How I Built This with Guy Raz - Advice Line with Sarah Kauss of S'well

Episode Date: June 20, 2024

S’well founder Sarah Kauss joins Guy on the Advice Line, where they answer questions from three early-stage founders about positioning their products in competitive markets. Today we meet Chiara, a recent college grad who invented a protein-packed chickpea hot cereal. Then Jesús, who left his tech job to go all-in on a line of greeting cards inspired by his Latino heritage. And Adam, a former X Games gold medalist who launched a brand of razors for men who shave their legs.If you’d like to be featured on a future Advice Line episode, leave us a one minute message that tells us about your business and a specific question you’d like answered. Send a voice memo to [e-mail] or call 1-800-433-1298.And be sure to listen to S’well’s founding story as told by Sarah on the show in 2020.This episode was produced by Chris Maccini with music by Ramtin Arablouei. It was edited by John Isabella. Our audio engineer was Neal Rauch.You can follow HIBT on X & Instagram and sign up for Guy's free newsletter at guyraz.com.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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It had tall windows, beautiful old details, and plenty of space for all of us. And being in that home on Airbnb, right in the middle of Vienna, walking distance from so much of the city, made it feel less like a visit and more like we were actually living there. Plus, taking a trip is the perfect time to host your space on Airbnb. Your place with all of its personal touches and its amazing location could make someone else's vacation even better. Your home might be worth more than you think. Find out how much at Airbnb.ca.com slash host. Hello and welcome to the advice line on how I built this lab. I'm Guy Raz. This is the place where we help try to solve your business challenges.

Each week, I'm joined by a legendary founder, a former guest on the show, who will attempt with me to help you. And if you're building something and you need advice, give us a call and you just might be the next guest on the show. Our number is 1-800-433-1298. Send us a one-minute message that tells us about your business and the issues or questions that you'd like help with. You can also send us a voice memo at hibt at ID.wondry.com

and make sure to tell us how to reach you. And also don't forget to sign up. For my newsletter, it's full of insights and ideas from the world's greatest entrepreneurs. You can sign up for free at gairoz.com. And we'll put all this info in the podcast description. All right, let's get to it. My guest today is Sarah Kaus. She's the founder and former CEO of Swell, as in the famous Swell bottles.

Sarah, welcome to the show. Thanks for having me, Guy. I'm thrilled to be here. It's so great to have you back. We first had you on the show, well, the last time, the only time was it was in April of 2020. It was right at the beginning of the pandemic. And it was just kind of a nutty time. I remember you were sitting in like your living room or your house and everybody was freaking out.

Yes. And at that time, I still remember Guy, at that time I thought, wow, this pandemic thing has been going on a few weeks. It feels like forever. I had no idea it was going to change our lives, really, for decades to come. So for those of you who haven't heard the story of Swell, Sarah started it in 2009, basically after getting the idea on a hike that you had a thermos and you took a swig and it was warm water and you thought, why can't bottles keep water cold? So you left your job and then you launched this company. And six years after launching Swell, the company made $100 million in revenue. It's an amazing story full of pivots and problem solving and massive risk-taking.

But eventually, you built it into an incredible business. And by the way, if you listening have not heard the episode, just scroll back and check it out. It's in the podcast queue. But we'll also put a link to it in the show notes. Sarah, you are no longer with Swell, just to be clear, right? Like the company was acquired, I think, two years ago or three years ago? Exactly two years ago. So yeah, I'm a free woman. I sold the business and I'm not associated with the brand at this point anymore. And how does it, how does it feel? I mean, to be, it was your life for, what, 13 years?

Yeah, 13 years it was my life. You know, it's bittersweet. Overriding feeling when I sold the business was relief. I was so proud of the company and the brand and the team. And I was incredibly happy to to, to lay. the plane in a soft place that I knew that this brand that I built and loved would go on, almost like sending a kid off to college, I would say. I was proud of what I had done. I still miss it. I still miss it sometimes. I'm still in contact with some of the team. I obviously still love the brand. I buy at full price now off the website. You don't even get a discount? No. I should have negotiated. All founders out there, when you sell your business, negotiate a lifetime discount because I forgot to ask. for that. I mean, I think Tom Ranks of Sunbum, who was on this show a couple weeks ago, I think

he gets free or discounted suntan lotion forever. Well, he's probably a better negotiator than me. No, I probably, I mean, I probably could ask, but I'm happy to support them. I actually really love what they're doing right now. Yeah. All right. So Sarah, before we get to today's callers, let me ask you a question about positioning, right? Because I think, I think all of our callers today have, you know, unique products that they're trying to position within larger markets. And, you know, I mean, water bottles, even when you started in 2009, I mean, it was already starting to get crowded. And it's, of course, continue to become more and more so, right, with like Stanley Cups and Hydroflasks and Yeti and O'Wallas and everything under the sun. What was your process? Can you remind us of your process of getting your product onto the shelves? Because I know, If I remember correctly, you were in New York City and you went store by store. The idea was you'd get them into Bloomingdale's and then you'd be gangbusters. But that's not how it happened.

No, that's not how it happened. And really for me, Guy, it was a crowded marketplace, but first well, it came down to positioning. I saw a position in the market for a higher quality water bottle, something, again, that kept things hot and cold, but was more of a fashion hydration accessory than something that you would take. to the gym or on a hike. I didn't want something that looked like a camping canteen. I wanted something that looked as elegant that you could buy it in the MoMA design store or, you know, would be in the holiday window at Bloomingdale's, you know, places where we were featured eventually, but you are recalling correctly that in the beginning it was just me hooffing it into stores with

my backpack asking to leave a couple water bottles on a shelf, sometimes even on consignment, just to see if they would sell in those stores. Okay. Um, Sarah, let's take our first call. You ready? I'm ready. All right. Caller number one. I think it's Kiara is our first caller. Hi. Yeah, it's Kiara. Hello. Welcome. Kiara, tell us what you're calling from and just briefly about your business. Okay, cool. I'm so excited. My name is Kiara Moonsie. I'm calling from San Francisco, California. And I'm the co-founder of Chi-G, a breakfast company on a mission to replace oats with chickpeas and all sorts of breakfast foods, but starting with the first ever instant chickpea hot cereal. Nice. Okay,

Chi-Chi is the brand. Yeah. Kiara, can you tell us what's the question that you brought for us today? So my question for you both today is how do we increase our in-store grocery sales as a brand new product that nobody's ever heard about or is really even looking for in the hot cereal category. All right, we'll get to your question in a moment, but let me ask you a couple questions about the brand first. Tell me about the product. So it's oatmeal, right? I'm looking at the website now. It's basically oats that are made from like dehydrated chickpeas. Yeah, exactly. So there's no oats at all. It's just chickpeas. So it's grain free. And tell me about the like the genesis, like the idea. How did this start? Yeah. So it started kind of from a personal experience. I used to eat a ton of oatmeal, like regular oatmeal from the packet, you know, maple brown.

sugar flavor, et cetera. And I would eat that every day. And like an hour after eating that morning oatmeal, I would feel a little tired, a little hungry, like right after. And I realized it didn't have that much protein. I went to Google and saw that people were adding protein powder to the oatmeal, but that ended up making my stomach hurt and tasting really chalky. So then I just kind of looked around actually in the grocery aisle, and I saw chickpeas going into other categories, like pasta. I don't know if you've had like chikpasta. Sure. Yeah. Yeah. All those other chickpea brands. And I said, why aren't chickpeas in the breakfast category? Yeah. That's cool. I mean, chickpea, and you're right. Like oatmeal does, like people think of oatmeal as this really healthy thing. And I

guess there are things about it that are healthy, but oatmeal does spike your blood sugar. For most of your blood, your glucose, for most people. It actually, because it's high in carbohydrates, It's not unhealthy. It's just it can create like a crash, like a couple hours later. Yeah, exactly. And that's a lot of our customers are a diabetic or they do wear those glucose monitors. And they're looking for an alternative to oats. And we're right there. So how did you do it? I mean, tell me, I mean, because I think you're, you just recently graduated from college, right, in the last year or so. Yeah, I graduated less than a year ago. My co-founder is actually still in college. But, We started off, really, in our dorm room, rolling chickpeas with the rolling pin. You would cook the chickpeas and then you just, like, roll them and smash them down?

Yeah, just to make them into an oat shape and then dehydrate them. And that was kind of like our initial version of what this product could look like. And then that worked? I mean, you would basically cook the chickpeas, roll them, dehydrate them, and then when you rehydrated them, it actually kind of had an oatmeal-like texture. Yeah, exactly. Surprisingly, it did. And it almost is a little less mushy than oats. Sometimes people think oats are a little mushy and watery, and the chickpeas kind of hold their shape a little better. All right. And so how did you take the next step? Like, how did you, for example, how did you just finance the first run of this product? So after we had this weird bowl of chickpea mush, basically, yeah, we had to figure out how to commercialize it, how to do our first production run. And the first step was the hardest step of.

making the whole business, which was basically a year of me calling different chickpea farmers, chickpee processors, co-manufacturers to try to get them to produce it at scale. And obviously it was hard because it was just me as like a 22-year-old being like, can you flake chickpeas for me? Can you like make this chickpea oatmeal product? I have this new startup idea. And what I've learned, especially what I've learned on your show is that a lot of times when you start calling co-packers, they don't really give you any time because you're just

a nobody. But after about a year, I did find some great partners to kind of help me scale it. And then, of course, yeah, we needed the money side of things. And as two college students, we had literally no money in the bank at all. But what we did to finance it was actually enter ourselves into a bunch of pitch competitions. And we raised over $100,000 just with pitch competitions that were non-dilutive. And we traveled around just giving our pitch to dozens and dozens of judges. I love that. That's awesome. Congratulations. Let me ask you one more question. I'm going to bring Sarah in. Tell me a little bit about where the product is sold right now. Is it mainly, are you mainly selling direct-to-consumer on your website? Are you in stores?

Yeah. So right now we sell 95% of our products through our own website on Shopify. And then about 5% of our sales are coming from around 30 Los Angeles grocery stores. Awesome. Okay. Sir, do you have any, before we start to tackle her question, do you have any questions for Kiara about the business? Yeah, Kiara. It looks like you're creating an entirely new category, something I feel I have a little bit of experience with. But one of my questions for you is your placement in grocery store. Where are you placed right now today? So right now we're placed in the hot cereal category with the regular old oatmeal, which is actually one of our biggest problems because a lot of our customers actually don't eat oatmeal because

they might be diabetic or gluten-free. So they're not even in the category. Yeah. I see. And I'm on your website now. Is your product gluten-free? I don't see that it says it on the packaging yet. Yeah, it is gluten-free. Well, I know in my local grocery store, which is a which is a Wegmans, a nice big chain here on the East Coast, that they have a gluten-free section of the grocery store. So I was thinking, just looking, you have beautiful packaging, by the way. Kiera, I was just looking at your website. I was thinking if you could more prominently display that this is a gluten-free item and get that on the front of your packaging, that could be really

helpful. Actually, we are kind of in the midst of updating our packaging, so it will say gluten-free on the front. And then another change that we're making is instead of calling it oatmeal, we're actually changing the name to hot cereal because we found that a lot of our consumers were confused about why we were calling an oatmeal because there's no oats in it. Yeah. So, all right, so your question is how do you increase grocery sales, right? And you're mainly in grocery stores, you said, in Los Angeles right now? Yeah, exactly. So I'm mainly interested in learning how to increase sales when we're already on the shelf. Like, how do we get random shoppers to pull our product off the shelf. I think something, Sarah, something you said, which I think is critical, is that this

is like a brand new, this is an invention. This is something that doesn't exist. Do you have any competition? Are there any other brands that are making chickpea hot cereal? No, we're the first chickpea hot cereal, which is why we're very urgently trying to move fast so we can be kind of the chickpea oatmeal. Yeah. I mean, Sarah, I mean, I think about you going door to door in New York with swell bottles. To me, it seems like this is, it's a no-brainer for samples, right? To sort of, and that costs money to get people to do the samples in stores. But to me, it seems like kind of this product is kind of screaming out for a sample table.

Have you guys done some of that in the grocery stores? Yeah, we have started doing that. And that's like basically where all of our sales come from is when somebody's in there doing samples. So we're trying to ramp that up a bit. And we're also planning to hopefully do some, like, right now we sell in five serving bags, which is a pretty big bag. So we might start selling in single serve pouches so that we can just hand out samples to people as well. That's great. Yeah, I think sampling is a wonderful idea because the more you can have people taste your product, know that it's not only healthy, but it's delicious would be, I think, a wonderful idea.

Kiaro, if you could be on any shelf or any part of grocery store, where would you want the product to be? I don't really, I think I would want us to be in hot cereal, I think. I don't really see any alternative to that. Yeah, I mean, it's like plant milks. You know, many plant milks want to be or beyond meat. You know, they want to be where the meat is and plant milks want to be where the milk is. And it makes, to me, makes a lot of sense that this would be exactly where you would go and look for oatmeal. But I do think that you have an opportunity, and it sounds like you're moving that direction,

to really emphasize things like, you know, a hot cereal, take out oatmeal, grain-free is great. 10 grams of protein, that's a lot of protein, you know, and I feel like that could pop a little bit more. Protein is really, I feel like protein is the new gluten-free. You know, it's just in everything now. So to me, that's a huge selling point, you know, high-protein, high-fiber is another thing. people are really excited about fiber, six grams of fiber per serving, that's a lot. I mean, that's great, you know, and I feel like that is, especially as people are getting more interested in gut microbiome and gut health. I mean, fiber protein, I'd slap both of those

on the front. Yeah, I think you're so right. My advice would also to try to find your influencers, not necessarily the big brand name influencers, but the hyperlocal influencers that care about fiber, protein, glucose, the more that you can get individuals to really share within their local communities to go and find this product on your website or in their local grocery store, I think it'll extend your reach. Because my example is with Swell, we sold over 50 million of our original Swell bottles before we spent a dollar on marketing. We asked our consumers to get out there, take the product, and to ask other consumers to give it a try. And the more that you can do that before you know what, those people are going to be organically sharing on

their stories as well. Yeah. And this, again, I mean, you have a product that is differentiated. No one's making it right now, but it means something really critical. And I don't know if you heard our episode with Magic Spoon, but if you haven't heard it, it's worth listening to. That is a, you know, it's a grain-free, sugar-free breakfast. They use allulose, and they use, like, weigh protein to create this puffed breakfast cereal.

that tastes like cocoa puffs or fruity pebbles or whatever. Well, the minute that they put that out and into the marketplace, there were a bunch of other competitors that some came just right before, some came after. You are going to have competition. And so you're right to try and get this out there quickly. I think that there's an argument to be made that you should also concurrently. And Sarah, you might disagree with me here because you didn't do this.

look for some more capital, look for investors. Sarah didn't do it. You never did it. You scaled your company without investors. It's an amazing story. But I think maybe in this case, it could be worthwhile. Do you have a different take, Sarah? I'm not anti-investment. In the last few years, I've been working as an advisor and a board member to a bunch of companies. I'm even an investor myself now in a bunch of companies. I'm not anti-investment. I can see what capital smartly apply to good brands at the appropriate times can do. So, you know, just be cautious and make sure you're using the capital appropriately. You're still thinking about your margins and your burn and try to find someone that can help you with the spend. You know, hopefully it's someone that's

actually, you know, done something in a category similar adjacent to yours. In addition to capital, they bring, you know, some other help in sales or other resources. Okay, great. Kiara, it's awesome. Congratulations on the brand on Chi Chi. We're going to be following. I mean, I'm going to look out for it. I know in a short period of time, I'm going to see it all over the place. Congratulations. Thank you so much.

Thanks so much for having me on the show. Thanks, thanks, Kira. It's cool. I mean, it's a great idea. Yeah. I love the thinking behind it because there is, right, there's chickpeas now and everything. But not on breakfast yet. Not in breakfast cereal, not in hot cereal and pasta.

and cookies and crackers. But yeah, that's cool. Started in a dorm room. Some of the best things are started in a dorm room. Yeah. I love it. Okay, Sarah, we're going to take a quick break. But when we come back, we will be talking to a caller who is looking to bring greeting cards

inspired by his Latino heritage to national retailers. Stick around. I'm Guy Raz. You're listening to the advice line right here on how I built this lab. Hello, welcome back to How I Built This Lab Advice Line. I'm Guy Raz, and joining me to take calls today is Sarah Kaus, the founder of Swell. All right, why don't we bring in our next caller? Hello, caller number two, is it Jesus online?

Hello, Guy, hi, Sarah. Hello, Jesus, hello, welcome. Tell us your name where you're calling, well, you know your name, but tell us your full name, where you're calling from and a little bit about your business. Yes, so my name is Jesus Rolkava. I'm calling from Salinas, California, and my business is, paper tacos greeting cards. So paper tacos are cards that are rooted in Latino culture and tradition. Nice. Okay, cool. So greeting cards rooted in Latino culture and tradition. What's your question?

The question that I have is, how can I tell the importance of representations that paper tacos greeting cards brings beyond Latino specialty stores? Got it. Okay. Let's talk about your story first. So what was going on? in your life when you started this company? What were you doing? Yeah, so I started the company in 2017 and, you know, I've been a designer for the last 20 years. I was working at Healer Packard at the time. But as a designer, I got to a certain point where I felt the need for something creative where I wasn't bound by guidelines from big brands. And, you know, it started because my mom's birthday was actually coming up and I went to a local grocery store to look for a greeting card for her. And my mom's, you know, first generation immigrant here,

United States only speak Spanish. And I was happy to see, you know, a wide selection of Spanish cards, but I didn't really see anything that resonated with me, like in the sense of like a culture or traditions or, you know, from the Latino experience. And so that's kind of got me thinking, we're so much more than just Spanish language. You could incorporate our food, you could incorporate our music. There's, you know, even within Latinos, there's so much diversity from what country you come from. And even here in the United States, my mom being first generation

versus me being second generation and first born here, were so different. And so, you know, just by using Spanish, I felt that there's still a lot more that could be represented there. And that's how the idea started

and I started doing it on the side. I'm looking at the site. And these illustrations are so fun. They're so cool. Do you do all the illustrations? Yeah, about 90% of them are done by me. Now I'm partnering with other Latino artists, which helped me produce some of the cards.

They're so bright and joyful. And like some of the cards, I mean, some of them are in English, like have a flannastic birthday, which I love because I love making flan. And then some are in Spanish, but everybody knows what Feliz Cumblianos means, right? I mean, so tell me who in your mind is the ideal customer for your products. Yeah, so the ideal customer would be, I think someone, exactly like me, like born in the United States, still has really strong cultural ties to their background,

speaks both English and Spanish. So throughout the day, they're switching back and forth. And not only people that are shopping at, you know, like I mentioned, Latino specialty stores, but, you know, I shop at Target and I shop at Walmart. So I would like to see more of that representation there. So that's like the type of people that I'm targeting for my products. All right, let's bring Sarah in to the conversation.

I still have a bunch of questions, but Sarah, you probably do too. Yeah. So I'm on your Instagram and, man, you have some amazing designs. I'm with Guy. They just make me smile. They're bright and they're happy. I'm a card writer. I write cards.

I travel with cards. I write them all the time. And I already have some cards that I'm looking forward to sending. You've done such a nice job here. Thank you. What's the experience been with the retailers that you're with currently? I'd love to just understand a little bit about the experience that you've had with selling so far. Yeah, I mean, so far, the majority are Latino specialty stores.

So, like, because within the Latino specialty stores, they get it right away. They know what I'm doing. And the products sell very well there. But it's when I'm trying to explain to other people that aren't from that background where some of that story gets lost or they're not really grasping with the benefit that they would have by doing this. One of the things that I really love about what you're doing here is that it's also it's sort of like a third culture. It's not your mom's culture. It's yours.

And kids like you. I say kids. Children who were born in the United States to immigrants, right? And the jokes and the art and the sort of aesthetic, essentially what you're saying is like this appeals to us. And we're talking about an enormous potential market, right? we're talking about tens of millions of Americans who trace their heritage back to Mexico or Latin America. Yeah. So like according to the U.S. census, Latinos make up 20% of the U.S. population. So one in five, you could think of it that way. So it's the market's really big. And the trend in that market is young. So 60% of that population is under 35. So you. Yeah, so born here, raised here, but still culturally very tied to their roots of where they came from.

So feedback I get from customers that see my cards is an immediate reaction of nostalgia. Like, oh, I remember my dad used to say that or my grandma does that. All of these great reactions that immediately has a connection for them as a buyer. And they know that as a sender to that recipient, they're going to get that same. exact reaction. I'd love to pick up on that thread that the guy just put out there and maybe pull that a little bit because I think that there is sort of this second idea that these aren't just Spanish language cards that you're making. And I wonder when you're in pitching these larger retail stores, I wonder if you lead with the cards that even, you know,

Sarah Kaus that doesn't speak Spanish will will smile and understand. And why, to send off to friends. So that way you almost have a starter conversation. And then you can explain the whole that paper tacos is actually filling in their clientele, because all of that great data, Jesus, that you just explained, maybe is it fully understood by all of the card buyers at all of these chains? But I wonder if you led with something that was more mainstream-ish that could really cross that divide that we're talking about. Yeah, I really really like that idea. One of the things we noticed when we went to the trade show is they like, again, like the colorful illustrations and the envelopes are really bright and stuff,

but then they're like, what does this say? And, you know, so I had to like translate it on the spot for them and kind of give them the background. So some good feedback we got there was like, oh, you know, you should put the translation like on the back so we're starting to do that. But an idea that came out of that was like, hey, we should have like a subsection that, like, Latino inspired, right? They're in English, but they're Latino inspired. And those could maybe be targeted, tells those stores that, you know, they might be in English, but they have some type of cultural reference in the artwork or something like that. I feel also like you should think regionally, at least initially, right? Because there are parts of the United States where Spanish is widely understood.

And so I feel like maybe your target in terms of retailers, like you're already in these sort of Latino specialty markets in California. But I also think like, you know, H.E.B. in Texas, you know, like because in Texas, most people are going to understand these cards. You know, and as you know, there are third, fourth, fifth generation Mexican Americans in Texas who don't speak any Spanish but might still really love this stuff, right? So, again, I think that you want to kind of think, okay, Texas, California, Arizona, you know, sort of those areas where you have this really interesting third culture. Yeah, for sure. And, you know, looking at sales, because we also sell direct to consumer through our site, you could see like where, you know, we have the majority of our sales. So like California, you know, Texas. So, yeah, so I think that's a good place to start with those type of stores. Sarah, I have a question for you. I mean, because you obviously were very successful in getting your product into lots and lots of retailers, right?

And obviously, every product is different. How would you approach a retailer around something like this? Because you would, you know, certainly in California, Texas and other parts of the United States, you would think that there's a natural audience and market for a price. product like this. I agree. I would really try to tell your story, Hesus. I would say to go deeper into your background and story just the way that you've explained to Guy and I today, but concisely in a way that a retailer could picture showing this at the front of the store on their website and maybe one of their marketing mailers, if you show your face, you show your story and show

some of your cards, I think that the second page, the second topic you would go into with that retailer is their story. What does this mean for them? You know, touching on the price point, the margin, the story and the success that you've just told that how well that you're doing at regional retailers and how much of a part of the business it could be by being a unique part of their assortment in the store and that gap that you're filling for them. And then finally, I think really you could show what the materials could look like in store. Make it as easy as possible for the targets of the world to say yes to you. Show what that. that assortment could be, show what the point of sale material would look like, really make it

a whole concise package that the buyer could just look at and say, yes, how many can you make and how soon can you be in the door? Got it, yeah. I really appreciate that advice. Thank you. It's such a cool idea. It's called Paper Tacos. Hey, Zeus, thank you so much for calling in.

Good luck. It's awesome. Congrats. Thank you, Guy. Thank you, Sarah. I really appreciate the advice. congrats. I mean, the cool thing about these cards is that you don't,

like you don't have to be fluent in Spanish to understand. I mean, the visuals are clear. They're super fun. They're really cool. I think he's doing amazing things. Oh, by the way, Hases, I think you need to post more on your Instagram. You have a lot of followers. So I know you're wearing a lot of hats as an entrepreneur,

but I just, you should, yeah, make those 30,000 people buy a card this week. Yes, exactly. All right, Sarah, we're going to take another quick brainstorm. But just ahead, we're going to hear from another caller who just launched a brand of razors for men, but not to shave their faces instead to shave another body part. Stay with us. I'm Guy Raz, and you're listening to the advice line here on how I built this lab. Welcome back to the advice line on how I built this lab. I'm Guy Raz. And with me is Sarah Kouse, founder of Swell. All right, let's take another call. Hello, caller. Is it Adam? It is. It is.

Adam, please introduce yourself. Tell us where you're calling from and just briefly about your business. Yeah, hello. My name is Adam Barker. I'm calling in from Salt Lake City, Utah. I'm the founder of Bolt Skin and Shave, and we produce razors and shave products as the first brand for men who shave their legs. For men who shave their legs. That's right. That's right. We're here. We're finally here. Amazing. I have a million questions for you. Okay. First of all, what question have you brought for us today? Yeah, so we are incredibly new. We just launched three weeks ago, and I'm really focused on growth. What kind of growth profile should we be pursuing? Are we growing at all costs? Are we burning hot trying to grow quickly? Or are we trying to take a more linear approach and focus on profitability first? Yeah. All right. Okay, we'll get to your question a moment. I've got a million questions for you. First of all, how did this idea come about? I'm assuming you're a man and you shave your legs. Yes, yes. So I've been a cyclist most of my life, you know, for the better part of my adult life, I have shaved my legs. And I've used a pink razor and a bar of soap. And finally, I was like, I think there's got to be a better way. All right. I'm going to ask you such a dumb question. I'm going to get heaped with abuse. But why do cyclists need to shave their legs? What advances to give them? So there's a lot of perceived reasons out there. I mean, at the very top of the top, the biggest competitors, the professionals,

there is a power advantage to shaving your legs. Wow. Right? Even with this micro millimeter of hair that gives you a power advantage? Yeah, it's wild. It's wild. They've done tests in wind tunnels and over the course of a 40K race, you know, 40 kilometers, you can save up to 82 seconds, I want to say, the statistics.

So there is that. But honestly, for 99% of us that ride our bikes, even if you're a very advanced damage, let's say, it's a cultural thing, right? When you get into riding road bikes or mountain bikes or gravel, whatever it might be. You want to show off those calves. You want to show off those quads. We've been working hard on that. So it's aesthetics.

And then to be perfectly honest, the most functional reason is if you spend enough time on two wheels, you're going to spend some time down on the ground. And when you crash and you get all scraped up, it's no fun picking hair out of your wounds. And it's also easier to clean up. As a mountain biker, let's say, you come in at the end of the day, it's a whole lot easier to clean up. But the honest truth is, is like you just kind of, a lot of guys do it from a functional standpoint, and then you just like it. You like how it looks. You like how it feels. I'm telling you, you'll never sleep better than the night when you shave your legs and you slip into the sheets. It's the best sleep you'll ever have.

I believe that. Because, yeah, because it does get, yeah, I mean, I'm kicking the blanket off at night sometimes. It's hot. Let's get you taken care of, smoothed up. And I sleep on one of those mattresses that cools you down. But that makes a lot of sense. So, all right. So you saw an opportunity basically to enter this space saying, hey, there's no razors for men who want to shave their legs. I'm going to create one. Tell me what you were, and you just launched it. What were you doing up until this point? Or what are, what are? What are? What? What are? What? What's your profession? So for the past 15 years, I've made my living as a professional photographer in the active lifestyle and outdoor space. So a lot of skiing, a lot of fly fishing. I've traveled the world from Antarctica to Southeast Asia. I work for brands in the active lifestyle and outdoor space like Traeger and Yeti Lifestraw,

Skechers. That's awesome. Yeah. Sarah, this has got to be right up your alley because this is a consumer product that could go on a shelf that, I mean, right? So what do you think? I love it. Adam, congratulations on your brand. I love everything that you've just said. I've just checked out your website. What I love about what we're talking about is that this is a great solve for a personal problem that impacts many other people as well. You made this product for yourself. And I'm not worried that the market's too

small. I love the fact that you're creating something that's niche. But at the same time, you never know how big the market is. This could be the first razor that women steal from the men, right? Like you said you didn't want to use the pink razor anymore. Well, you know, you just don't know the women might start using the bolt razor. So it doesn't concern me the size of the market. What I love about it is that you are the consumer and you're creating this to solve your problem, but then it's also going to solve the problem for others at the same time.

Yeah. And thank you, first of all, Sarah. It's so great to meet you. I'm a huge fan of your story. I'm a huge fan of your hustle. Thanks. Very inspiring. But you're spot on.

You know, we launched three weeks ago, and our reviews are just now starting to trickle in. And a lot of those reviews say, now my wife is stealing my razor. Because it actually, it functions so well. One of the biggest differences in our razor is that the cartridge is tuned for coarser laycare. So the product, yes, we're targeting men, but I believe there will be an underground movement where women are finally stealing the razor from their men instead of the other way around. Adam, how did you finance this? Friends of Family Round.

I raised just under $400,000 in about the last year. Wow. Yeah, it was... Was it hard or was it... I mean, that's great. It was very hard. In fact, I'd say 75% of that just around $400K came in the last 90 days of me raising over the last year. So there was a lot of...

I have this idea. I've got my manufacturers. I know what my costs are. I have to launch in April. We had a hard launch date for a huge trade show and event that we were going to. And it was a little bit of field of dreams where if you build it, they will come. And I just committed. And then what better motivator than bills coming in to raise some money.

Do you, I read here on your site that you are X games gold medalists. So, I mean, you're a serious athlete. And one of the cool things about being a serious athlete is you can connect with others. Like I think about, you know, we have an episode of the show on Theraguns. And, you know, Jason Wersland, who started that brand, he really got it in the hands of athletes. Or Gary Erickson, who started Cliff Bar, who was on this show in the advice line a couple weeks ago. And, you know, he's a cyclist. And he gave his bars out to every cyclist.

You went to every cycling event and gave that cliff bars as a cliff bar tent. I mean, you, because of your, you are an athlete, in addition to being a photographer, like you need to be giving away a significant amount of product like now, you know, already. Obviously, you want to make money, but you need to basically say, okay, I'm going to give away $25,000 worth of this stuff and do it really, really strategically. Sarah, I think this was kind of pivotal for you. You basically gave a swell bottle to everybody, every attendee at TED. So in their gift bag, they got a swell bottle that said, Ted, you know, whatever, 2010 or something. I used to go.

And so I have a bunch of these. But I think that proved to be a transformational decision, even though it cost you a lot of money. Is that right? That's right, Guy. We worked with the TED conference for probably 10 years. And it was expensive when they first called Adam. it was a very big decision for me to donate, you know, 2,000 bottles and, you know, pay for the shipping and all of that. But it was a big decision. But how do you get in front of your core market? You know, for us, it was it was the Tedsters, as they call themselves, you know, the early adopters of technology and design.

But, but for you, Adam, it's those athletes, you know, so it could seem like a big part of the money that you just preciously, earns, you know, and I congratulations on your 400,000. And I'd be very careful on giving that away. But I absolutely agree with Guy that you really do need to find out, you know, who are your influencers? And how do you ask them to not just use the product at home, but to post about it? So those in their community will find out about it as well. It really helps you extend your reach in a way that is really imperative at this early stage for you. You know, I actually come from that world. Working as a photographer, I would see the people that were in charge of marketing for the companies that I would shoot for. And as a new brand and a very bootstrapy brand right now, I'm super sensitive to asking people for something without being able to offer them something in return beyond just product. And so Sarah, I wonder, or guy, if you guys can speak to, you know, what is a good give back? How can I, how can I give without writing a massive? check because to some of these athletes, you know, they're willing to do it. And to others,

they definitely need some money behind that, which we don't have yet. And I'm sensitive to that, to that ask of wanting something for nothing. My answer to that is to find lower tier athletes, not lower tier, but athletes who are who are more like you. It's like you don't go to the, the winner of the Tour de France, right? But you go to, I mean, there are Iron Man triathlon all over the country. There are all kinds of local competitions. Like, I mean, you're in, you're in Salt Lake City. Yep. I mean, there have to be, you know, dozens of cycling and running events every weekend, starting in a spring in, you know, all through the fall in Utah. So I feel like it's those kinds of athletes that could at least initially have an impact. And also, you know, there are lots of, I mean, there are. And then, enormous number of people on social media, right, who have 100,000 followers. And they're not, these are sort of more micro-influencers who still are influential. They're still reaching a

significant number of people. I have to agree with you, Guy. I think it's those 100,000 influencers, those micro-influencers that were the most impactful for us as well. And, you know, maybe they do it for a free razor. Maybe they do it for just show. that they're tapped into what's new in their community. But I do think that having those hyper-local influencers are going to be really useful to you, Adam. You might actually have some top-tier athletes that find your product and post, unbeknownst to you. They might buy it themselves. They might find it and then post about it. But I think the more you can ask for help from your community along the way, I think that's helpful. Another idea for you I had was maybe trying to find some

some partners to help you co-market and extend your reach, maybe other brands that are in the fitness industry that they're doing gifting, maybe a subscription gift box that you could join without all of the expense yourself. Yeah, that's fantastic advice. And in fact, to your point, I just got back from the St. George Iron Man last week. We were there last weekend. We've exhibited, you know, what I'm finding is that in-person activations right now are the key, is having people handle our product. Our razor feels different. It's quite weighty. Right. And so getting that in-person exposure, nobody can sell it like the founder. By the way, when you're going to those events, are you shaving legs on site? So that was the plan. I actually, we have a leg barbershop theme

booth. It's awesome. I love that. I actually found a 1920s barber chair on Facebook marketplace. I got it re-opulstered in our branding with blue vinyl. and a big yellow embroidered bee. It weighs about a billion pounds. So I didn't take it to St. George because I couldn't move it myself. The plan was to shave legs at our launch. We didn't quite get there. We had a ton of people ask.

So it's in process. And that's going to be so awesome on social media. I mean, that is the kind of stuff that you're going to want to film. You're going to want to put that across all the channels. You're going to want pictures of guys getting their legs shaped on the site. because that's the kind of thing that pops. I mean, it's so fun. It's kind of weird and quirky, but it's cool.

But Adam, I realized we haven't actually answered your question yet, which was should you just try to grow, grow, grow, grow fast, or try to focus on profitability and take it slowly? This is a great question. I'm really glad you're thinking about this. Sarah, I mean, you grew really slowly until you grew really fast. We grew really slowly and then really fast. however, we were always profitable. And I have to say, I started my life and my career, Adam, as a CPA, and as an accountant. And I was afraid of debt. And I absolutely think you should dream big. But I would caution you to think about profitability. Don't be afraid of those marketing giveaways. You have to feed the brand.

But at the same time, this isn't a story of growth at all costs because you really want to stay in this for the long term. This is going to be a long bike race for you and you don't want to run out of cash early on. So I would do both. And I know that that's a cheater answer, but think big, but let's think about profitability at the same time that you're doing all the really sexy things to build this brand. That's such great advice. I really appreciate your encouraging words. I do believe that we have a great opportunity here. What we're finding is that a lot of men, we're taking an activity that for the men that do it, it has largely been totally overlooked and unacknowledged, and we're turning it into an experience. You know, we have not just a razor, but we've got

shaved products. We've got an exfoliating leg scrub, a shave butter, a post-shaved lotion, a CBD recovery balm. And these all create an experience around an activity that's kind of been in the closet for a lot of guys. So it's answering those needs and then some. So, and I really appreciate the methodical approach that you took. And I mean, I, I, Of course, I've raised this money. We had to spend a lot of it, right? CPG startups are stupid expensive. I couldn't believe it.

I spent $100,000 on stuff you can squeeze into your hand, you know? But I do have a little bit of runway that I'm clutching so tightly too. And it's hard for me to wrap my head around letting go with that. But I am a marketer. I believe in marketing. You've got to spend money to make money, but I got to find a responsible way to do it, you know? And you will. And again, shave legs, man.

You got to go out and just shave legs, film it. I want to see that all over social media. We'll do that. You got to go to our website and watch our launch video. It's an AA-style support group for men who shave their legs. It's hilarious. I love that. That is great.

That is great. Adam, congrats, bolt, skin, and shave. Good luck. Keep us posted. Thank you, Guy. Thank you, Sarah. So appreciate you having me on the show. I appreciate your advice.

Good luck, Adam. Guy, you're a good market. I love that you thought of that idea about the shaving legs on site. I mean, wouldn't you watch that if you saw the video, be like, wait, what's going on? Look at all these, like, jacked dudes getting their legs shaved. And then you find out that actually helps them with their aerodynamics. Showing off their muscles at the same time. I mean, I live in the Bay Area, you know, and there's a lot of hills around here.

And I see these cyclists just going up these grueling hills, you know, and you're just like, now I'm going to look at their legs because he's probably right. Most of these guys probably shaving their legs. I never paid attention. I will have to watch. You learn something new every episode. Sarah Kaus, founder of Swell, thank you so much for coming back onto the show. Thanks for having me, Guy. It was fun to spend some time with you. And by the way, if you haven't heard Sarah's episode, the story of Swell, go back and check it out. It's an awesome story. You can just scroll up and find it in our podcast keyword, even easier. We will put a link in the podcast description.

Also, it'll be in our newsletter this week, so check it out. You can sign up for our newsletter at guyraz.com. It's free. It comes out every week, and I think it's pretty good. And thank you for listening to the show this week. If you are working on a business and you'd like to be on the show, send us a one-minute message that tells us about your business and any questions or issues or challenges or problems or crises that you would like help with.

We will try and do our best to solve them. And also make sure to tell us how to reach you because some people don't, and then we can't call you back. You can send us a voice memo at hibt at id.wonderry.com, or you can call 1-800-433-1298 and leave a message there. And we'll put all of this in the show notes. So if you don't write it down like me, then you can just scroll down and see it there. Thanks. We'll be back next week. See you then.

This episode was produced by Chris Messini with music composed by Ramtina Rablui. He was edited by John Isabella. Our audio engineer was Neil Rouch. Our production staff also includes Alex Chung, Carla Estevez, Casey Herman, Elaine Coates, J.C. Howard, Catherine Seifer, Carrie Thompson, Eva Grant, and Sam Paulson. I'm Guy Raz, and you've been listening to The Advice Line here on How I Built This Lab.