Your Next Move - Leveraging Your Business’ Profit, Purpose, and Power to Thrive

Episode Date: April 30, 2024

Today’s episode comes from the Your Next Move vault and is a conversation between Lindsay Blakely and Gail Becker. Gail is the CEO and Founder of CAULIPOWER -- a food company that started with frozen pizzas with cauliflower crust.  This company, that started in Gail’s kitchen, quickly grew into a full line of vegetable-based frozen foods that can be found in Whole Foods, Walmart, and Target.

With the VentureX Business Card from Capital One, you earn unlimited double miles on every purchase. And with no preset spending limit, your purchasing power adapts to meet your business needs. Capital One, what's in your wallet? Find out more at capitalone.com slash VentureXBusiness. Terms and conditions apply. I'm Sarah Lynch, and you are listening to Your Next Move,

audio edition produced by Inc. and Capital One Business. Today's episode comes from the Your Next Move vault and is a conversation between Lindsay Blakely and guest Gail Becker. Gail is the CEO and founder of Kali Power, a food company that started with frozen pizzas with cauliflower crust. Born out of the need to feed her sons,

both of whom were diagnosed at young ages with celiac disease, this company that started in Gail's kitchen quickly grew into a full line of vegetable-based frozen foods that can be found in Whole Foods, Walmart, and Target. Gail, thank you so much for being here. Thank you so much for having me. So let's just jump right in, Gail. You have such a great story. Like many great entrepreneurs, your idea came from the need to solve your own problem. You needed to feed your kids. At what point did your idea become an actual company? So I'm the mom of two boys with celiac disease, and they were diagnosed at such a young age that there was no gluten-free food in the store. So anything they needed, I would have to

make from scratch. So if it was a cupcake, I'd even have to make the frosting. And what it did is it gave me a really good perch from which to watch the gluten-free industry evolve. And what I began to notice over the years was how much junk the industry was putting in gluten-free food, more fat, sugar, salt, and calories, and less nutrients. And so I thought, like I think probably many of your listeners do, well, I was just going to wait for someone to do something, but no one ever did. And so easily fair to say that calling power was born out of a frustration of waiting. Like many great ideas. But there's a rather long road from idea to actually starting a company. So tell us a little bit about how you started to get this idea off the ground. So in my personal life, there were sort of three things that happened at the same time. One is I

was working in corporate America. I had worked my way up the corporate ladder. And to be perfectly honest, when I got to the top, I didn't really like the view all that much. And so I slowly became disenchanted with what I was finding in corporate life. The second event was the passing of my father. Now, my father came to this country with nothing. He was an immigrant. He was a Holocaust survivor. Really, he had less than nothing, no family, no money, no language skills. And he built a small business in San Francisco. And when he passed, something inside me really changed. And I knew I wanted to do something more meaningful, but I didn't really know what that was. And then finally, this idea, I was looking, always looking,

like many of us, always looking for ways to get, you know, get my kids to eat more vegetables. I stumbled across cauliflower crisp pizzas on the internet. I didn't invent it. There were about 569,000 recipes the day that I made my first, and by the way, only one at home. And I made it and it was okay. It wasn't great. And about two weeks later, my son said, Hey mom, are you going to make that again? And I said, there's no freaking way I'm making that again. That took 90 minutes to make a pizza crust. And who has time for that?

And by the way, it was kind of insulting that someone thought everybody did have time for that after a full day of work. So I said, I'll tell you what, I'm not going to make it again, but I'll find it for you. And I looked everywhere and I couldn't find it. So I took all of those three events in my life and I put them in a proverbial blender. This recognition that the industry was putting all of this junk in gluten-free food, the passing of my father and my disenchantment with corporate life, and the realization that I can't be the only one who thinks 90 minutes is too much time to make a pizza crust. So I put all those in the proverbial blender. And what I came out with was, I know, I'm going to quit my job and start a company called Kali Power. And that's what I did in May of 2016. And we launched in February of 2017. Wow. So from the idea to launch, walk us through some of maybe the key turning points. Did you go out and seek funding immediately or did you try to get a product out there first?

So the first thing I did was I realized, to your point, that I didn't have any experience in the food industry other than I cooked it, bought it and ate it. And so I realized that I needed to hire people around me who did. So my first step was really hiring consultants who were experts in the field who could not only help me get started, but teach me along the way. And those were, you know, really remarkable times. I was like a sponge. Quite frankly, I still am. I still learn something new every day, which is part of what makes it all so exciting and rewarding. So I hired those people and they helped me find a manufacturer, which by the way, a lot turned me down initially. I think, you know, you can just sort of imagine

back then like, hey, I don't have any food experience, but I'd like to make a pizza crust out of cauliflower. They sort of looked at me like I had three eyes. But, you know, through the help of many people, some consultants that I hired, but also many people that I had met along the way who sort of were intrigued with the idea or wanted to help the startup, we were able to have a product and launch it in February 2017. One of the most common questions attendees have had when we've spoken to folks in the consumer packaged goods space is, you know, you have your product, you have very little marketing budget. How do you spend what you do have for an effective message that reaches as many people as possible?

I'm sort of curious what your marketing tactics were in those early days. It's such a good question. And look, you know, everybody comes to their business with a certain expertise. I didn't have any food expertise, but I actually knew a little something about marketing because that's where I spent my 16 years in corporate America at one of the world's largest communications and marketing firms. And so that's what I was able to rely on while I was learning everything else. So, you know, early on, we relied very heavily on social, on digital, on a lot of community engagement, and earned media, quite frankly, because we were the first cauliflower

crust pizza. We were able to build a lot of excitement around amongst consumers, and those consumers helped convince the retailers that this was a product that they wanted and should bring in. And starting a food company like this, I mean, how important is it for you to show up at say, you know, food shows? Is that still a powerful way to launch a food brand? So my heart just sank a little bit because I miss the food show so much. So I would go, since the beginning of the company, I have been to every food show until they stopped because of COVID. I do think it's actually a really important way. And in fact, I sometimes struggle with the idea that so many young companies, young food companies are starting out today and they don't have those

food shows. They don't have a means to get so many people to try their product and so many retailers to try their product in one way and, you know, in one place. And I do worry about that. But the food shows, that's where we launched. So it was Expo West, which is the world's largest food show, 80,000 of your closest friends from the food industry. We launched there in the spring of 2017. And there were only three of us, including my son. And I think we cooked probably about 1,200 pizzas in a weekend. I still remember our tiny little oven.

But it was magical. Our booth, some people have very extravagant booths. Our booth back then was a tablecloth I got from Target, a basket of fresh cauliflower, and a banner that I ordered on Zazzle. And that was it. It just goes to show you that when you have a great product, you don't need all of that other stuff. It worked out pretty well. So it sounds like a lot of sort of good old-fashioned hitting the pavement with products. So tell us about your first big break with retailers. So with food, you have to actually make the product before you can get a retailer to buy it, right? So I actually had to make samples

of the pizzas, you know, at the manufacturing facility. And so if there's any budding food entrepreneurs out there, Whole Foods has this program where you can pitch the local region that you live in with your product. So I'm from Southern California, which is a large region for whole food. So one day I took my styrofoam little basket filled with lots of ice and I brought four pizza skews and they wouldn't even give me a meeting. I had to drop it off with the receptionist, which was kind of akin to like dropping off your child with a stranger, but I did. And then about a week later, I heard from the local buyer that, you know, she and the rest of the office loved it. And they'll be, they would be bringing us into 30 Whole Foods stores. And it's kind of one of those things where you never forget where you are the day you get your first sale. I happened to be in a Starbucks in Washington, DC when I got

the news and I really just wanted to jump up and buy everyone in the place a latte, but I didn't have any money, so I couldn't. One common narrative I've heard from other food companies when they do get that first call, hey, you're going into Whole Foods, is there's a bit of a moment of panic because then you actually have to produce the product into all of those stores. So I'm sort of curious if you had any supply chain or just supply issues to fulfill that first partnership. Oh, yes. Very much so. You know, look, and you know, different food products take different amounts of time, energy, money and resources to make. Little did I know at the time that, you know, frozen food was the most challenging, not just the most challenging part of

the grocery store to be in because of its limited space, but also from a supply chain perspective, just the most complicated. There's a very funny story that happened for my very first order from Whole Foods. They picked it up from the manufacturer and it was on its way to the distributor so Whole Foods could get it. And I'll make a long story short, but when they got to the distributor, the gate was closed. So the truck had to turn around and go back to the manufacturer and that gate was closed. So literally my entire life was wrapped up in this freezer truck in the middle of Illinois in the wintertime. Thank God it was, it was cold out. And if I didn't make that order for Whole Foods, they never would have

ordered again and the business probably wouldn't be anything so I stayed up all night with the driver and I gave him a bonus if he could get it to the place on time and the only thing I will say is that it now I have an idea of what it's like to be an expectant father because it's like one of the most important occasions in your life and you can't do a damn thing about it. That's a great metaphor. One of the interesting turning points, I think, in your story is going into Walmart. And I know that you initially were counseled against going into Walmart too early. Tell us a little bit about who gave you that advice and why you didn't take it. Okay. Lots of people gave me that advice, to be honest with you. You know, it's a big commitment for a small company. And, you know,

rightly so. There are certain metrics that you need to meet, you know, in order to succeed with Walmart. And, you know, we were a very small company. We didn't have a lot of the things in place. I mean, talk about building a plane while flying it. I mean, so much so. But being in Walmart was really important to me. Look, I was really happy and fairly, you know, comfortable, I should say, in corporate life. I got paid very well. There were lots of perks. I got to meet interesting people. I didn't have to leave that unless I really wanted to do something that was going to have an impact. And that was what I wanted to do when I knew I couldn't really have an impact unless I was going to be in Walmart. So it was really a personal decision for me that really was my whole reason for starting the

business in the first place. I really wanted nutrition to be accessible to all in every sense of the word. And so, you know, most people don't know this, but we were actually in Walmart nationally before we were in Whole Foods nationally. So Walmart took a very early bet on us. And I have to say, you know, even though we were obviously a much smaller company at the time, they were really great to work with and sort of helped me figure out a lot of the pieces along the way. And I think it was one of the best decisions I made. But in terms of the larger lesson, I would say one of the keys to being

an entrepreneur is knowing what rules you're going to follow and then knowing which rules you're going to break because you got to do a little bit of both. Okay. So tell me more about that. What rules did you break? Well, definitely the Walmart rule. I also, you know, I also, there are a lot of people who, you know, it wasn't conventional wisdom to go into so many new categories, to be honest with you. I did get counsel to, you know, just do pizza and just stay in pizza and do pizza a hundred different ways. But I knew that there, but our consumers were asking us for more. And I knew that there was a lot more that a lot more meal hacks to be done. So we made the decision to go in that route. And, you know, given the success of, let's just say our chicken tenders,

I think it was the right decision. Yeah. That's something I wanted to unpack a little bit. I think every entrepreneur making a product faces this decision of sort of when to expand the product line and how to expand in a smart way. Can you tell us a little bit about your decision-making process in terms of where you expand, what product lines you think will be successful? Sure. So, you know, the one thing I will say, I wanted to make sure that we had the permission to expand from two of our stakeholders, consumers and our customers being the retailers. And I really waited until both were asking us for more. Retailers were very happy with our performance because we were bringing new people into the freezer aisle that hadn't been there in quite some time, right? There are a lot of people who buy our pizza, who quite frankly, hadn't bought pizza for the last 10 years, frozen pizza. So because of that,

and because of the new people that we were drawing to the freezer, the freezer, the frozen buyers were saying, what else can you do? And then we're also hearing at the same time, we're also hearing from a lot of our consumers, a lot of people who said, you know, I love what you do, what you did for pizza. Could you do the same thing in category X, Y, and Z? So part of it was a big part of it is we took our cues from the people who mattered to us most. Did any product launches not work out as planned? Any failures along the way? Oh, I got a long list of failures overall. I would say the only product that is not available any longer is our baking mix. So we had, but it has a happy

ending. So the baking mix was a product that I think ended maybe a year and a half ago, maybe two years ago. And it was a baking mix. You can make anything you want out of it. You can make pancakes or muffins or whatever. And there was a cauliflower baking mix. Well, what ended up happening was one of the ingredients in the product, they stopped being made. And so that meant that we would have to take the product off the shelf for six months before we could get it again, before we could make it again. And that was a really hard decision. But because of some of the complexities around that with our retailer relationships, I made the decision to just cease making the product. The happy ending though, is that one day I had some leftover mix sitting in my cupboard. I was playing around with some raw chicken tenders, I decided to use the baking mix to coat the chicken and then air fried it because I kept seeing all these people coating their chicken and everything from

tortilla chips to, you know, cereal and then air frying them. So I thought, I wonder if we could make it easier. So I did that. I served them to my family. They loved it. They didn't even know what the heck they were eating. And I thought, hmm, this could be something. And that is really how our chicken tenders were born. So even, so was that a failure? No, I don't think so. It was a product that was born for a reason, but evolved into something, I think, much bigger and better. That's brilliant. I think another interesting story to maybe share with our viewers is this idea that you actually launched a parent brand, Vegilutionary Foods, that you initially thought would be the brand under which you would launch the chicken, the sweet potatoes. But retailers told you otherwise. What did you learn from them? Yeah, so we did. So the sort of the mother brand that we like to say is Vegilutionary Foods. We did. So we have our sweet potato product, which was actually our second line after pizzas. And we were nervous. I'll be honest with you. I thought people are going to get confused because, you know, they're going to think, oh, well, this doesn't have any cauliflower. So why is it called cauliflower? And, you know,

on and on. So we decided we, you know, we thought we were so smart. We thought, oh, you know, let's start another brand. It's going to be the sweet potatoes brand. And we're going to launch these things. Well, two things happened. One, the retailers would have none of it. And they said, I don't know what the sweet potatoes brand is. We don't want it. We want cauliflower. Please make cauliflower bigger on the back. So I thought that's a good insight. And then our buyer from Walmart, who's wonderful, said, I think it's perfectly logical that a company like cauliflower would just make things out of vegetables. And, you know, it really became a defining moment for us because Caulipower is not a company that makes things out of cauliflower.

Caulipower is a thing that creates meal hacks out of vegetables and the magic of vegetables. And that is what the company has evolved to. And what I realized is that consumers are much smarter than the rest of us. Consumers had no problem seeing that and it has really become sort of a cult favorite product. I love that story. We're going to take a quick break and be right back. Here's a little tip for growing your business. Get the VentureX Business Card from Capital One and earn unlimited double miles on every purchase.

Plus, the VentureX Business Card has no preset spending limit, so your purchasing power can adapt to meet your business needs. And when you travel, you'll have access to over 1,300 airport lounges. Just imagine where the VentureX business card from Capital One can take your business. Capital One, what's in your wallet? Terms and conditions apply. Find out more at CapitalOne.com slash VentureX business. You often talk about the importance of raising smart money from investors. So why don't you tell us what is your definition of smart money and then how you raised smart money from investors. So why don't you tell us what is your definition of smart money and then

how you raised smart money? So look, I'm very honest about the fact that I didn't have any food experience. So it was really important to me that, you know, at least my investors would come from the food industry. I only talked to VCs that specialized in food. And I think it was a really good decision because look, especially today, money is fairly cheap, right? Money is fairly cheap. You can get it in a lot of places,

but smart money is really hard to get. And sort of being able to find that beautiful balance between smart money and, you know, money from people who have had great success and also had a lot of failures that they could steer you away from was really what I was looking for. And so I hired someone, I obviously didn't have any connections with any food VC. So I hired someone to help make introductions. And then I pitched my little heart out about 45 times until I got an investor. Can you give us a few lessons learned

from doing those 45 pitches? Yes, I have three lessons. One, don't wait as long as I did. I think I waited too long. So I launched the company in February, 2017. We ran out of money in September of 2017. And we were going into Walmart in October of 2017. So I waited too long. I should have raised the money earlier. And I counsel anyone watching not to wait quite as long as I did. Don't wait until you really,

really need it. The second thing I would say is, you know, it's a dance. It is all about, you know, if they like you and believe in you and believe in your product and believe in your business plan, a hundred percent, but it's also, you know, how do you feel about them? And it's really, you know, it's almost like dating, you really have to find that right chemistry. And then three, you know, don't be discouraged if people turn you down, I will tell you that I did talk to about 45 people. And most everyone didn't turn me down necessarily. But they did say, hmm, we just, because we were so new and we grew so fast, people just wanted a little bit more data. Oh, can we just wait to see how you did in Walmart? You know, can we just wait a few months? But I couldn't, I couldn't wait a few months because

I was out of cash. So there was one VC who said, you know what? We believe in you. We think it's going to do well in Walmart. We think this is a great business. We're going to invest. And they did. And then when it came time to closing my second round or going out for my second round, all the companies, all the VCs who turned me down the first time who wanted to, you know, they were throwing, practically throwing money at

me. Oh, we want to invest. We want to invest. But you know, when you're an entrepreneur, early belief and early trust means everything. And so I made the very conscious decision just to take money again from the same people who believed in me very early on. It felt like the right thing to do. And that's what I did. And so far, that's the only group I've taken money from. That's really smart advice. Let's fast forward a little bit and talk about COVID and what kind of immediate impact did the pandemic have on your company thinking back to mid-March? So obviously from a, you know, there was a business perspective and the personal and team perspective. So from a business perspective, you know,

the first couple months, like everybody else, was great in the sense of, you know, people were just loading up on everything, including frozen pizzas, But it was really hard to get product on the shelf. There were so many challenges. I always say that, you know, for Thanksgiving, retailers usually have six months to prepare. In this time, in COVID time, they had about six minutes. And so it was really challenging just to get product from point A to point B, oftentimes having nothing, no relation to anything that we were doing. Although I'm incredibly proud that we have among the most, the highest service rates in the industry, higher than companies much larger than us, which is something I'm super proud of. But I will also tell you that, you know, there was a while when people weren't reaching for better for you foods. They were reaching for comfort foods. They were reaching for lots of macaroni and cheese and, you know, higher calorie options. And, you know, it made sense. It made sense. But I think now we're starting to see that

it's a hard way to survive like that. And now that, you know, their made sense. It made sense. But I think now we're starting to see that it's a hard way to survive like that. And now that, you know, their light isn't at the end of the tunnel and, you know, people have noticed that there's a COVID-19 along with the COVID-19, that people are now starting to trend back toward healthier eating. The other thing that I will say, just from a, you know, team perspective, we had a lot of people. So obviously we had in the midst of our busiest time ever, we actually had to take the whole company virtually, just like everybody else. And it's

interesting because we had a lot of jobs, maybe about eight or nine jobs that really were rendered unnecessary in COVID. People who were responsible for you know our presence at booths or live events or things that just weren't relevant anymore so we didn't let go of anyone and we just put those people into roles into new roles that now things that we needed in terms of e-commerce or supply chain or sales, business roles that we didn't have before that were now necessitated because of COVID. So really the ability of so many on our team to pivot and learn and, you know, want to help out the company and take this opportunity to have a different role was really something extraordinary to watch.

And I also understand that with this enormous shift to people ordering groceries online, a really key part of the strategy is sort of optimizing your digital presence. Can you tell us a little bit about what that entails? Because obviously the big challenge is you need to be found by customers that are shopping online. So how do you do that? Yeah, absolutely. It is important. Look,

you know, we are sold on Amazon and we do sell some things, not food products, but we sell a couple of boxes and some merchandise on our own store, but our food is all sold on Amazon. Because it's frozen, it's never going to be a huge part of our business because the cost of frozen shipping is just too high. That's not something that we add to, that's just the cost that we're charged. So, you know, frozen shipping in this moment in time is just higher than I would like. So, it's always going to be a part of our business. And we've certainly seen those numbers increase, but it's never going to be that high. In terms of, you know, online delivery, though, that has picked up tremendously.

The Kali Power consumer is that much more likely to order our product online than other frozen pizza options. So we've just, you know, made sure to clean up our presence on a lot of retailer.com. We had a little bit of a specific issue because of our name, Caulipower, that whenever you type in Caulipower, cauliflower florets would show up. So we have some unusual challenges, but we work through. I know you're also in a position to track consumer behavior pretty closely during this pandemic. And you mentioned sort of noticing the shift from comfort food to then, you know, people realizing they really need to start eating healthier again. I'm curious if there are any other learnings you've had over the course of

the pandemic, just about your consumers' behavior. We had this campaign at Kali Power that we actually did some research to support and it was called the Thick of My Own Cooking campaign. And we did that about just a couple months ago. You know, 94% of people would have rather had quicker and easier meals than pancake cereal or sourdough bread or banana bread or sort of all of those trends. So we made fun of it, right? Because everyone is sick of my own cooking. So I think, you know, we're, we are living in a world where consumers, you know, are beginning, you know, obviously care about what they eat. Nutrition and immunity boosting is obviously very important, but so is convenience. And, you know, Kali Power has always lived at the intersection between taste, health, and convenience. And I think, you know, when you

often go through the grocery store, it's always easy to get one of those things, right? Two is a little bit harder, but doable. But at Collie Power, we make sure that we deliver on all three of those tenants. That is the core of who we are. And are there any operational changes? I mean, you also mentioned sliding employees into different roles, but any other operational changes that you think will endure even once things get back to normal? Yeah. One of the things that I've noticed, I would say two things. One is, you know, when we started out, you know, we were in a bit of a disadvantage because, you know, we just didn't have as much experience as a lot of the bigger food companies. But what the pandemic did was something very interesting,

is that it put us all on the same playing field. Because it's not like those big companies ever had went through a pandemic either. So, you know, we all were figuring it out at the same time. And for the first time, they had no better answers than we did. In fact, I would say that because of our fast growth, because of our ability to be nimble And because innovation is at our core, we were able to innovate everything from ways that we did our operations and our supply chain. And innovation came from all levels of the company.

People who had great ideas about what we could do when we hit one roadblock, and then what we could do to pivot and try another way. And that is really something that was extraordinary to behold and really something I'm incredibly proud of our team for. I'd love to talk a little bit about the future of the industry, particularly, as you just mentioned, the future of the supply chain. What might this look like if you could sort of design a better supply chain to protect companies like yours in the future from major hiccups like these? I think a lot of people learned, you know, a lot during these times,

you know, always good to have more than one supplier, you know, particularly when you hit a certain size, because if one plant is hit with COVID, you can pivot and go to another. That's a big one that a lot of people had only sort of thought of in terms of a plant fire or whatever. But, and then also, how are your products made? Are they being, Are they able to be made while standing six feet apart? Because it's something no one ever had to look at before. And that can certainly interrupt your ability to deliver. So a lot of, there were some companies, quite frankly, that tried to take advantage that with limited operations, limited cold storage, limited freight, there were people who would go to their bigger customers first and sort of the smaller customers had to sort of fend for themselves. I mean, we're fortunate that Kali Power is at a size now. We're an important customer to a lot of these vendors and people in our ecosystem. But it's really hard. It's really hard.

I would say the hardest part of this journey has been just making stuff, whatever you're making, whether it's frozen pizza or a bag of nails, anytime you make something and you have to deliver it in this crazy world that we're living in where demand is high and transportation is low, it's extraordinary. But I'm really just so proud to see, at least for Kali Power, how we've been able to innovate

and continue to make good on our promises to our customers. I want to go to the live chat for just a second. Yeah. Someone was asking how you handle interruptions or limitations in the cauliflower supply chain. Well, we're fortunate because of our size now that we've been able to do some long-term and large contracts. So we feel good about that now, certainly. Had this happened when we were much younger and just starting out, it would have been more challenging for sure. And there's a lot of young companies out there that don't have the buying power necessarily. I'm a big proponent. You're going to, you'll hear me say it, you know, whenever I get the chance. But I think now is the

time to support small businesses, independent businesses, woman owned businesses, businesses that, you know, try and make the world a little bit better. It's really, really hard to operate in this universe. And so whether it's Kali Power or someone else, I just encourage everyone to help those companies grow so that they can be sure to deliver for you in the future. Do you have any advice for those smaller companies that say don't have the buying power that Kali Power has? How do you negotiate? You know, it's hard. And by the way, we were there and we were there not that long ago. I certainly would go to all, you know, the meetings. And I think it's really important to share your story and to let people in on why you're doing what you're doing. You know, it's interesting, you know, obviously,

you know, consumer, our consumers and our fan base, they know a lot about the Kali Power story. I get lovely notes and messages from them all the time. And it's the best, best, best part of my day. But people forget that you have the opportunity to make people in certain positions, make them believe in you as well and make them part of your journey and enlist them in the process. I will say one of the things that has struck me the most about this entire crazy thing has been how many people who have many more years of experience than I do and buyers or brokers or, you know, retailers or what have you, who are cheering us on, you know, who root for the David over the Goliath, who like would call me separately or send me an email separately and say, you know, you really should

try this. I mean, there are, I have like a handful of people and names of people who went out of their way to help teach me and teach Kali Power how we could be better. And that's priceless. That's great advice. So this is a question I've been asking all of our speakers on this series. I'd love to know how the pandemic has changed you as a leader. What a great question. I would say it's changed me in a couple ways. One, I've always been pretty empathetic, but I think now even more so. I would hope we all are now even more so. I've been struck by how different people have reacted to this. Some people are really sad and lonely not being in the office. Others couldn't be more thrilled to not be in the office. Some people are really depressed. Others are happier than they've ever been. And I think what the lesson is, is all of that is right.

Like there's no right way to absorb what has happened to us. And, you know, I feel a responsibility to my team to make sure that they know that they're part of something bigger and that we're really in a unique position because we can actually help people through this. We can actually bring a little tiny bit of joy to someone when they're struggling for yet another thing to make in their kitchen, or let's all make, you know, pizzas together with the kids, because that'll be fun, and that'll be dinner, and that'll eat up a good hour, too. So, it's a real privilege to have that role in someone's life right when they need it most. And that's something we take very seriously. So I would say those are some ways, you know, personally on the plus side, it's been wonderful for me because, you know, I get to see my boys

a lot more, which is great. And I, you know, that's priceless in and of itself. I do miss being in the office. I do miss working with the team. I do miss the onsite collaboration. But more than anything else, I just feel so fortunate to be able to help people in some small way. It's really a privilege. That's great. I'm going to go to audience Q&A in just a second. I wanted to just dovetail a bit on talking about you missing the office. And I'm curious if you've come up with any sort of rituals or hacks to make you more effective working from home. We all want to know how to do that better. Yeah. Well, my desk is in the middle of my den right now. So I do think that, you know, having, putting, you know, your desk doesn't have to be in your home office or wherever it is. Put it in a place that sort of brings you joy. And for me, I get to look out of the backyard, which is at

least something green, and that makes me happy. I would say even more importantly, since the first day of lockdown, I somehow have told my team that I would send an email every single night, every single work weekday night. And so since I think we're on day 300 or something, but so since then I've sent a little email every night and it can be anything. It's something that one of our team members did that was fantastic, or maybe it's a funny meme, or maybe it's a note from one of our consumers or from one of our retailers. And I have to say, it's been a great way to, one, make people remember that they're still part of the team, even though they're alone at home, they really are part of a larger team with a much larger mission. And two, that larger mission is, you know, is something that we've

also been able to build upon during COVID. So from our very first day of selling pizzas, we have given a percentage of sales to help build teaching gardens and underserved schools across the country. Well, that was all well and good, except during COVID, those kids aren't in school. So they're not getting, not only are they not getting their lunches, they're not getting the produce that was growing in these teaching gardens. So we knew we had to pivot. So together with the American Heart Association, we did pivot and we bought boxes of produce,000 boxes to 4,500 families in those four cities that all of our team participates in giving just to really help drive that mission home. That's wonderful. Okay, so we've got some great questions here.

Excellent. Mike Silverman would like to know if you are in Costco. He says he's heard it's very difficult to get into Costco. What has been your experience with the store? Well, Costco is hard to get in. I will tell you that probably an even harder element of Costco is you have to know when to say no. So interestingly enough, and by the way, it's all by region. So, just because you get in one region doesn't mean you get in another region. So, you have to technically be able to sell your product in every single Costco region if you want to be nationwide. but it is hard. But probably the hardest bit came when Costco came to us very early on and said, you know, we want your pizza crust, but this was in San Diego. And the toughest thing that an entrepreneur, I had to do the toughest thing that an entrepreneur will ever have to do.

And that was say no. And I had to turn down Costco because the one thing you don't ever want to do with Costco is not deliver. And I was worried that I would not be able to deliver the kind of demand that they would use. And so I had to say no. As a result, another brand got in there nationally. And it was really, really hard, but it was the right thing to do. Because if I didn't do that and I didn't deliver, I'd never have another chance with Costco. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. Another question, this is a hiring question. What attributes are most attractive during an interview with you? I would think Kali Power has a good mix of people like me, people who like wanted a second chance,

wanted to try something new, wanted to learn food, wanted to reinvent their life, and people who have worked in food, you know, and they know it like the back of their hand. And it's a really great mix. I think the one thing that connects us all is there's a lot of passion for the business. And that is probably the thing that if someone's asking me how to capture my attention would be passion for the business, someone who's tried all our products, someone who can give me great and specific feedback, has spent time on our website, in articles, at our retailers.

That always impresses me. I cannot tell you how many people have interviewed with me and I said, so what do you think of our products? And they said, I haven't tried it yet. Just lie if you're going to say that. Just don't say you haven't tried the product. I don't care if you interview with me or someone else. Always try the product. Very good advice.

Matthew Barron would like to know, what is the number one thing you feel investors look for when investing in a startup other than GMV? I think he means gross merchandise value. I think they look for, well, obviously it depends what stage, right? But I think it looks, they look for three things. One, they look at the founder. And if they think that you're someone who knows it all and has all the answers, and isn't really open to taking criticism or advice, it's probably not going to work out. You as an entrepreneur, I will tell you that one of the and maybe this is particularly beneficial because I'm a little bit of an older entrepreneur, but you know, you have to be willing to admit what

you don't know. And, you know, nobody wants to invest in a company where the founder thinks they have all the answers because they don't. I certainly didn't. And, you know, most don't. So I think that's one thing. The second thing is you have to have a passion and a belief in what you're trying to do. They have to be able to feel that you are relentless and tireless and that you will do anything to move your business forward. And that needs to be quite palpable. And then third is data,

data, data. You have to show from a data perspective why your product is going to work and how you're going to scale the business from point A to point B. I would say those are the most important things. Great. Scott Slavin would like to know what were the hardest parts about your transition from your old career to your new one as a food entrepreneur? Scott, how long do you have? Eight minutes. Okay. There were so many hard things. I mean, everyone has a different way of doing it. For me, I didn't tell anyone what I was doing. I left and I sat in my home office, which is actually much closer to me now than I thought it would be again. And I sat there for about nine months and didn't tell anybody what I was doing.

And that was really hard because it was a decision I made because I knew people would say I was crazy and I just didn't want to hear it. But that was a decision that I made for that reason. But it was really hard. People sort of second guessing you, people thinking you're nuts for leaving such a great job. There's a lot of clutter and chatter and what have you. And for a while, you know, I forgot how to introduce myself. I had been so used to working in corporate America and being defined by who I am and what job title I had and, you know, where I ranked in the company and blah, blah, blah. And at the end, so it took me a while to feel like, oh my goodness, how am I going to, you know, introduce myself? In fact, there's a great story. Cindy Eckert, who is the amazing

founder of Addy, otherwise known as the female Viagra. And I was with her at an event and, you know, I was handed the scariest thing you could possibly be handed as an entrepreneur was a blank white sticky and a black felt tip pen. And, you know, write your name and your title on wear it on your on your clothes. And I literally was just dumbstruck. I didn't know what to write. And she looked at me and she said, you write entrepreneur. And it was so clear to me. And it's what I would still write entrepreneur. And it was so clear to me. And it's what I would still write today. It is,

it is the, it is the, you know, the proudest title other than mom that I've ever had. And, you know, you can strip away my CEO title any dang time you want, but that entrepreneur title means everything. Gail, it's been such a pleasure chatting with you. Thank you so much for being here. Thank you so much. That's all for this episode of Your Next Move. Our producer is Matt Toder. Editing and sound design by Nick Torres. Executive producer is Josh Christensen. If you haven't already, subscribe to Your Next Move on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen. Your Next Move is a production of Inc. and Capital One Business.