The Skinny Confidential Him & Her Podcast - The Ultimate Guide To Business Success From A Multi-Million Dollar Founder -Morgan Zanotti Of Primal Kitchen

Episode Date: November 1, 2024

#771: Join us as we sit down with Morgan Zanotti – former President & Co-Founder of Primal Kitchen, one of the fastest-growing brands in the natural food industry. Having led Primal Kitchen to exceed over $200M in retail sales in just seven years, Morgan reveals her insights on building & selling a successful business. In this episode, Morgan shares how she navigated strategic business partnerships, the challenges of growing a retail brand, & offers an insider perspective on selling a multi-million dollar business to one of the World’s largest food & beverage companies!   To connect with Primal Kitchen click HERE   To connect with Morgan Zanotti click HERE   To connect with Lauryn Bosstick click HERE   To connect with Michael Bosstick click HERE   Read More on The Skinny Confidential HERE   To Watch the Show click HERE   For Detailed Show Notes visit TSCPODCAST.COM   To Call the Him & Her Hotline call: 1-833-SKINNYS (754-6697)   This episode is brought to you by The Skinny Confidential   Head to the HIM & HER Show ShopMy page HERE to find all of Michael and Lauryn’s favorite products mentioned on their latest episodes.   Visit primalkitchen.com/skinny and use code SKINNY for 20% of your online order.    Produced by Dear Media

The following podcast is a Dear Media production. She's a lifestyle blogger extraordinaire. Fantastic. And he's a serial entrepreneur. A very smart cookie. And now Lauren Everts and Michael Bostic are bringing you along for the ride. Get ready for some major realness. Welcome to The Skinny Confidential, him and her.

Aha! If you want to sell your company, in the end of the day, you really need to figure out what the strategic or the private equity buyer wants, right? So when we sold the company, we had never done a dollar through the register at Costco, Walmart, or Target. So when we're going to pitch selling the company, there's so much white space. You're really selling white space. You got to leave something for them. You either got to leave it in distribution or you got to leave it in innovation. Hello, everybody. Welcome back to the Skinny Confidential, him and her show. Today, we have Morgan Zanotti on the show. She is the president and co-founder of Primal Kitchen, one of the fastest growing brands in

the natural products industry. Morgan had a front row seat along with our friend Mark Sisson in building an absolute behemoth in the retail space. Primal Kitchen went on to exit to craft for over $200 million, which is an incredible story that we get into here. We have had a relationship with Morgan and Mark for a few years now and thought it would be great to get her on the show. She's got a ton of business insight for anyone that's looking to build a brand, build a business, scale that business, work with people, build a business culture, and even just find a path for their dream career. There's a ton to unpack in this episode. Morgan is a wealth of knowledge. We could have talked to her all day long. With that,

Morgan, welcome to Skinny Confidential, him and her show. This is the Skinny Confidential, him and her. How does one set out to sell their company for $200 million to craft? When you started doing this, was that even a seed in your head? Yes, in the sense that when we launched, Mark was very transparent with me. Look, there's like no margin in the food industry. So you're lucky if you break even. Most companies that you see on the grocery store that are growing fast are like pretending they're crushing it, but really they're like burning massive amounts of money, probably running at sometimes negative gross margins, which means they're actually losing money in the unit economics of every item they sell.

They're funded by like private equity funds. And I think it's kind of just like a private equity circle jerk, if you will. Like you saw it with the plant-based food movement, right? Like they all raised all this money. And then all these marketing dollars flooded the market. And there was this big like consumer hype around plant-based food. And then they ran out of private equity money. And then the company's like, don't have any sales now. So when we launched, we were very transparent. Mark said to me in 2015, we launched the company. I like never let him live this down. If we could just sell this for 30 million one day, I would be happy. And then like a year later, he's like, if we could just sell this for a hundred, I'd

be happy. And then knowing Mark, Mark, that wouldn't have satisfied your lifestyle. No, buddy. No, that wasn't enough. If you're listening, we can go back to the poor house. I know Mark. No, he's good. He's pretty.

I remember talking to him early on and being like, so what if it all went away? And he's like, well, I would just like wake up, do the crossword puzzle, go get a coffee, like make love to my wife and like, I'd be fine. Like it would all he, I think he has a good perspective. I'm just like, he's the best. I love people like that. It's like, what if instead of having anxiety about it all going away, you apply what you've learned to like the next day and you just start over and pick it up again. Yeah. So so when he comes to you and says he has this idea or do you go to him? What's the story? So I will give you like the quick story. I mean, I have an accounting degree. I grew up in Chicago eating like bagel bites and

s'mores, Pop-Tarts and all that. Had my own kind of like every story like you've seen that meme where it's like, oh, my kid like pooped blood. And then I launched a snack like every healthy food company. but I had like Mark had IBS there was some like health stuff there I ran marketing for a brand I lived in South America got an accounting degree quit my job like to waitress I just had this crazy like experience in my 20s I lived in South America for two and a half years where I was like everywhere 315 hours on a bus from like Argentina to the southern tip of Ushuaia you were scrappy I was super scrappy. That was like

my favorite word in business. Yeah. Just enjoying. I quit my accounting job and I was like, I'm moving to Argentina and I was supposed to stay six months, met three girls from Ireland and traveled for like two years. Yeah. And then I got my yoga certification in Hawaii and then I came home and I was like, oh my God, all my friends have jobs. Like I have no idea what I'm doing with my life. You know, I'm so lost. Started seeing my dad's therapist and just kind of like figured it out. I ended up learning how to surf when I lived in South America. So I came back home. I had dated this guy who was like a lot younger than me when I was living in South America.

He was from Santa Barbara. I'd never been to California. I surfed Lake Michigan in the winter. You have to surf like windswell with like a hood and like the whole wetsuit, booties, everything. Yeah, it is like a giant, like there was ice floating. it's a lot like a cold punch but i was protected i was wearing wetsuits so i'm not as diehard as you guys are listen i'm not surfing in ice yeah i guess it's like two minutes yeah surfing and ice i had icicles like hanging from my you're not doing that you're not surfing and i like intense you're not surfing in warm water when you say you went

to your dad's therapist why are you going to your dad's therapist what was the reason because you didn't feel like you had any no I just came home and I was like I don't belong anywhere like what am I doing I'm behind in life you know like the feelings you just have in your 20s you like you think you're behind all your friends like I don't know you just the normal feelings my dad's like listen I had a midlife crisis or a quarter-life crisis like you got to go see David Roadhouse. So I started seeing this like really cool therapist who was like Stanford theology, like worked at Rush Hospital, helped like transition people to death and then realized

like Christianity wasn't really providing like the right medium to help with that and got super into Buddhism. So my dad was like downtown Chicago. I don't know how we're here, but my dad was downtown Chicago, like financial advisor, but waking up every morning, like meditating when I was growing up. And that was because of this guy, David. And David, he has he's like really old. He married my husband and he's probably like 80 now. He's great. So he started to be my therapist at that point in my life. And I feel like that was kind of like pivotal for me like does he implement Buddhism in your routine through therapy I mean not really but like that would be maybe his like general approach but he sees like if you guys know who Richard Melvin is he's one of the most successful like restaurateurs he started lettuce entertain you which is like a huge like it's a

huge Chicago restaurant company he has got some clients like that guy is public but he has some other like really successful clients in like the wine industry and whatnot so I think he does well with like he called me triple type a once but I think he does well with like some triple type triple type a yeah I was like I don't even I feel like I'm so I don't know that Michael's triple type a I feel like you're double type a triple type I'm like actually quite laid back so I don't know like what he meant by that a lot of energy and like a lot of like ambition so so at what at what point does something crack with your career where you where i meet mark so yeah so i moved to california because this boyfriend he was like in santa barbara i come out the young guy the young guy yeah that i met in mexico the really young guy i'm just

kidding yeah totally really young guy that i met in mexico was fun you know while it lasted and then um came out to California and I was like, oh my God, I'm moving here, like done. So I moved two months later and I was running, I like reached out on LinkedIn to a sales. I love this brand Kavita. Do you guys remember? Yeah. So I reached out on LinkedIn to someone who worked there and I was like, do you guys have any job openings? And they were like, oh yeah, talk to the, talk to like, we're actually hiring a marketing director. And I had like no business being the marketing director for Covita. I had worked at an agency and managed the Frito-Lay account and they hired me. They were like sub 10 million in revenue,

running the business out of a garage, crazy environment. And I stepped in and ran marketing for them for like all of seven months. And then I met Mark because I knew who he was. I was like a follower. I had my own, you know, health revelations, right? So I was a follower of Mark. He had his blog at the time and that was like kind of it. And he had this event, Primal Con, where everyone would like come,

run around barefoot, play Ultimate Frisbee and like eat paleo food with Mark. He was ahead of the curve, man. He was way ahead of the curve. Wow, fuck. And for the, I mean, Mark has been on the show multiple times. Mark and his wife, Carrie, have been on the show.

Primal Kitchen, Mark, Mark's Daily Apple. You guys Mark and his wife, Carrie, have been on the show. Primal Kitchen, Mark. Mark's Daily Apple. You guys should go listen to it. I just want to make sure. My ketchup that I eat. My avocado mayo that I have. He's also a friend. Yes.

Yeah. Okay. So he was way ahead of that and you attended one of the events? No, we sponsored it at Kavita. Got it. And I didn't need to go. I could have just sent the marketing director, but I wanted to meet him. So I went and I met Mark and Carrie. And then at the end of the night, I was like, do you guys need to ride home to your hotel I could have just like sent the marketing director, but I wanted to meet him. So I went and I like met Mark and Carrie.

And then at the end of the night, I was like, do you guys need to ride home to your hotel? And they were like, yeah. So they like hopped in my Ford Escape. I like dropped him off at the hotel. I quit Kavita. I'm on a surf trip with my now husband, who is not young. This is a different guy. And we're like in living in a juicy van for a week, surfing from San Francisco down to San Diego.

And Mark calls out of nowhere. And he's like, hey, this like food company, do you think you could come meet with me like he didn't know anyone in the food and beverage industry so I started like our first meeting he was going to call the brand Primal Blueprint which is the name of his book and I was like that's a terrible name you should call it Primal Kitchen and I'll never forget I always give him shit about this he was like that he's like oh this meeting was worthwhile and I was like yes you asshole this meeting was worthwhile before I changed the name of your brand. But this was like 2013.

We didn't even launch for like a year and a half. So I started consulting for 50 bucks an hour. Mark with Mark on Primal Kitchen. Wow. Yeah. Okay. It's a good deal. So it's a good deal. I was really cheap.

I know. Here's why I love stories like this. And we haven't even gotten through the story, but just to begin with, I love that you said I was applying for marketing director. I didn't know what the fuck I was doing. I had no experience. Like this shows you that tenacity and grit and putting yourself out there is a really successful combination because it's obviously worked for you and getting scrappy and just seeing what sticks on a wall. There's so many people that

I talk to, and I'm sure you the same, where it's like, I can't do this because I don't have this degree. I can't be a marketing director because I've never done it before. And I kind of think that that's bullshit. Like, I think if you put the right mixture together, you actually can do it. You're almost making an excuse of why you can't yeah i would totally agree or it's not just that it's just i think people they like it's funny because i wish more entrepreneurs would just be honest about how much of the beginning is bullshit where you're just like figuring random listen the beginning the middle and the end is all bullshit like we sold the company to craft and like i my boss there was who's, like, a 17-year Heinz executive, was like, Morgan, listen, like, nobody has any idea what they're doing.

And I was like, I feel so much better. I mean, like, I barely know what I'm doing. Yeah, I mean, do any of us. And I say that all the time. Yeah. But my point in saying that is, is, like, what I always find a shame is all these people think that they're going to one day know how to do it. But in my opinion, you only figure out how to do it by doing it. Yeah. You know what I mean? Totally. And also like the story doesn't really ever make sense in like, until you look back on it. Like

for me, you know what I mean? Like in accounting degree, like, I don't know, like how does this thing all tie together? But I don't know. I just feel like nothing happens until you like meet someone. So in the end of the day, you got to just like put yourself out there and like meet more people. I think about it all in terms of momentum, meaning like the end of the day, you got to just like put yourself out there and like meet more people. I think about it all in terms of momentum. Meaning like the momentum of like Mark meets you at a random trade show. Then you give him a ride and then he's thinking of you and then he's got this idea. And then it's like, then his energy is feeding your energy. And then you're both, it's like you're both kind of start putting like, I even think with a company, like one person can push something so far.

But all of a sudden you have 70, 80, 100 people pushing the same thing. And that momentum is so strong that almost like forces the thing to go somewhere. Yeah. Does that make sense? Yeah, totally. But you can't do that unless you get moving. Talk to us about the early, early, early stages, the nitty gritty that no one sees, initial rejections. Like what happened in the beginning that maybe could have broken you guys, but didn't?

Yeah. So like Mark had hired a couple to help him like launch the business. And I was just the marketing consultant. And like they weren't really getting anywhere. So he let them go right before we launched and we kind of took off. But he was like working on a product. He probably told you about it. This Carolina Gold barbecue sauce that he was obsessed with.

And I remember getting the ingredient statement. And I was like, Mark, you can't launch this. Like this was back when if you just slapped paleo on anything, it was like fine. I'm like, this has like 29 grams of sugar in it. Like the, it's literally like the formulation was like 44% maple syrup or something. So I think the early days, like the early, early days, God, I didn't hire anyone for 10 months. So Mark had, for those listening that don't know, he had a supplement company, which we still sell supplements today and a blog. And he was doing like, say, maybe 10 million in sales and probably taking home like 2 million a year. But his base was kind of dwindling. So we

had like support staff of people who like were able to ship packages or like handle customer service. But there was no one really like strategically focused on the brand. So I think for like people listening who want to launch a food company where a lot of people get in trouble, I would say like things we did right, we price the product right. Like if you don't have enough gross margin to start, like a lot of people are like, oh, I'm going to price it here. My margin sucks. It's like 30%. But when I get scale, the ingredient costs are going to come down and it'll be fine. And it's like never fine. Like our price at on our products, like one unit at 10 million in revenue and like 150 million in revenue is really not that different. Like minimum wage increases, inflation happens,

like stuff happens and it just doesn't. You gotta set it right from the beginning. You gotta set it right from the beginning. So people mess up there a lot. But I think for us, let's see what were some of the like, God, we couldn't make mayonnaise like a year in. We couldn't get a broker like our broker now is a broker who rejected me in like February and then Whole Foods called and there was like, can you pick this brand up? Like we want to bring them in. A broker to broker your product into stores. Yeah. Like you need a sales team to manage a broker and then you need a broker who's going to like handle like they have like boots on the ground to go into like every natural food store. And they manage like Whole Foods merchandising and all that kind of stuff.

Like they rejected me. So it was a lot of just like figuring out like who's the right broker to work with? Who's the right first hire? You know, all those kinds of things. But we have this like one bad. We got in. We got a bunch of distribution like the first 10 months. So we were in retail.

If you like get distribution and then you can't ship your product because you have issues or you're out of inventory, the store doesn't want to sit with empty spots on the shelf. So they'll just kick you out. And it costs money to get your product on shelf like people don't realize. But you pay like one case per store per week at Whole Foods, for instance. So like if Whole Foods takes you in 350 stores, you're giving like you're giving a case to all 350 stores for free just to get on shelf. It takes a little while to pay that back. Margins are low.

If you get kicked out 10 months later, like that's a big loss. Right. So we couldn't make mayonnaise. Like suddenly 10 months into the business, we just like the manufacturer was like, we ran the product and it like didn't emulsify. We had to pour it down the drain. And we're like, what? And then you can't get it's not like they can just try again the next day. Like the next day they're running Hellman's mayonnaise. And the day after that, they're running Trader Joe's private label mayonnaise.

So you have to wait like a week to get back on the schedule. We had like no inventory. So we were like pretty much freaking out. And then they ran on the weekend for us. We had to pay overtime, finally started making mayonnaise again. I got engaged the same weekend that they started making mayonnaise again. I go to Malib weekend that they started making mayonnaise again. I go to Malibu the next day. We were running the business out of the Malibu Chamber of Commerce, this like tiny office.

And I didn't want to tell Mark. It was like such a big deal for us. I didn't want to tell him on the phone. So I like, wait, he like busts in the office. And I was like, we're making mayonnaise and I'm engaged. And we both just start like sobbing in the office. And it was kind of just this like, I don't know. That was like a big, tough thing for us early on. When you guys were going through that stressful period of time,

what were things that you did both professionally and personally kind of manage that? Because I think a lot of people, it's inevitable. You're going to hit this in any, even if you're not running a big business, just like in any endeavor. And I just wonder looking back how you guys manage that. And do you think you manage it it well i think how we managed a lot of stuff is we like send a lot of free protein powder and a lot of stuff to people who maybe other people like overlook like there isn't an admin i meet that i don't send a free package of primal kitchen stuff to like anyone i'm working with or like our like i feel like there's a male ego thing like mark would always be like we got to talk to like the guy in charge at our co-man Q&B.

And I'm like, Mark, that guy's like golfing. He has no idea what's going on with our account. Like truly, we met him and I was like, this is a joke. It's like when someone, this is like my pet peeve. I've never talked about it on the show. When someone's pitching an investor

and the investor's like out to dinner with his wife and like say you're like pitching the guy and the person who's pitching dinner with his wife, and say you're pitching the guy, and the person who's pitching doesn't look at the wife. Yeah. I'm like, And you're so dumb. Don't you know the wife's going to try the product? She's making the decision.

And she's also going back saying, I didn't like that guy. Pass the ketchup. Totally. If you're talking to anyone, you should be talking to the assistant, and the admin, and the producer, and all of the people, because you're if you're talking to anyone, you should be talking to the assistant and the admin and the producer and all of the people. Because you're right. The guy's golfing or the guy's being manipulated by the wife. Who's actually doing the work like this guy is not doing the work.

Just like honestly, like I got to a point at Primal Kitchen where I'm like, look, I I'm not doing the work like Anna is. Call my marketing director like you're talking to the wrong person so I feel like we always like Jim Clazzo was our account exec and I would send protein powder to his son at college like our UNFI rep I sent product to him he would trade with his hairdresser for haircuts for Primal Kitchen protein powder and we had like a great relationship with UNFI like almost a sweetheart deal our broker was like I literally have never met anyone who and it's not that hard it's's like just good karma, good energy. Like, don't be an asshole. When Whole Foods calls you and wants to do a huge deal with you, how far is that in to the business? And were you guys freaking out? And is it an epiphany aha moment or is it not like that?

It was definitely a big moment back then. You sold in regionally. So we got into like the Rocky Mountain region. So it wasn't like a big deal, but it was like, okay, you got 60 stores in the Rocky Mountain region, right? Like it was a big deal, but it wasn't like a big deal in the sense of like the numerical value on the deal. But yeah, every win, anyone who says yes to at that phase is just like a big deal. You know, I remember like Mark had to go meet with Publix on the same day I had to meet with Costco. And you don't you're like running so fast. I feel like at a certain point you like don't even have enough time to celebrate all the wins that are happening. What are the things that you look back on, like the points where you guys really peaked? Like, is it when you launched Ketchup? Is there a certain retailer you got in? What are the things

where you can remember just feeling the success i mean selling to craft felt like felt like that was way before that way before that definitely whole foods publix is like a notorious list of chain in florida it's a really hard account to get into and like the rumor is you don't get into publix until you're like in your third or fourth year of business and we got in like 11 months in and that felt like a really big win that was meaning like they just vet the companies and make sure they're going to be legitimate. Yeah. And there's like only one broker they like to talk to.

So if you don't have like the right broker, you like can't even get a meeting with them. They're just like notoriously like kind of hard to get into. Did you guys the whole time know you wanted to sell or did you kind of just say we're going to see what happens? No, Mark and I knew we wanted to sell. And I think that's really important. Like I give advice to a lot of like people are always calling me and I'm like, well, what do you want to be when you grow up? And if people can't answer, I'm like, look, you lifestyle business and you just want to pull like you want to run your whole like personal expenses through a business and you want to pull a million dollars off a year for salary, that's like a

totally different strategy and decision making platform than if you want to like grow something to sell it. So what explain the differences? So say there's someone listening that wants to sell their business and say there's someone listening that wants to sell their business and say there's someone listening That doesn't want to sell their business and pull money. What are the differences? So i'll give you like a perfect example a friend of mine who you guys know you've probably an influencer friend of mine She's amazing. I'm sure you've had her on the podcast, but she has a powder business like protein powder all of this, right? And she has a great life. She's like doing the influencer thing. She's home. She spends time with her kids she's this great business and She's like should I you know take this retail? And I'm like, well, what do you want to do? Do you

want to be a CEO? The only reason in my mind you would go to retail with a food or beverage product is if you want to exit the business one day, because you're not going to make money. You're not going to make a lot of money. The chances you're making enough money to justify is hardly, it's just not worth it. Honestly, I don't think it's worth it. So I always said to her, what do you want your life to look like? Do you want to be a CEO? Do you want to hire a team?

Do you want to be in an office? Or do you just want to keep doing this lifestyle, but maybe make more money? And she decided, yeah, forget it. I don't want to go to retail. There's just a lot more involved in that. And I think some people who are in retail, if you want to sell your company, in the end of the day, you're really like need to figure out what the strategic or the private equity buyer wants, right? So like in the food and beverage space, it's like they want growth that they're like brands can't achieve on their own, right? So there's only like, you's like they want growth that they're like brands can't achieve

on their own. Right. So there's only like you you don't really want to buy like a healthy Hellman's mayonnaise. Right. Like it just wouldn't feel right. Like my father in law in Michigan is like not buying. He doesn't want Heinz to make like an organic unsweetened ketchup. It just doesn't fit the brand. So in order to grow, they need to like tap new brands and new audiences but like if you back it up even further from that when we sold the company we had never done a dollar through the register at costco walmart or target so when we're going to pitch selling the company there's like so much white space you're really selling white space like you're saying this has not been done and look at what you can do and how much growth we did 50 million in the natural channel and whole foods is our biggest customer and like

craft heinz has never even called on whole foods right so so what you're really selling is the white is the opportunity for growth that's interesting so you don't want to realize it all yourself so you don't want to tee it up because think about it if you've realized it all their self yourself then there's nothing what's there left for them to do yeah you got to leave something for them to do. You either got to leave it in distribution or you got to leave it in innovation. Huh. Meaning like.

I never thought of it like that. That's really smart what you just said. I never thought, I never looked through a lens like that. Yeah. So. Well, think about it. If you're buying, it's like buying a house at the top of the market that's already fixed up as opposed to buying something that's a gem and a teardown that you know if it gets

fixed up is going to get millions of dollars and more value. You wouldn't buy the thing that's already done and it opposed to buying something that's a gem and a tear down that, you know, if it gets fixed up, it's going to get millions of dollars and more value. You wouldn't buy the thing that's already done and actualize all the value because then you can only go down. How long did it take from you guys starting the company to sell? What was the roadmap? Three and a half years. It was like really fast. That's really fast. It was fast. And did you guys the whole time know that you would want to sell in three and a half years? You knew?

Okay. Like when I was at Kavita, because Kavita also sold to PepsiCo. So I was there when they were sub 10 million in revenue and structuring. They had like a structured buyout with Pepsi. So they were kind of like negotiating that when I was there. And at the time, at that time, which was like 12 years ago, people used to say like, you just need to get to like 30 million and you can exit. And then it was like, you need to get to like 30 million and you can exit and then it was like you need to get to

50 and then you can exit and now it's like I don't even see like 100 million dollar businesses exiting like it definitely like the bar is leveled up so I think Mark and I knew like around where we wanted to be it just felt like a good time and we were worried this was like 2000 the end of 2018 this is funny because like little do we know what we were in for we were like we don't know the election like this could get crazy and then like covid happens like you know after we sold the company right imagine that was good for that particular business because more people were at home cooking you know yeah but like a lot of big brands got prioritized to be honest like in the targets of the world like they couldn't deal

with the broken supply chain from like smaller distributors so any brands that were selling you can sell through a distributor you can go direct to like some of the bigger chains warehouses like some of the bigger brands were selling direct to the bigger chain warehouses and they like it was helpful but it wasn't like there were some challenges what is the whole process look like from beginning to start is craft courting you from beginning to end? Is craft courting you? Did you poach craft? Did someone set a meeting? Once the meeting starts, how long does it take to sell? I'm so curious to hear from someone who's done this, the start to the end of action. Was it eight months? Was it eight days? What does it look like? Yeah. So I like, I didn't know this, but there's like a whole process you go through and it's literally called like a process. And so we did a thing called a bake-off where you hire, you like meet with a bunch of investment bankers and they present you like, we think we could sell you for X and you pick who you want to hire to sell your company. So we did this bake-off at Soho House in Malibu. It was like

me, Mark and Rick. And we invited like, like we had all these meetings we invited all these bankers out not one woman by the way which you know i love men i have i'm like one time i said i was like an anti-feminist and i got all this flack at like uh speaking about but i've loved working i don't have any like i'm not going to choose someone just because they're a woman i'm going to choose them because they're the best but we did interview a bunch of like asshole men bankers who just literally didn't even look at me to your point earlier about the husband wife thing i'm like do you know who's making decisions here like whatever so we did this bake off what are their names yeah right a bunch of guys a bunch of banker guys came they presented to us like here's what we'll do and like half these people they're like this would be our strategy we would like take you to the 301c group at general mills and i'm

like i partied with the guys that run the 301c group at General Mills. And I'm like, I partied with the guys that run the 301c group at Expo West. Like they haven't bought a brand. Like you have no idea what you're talking about. Like you don't know how to sell a company in the food space. You know, it was a lot of like, but these are big banks, right? Like big bankers, big bank names behind them. So we ended up hiring no one. I was just like, Mark, this is like not going to work for me. Like all of these guys are a no. And then through Thrive Market, we got introduced this amazing woman romitha and she had sold by to dr pepper sample group she had sold dollar shave club she had sold blue buffalo to general mills she sold vital proteins and we met her she sounds like she can get it done we met her and i was like she can come on the podcast i'm sold yeah

you should bring her on yeah she sounds great yeah so Romita, she's like one of my dear friends today. But we hired her in like April maybe. And we started the process. So it's like very scripted. Like you open a data room, you send out like a SIM, which is basically like a, I don't know, like a long deck with kind of like general information about your business to all these different potential acquirers. For us, it was either private equity or strategics. Strategics means like the Kellogg's, Kraft Heinz, PepsiCo, Coke's of the world, those big publicly traded strategic companies. And then they submit like there's a date and they submit like an IOI. It's like so crazy. I was like, wait, so you mean on this day, we're going to get like a letter with people's

range of what they'd pay for us if they're interested. And then you pick who advances to the next round. And at this point, it's very procedural. It's very like it's called a process. It's literally called like a process. Right. Our process took six months. I was 32 weeks pregnant doing management presentations like huge, all like, you know, the people who make it to the final round, fly out, you have like six hour meetings, they grill you,

you're like presenting, you're kind of doing like the dog and pony show. And then like final bids are due and you pick a final bid and then you sign a deal. So when, how long does, when you sign the deal? By the way,

it sounds simple, but it's a fucking grueling process. It wasn't that grueling to me. But yes, I mean. They're grilling the shit out of you. You know, it wasn't that bad. It wasn't that grueling to me. But yes, I mean. They're grilling the shit out of you. You know, it wasn't that bad. It was just more like nerves on my part, I think.

They weren't like, there is some grilling for sure, but you're like so prepared. Like if you hire the right like banker. And if you love your product. At a certain point, I remember being like these bankers know my business better than I do. You know your product inside and out too. And you've like created it from the ground up. But there is, it's a different language a bit there is like that you know where you're like I don't know like exactly what you're talking about you know I

don't know. So yeah so when you pick the company is it that quick is it just like you sell to them? It kind of is. And are you guys off Primal Kitchen like how do how do you do, how do you set that up? So we, Mark and I, we had talked for like two years. We didn't, Mark and I owned 95% of the company when we sold. Most people raise money. Like, this is super rare. But we ran the company on a $9 million line of credit at one point in time that Mark had a personal guarantee on. We were super scrappy. We had $2 million of EBITDA on $50 million in revenue the year we sold.

And they thought that was like phenomenal. So I always ask people who want to get into the food industry i'm like well when primal kitchen was doing 50 million in revenue like how much ebita do you think we had and they're always like i don't know like 10 20 million and i'm like try two it's pretty wild though it's pretty wild yeah you know what i know what ebita is you guys can you explain it's like bottom line profit on your business. Yeah, let's not get into it. So I was talking to a banker the other day. He's like, oh, maybe I can come on the Skinny Confidential and talk about EBITDA.

He was like, I want to find a girl. I'm like, that's a good way to come and never get married. Oh, no. It's so boring. The last thing we need to do is start going into EBITDA here. But the funny, we ended up going, Lauren and I, in probably around 2006. Did you tell us 16 or 17 is when you sold? We sold in 18. We closed January 3rd of 19.

Do you remember that party that was at Peter Thiel's house? Yeah, I met you guys there. That's where we met you. Yeah, I was with Kelly Levesque. Yeah, that's right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's where we met you.

I forgot. The reason I bring it up bitterly, John Durant, is because we, I'm just kidding, but we just started doing things with Wild ventures like oh yeah after that he's like hey come to this party we're gonna celebrate this huge win and

that's when we met mark yeah yeah yeah and i was like oh great and you're like thanks we didn't invest in yeah we did the five percent we sold was like friends and family but influencers and such through john durant that you mentioned yes hi john when yeah when you make the decision to sell to craft and craft is known for all different kinds of things right how do you make sure that your product has the integrity that it does because you guys are very specific about ingredients you don't mess around yeah i mean look like i think everybody is always like oh you sold to the man you like it's evil the evil empire like you're gonna mess up your product but the reality is wait hold on everyone that says that that's true you're gonna

tell me that if craft offered you 200 million dollars you wouldn't sell no no that's true thanks craft but the other reality is syrup in my garage yeah come on everyone i can't when people do i know i'm with you but the other reality is like do you think craft is like stupid enough where they're gonna buy us and then be like okay now we're let's introduce canola oil and see how this goes like they're like the first we had like a four hour meeting and they were like we spent two hours i'm like can you guys just like very clearly define what your ingredient standards are like it was like the first thing they wanted to understand about us and then truth be told like we're five're five years post acquisition. I like just stepped out of my

like president and CEO role in the spring. And my whole team is still there, like my entire team, which is also like literally unheard of. How big is your team when you sold? Oh, God, we probably had 50 people maybe. But I mean, like my senior executive team, like most people, 95% of the people who are working for us when we sold are still there. So Kraft has maintained the integrity of the product and also has the same team. Yeah. And really, they just like took off my plate the stuff that sucks about running a business. So like legal issues like BS, Prop 65, whatever, there's all just sorts of BS. You guys probably know, like, you know, I don't know. I

don't even, I'm not even going to go there, but there's a lot of BS lawsuit stuff that comes up that it's just nice to be able to pass along to someone else, not having to manage the bank relationship for financing the growth of the business. HR stuff can get super complicated, especially through COVID. Like we were so thankful to have like a real HR organization to help guide that process for us. And then like quality, their quality team is the best in the country, right? Like they're just, they really were only like value add for us. For me, this is like a weird question. Yeah. If I sold a company tomorrow for 200 million, say I sold the Skinny Confidential. Yeah. There would be a little bit

of almost a depression. And let me tell you why. Yeah. It's almost like a wedding where you get married and you have like the best quote unquote day of your life. And then the next the Sunday hits and you're like almost having Sunday scaries because you've peaked at this moment. Yeah. When you sell for this much and you've like checked the boxes that everyone wants to check and you like you've done it. Is there like kind of like a melancholiness afterwards or no? I had I like severely burnt out after. So like I was 32 weeks. I had my first baby November 6th and we signed the deal with Kraft November 28th.

So I was like home. I had five days of maternity leave that consisted of my hospital stay for my C-section. I came home and Mark spent, I came home on a Friday, Saturday, Mark and I spent four hours on the phone. We bonused every single person who worked for us. And like, they were pretty substantial, like life-changing amounts of money. And we called everyone. The deal broke to the Chicago Tribune like a day or two before we were planning on announcing why Chicago was that something where like Kraft is headquartered in Chicago so someone broke the sale which was weird like we're like oh god so we had to like hop on the phone in the

morning and call everyone and say like hey we sold the company we have a retention plan in place for you and we have a really big check for you that will be transferred as like a bonus thank you for everything you did to get us here and you know we sit down so it was like a sob fest like mark and i were like calling everyone we had like you know people was like life-changing amount of money for people right like people were like oh my god i just like paid off my college loans i had like no idea you guys were going to sell the company like it was mark and i mark would definitely tell you like it was besides the day we were making mayonnaise like probably more than that like our favorite day of running i felt

like oprah so when you get a car when you wake up on on the like whenever you go back postpartum and it's a monday and you've done you've done i was just so burnt out because i never took maternity leave i remember that spring like people calling me and i remember like people calling me for work to ask like real questions and i was like why are they calling me like i remember like people calling me for work to ask like real questions. And I was like, why are they calling me? Like, I cannot, I can't do this anymore. I like really burnt out. But then we started working on new innovation and I got like invigorated again. I think my melancholy moment, I stayed on, you know, like my role really didn't change that much. And we had an earn out on the deal that was like two years down the line and we hit our earn out. So I was pretty motivated to keep going for two more years.

And also like we sold the company for 200 million. Mark and I owned 95%. Mark owned the lion's share of the 95%. So I think Mark's melancholy definitely hit like harder than mine, for sure. Yeah, but we talked to him and he's, you know, like I said, he's a friend and he, you know, it sounds like you did this so quickly,

but people forget Mark had been in the health and wellness space for decades and so i think what felt fast for maybe a lot of people with that particularly for him it probably felt like such a long run yeah mark definitely had the melancholy though if he told you he didn't he's full of shit because i remember mark because it's like it's like you it's like when you it's almost like you go to the moon well you know what is really hard for me right now to be honest so. So like I hired all my friends. So my the girl that moved to South America with me is was our first hire. And she's our VP of marketing still today. The woman who hired me at Kavita, Amanda, she's our VP of growth. She still works for Primal Kitchen today. My friend Kelly, who I played soccer with in high school, she runs West Coast Sales for us. My best

friend Natalia manages the Target account. Rick, my mentor who I consulted with in between he came on and was our COO so I I have recently like transitioned out of my day-to-day role there and I'm like during the day I feel like I'm like a needy person these days I'm like calling people and I'm like oh my god like I don't have anybody to talk to during the day right now my whole social life is there is that people don't realize that when you they think like oh you've made it you've done the thing you made the money and it's like you hear this and she this I think this is really real it's real I mean listen this is like nobody's gonna feel bad for anyone that has a successful exit I was me but we we know a lot of people that have successfully exited businesses and what happens is like there's this period after about a year or two where they're looking around

and being like, well, what am I doing all day? What do I do now? Yeah. What do I do now? I can't imagine that. It'd be awkward.

Because you have all this money and you think because you have all this money, you're going to do all this stuff, but you do that for a while. And you're like, okay. And then you realize like your friends and everybody still have to go to work.

Yeah. And like, I have, there's somebody I'm thinking of in particular and he just took another job as CEO and like the salary doesn't matter at all he just wants this like social he like has his own jet and he's like i need to like he was like the first time he flew commercial to go to the to the like whatever it was going for the company yeah but he's he's just like he's doing it because he's bored in his life it's like he wants he needs a purpose to do something yeah how do you think

about what to do next because i see a lot of people who sell their company, they'll try to do like a hundred things next or they'll try or they'll be quiet for a while. Like what's the strategy of what to do next? You open a discotheque. Yeah. I once owned the domain name surfyogaecuador.com and I just wanted to like have a surf yoga retreat in Ecuador in my twenties. But no, I think for me, I have been like sitting for like years wondering like what is next, like and kind of like searching. Like I was talking to Giselle, Ryan Seacrest. They all wanted like a CEO. We want to launch a company. Will you be the CEO? And ultimately, I just like don't feel like I need to be anybody's like yes woman at this point in my

life. I really want to do like something for me. I moved into a consulting role with Primal. I think that's a consulting is a great way to just kind of like slowly step back. So it's more like advisory. I'm still very involved, but more like almost like a board member would be right. And then I picked up this new cool gig with a big private equity fund called Summit. They have an eight billion dollar fund and they they have an investment thesis in health, wellness and VMS. I'm doing this executive and residence program with them. So kind of like looking at deal flow, which I like love. So introducing them to founders in food and beverage space and, you know, sitting in on

management presentations and kind of helping with the investment thesis there. But I really couldn't leave. Like I stayed, like I said, for five years. I also had three kids. So I kept every time I think about leaving, I just like there would be another like like corporate maternity leave looming in my future and I just couldn't get out. But I did finally like have kind of my aha, like hell yes, for what I want to work on next. And I'm just really excited to put into the world. And I think that was kind of like my impetus to finally like make a move. Can you talk about this aha moment?

Yeah. So I am entering into the category, this is the hardest category in the grocery store. I said it would never go into, which is beverage. But I am, I think you'll appreciate this, like very bullish on just like macro trends. Like we leaned in at Primal on like no seed oils, unsweetened. People don't want canola oil. It doesn't, like we don't think that trend is going to go away. I don't think people are going to like want to seek out more sugar in their condiments moving forward. And I'm very bullish on just like protein right now. I feel like protein is kind of like where it's at. And I became aware of this ingredient, like there's a clear whey protein isolate. So I'm going to put protein into like

a two gram of sugar soda, if you will. So it's like a protein water, but sparkling. Sounds good. Yeah. So there's some protein water on the market, but none that's sparkling and I'm super excited. So I'm doing, I'm like in R&D and doing package design and like kind of rolling out the business plan on that i would drink protein soda oh so yeah when you yeah think about right yeah yeah like you could replace your sparkling water what is a hit like you've you've seen it like what is a hit what are the ingredients for a hit a hit business yeah yeah i think like oh god i have so many thoughts on this i see go off i see a lot of businesses that get too like diversified categorically so like if you

see the biggest exits like rx bar right they got to like 100 million they were super profitable and they were very focused in one category so it was just easy to be acquired the worst thing that could have happened to me at primal kitchen is our bar business could have taken off because say i have a business that's 50 million in revenue, it's 25 million condiments and 25 million bars. Like Kraft Heinz doesn't want to buy me. They don't value the bar. So they're not going to value the bar side of the business and the exit. And Kellogg doesn't want to buy me because they don't sell condiments. They don't know what to do with you. So I think a lot of entrepreneurs get really swept up in like the innovation of it all. And they just tried,

they go real wide on categories. We went wide, but we were at least like 75% condiments. Think that makes it harder to sell. So I'm passionate about that. I think you used to be able like 10 years ago, like Covito was never profitable. They were like, we'll never be profitable. We'll sell and we won't be profitable. But PepsiCo has this large distribution network.

We put our trucks on there. Instantly the brand becomes profitable once they sell to PepsiCo. Those days are so over. Unit economics, profitability, running a responsible company is sexier than ever. Go figure. So I think it was a little bit of the wild, wild west in the CPG industry five years ago. So I don't know. I think focus... I just saw this amazing company that had like 225 million in revenue, 20% EBITDA margins, and like they had a failed process. And I think it's because like the founders seemed difficult and the strategics didn't want to like take a risk to have difficult people, you know, dealing with difficult people in

the corporate environment. So I think there's a lot of things, but I'm really big on just like this, you're selling the white space opportunity. And like, sometimes the idea is better on PowerPoint presentation than it is in real life. Like if you want to launch that subcategory and you're not in there, put it in your deck, in your presentation and like sell the opportunity because like the buyer at craft looks at your, they get your Walmart data. The analyst is like, okay, they did this. Their Walmart business is $10 million, right? But if you've never sold a dollar through Walmart POV, there's no data to analyze in their mind. They're like, this is at least a hundred million dollar

Walmart business right here, but it's really not. So. They're looking at what else you can do and how much further you can go. Yeah. And sometimes when you've done nothing, like the idea of it is bigger than if you have some actual data to like do some mathematics. So are you telling me this whole time I could be doing nothing? What's the special sauce? Speaking of special sauce, just a tangent. I use your Primal Kitchen special sauce on my bowl of meat.

Yeah. The dipping sauces are crushing it. It's like amazing. The special sauce. I don't know if you guys meant to do this. It tastes like In. It's amazing. The one with the blue, I like the blue one. I don't know if you guys meant to do this. It tastes like In-N-Out, but it's healthy.

We have a chicken dipping sauce that's in the orange bottle and we thought the chicken, the healthy Chick-fil-A sauce would do the best. It's not this yum yum sauce, which I didn't even want to launch. I was like,

that is a tiny category. Like it's a black, it's got a black label. It's crushing it. It's like selling up there with like our ranch dressing. Like it's the most successful innovation we've ever launched. It It's crushing it. It's like selling up there with like our ranch dressing. Like it's the most successful innovation we've ever launched. It's crazy.

I like the special sauce. Yeah, the special sauce is one of the dipping sauces. That's one of the four. Okay, but that on a bowl of meat. Yeah, that is good. With chopped lettuce, chopped tomato, chopped jalapeno, chopped red onion, maybe white too. And a little bit of Primal Kitchen ketchup.

And it tastes like a fucking In-N-Out burger. Yeah, yeah, it's good. That was the idea. So what's in the special sauce for a founder? What do you look at and you're like, that founder knows what they're doing? I mean, I don't think any founders like we talked about really know,

like nobody knows what they're doing. Okay, but like what's the recipe that you see that works? God, this is so hard. Like they're all so different. Okay, that's fair. I mean, I think like the team you surround yourself with and like the strategy and your willingness to be able to like bend like sometimes it's like my friends who i don't know if you had any friends who went in with like childbirth with like a really strict plan and they had like the worst labor and delivery

yeah you gotta kind of go you gotta kind of be able to like i was so fat i just didn't even care i was just like i was like a literal sow yeah i was like yeah whatever happens right and you were probably like much easier to deal with put the 528 hertz on do what i said she's actually pretty easy i had a list for him but like it's yeah you just gotta go with the flow no so i think sometimes people can be like too rigid stuck in their ways and then it's like they can't even hear the advice that's being given a bit. What do you think has been the best advice that you've gotten from all the successful people that you have met? What's something that really resonated for you? One of my mentors is this guy, Dave Barham, who founded VMG, which is like arguably the most successful consumer private equity fund. And I grabbed him out of a trade show in 2016, out of the aisle. I was like, oh, VMG. And he's like, what the hell? And we became friends. And he's still a mentor of mine today. And he was very... I met up with

him frequently for advice on growing and selling Primal Kitchen. And he was very like, you need to have your end goal in mind here. You really need to know what you want to do and then work every decision back from there. And I think that philosophy like really infiltrated also just like the scrappiness like cannot be underestimated. Like I meet people who are like running a $10 million business, a $10 million revenue business, and they have like a PR firm that costs $200,000 a year. And I'm like, what are you doing? Or you meet people who spent like, I met a guy who was like, yeah, this $30 million sweetener business and he's spending $250,000

on a brand refresh. Like, we did our package design in-house. Like, I just, I see people, like, they just don't know how, they don't know, they're like suckers and they end up falling for these, like, it's almost like criminal,

almost kind of pisses me off, but just like, total waste of money. Like, you're going to make mistakes make mistakes but like is pr worth it everybody hates our pr agency like that's the truth like i think pr is gonna hate us i mean i feel like you almost gotta be i mean i'm not this is not a this is just a pr in general it's almost like you gotta almost be firing them every month that's what i always say And then you get a new Rolodex, maybe like six months later. Yeah. Yeah.

Well, it's hard. It's hard to quantify now. It's just hard to quantify how valuable that kind of stuff. Like, okay, so we'll do this show for example. Yeah.

And. Oh, this is going to make me give me some shit. We'll do this show. And then like, you'll get all these press articles from all these quote unquote big outlets

that people want to be in and I'll go look at the analytics across all the shows. I'm like, that didn't drive any shit over here. As a matter of fact,

my COO Gillian told me that there's a way to measure it. Hold on. She said it's called, have you guys heard of this? The way I measure it is I look at the analytics

that are analytics. The Barcelona Principles. Have you heard of this? No. It's the seven guidelines that help measure the effectiveness of public relations. Everyone go Google it. Goal setting, measurement and evaluation, outcomes and impacts, exclusion of ad value, social media, holistic approach, integrity, and transparency. And you can actually go and look at this. So I don't know if that helps you. I don't know. My personal take is some of these publications need our content more than we need

them to write about our content. Does that make sense? Totally. Maybe that's arrogant to say. No, I mean, we've had similar experiences. We did big, heavy hitting influencers and then we tiny influencers and we could see these tiny influencers just posting a ton about us and there's a lot of authenticity there and it drives like more revenue and followers. I'm like the anti, I'm like the worst CEO type in the world though. Like I don't, people be like, what's your target demographic? I'm like, I don't really believe in that. Like, I think it's so much of this is just like bullshit marketing made up crap for someone to like present in a meeting. Like Mark and I had no business plan. I have no MBA. It was a lot of just like, what's the total risk here? Like we

spent thirty six thousand dollars on our first run of mayonnaise. We were hoping we'd sell it out in a year and it sold out in a week. And we were like, OK, we're on to something. We priced the product at nine ninety nine because in order for us to keep 50 percent gross margin, people were either going to buy it at nine ninety nine and we had a business or they weren't and we didn't have a business. I think I think you guys were not selling food to me. You're selling cleaner living. You're selling a cleaner kitchen. Like for me, I think I'm selling daily habits. I don't think I'm selling beauty tools. I'm selling daily habits. And I think as a brand, instead of your target demographic, you need to really understand what you're selling.

Yeah. Because Primal Kitchen to me is it's selling me a better version of ketchup a better version of mayo and it's it's almost selling me peace of mind yeah do you know like that super you know super mario brothers the game like you know how he runs and he jumps on the like the plant and he gets fired michael and they this is the only like marketing thing love. It would be like, don't sell, what was it? Like, don't sell the plant, sell the ability to throw fireballs, right? Like, you don't want to go being like, this is my plant. Look at how beautiful, it's red, it's beautiful. No, you want to be selling like, listen, when you jump on this plant,

like you can throw fireballs. So I feel like that is like a good marketing thing that's kind of stuck with me. You sell the thing that will happen if you do the thing. Yeah, you sell the end result. result like you don't sell the attributes. How do you balance being so successful and having three boys? You told me off air a little bit. It's really difficult to be running a business the way you and I want to be running a business and also show up and be a present mother.

And I think that that needs to be talked about more. I don't see what's so hard for you women. Yeah. I don't. Dad shows so hard for you women yeah i don't anyone who's like i got this balance is lying like in my opinion yeah well my husband actually like he played football for the air force academy had like a whole career and then he stays home so we like sold the company and then he's a stay-at-home dad and that's like- You stay home, Michael. Yeah, that's really helpful. Do I have that as an option?

Yeah. I'm just kidding. I would go crazy at home. I couldn't stay at home. No, he's great. Like he's really much more patient with the kids and like a bunch, much better mom than me. But I was telling you, like, I feel like being a working mom, you're just like with the kids

for too much time and then I'm overwhelmed. And then the other side of the pendulum, I just swing to be not with them. And then I'm just ridden with guilt. And there's like really, I'm really trying to find the happy medium, but it's like, it's hard. My kids are two, four and five. I have all boys. There's like no limit to the amount of energy. If it makes you feel better though, my mom worked my whole life. And I remember she would come home late and I remember waiting up her, but later in life, I really appreciate it. And I think like the types of women, both in platonic and intimate relationships,

like I'm always attracted to like that kind of profile. So I think it's, I think it's going to be good. Yeah. Let's hope. Yeah. That makes me feel better. We'll call you in 30 years.

Like, I guess what I'm saying is like, I think I understand the guilt, but I think. No, you don't understand. You actually don't understand. I understand that you feel the guilt is what I'm saying.

It's horrible. But. I feel guilty when I go upstairs for too long as a byproduct of a as a son who had a mom that did the same thing it still does i think it i appreciate it later yeah and it changes kind of like what you're looking for before you go i only go to therapy like four or five hours a day i only go like once a month his therapy is right when i wake up in the morning he wants to talk about all his moves. You guys can use code skinny

at primalkitchen.com slash skinny you get 20% off your online order. I 100% recommend getting the special sauce, the ketchup, the mayo.

Michael likes the chocolate collagen. He uses it in his smoothie every single day. What is your favorite product, Morgan? The buffalo sauce, the vanilla collagen. You really can't go wrong with your products. You can't go wrong. I'm a big believer in your products. I've been a fan every single day. What is your favorite product, Morgan? The buffalo sauce, the vanilla collagen.

You really can't go wrong with your products. I'm a big believer in your products. I've been a fan of the brand forever. I just like to look at Mark's face every morning. I know, that makes it extra special. If only he had his shirt off, it would be a lot better. Well, I see that on Twitter. I know, we see that a lot.

Can we do a giveaway to one audience member of all our favorites, like a Michael, Lauren, Morgan situation. Okay. You guys go follow at primal kitchen on Instagram and tell us your favorite part of this episode with Morgan on my latest post. If someone wants to come work for your new sparkling protein soda company and they want to be brazen and slide into your account. You get that up and go and come back.

We'll talk about it. Yeah. No, I totally will. What's your Instagram if they want to say hi? Well, it's like Drinkway. So W-A-A-Y is going to be the brand name.

So drinkway.com and that's Drinkway on Instagram. What's your Instagram? Morgan Zanotti. What's the first thing you bought when Kraft deposited those funds in your house? Oh, a house.

That was like a big... Literally a house. No, no. This is truly... We signed the deal on November 28 28th we didn't close till january 3rd we went into escrow on a house and had to remove contingencies prior to january 3rd so the money hadn't been transferred yet we go into escrow on this house and i was like adam if this doesn't come through we're gonna lose the contingency deposit on this house and we like can't afford this. So yeah, we like really did buy a house. What's like something random that you bought though? I bought a Tesla. Okay. And

this is a good story. I was going to mommy and me classes at the time and I had this like Ford Escape that I'd had for like 11 years that I loved. The Ford Escape that you drove Mark and Carrie. Yeah. And I missed this car because it had like keyless entry. It was great for surfing and stuff. I don't know why they don't do more keyless entry on the cars, but I digress. I go to Mommy and Me and then I'm like, I can't show up to Mommy and Me with the Tesla with the doors that open like this. Like I'm from the Midwest. This is so obnoxious. And then I drove the Tesla and I didn't get it. I'm telling Mark, oh, I don't know. This feels like so indulgent. And then I went to one class of Mommy and Me and I was like, you know what kind of fucking hate mommy and me class

I think I'm just gonna quit mommy and me and go buy the Tesla. So I quit my Mimi I never went back. I bought the Tesla and that was like kind of my Indulgent my kind of gal. Yeah Thank you guys, this is awesome