
Gene says their responsibility is to provide clients and partners who use visual content with imagery that is going to promote change. They have to make those assets available and frankly make them easy to find & surface with their technology. They arm research teams with the right facts and support so they will be of better service.
Younger generations have a shifting set of priorities. Millennials as a group, for example, are broader. They're as much motivated by working for organizations/companies that are mission based and socially conscious as they are around making money. Increasingly the expectation on the behalf of professional staff is that these things work together and complement each other.
As the conversation wraps, they talk about what he is excited most in the coming years. He’s really hopeful, to see how they build on Visual GPS.
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Jonathan speaks with Jeremiah McElwee, the Chief Merchandising Officer at Thrive Market. They have a great conversation in this week's episode as they talk about Jeremiah’s passion for healthy food and sustainable farming practices and how he has helped grow the catalog at Thrive. They talk about the mission of Thrive Market to democratize healthy products to all Americans.
Thrive has a little over 5K different products ranging from packaged grocery to grass-fed meat & seafood to organic and clean wines, as well as nutrition and beauty. Jeremiah talks about his 27 year career in the space and how he is at the stage where he couldn’t imagine doing anything else. His passion started earlier in his life as a result of his health challenges. After experiencing the benefits of clean eating, "I felt I had to spread the word, the gospel, of living naturally and avoiding the standard American diet of processed food,” said Jeremiah. He joined the Thrive team in 2013 and has built a community of relationships where he can learn every day. He says he did not grow up in a hippie commune and that most people that do what he does have some roots in that. He grew up surfing and skateboarding and embraced anti-establishment early on.
“We’ve been conditioned to be exposed to advertising; but at the end of the day where you chose to spend your money drives what we do more than anything,” said Jeremiah.He looks at sustainability as a way to create real change and involves the suppliers of their products in the conversation. They start by asking a lot of questions. They are fortunate to have a whole merchandising team that talks to suppliers every day - whether 3rd party or private label and talks through how brands can get on Thrive Market place. They love 3rd party certifications, USDA Organic as well as ethical trading certifications and the myriad of others. All are fantastic and show they’re paying attention.
So much of what’s done and what happens in our food system is a byproduct of “that’s how it's always been done before”. They realized early on that as soon as they had any sort of scale, the best way they can raise the bar was through a private label. They’re able to keep products cost way down, 15% to 40% less than with a leading brand. What makes their products unique is that they never look for the highest margin to sell.
Jeremiah talks about how they’re not trying to solve one problem and create several others. They’ve been able to run the gamut of products and be involved all the way down to the farm level and all the way up to amazing sourcing agents. For him, it’s very exciting as a food geek, because they are able to work with really small scale farmers. They don’t have pressure of brick and mortar.
They view themselves as member owned and explore how they can offer greater value. Most members save their fee in the first two orders. The coolest part is that customers are doing good for farmers around the world. By drinking a cup of coffee you’re helping a co-op of 14 farmers across the Andes have a better life - not just achieve baseline economic sustainability but actually have abundance. They have tons of american farmers we work with too.
They are working on pilot programs to do a few things like label all products on how to recycle them and the path you take to end its life cycle and look at how to reduce packaging.
They believe that reduction is the first step. They are working with a number of partners who take plastic materials and any painted or non-recyclable materials to figure out how to upcycled into building materials so it becomes a usable durable good. They are also working to reduce plastic across the supply chain and how to use the most recyclable form of plastic.
They emphasize not letting the perfect get in the way of the good -- it’s about the evolution toward the perfect. You won't be on day one. It's important that you move in the right direction - if we all work to incrementally improve we’d get out of this whole much faster. Organic is the first step, but it’s become a monster. It used to be regional or local but now the demand is so high that it's led to traditional farming methods (i.e. monocropping) that impacts the earth, depleting it with every harvest that you have.
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