Hint Water’s Most Effective Marketing Channels | Exit Strategy S1E3

Episode of My First Million with Sam Parr and Shaan Puri.

Transcript

Note: This transcript was auto-generated from YouTube captions. It may contain errors and lacks speaker identification. A full Gemini audio transcript will replace this.

Kind: captions Language: en [Music] welcome back to the third episode of exit strategy podcast with here with one of my favorite founders her name’s Cara and she’s the founder and CEO of hint water Cara thanks so much for doing this super excited job thanks for having me I feel like you and I have met plenty of times in the past but rarely we had an opportunity to do it like an in-depth one-on-one discussion so really excited to do so just a quick background in the history of hint water you guys started in 20 2005 much like what you’re drinking right now you guys make a flavored water that’s generally flavored with fruit the water is generally non-carbonated although you have a carbonated version there’s no sugar stevia calories artificial nerves in the water dissolve that sound right am i messing out that’s absolutely right we have over had 20 flavors of our water and and then a few years ago we came out with a a carbonated version and then a caffeinated version of the product too and so you started the business back in 2005 when you were making the switch from Diet Coke because you just didn’t feel healthy drinking the 8 to 12 cans that you were drinking is that right yeah I just you know I I never realized this about myself but I you know was really I just I really just wasn’t happy with where I was at from a health perspective and I had gained a few pounds but I had also also developed really bad adult acne which I had never even had as a kid and I really felt like my energy levels were low too and I couldn’t really figure out what was going on and you know we were I was at a time when I had taken I had had three four kids now but I had three kids at the time so I was taking a little break from work I had left AOL where I was running their e-commerce platform and I just you know was interviewing for jobs we were like we my husband and I were redoing a house in San Francisco and I just took the time to kind of you know get in shape and it’s funny I mean I always tell people when I’m out speaking about sort of my background story I really thought I mean I probably wouldn’t have admitted it but I really thought that my pathway to get healthy was just shopping at Whole Foods like if I went into Whole Foods and I went shopping there that I was good to go like I was like you know I was going to be healthy and then I was like okay well I’m not really getting any healthier things aren’t really changing for me and I had been an athlete growing up I was a gymnast and so I you know started I knew how to train and so I thought okay I’m really gonna start working out and training and and you know continuing to shop it and buy you know better for you products but then nothing was still working and so I ended up going to a few different doctors who basically said you know look you’re probably having too many cupcakes and I’m you know and that’s why you’re getting all this weight and that’s where you’re having this problem with your skin our you know hormones or you’ve had babies too close to one another and none of it really made sense to me so your response wasn’t like the cupcakes are from Whole Foods that yeah no I really you know I said no that’s not really what’s going on so yeah at that point I I really started to take a closer look and and you know maybe one of the doctors said hey keep a diary of everything that you’re eating and everything that you’re doing and I don’t even think I really counted my diet soda consumption because I didn’t really think of it as food I really buted as just like something else that I’m doing and and there’s nothing wrong with it so why count it but then one day I was looking at the label on you know his diet coke was my favorite but the Pepsi people loved me because I always talk about you know Diet Coke and and yeah my problem with Diet Coke not my problem with diet that’s a Pepsi and I realized how many ingredients have had and so many of the ingredients I just didn’t really even understand and so I thought I don’t know maybe I’ll just put it to the side for now and just see what happens but not really thinking that would be any dramatic change and I swapped out my diet my diet sodas for plain water and at that point I really realized that you know I had things were getting better my energy levels were coming back my skin was better and I was losing weight and in two and a half weeks and it was it was a pretty dismal two and a half weeks like I felt like I had a really bad case of the flu I just didn’t feel right and I now look back on it as as detox like I didn’t call that Ben but I was really getting off of you know at that time it was Splenda and NutraSweet and some of the other sweeteners that were going into these diet diet drinks that I was drinking and I had lost 24 pounds in two and a half weeks my skin had cleared up my energy levels were back and that’s when I was like God I’ve actually been marketed to and I’ve been told that something is better for me because it has the word diet and that for me was like this epiphany and again like I had I’d grown up in the publishing industry and the in the tech industry I never really paid attention to you know labels on food as being tricky and so at that point you know I was kind of living my life and let you know another six months pass and you know I kept losing weight I sort of went through a period wondering if I was actually really sick because I was losing weight so much faster and you know my skin continued to stay great and you know my energy levels great and and by the time six months rolled around by a I had lost 55 pounds which was kind of my you know college weight it was like my goal weight and it was dramatic like you know people would see me and they were like gosh you know wow you look like you lost a lotta weight and I’m like yeah I did and everyone’s like you okay and I’m like yeah no I’m really good I feel I feel really good and you’re like well what diet were you on I was like I wasn’t really on a diet I actually stopped drinking diet soda and that’s when I realized that I educating so many people about my experience including the guy who was stuck in shelves at Whole Foods when I decided I really want I started in order to drink water because then I realized I really wasn’t a water drinker after all I thought I don’t know how long I can do this because I just I’m so bored by to ignore it so it’s slicing up fruit and throwing it in water and and then I went looking at my favorite Whole Foods in San Francisco for that product and everything had sweeteners in it that had fruit and then a lot of times the fruit wasn’t even you know real fruit that they were using it was you know lots of other stuff so I you know really saw this like need in the market but I never really thought oh I should I should like go become a beverage entrepreneur I mean I really saw it as like you know this is this is criminal what I’ve experienced and so many people really do want health but I have a really hard time finding us and so you have this epiphany and you say okay you know what like water is boring it’s hard to drink it just you know plain tap water or bottled water week after week and adding fruit sort of you know changes that dramatically right it’s good for you and it’s still water but it’s got a flavor it’s got flavor and it like lets you drink it consistently so you start this business how do you make it the first year like do you go to third-party manufacturers and say hey I’m interested in making hint water or are you making it at home I’m always curious like are you cutting up fruit as a third party manufacturer doing that how like how do you guys make this stuff yeah so we so initially I mean I was making it at home and and literally cutting up fruit and throwing it in water and then what I realized pretty quickly I don’t know if anyone’s ever sliced a fruit and thrown it into a pitcher but if you you know so even if you put that in the refrigerator what you need to do you know from a bacterial standpoint you can’t leave it off but on the counter for too long but it’s sort of I used to say it would get likes Meggy looking like it would have you know the water or the fruit would actually get sort of soft it would just like the Pope would be sort of funky after a while and it just wouldn’t taste as good so I started to try and figure out like why was that and then what I realized is that if we actually took you know the skins and oils of the fruit and created it our own extracts and and then dropped a few of those into the water then we could actually you know still be using fruit but you know we’re oftentimes we’re using the rind so people like we just recently came out with a lime there are a lemon flavor and people were asking us for years like you know why don’t you have a lemon flavor it’s really odd and because a lot of times we’re actually using the skins and most of the time we’re using the skins and oils and so it would almost taste like you know that the lemon naturally has like a you know it can taste almost like a turpentine almost like a furniture polish like sort of smell to it now totally and so you know it’s just again it was trying to figure out exactly how we could do that in the right way that it wasn’t you know like reminding people of of that I mean same with cherry I mean cherry so so often reminds people love bad cherry medicine cost medicine that they used to take as a kid and you know that was the same thing it was like you know we just wanted to make sure and again we’re not using sugars or diet or any type of you know stevia or diet sweeteners in it too so it’s it’s really there’s not a whole lot to hide behind it’s really a matter of the type of lemon the type of cherry the process and and you know so often times you know people will say to us well you know how do you get that well-rounded taste like year-round and and oftentimes we’re using actually grape skins to actually round it out but again it’s all you know vegan and I say that but a lot of people say like oh it’s fruit of course it’s vegan and I’m like well actually that’s not the case I mean that was my epiphany when I was looking at a lot of these you know so-called diet diet drinks that were out there a lot of them that are claiming to be you know fruit are actually using things like bone marrow natural the turn girl in general has a pretty wide definition and so so you know cockroach wings for example are considered you know magical they’re they’re oftentimes used for food coloring the red color in particular so you know I always tell people that you know even bone marrow like even if you are okay with you know eating bone marrow at a French restaurant a lot of people think that you know the fact that they’re actually drinking bone marrow and some of their drinks is kind of you know gross and and the fact that we’re not actually they calling that out in all true drinks it’s just that is creamy right yeah yeah I’m okay I’d be okay eating chocolate-covered cockroach wings once in my life but I’d want to know what I was eating if there were cockroach wings in you know a blow pop because it was bread I’d want to know that before I put it in my mouth like that type of transparency it seems like it should be table stakes these days in the food and beverage industry like an awesome bone marrow I mean you know either you know that’s one where you know more and more we’re seeing people you know not that they’re vegetarians right or vegan and and just like they they are there’s you know some mainstream drinks that are out there that they’ve thought they’ve been drinking for years that actually have that so so that was you know for me that that was you know really kind of we I probably spent you know close to a year actually trying to figure out we looked at a lot of flavor houses because I had you know run into I was trying to find a co-packer to actually bottle it we kept getting pointed to all these flavor houses and and that’s the challenge that we couldn’t actually I mean this was 15 years ago we couldn’t really figure out what was in all of these flavors and a lot of the flavors just were not as real as you know we wanted them to be so that was when we started creating our huh and can you talk to me a little bit about that about what it looks like today at your co-packer today or but your bottling facility are they do they have like the rinds of lemons and you know pineapples and grapes and skins and oils does that happen a third party facility how does that work cuz like if there that must be a you know I’m always amazed at businesses like yours only because the because the drink is so spectacular but just like making it do you have like you know I’m reading this book by about McDonald’s and they’re talking about how they perfected the French fry and for a while they were like okay we got to make sure we get the oil right and the time right and then it turns out that like that’s not the only thing that matters because if you throw cold potatoes in ten oil it’s very different than if you throw warm potatoes and then it matters in terms of like the sugar and starch that’s already in a potato so they have to go they ultimately had to go back all the way to the manufacturer of like the potato in Idaho in order to make a consistent french fry for product like yours you’re talking about rinds and oils of like lemons and grapefruits and grapes is your co-packer doing that are they like getting these rinds and sort of mixing it with water what does that operational complexity look like no we actually have so we now have a we have a third party that just works for us that puts that creates tap for us so they do have that but what but we have multiple co-packers we are only distributing in the u.s. today but we send that into our co-packers so yes there any like crazy stats there are you can you say like you know we you know like I looked at something about like about Panda Express and they’re like we use 30,000 pounds of chicken every X number of days or something to that effect do you got luck are you like oh my god where the Lord we’re one of the largest consumers of grapefruit skins in the country yeah you know I I don’t think we I mean we use such a tiny amount I mean in every bottle there’s only like two to three drops of the oil and so I wouldn’t actually say that you know we were like a major producer of it I mean what’s really interesting about it we you know people always ask us like you know do you use organic fruit and we try to use organic whenever we can but you know the key thing for us is no pesticides and what I always tell people about organic fruit when you go in to you know these co-packers and you know our original co-packing plant that we used was and still use it every once in a while is that they also do they’re on an apple orchard so they have you know lots of apples and they do other people’s products or and in and I’m just amazed at how much fruit that actually gets produced if into juices that actually has mold on it and so you know I I mean it’s it’s a problem and so you know we don’t want that’s sort of another reason why we really want to produce our own our own flavors too because we’re you know we have a lot more control over that and being able to see that you know we’re we’re getting what we’re getting you know that doesn’t have that doesn’t have the mold on it but just in terms of you know complexity I mean we make it you know easy to to you know drink our water and and you know it’s pretty it’s it looks pretty simple on the outside the truth is is it’s not that simple because of tempo and you know and and everything else about it but I always you know you and I have talked as as founders I mean you know there’s all these founders stories that I actually my book is coming out in October that really dives into a lot of these you know nightmare stories along the way you know of creating not just hint but just sort of like other stuff for me oh well and and sort of my I was in the early days of CNN I mean just sort of a you know lifeline a little bit but and what I’ve learned along the way but but you know it’s interesting we we produced the first non-alcoholic water company that didn’t have with fruit in it that didn’t have preservatives in it and so and for me I really you know just didn’t trust the word preservative when I first started I couldn’t exactly look back right and it’s just and I thought I kept asking the question I go to these co-packers and I kept asking the question like you know why do we need preservatives and they’re like because in order to have a shelf life to go beyond the shelf at Target you need to have you know extend the shelf life otherwise you know you’re you’re not going to be able to grow this company and so you know there was a point probably a year into being you know in Whole Foods we weren’t probably a little over half the country and we almost just shut the company down because we just couldn’t figure out how to do it and you know my husband Theo who’s our chief operating officer I mean I really give him full credit I mean we literally like thought we had tried aseptic packaging and and you know really just we’re looking at all different ways to ultimately do this and then finally I remember him getting up in the middle of the night and I heard him out in the kitchen really trying to figure this out and I said what are you doing and he was like you know I’m just trying to figure out if we can use heat and just to actually you know but it’s tricky because of the sugars and you know you don’t want you know to turn the fruit and I always tell people you know just in layman’s terms it’s like a cooked carrot versus a raw carrot or a you know rock Roth strawberry versus a Robert very different type of thing and so you have to be very careful with it and so it’s not a straight shot of heat if there’s actually you know ups and downs along the way in order to make sure that that doesn’t you know change and so when I talk about like this is a product that is not easy I mean it’s probably you know the biggest reason why companies like have had a hard time replicating it over the years because it’s it’s you know it takes time and it’s you know it’s an artisan product that is that is really you know priced as a mainstream product for you know anyone to enjoy and so and so the heat is that like a form of pasteurization that you’re doing in order to provide shelf shelf life gotcha okay and so that was like one of early on you’re basically like we cannot put this the shelf anywhere because the shelf life is several weeks as opposed to you know a year or two in which is what you really need to get intellect or yeah and so we assume I mean this is this is a segment my book I mean it’s you know it’s it’s like funny now it wasn’t funny then but I mean we used to go into Whole Foods and we’d stock the shelves in Whole Foods and we actually had inventory in our warehouse and in our garage but we would just tell them like oh we we this is all we have we’re out of stock and so they would yell at us because they’re like you guys don’t have enough stock you know to maintain this relationship and the truth was was that we were really nervous that we didn’t have you know the stability on the project and you know I always tell entrepreneurs this too we were you know CEO who’s you know my husband and our chief operating officer I mean he was an attorney prior to helping me start hint and he had worked on the the case I don’t know if you remember voilá when they had the e.coli you know a few kids died I mean it was horrible and they were not like pasteurizing the product and it was awful and so he learned like a lot about you know shelf stability but also you know the dangers of it and so every single day literally in the early days of hand I mean we were taking our product to a lab to make sure that you know it was actually I mean it was truly we believed it was safe you know and knew that you know we didn’t want to mess around with people’s lives at all but when I see that you know I’ve talked I’m sure you’ve talked to many entrepreneurs and and especially in the food space I mean it’s just it’s frightening to me sometimes when I hear like people are like oh yeah no we haven’t we haven’t really figured it out because our volumes aren’t that big and I’m yeah an ingestible that’s nuts yes how could you possibly think of that’s okay there was activity over there’s a start-up Deora brand that launched a couple years ago identity argot had stability issues all of their deal wrote would melt basically three months into their shelf life and you know they got called a target target ended up giving native their shelf space and it was a complete disaster and like from that perspective it’s bad both from a brand perspective from a customer perspective his target doesn’t really trust your brand any longer and from a you know consumer perspective because you’re selling an inferior product or an ingestible product that could harm a consumer that’s like unforgivable yeah I do yeah it’s crazy I do want to talk a little bit more about that you know in preparation for this podcast I looked at you know I did a bunch of research on him today you guys are a massive company you know like uh uh you know there was this guy that works at native who would not drink any water he would only drink hint water I’m pretty sure he brushes his teeth whatever and anytime we’d have to travel he would have to instacart Hinch water to the hotel before we landed so we’ve gotta look Vegas and New Orleans and you know different like in Minneapolis and he was instacart in water it was crazy a huge fan of him and you know from from what I can tell look you know I’ve seen articles in 2006 2018 you guys were somewhere in the 90 to 100 million dollar run right back you know back then what were the numbers looking like in 2005 and where were you getting sales from because you know this is 15 years ago direct consumer isn’t nearly what it is today where were those sales from and what is it would those sales look like so it’s uh so you know we started out I mean literally delivering cases and and you know I was doing and initially I just had my fourth child and and you know I joke about this but I think the you know just really thought I was out of my mind I mean I had four kids it just sticks and I’m you know a previous vice president you know at Ebony and you know it’s he’s like wait I get that it got you really healthy but why do you really want to do this I mean you’re you know you could go get a job somewhere else and you know go make a lot of money and and I thought you know for me it was really about you know resetting health for people and and like I didn’t care whether or not I didn’t set off in my business plan to actually Oh build a billion-dollar company or become the next red bull or vitamin water or whatever for me it was really about you know helping people change health and I really believe when I described this company to people I said if I can actually just get it in the hands of people especially the people that are drinking these you know flavored waters or vitamin waters or diet sodas or even you know full-fledged sugar sodas and get them to drink our product maybe they’ll eventually get to water maybe they’ll never get to plain water ever but like we could actually change health and you know the world and you know in our little you know area or whatever and you know that that did not only mean you know helping people too like we were here and early on that this was you know and I saw it myself helping me lose weight but it was also you know type-2 diabetes at that time was probably 2% of the population I mean it’s you know upwards of forty five percent of the population just in the u.s. have you know of type 2 diabetes or prediabetes and heart disease and lots of other things so I thought you know that how do I get it in the hands of people and so when we initially went into Whole Foods I mean that was the first retailer and around the Bay Area went into some others I was actually interviewing sort of like not seriously interviewing but had had a few conversations with this guy of meat cortisone II who was at Google at the time and he worked with my husband at Netscape and and so Amin was talking to me about a job at Google and you know he’s really nice and kept upping the salary that he was talking to me about and after a while I was just like you know what I mean like you know it’s really nice and you’re I consider you a friend in this job you know likes you a lot but for me it’s really about it’s not about an offer right now it’s about I don’t really want to commute down to you know Palo Alto and Mountain View I really want to stay up in the Bay Area but then I really you know I just want to go and do this and see if I can actually help lots of people and so that was a major turning point for him because amede you know somewhat joking but he was like oh well do you have do you have a sample of this product and I pulled it out of my bag and he was like of course you have a sample of the product and you actually selling him during a job interview in order to get hint water into Mountain View’s offices yeah but I never even thought of it as yeah sure but he said to me he was like oh you know we have the sky Charlie you was our chef and you know he will talk to Charlie about it and and see and I was like okay cool yeah if you guys like want it in your offices I’d be really fun and I had no idea what I had stumbled upon and you know Charlie ends up calling saying hey I really like a meet a lot like can you send me some samples of the drain yeah we’ll give it a try and see what happens we’ve been doing food and it’s fun well but let’s you know give him to try as well and and you know he called back a couple days later and he’s like do you guys have more supply and I’m like yeah how do you have you know another office or he said oh we’re just going through this like crazy to vary within like two weeks of that conversation we don’t need Google became our number one retailer I mean I saw your number two accounts you know Whole Foods and Google’s sort of like looking into every gotcha yeah they quickly overtook it I mean like I say retailer and quote right they weren’t really a real killer yeah and they were they were just in you know it’s interesting because Google was really trying to make sure that they had healthcare better for you you know products not just drinks but also food like they were I mean they were really aware of it and very early and so and what you’re yes so that was like the beginning of 2006 and so I mean that was like and again like we were you know still trying to get our shelf life or shelf life was maybe six months and we were trying to figure out if we could you know get it higher at me today our shelf life is two years do those b2b sales still make up a again part of your revenue but you know you selling to Google I know I discovered your product and startup as well when I was working out of somebody else’s office and was in the refrigerator those pdb sales make up a significant percentage of our revenue today or is it sort of like now you’re in Whole Foods and Target and Walmart and sell on Amazon and so it’s still nice but less significant well it’s interesting I mean we’re we’re obviously taping this during a crazy time in history sure yes that’s right and so our food service sales you know just because nobody’s going into offices is actually cut with it’s interesting we’re actually talking to a lot of the executives that some of these companies and some of them are even sending them home cases home to their employees just as a you know gifting them just to say hey continue to stay healthy but you know food service has really been I mean that the sort of corporate food service has been massive for us started with the tech companies in Silicon Valley that just really embraced this and then they would embraced us and then they would go into their local store and say hey look you for the product yeah yeah that’s great what a great look flywheel effect ya know and I always tell entrepreneurs too it’s like you know it wasn’t strategic that we I said God if I can just go get Google or I can go get Facebook I mean I remember you know Sheryl Sandberg’s assistant when she left Google and she went to Facebook and she called me and said hey you know what you guys delivered this company Facebook and they were still in Palo Alto at the time so I was like sure you know no problem is crazy yeah and so that’s it and so what is it and so when did you look you know in 2005 you get Whole Foods 2006 Google comes along Facebook comes along the Business Objects some point obviously the you know something sets in your mind we like I’m not just delivering products anymore this can be a legitimately large business at what point did you raise money like you know you uh compared to most of the startups that I speak with in San Francisco that have not been around for 15 years you know it’s pretty recently like you know their their first chat one more than five or six years ago when did you guys first raise money in the lifecycle of your butt so I think it was early 2007 and you know I we sort of did this a little bit differently I mean maybe to some extent you know I I think you know you’re probably you very similar where you know we really thought early on that I still wanted to have like dinner with my friends and not have them in us in me like how you know how’s it going right so I I was able I mean we we had made a little bit of money and you know with Netscape and with AOL and so and we thought you know we have to be careful but let’s just let’s just try and see how long we can go with self-funding and you know I always tell entrepreneurs to I mean we have an amazing house in San Francisco that we had gutted and remodeled and all you know four kids were you know that we had a baby at the time but the three kids were in private preschools and private schools in San Francisco and you know I remember looking at Theo one night saying like you know this is not really that sustainable if we’re gonna be sitting here like trying to pay for school like how can we actually conserve money and actually put it into you know our company and so yeah that’s when we decided let’s go find good public schools around the Bay Area and and you know and that’s what we did and we move dr. Marin cut Marin County and you know again like marinas gorgeous and nice it wasn’t where we were sacrificing so much yeah and so today can you talk about so today can you talk a little bit about how much you’ve raised you know over the last 15 years yeah I mean we’ve raised you know this this part is all public I think it’s a little over 60 million but we’ve raised in a sort of a different way we we haven’t done venture or you know no private equity we have a family office out of Brussels which was you know they’ve got a little more money into the company there into their their family office then than they originally did but it really stemmed off of the Stella veer family and said what you put why did you like the family office first as a VC look it’s apparent to me to be clear I just want to make sure listeners understand like why is a family office different or better for you than a VC yeah I mean I sorted I didn’t know back then when when we necessarily took money but these guys had actually been investors and vitaminwater and vitaminwater know had sold to coca-cola and so part of their they came to us and sort of part of their you know thinking was we really want to invest in you know healthy lifestyle and better for you products outside of Europe and so they were looking you know at the hint and you know approached us and said like why wouldn’t you take money you know we add advisory we had an advisory role with vitaminwater and we were big investors and so you know that was really like our thinking back then but you know I laugh and I don’t know if you ever talked to sort of Silicon Valley investors I mean look we are stopped in most of the Silicon Valley you know offices and and but and you know we definitely when we were going out and raising money I mean we would pitch some of these people and what’s interesting is that so many of these people you know they love drinking here it would always start off like oh we drinking all the time we love your product everything’s great but many of those people you know people always invest in what they know and and what they think they can add value to and so I think that they viewed us as a company that if we actually were doing it right then you know coca-cola would come in and they would just knock us off and the truth is I mean this sort of you know I’m skipping to the end game on this but the truth is is like you know Coca Cola’s knocked us off like six times I mean and every time it’s just not with their core competencies you know you know when people ask me to say yeah people will ask me the same question why do I attend P&G build their own version native and I’m like it’s the same reason that when you look at a bird you don’t you’re not like oh now I know how to fly just because you’ve seen something grow who doesn’t mean that it’s in your DNA and the people who work at coca-cola didn’t start coca-cola there are stewards of multi-billion dollar brands like sprite and you know Diet Coke and and Powerade and so like their skill set is to steward those brands and grow them as fast as possible but in a very different way than going from but the difference between going from zero to 50 million is very different than going from 1 billion to 1 billion and 500 million dollars right or even 1 million 1 million 50 million dollars like it’s a very different skill set I mean sorry when the first you know when the first time that they came in and and knocked us off I mean I was talking about it was on a timeline but like that was a really bad day I’m sure you guys have this you know same day by one of these big guys I’m good what I realized is that it actually has helped us to get more space because they eventually have given up because you know there’s probably internal fights especially you know when you look at kind of the mothership of these soda companies it’s sugar right which is sort which is totally counter to what we’re doing we’re just getting people to drink water that tastes better and that’s it and so it’s in and so every single time they’ve come out with a drink that is a you know competitor it’s just it’s just we’ve noticed it’s hard for them and we end up getting more space yes just going back to your VC question I mean we would talk to these VCS and you know first of all a lot of these species I mean the core consumer for diet coke is female and it’s no surprise there’s a lot of VCs that are not female and especially you know 12 13 years ago when I was pitching so I be in there talking about you know my diet coke addiction and they would they would look at me like well that wasn’t really addiction was it and I was like oh no it was it was real and like it was right up there with like you know cigarette addiction or like I’m like the same timeline and they’re like really like people actually have that and you know it and again it was just not what they knew and so they would still keep ordering cases in cases a hint to consume in fact some VCS have told me that they won’t invest in in tech companies unless they have hints in the office because they really really believe that like they that they you know understand what their employees need to stay healthy I mean crazy stories like that a lot of its most but but yeah I mean they just wouldn’t end up investing and so and so we ended up you know going a different route and and you know just raising from a lot of individuals so we have over 100 investors and the company and and so John Legend is on your cap table I think my brother actually transparency is also on your cap table but I want to fast forward a little bit to today you know I’ve heard you talk a lot about how about 40% of your business is online now versus brick and mortar which is crazy because I think it’s like um you know I won’t talk to you a little bit about shipping costs later on in this conversation and how you sort of manage those because you know shipping water is not an easy thing to do but let’s talk a little like um you know 40 percent of it is online sixty percent is in brick-and-mortar stores can you talk a little bit about the brick-and-mortar stores that you’re in right now yeah it’s I you know we’ve we’ve started in sort of a specialty store market which is like the you know Whole Foods and sprouts and and some of the local ones and then went into the conventional grocery I think where we really had the toughest challenge in congressional or in conventional grocery was with you know we just didn’t have the bandwidth and and the people that the big you know soda companies have and so we would you know just get knocked off the shelf and you know we wouldn’t have the slotting fees and and you know lots of stuff was going on I think that’s where you know we really started to realize not only from a revenue standpoint but also from a you know it just wasn’t as as challenging to compete inside of these firms and then you know lots of other it wasn’t just Silicon Valley but lots of offices in New York we’re cropping up that were extensions of Silicon Valley or LA or whatever and so we started getting into more and more and then you know companies that wanted to be like Facebook and Google and you know recruit people like they would they would end up putting us in so you know we became you know pretty giant in those companies and then and then you know we we finally got into target a few years ago you know in a in a pretty pretty decent sized way we were you know we started out with a few feet of space I mean it again like I’m sure you and I could swap stories on this it’s just you know we we had gotten to a point where we sort of understood like if we didn’t have enough shelf space then you know we just wouldn’t yeah yeah and so we would like look little and so I remember reading a case study on Tom’s you know the Tom’s I mean their toothpaste and Pennsylvania yeah lots of tots of Maine and lots of things this was you know before they were acquired but I remember hearing sort of their sales plans and they talked to Beth about like they got to a point where they would tell buyers like you know if you don’t give us this kind of space you know they their sales team would just say I you’re just not ready for us short like welcome back like it’s all good and so we’ve really started saying that you know to these large retailers because we knew that we would fail it unless we actually had a certain presence and so we we ended up going into target and then you know really got smarter about the data too and and started realizing I mean it’s I’ll give you a crazy statistic I mean in in target we do more dollars per square foot than some of the large brands like a vitamin water for example and and so that is like when you can actually take that kind of data and you can’t do that when you’re first starting a company right and you’re not even gonna register on this data but when you start being able to articulate that to these buyers I mean you you know you’re just getting smarter about you know the data and sort of what you’re doing and I think just sort of how that relates for us into the e-commerce side of the business - I mean that you know is sort of its own story I mean we started we we had gotten into Starbucks another big food service company we were in 11,000 Starbucks and you know which was a great day when we rolled out in Starbucks and we were only one flavor it was the blackberry and but we were you know rolling along and doing you know two to three times what their goals were for us and and one day we got a call from a buyer at Starbucks that said hey we’re you know we’re gonna bounce you out of here because because Howard Schultz said that you know we’re only going to have beverage brands in here that are distributed by Pepsi because Pepsi is actually doing the distribution for us for our ready to drink Starbucks drink and and so I always you know my big lesson learned from that day was you know don’t have too many eggs in one basket I mean really that was a bad day and you know I don’t cry often but I went home and I cried and I thought how am I gonna tell my investors aboard about this and then I remember a couple weeks later you know I resurfaced and I’m like look I’m not gonna lie it was really bad that we got bounced out of there but at the end of the day we just need to find these consumers because we were doing well and Starbucks actually paid us for product and they exposed us to places like Chicago and you know lots of places taxes and and places where we didn’t even have distribution and so a couple of weeks after that happened we got another email from from you know another big brand they weren’t even that big back well they were pretty big but they didn’t have a grocery business I guess it was six seven years ago at Amazon and they were grocery business and I you know took the email and I said you know tell me about this grocery business and I I mean I had dealt with Jeff Bezos in the early days when he was just a book you know retailer when I was running when I was running aol’s business and I really believed that I wasn’t I didn’t know if I really believed I I wasn’t sure whether or not this was a serious business because I thought Amazon gets into little businesses and sometimes you hear about them and sometimes you don’t and yeah I wasn’t sure whether or not they could be serious and in the grocery business because of weight and all kinds of issues I thought I don’t know maybe they have it figured out because they’re doing books and those are pretty heavy and so but I had a lot of you know blackberry hint in the warehouse that was supposed to be you know going to Starbucks and so I sold it to Amazon instead I sold it to Amazon and so that was the only flavor that we had on Amazon and then very quickly they you know told us like you guys are one of the number one products in grocery but in addition to that what we’re seeing is that you know this goes back to the data side of the story they they said we’re seeing that your consumer is also buying things like you know and you know better for you product and I thought wow that’s really interesting and I asked Amazon for the emails of these consumers because I was like I’d really like to reach out to them and they said no way you’re not getting love to ask you but yeah sorry go ahead now well I’d love to ask you a little bit more about the brick but about the data side of things which you were talking about look like you know at native we were entirely direct-to-consumer through our own website so we understood things like aov really well repeat purchase rate when customers would purchase and if they didn’t in you know X number of days what we should be doing in order to retain them and once we launched into Target and Walmart and CVS and Walgreens like that data became a lot more grey to us we did you know it was hard to understand we’d be purchased right because did you buy it or did you buy on our site and then you bought at Target did you buy and Target and then you bought on our website we don’t know if it’s your first purchase or your second did you guys experience the same type of like fuzziness with your data once you launched like you know going from selling everything yourself in 2005 to now having a robust online store of robust Amazon score a big target business do you guys experience that data fuzziness or like is there something that you’re doing to sort of help you through that morass so I so you know we obviously have sales numbers that that can go and buy store and and I say obvious like you you know again you get to a certain level in these stores and and they’ll start to give you some of this yeah it is does somebody like a target we definitely have that and then we can you know match that with how we’re doing on our own website and which is what we did after you know Amazon but it’s uh you know it’s it’s still very difficult for us to see that you know Lisa Smith is purchasing on you know drinking calm and then yeah they’re also going at Target yeah I think the Holy Grail that’s the holy grail of attribution yeah and I think it’s it’s really tough I mean the only way you know I think electronics able to do it because they get you to like get a you know products like like our first but I think what online has allowed us to do is when we see for example we can go back into you know I’ll pick on Target or Costco we’re going in nationwide in to enter Costco and the next few weeks so it’s you know it’s interesting because we’re able to say to them like you know here’s our top ten markets or cities inside of you know are drinking calm and we can also match that to a target we don’t necessarily have to say oh this is target’s data but we can say oh this is a major retailer and we can show this and you know again you get in front of a buyer that really understands the data and it’s just it’s obvious that they’re missing sure right and then also I think from a standpoint of the one other thing that I’ll just say really quickly that it allows us to do is that you know I always say to entrepreneurs that if for example a major retailer that’s in Florida was to just come and turn you off as a consumer you know it’s just I we’re gonna kick you out of here and you don’t know a lot gonna be in here you know what I realized is that without having our own online site we’re actually able to go in and market so you’re you’re really hedging your bets sure and and it allows you you know to be able to grow the business I mean what I’ve realized now was that retailers need to do what they need to do right and and I need to do what I need to do for hands as well and so the more you can have you know options out there and certainly during you know this whole corona incident I mean it’s you know we’re considered essential so they’re still in stores and and you know going in I’m doing my part to help the sales team once a day to go in and check on supply and and etc but you know I think being able to you know have a direct-to-consumer business that is you know higher now than forty percent of our overall business has allowed us you know to really like grow our business when you know these restocking issues are you know sure someone else’s problem and unfortunately products get hit by it yeah and then do you like you know you were talking about getting into Costco in the next few weeks which is amazing congratulations first when it comes to that do you find other pricing issues among the retailers that you have in Amazon look for a native it was hard to hold the price it’s hard to hold the price everywhere consistently like you know today Walmart will sell well 1197 and target will sell at $11.99 but that’s basically the same price you know one of our concerns was that we would all of a sudden have somebody drop the price to nine dollars or eight dollars and then have to deal with something like that do you guys have any of those issues or are you guys sort of like good when it comes to pricing on the product so we never try to you know we give us suggested retail price and people have different margins that they’re working on but but you know look Walmart and Target have amazing algorithms that will change on a dime you know depending and you know and and so you know we have consumers who write to us and ask us we buy on your side or should we go to Target buy the product you know they they’re like we just want to know where what’s best for the small business yeah right and so we always say to people like wherever you want your the consumer you’re in charge any place that we deal with is you know like we’re excited that they’re you’re growing your black boots there’s always going to be people that are going to come to native site or hint site and you know buy and I think there’s this perception that it’s like fresher if you you know get the product on our site and you know that’s not true I mean as soon as we make our product and you know I mean we actually it’s a longer conversation but that’s sort of another thing and we really don’t we we pretty much are making our product on to me and I mean as as soon as like we we spend very little money in warehousing because we’re we’re making it and it is going out the door and so and it’s you know constantly running but we’ve got sort of the supply chain thing where you know I think pretty advanced about that so even it through this whole corona you know situation you know I saw early on probably a week before people were even talking about sort of these hoarding issue news and out of stock issues I said to our sales team like this whole auto-replenishment thing is not working that may not many many stores that I’ve been into and you know the response I got back from our team was like well they keep telling us that they’re on auto-replenishment and you know I mean we also have a product where we’re you know depending on how much space we have in stores if people come in and buy 10 bottles of hint which is common you know they’ll they’ll wipe out the shell right yeah that’s close and so it should and so it’s supposed to match with register data to say like oh you’ve got to automatically reorder it but the stores have never seen anything like this not just for hint but for like other products and so you know they just couldn’t keep up with it so we went around to all of the buyers of all of our kind of all of our companies that we work with and we said look there’s there’s definitely an auto replenishment product and and somewhere in here but you know we’re not going to try and figure this out and we don’t expect you to go figure this out if you wanna you know like order from us directly we’ve got trucks that will truck our product right into you and you know I’d say over 50% of the people that we deal with just said you know yeah let’s do that even if it’s just for a couple of truckloads to catch us up that’s fine but again like you know the number of shelves that I look at now and that are just empty you know I think I think we we just watch it really carefully and you know people are like how did you know that and I said I just I don’t know I’ve been you know I I’ve watched it and you know it’s it’s what great founders and CEOs or to do you need to really understand like why is this happening and I’m sure once you know the whole everybody gets back to work goes back into an office and you know no I’m sure the number one thing that a lot of these grocery retailers are gonna do is figure out this auto-replenishment thing because it’s a mess it’s you know it’s personally and I don’t know who owns those companies and those software’s but they’re they’re not they’re not perfect sure would love to shift the conversation really quickly to marketing have a couple questions here one have you guys had a booth at Expo West in the past and I’m pretty certain you have or you’ve been taxed by West find those types of events do you find out types of events helpful to your business to like network with buyers like I’m sure there are a lot of people who are listening who are gonna be starting food service businesses or who in the or in the food or beverage industry who you know may not want to spend the money it takes to get in tax by West did you find that to be helpful for when you were growing hint yep for sure I mean our first one our first show was at fancy food in New York yeah and in a few weeks after we actually put the first bottle on the shelf at Whole Foods and I mean I literally got the worst space possible and in New York Birkin and I had no idea you know a bit just some tech booths but I just thought I mean it happened so last-minute I literally like brought my own table in and set it up and it was just I mean it was super bare-bones and we had every buyer from Whole Foods lining up so I always tell you know entrepreneurs to it it’s like sometimes when you actually look pretty scrappy but you have a great product it like it’s it’s you know they’re they’re gonna come come by you and you know and and they’ll they’ll recognize that you’re you know that you’re authentic and real and you know I I mean I I laugh now because I had no idea what uNFI was and some of these distributors have seen Cisco trucks around but I had never really figured figured that whole world out so that was our first and then and I would say a couple years later Expo West which is an Anaheim every year that that’s been I mean that’s a great show and I think the one on the East Coast has has been an OK show as well but the a big one and yeah we’ve been doing it for 14 years and I’d like some brands I mean some brands like actually write orders they are at the shows that’s never really been our purpose at our goal I mean we use these trade shows not only to you know get with buyers but also to really understand what else is going on in the marketplace from a marketing standpoint and just talk to other you know people there and and now it’s gotten to a point where you know it’s just a time I you know we have over 200 people in the company now and and so for us we actually try and you know staff our booth with people that you know don’t get to work the tradeshow booths like we don’t hire you know the booth babes or whatever colors come and yeah right we get we get our team in there you know who just like love being there or passionate about the product yeah yeah you know I’ve always heard things like when you’re sampling it costs go for instance you can either get the Costco employee we used to hand out samples in which case you’ll barely move any product but if you put your own team member there who’s really excited about a product like hint water they will go through samples really quickly and go through sales much faster because they have somebody who’s authentic and believes in the brand and passionate as opposed to someone who’s like you know one of those people who is just handing out tiny samples like go on go on your way they actually know the brand and when a consumer asked about it they can respond to it but ton of questions I’ve also noticed that you like this year you guys had a Super Bowl commercial yeah it was can you talk a little bit about that like you know yeah that is insane I would love to like understand how that sort of came about you know I’ve seen certainly seen the commercial where you know somebody’s talking about how they really enjoy blackberry and they’ve got blackberry on their face and somebody else licks it off their face and they’re like the hint water they hit water flavor the blackberry flavoured hint water tastes more like blackberries than real blackberry can tell me about how that came about can you tell me a little bit about costs and stuff as well I think everybody’s always curious about Super Bowl commercials yeah and how like whether they’re extravagant or not we’d love to hear the background yes so I mean it was a pretty crazy story we had started to do some TV and just run in remnants you know ads so we shot three commercial was actually in the fall and two of them we had running and you know it’s uh we were running just for about eight weeks on you know just various but like some news channels so some people had seen it and then some sort of overnight stuff we were just sort of testing it and and then we were also not only testing the brand commercial but we were also there’s a tweet diversion and that is direct-to-consumer so you could actually you know you get an offer and and doing all of that and so so we have this one ad that was sitting in there and I don’t know it was it’s a crazy story one Sunday so I you know was that CNN for a couple of years way way way back and I had just run into a woman that worked with me at CNN and it’s now you know pretty high-level at NBC and just happened to see her at a conference and earnings Laura and I was chatting with her and I don’t know one Sunday I just was like I should just text her and just ask her you know I knew it was on Fox and I should just ask her who’s like if she knows anybody at Fox and if there’s any inventory and I had sort of heard that they were sold out but I never really trust what I hear and so she’s like oh yeah you should like you should you know just Texas this guy he like runs Fox Sports and he’s a good friend of mine and just tell him to Laura sent you and he laughed he said oh no we’re totally sold out but he said you know it’s funny that you mentioned this that there’s I just spoke to somebody who was doing regional stuff and I was like what do you what do you mean I mean obviously I know what a region is but he said so in the major areas like San Francisco in New York and Chicago there’s they have to leave a little bit of inventory in those markets and I said so you’re saying that there’s like multiple people and and this is literally two and a half weeks before Super Bowl was running Wow and so I and so he said do you have an ad and ice you know it’s sort of like I wasn’t sure that was it sure gonna be the advent I was like yeah we have an ad you boys do you Bluff do you know there’s uh he said yeah you should talk to this guy you can drive this one guy and he can get him for all the markets I still didn’t really think that it was gonna happen but I was just I don’t know I was bored and amused by it and I had never really you know I had started joke like we’ve got it when we were making these commercials I said they have to be like something we could run on the Superbowl one day but it was kind of something that I just was energizing the team about more than actually thank you seriously about it and so the guy reached out to me and I was like okay so the Super Bowl is in less than two weeks and you have inventory in all of these markets and he said you got in every market I have inventory left and and so I I was like you know so what do we have to do and he said well your ad has to be like traffic through not only the NFL or and not only Fox but also the NFL and so you know a couple days here a couple days there and so you know the response back from my team was like this that there is no way like you I mean you’re just dreaming this is gonna be like five million like I’m like we already have that it’s like it’ll be fine you know the founder just saying it’s gonna be great you know it was still I was getting shot down by everybody in the company they were like there’s just no way but this is happening and and so then 10 days before I guess 11 days before the Super Bowl I you know resurfaced it and I said you know we should really we should really go back and do this and I said to the I said to my CMO I was like go back and just say a guy like give him a lowball offer and he’s like err sold out for national there’s no way that they’re gonna go for it and I was like no what is it was running out of time right so one week before Friday before and I said this whole thing has to be trafficked by the NFL or else they’re gonna be giving the beast spots away to their own advertisers by Tuesday morning it has to so so at five o’clock Friday turn in our bid on this and let’s see what happens and I mean I have to tell you I mean we ended up getting getting you know the overall plan was less than 50 percent I mean we got we we had eighty percent of the country for less than a million bucks and so eighty percent of the country in terms of this saw the ad for less than a million dollars on a Super Bowl commercial there’s a 30-second spot on fifteen thirty and so and so what was crazy is that what they said to us is it will run sometime during the Super Bowl it can be anywhere I think it was like I can’t remember exactly I think it was anywhere from 30 to 60 minutes before or I think it was 30 to 45 minutes before the halftime show or after we literally were right before the halftime show so everybody was coming in to see the halftime no was shelling that’s been getting ready and saw the spot and it was you know it it’s a I’m you know it was it did amazing and it and we were we were so excited about it but not only from a you know consumer perspective and you know definitely it was you know where you’ve got people licking each other’s faces which you know probably we wouldn’t run that out in today’s climate by yeah but he got people to remember it and they were talking about it and it was you know it like some a very small percentage of the population was was you know thought it was offensive that two guys were licking each other’s faces like Gen X’s and Gen Z’s thought it was hilarious 12 percentage of the population will think everything is offensive like if you run they’ll think it’s offensive if you’re gonna like if you want to walk on eggshells and please everybody you’re not gonna do anything yeah did you a bunch of friends texting you being like hey I just saw your you’re like company on the super on a Super Bowl that I have never said this about my cell phone like my cell phone I think I had over 400 texts within like from all over the country just laying oh my god oh like and I think that that was the thing - that what I was going to say is it wasn’t just consumers but it was also you know people in the industry noticing it was investors it was you know lots of people most important was employees like the excitement that they were getting all these texts saying oh my gosh like you know there’s this er there’s this big soda you know Pepsi is doing it and Coca Cola’s doing it and everybody’s doing it but then all the sister the little underdog shows up yeah yeah so that’s an amazing story and and so people people were so excited but again I think it’s just you know never lose your scrappiness right like no matter how big you get and and you know I think my curiosity and also just my previous life of sort of understanding like what is trafficking and AD and it just like stuff like that it just takes time right and and we knew it was gonna clear but we but we just like we were playing against the clock and the guy that we were dealing with like knew it like and I just said like is your manager just freaking out right now that you have these open at this open as me it’s like kinda like can we get the advantage of the leverage that you had that’s fantastic so so we’ve talked about like some of your incredible marketing successes it sounds like a Super Bowl ad was fantastic you’ve had a bunch of successes that like you know that trick shows that you’ve gone to in terms of getting in front of buyers can you talk about any like tough marketing failures that you’ve had you know at native we had a bunch of marketing failures where we tried to buy really large podcasts or we try to you know buy our way into places and it just failed spectacularly where we’d spend tens of thousands of dollars and it just didn’t work out we also had that when we tried like you know I remember the first like couple months that I launched the business we’ve lost thousands of dollars trying to buy Google Ads that’s supposed to do you know I’m sure there’s gonna be a lot of people who are listening to this podcast who aren’t nearly at the you know level of scale that you’re at but want to realize that you’re also a human being and want to realize that you know there’s failures along the way were there any like failures from a marketing perspective that you had in the last 15 years you can talk about yeah I mean I would say a couple of things to that first you know I again I I was in advertising before so I sort of always had this theory that unless we you know could really get the frequency that it wasn’t worth it so you know we didn’t we never really it’s like went out and bought one billboard because I just thought it like one billboard it’s just like anything right it’s just wasting money if we’re if we’re just doing one thing and so I think that we’ve always believed like you know buy it buy a chunk in an area and you know do do it right or just don’t do it at all and that sort of been our theory too that you know just just not only from a marketing district marketing brand standpoint but also from a distribution standpoint we’ve also just believed like if we can’t actually do well in a store or in a market like we shouldn’t be there right and I think it’s the same sort of philosophy for like don’t be afraid to take your time and which is sort of like you know not what everybody would say like I mean we’ve had so many you know brands that have said no you got to get across the u.s. you got to get into Kroger you gotta get Publix like Costco fast fast fast and so many of those companies aren’t here anymore because we just spent too fast right so if you don’t have the money to go into those markets and really do it right I mean my best advice would be you know just do the markets they you can be really good at well period right and and like slow that growth but I would say you know they’re you know even I’m just thinking about you know Facebook I mean Facebook is sort of the the conversation for Aldi to see you know brands right and and figuring that out I think I think it’s just it’s really uh you know again don’t put all your eggs in one basket right and I think you have to figure out constant how do you continue to you know grow and you know go back to your list and and you know get the existing buyers to keep buying until you find the right time to ultimately you know get facebook to be at a point where you know your cost of customer acquisition isn’t crazy so I think that that’s you know that’s the key thing a lot of people say to us like why are you on Amazon but you’re also you know on your direct-to-consumer site there’s a value to us of being able to have you know a name that we can go back and market to and have a subscription service and then you know all of those things so it’s surveys to understand what a o V looks like and repeat purchase rate looks like that’s crazy that people would ask you that there’s clearly value and you sort of having your own direct channel with consumers yeah totally and and I think it’s just it’s again you know I never I mean I look at even I think about I talk about in my book the the whole Starbucks situation I mean it was clearly distribution I mean they were selling millions of dollars to multi millions of dollars of product every year but for us it really was a marketing play where they were getting us into all kinds of you know there’s a Starbucks on every corner right and there every couple of every couple of blocks and so we were getting you know we were visible in so many places and then you know when they turned us off I really viewed that as a failure for a lot of different reasons including I blamed myself for not like having you know too much in you know to that relationship I mean they were clearly buying we weren’t writing them large you know slotting fee chapters or anything like that but I still had a lot of inventory I didn’t there was a lot of risk with that and you know what I’ve learned to do though too is you know not be so hard on yourself and create all this anxiety around the fact that you know in some ways he failed in some way she tried I think instead figure out like you know what was the good I’m a huge believer that in fact when we to Amazon at the guy who was the buyer reached out and said oh I get your product all the time at Starbucks and so if if we were not in Starbucks won’t be an Amazon we wouldn’t be an Amazon you’re a great story yeah right and so every so sometimes it just takes a minute to actually I’m sure you know the the Google story for you and sort of feeling like oh like I mean made a mistake there or whatever if you sit back for a minute and you actually just say like what did I learn you know I got that much smarter about how I do my buys for this next one where I saved mine and again like sometimes you have to connect a bunch of different dots to actually sometimes it takes time to figure that stuff out but I I just don’t really view you know life in general as failing as much as you know I’m gonna it’s teaching me that I can do better on the on the next run and and maybe that also is you know telling an audience that here’s what I learned along the way I mean you know and and these are the lessons maybe it’s you know I’m giving back to other people to learn from you know my mistake my feel ya know whatever but but I I just I’m a huge believer that that’s that’s such an important piece of this as well and you know you make the best decision based on the best information that you have and you know and I think that that’s that that is so key and and sometimes you know that’s challenging too because I’m sure you know you you have things in your head that you maybe did wrong or we’re not exactly how you wanted them to turn out and now then people come to you and start talking to you about you know Google AdWords or whatever and you’re like God you know I sure and you’re gun-shy and so you know exactly what you need to get over or what the prices and so it’s a lesson yeah yeah and you know initially when we were talking about marketing you were talking about billboards and how you didn’t want to buy one billboard and there was like a frequency that you thought was really important in order to get consumers to sort of resonates a brand or think it when you were setting your marketing campaign when you’re setting your marketing budget our campaigns do you think okay we’re gonna allocate this much to digital this much out-of-home this much to you know b2b or are you sort of like look this is a living organism and we’ll call the play when we sort of walk up to the line so we currently divide our marketing out into branded marketing adults as well as direct to consumer and so some company is actually having especially when you’re small you have one person who’s maybe you know kind of yeah sure kind of being or running the ad buys or whatever they’re actually two very separate you know departments in terms of in terms of budgets but what we found is the more money we put into direct-to-consumer as an example in terms of ads like there’s a lot of people who will go on Facebook or you know or other other places where we may show up and they’re gonna walk into a Target store or they’re gonna go on the you know they’re gonna go on an insta part or whatever an order and so that for us we’ve just found it you know there’s some carryover into the branded or sort of the offline stuff that they’re gonna do they may not click the button and actually order online or you know if they see TV they may you know again go into their local grocery store or you know whatever they they you know might end up doing that so I think it’s it’s just a matter of there’s definitely spillover into that so it’s it’s a you know I would say that from a from the standpoint of budgets are direct-to-consumer just because of its measure ability and because of the spillover we put more money into that but you know it on the on the flip side of that too we viewed the Superbowl ad as there was no you know at the end it said direct it said Dre Kim calm but there was no 800 number or nobody’s going on don’t know if Superbowl to go by but you know the next time that they saw a direct-to-consumer ad did they click it because they remember of course yeah and you know and so that’s that’s really how we you know how we view it and if the direct consumer side is sort of larger than the branded side it’s Facebook like a native Facebook was king there and I think you’ve told other people as well Facebook is King therefore hint as well is that right is that where you say okay this is our yeah yeah definitely I would say I would say from you know third party like companies where we’re doing doing it we’re also you know we do we also you know go out to other lists as well and and do you know different swaps with other companies as well to try and figure out if we can you know email people and do some sort of partnership too so we’ve done you know it’s it’s funny to just from a branded standpoint and again sort of I can’t say that I was strategically like you know brilliance or you know knew exactly what was going to happen but a few years ago Verizon reached out to me and they’re like hey you know we’ve got this ad we’re asking entrepreneurs to be a part of this ad would you be interested and I’ve been a Verizon customer since pretty much since day one I wouldn’t get in cell connection through you know ATT sorry ATT but I’m sure they’ve got a lot better but it was but it was just I’ve just always been Verizon and and that was from my well days and I was traveling around a lot and so I still have my nine one seven number even though I’m living in the Bay Area and so they asked me to be a part of this and they didn’t really give me a sort of clear definition of what it would be and they told me to show up in this like studio and I really thought it was going to be print and then after they did the print they were like by the way we think we’re gonna run this and they they actually didn’t run the ad until recently and so it’s running on CNN like a lot right now and by some miracle they were just talking to me just like you and I were talking about some miracle I had a quote that they picked up on which is part of the Verizon and it said you don’t have to be together to work together and so that has become a Verizon like quote and it says cure gold and founder and CEO of hint and but the number every time that Verizon ad runs people go on to our site yeah definitely it doesn’t say drinking concert it’s very subtle and then the exact same thing happened with a company called NetSuite and I was speaking at you know their their conference and you know I tell the story that I truly didn’t know how to call Oracle to we were like moving out of QuickBooks and you know I didn’t know how to call Oracle I just thought where would I start and I’d heard about NetSuite and and you know I just thought they’re like maybe eventually we’ll get to Oracle but for now like let’s let’s start with these guys at NetSuite and so we’ve you know grown with them we told them all their problems that they had and and we continue to grow and the CMO said to me you know I loved watching you on stage like you’re just you know telling the story and and would you do this ad for us and I was like sure and so so that ad has now been running for a year and every single time that ad runs it’s like you know hint people go to have water duck yeah sure yeah and so we have not spent a dime on that advertising and you know we we have you know I would say it’s I would say conservatively between Verizon and NetSuite which is now an Oracle company easily 50 million dollars and adds that they will that’s crazy in our brain I certainly seen a lot more like businesses doing that like I’ve seen a senior at first on like that sweet it’s fantastic I’ve seen shipstation doing ads with a beard brand I’ve seen like Amazon doing ads with companies like not pods it’s really amazing to see these large business or its business has sort of leaning into that I feel like it all started with American Express a long time ago and I’ve done some for American Express to you I mean I think that I’ve learned I’ve done it for some of their direct mail pieces I haven’t done a television commercial but I think like that’s you know the other thing that I say to entrepreneurs it’s like you know none of those were intentional partnerships but they’re they’re authentic and they’re real and I think that you know when you’re out that’s why I always tell entrepreneurs like the sooner you can get out and actually tell your story to and that doesn’t mean like necessarily like talking to press outlets about it I mean maybe it does but also actually speaking and whether that’s you know at whatever the hustle or shorter grind or whatever you go you know it you go and speak at some of these conferences and you start telling your story about like we initially funded the company with our American Express card and thank God we had like good credit yeah and because we needed it and you know to buy the bottles and the cabinets and then you know American Express reached out like took them six months so they reached out and they’re like we want to talk to you about the story and thank you for being a customer and then suddenly you know it was clear that they wanted to get you involved and so those things are you know so valuable like if you can figure out two or three partnerships that you have where you know you just really believe I mean again like you know I had another phone company reach out to me after the Verizon one and I was like you know I just I wouldn’t do like I wouldn’t do another food company I wouldn’t do you know but I I just thought like these are these are companies that I truly believe in and and I think like if you can borrow equity from those brands because they’re clearly borrowing equity from our grant right we’re startup we’re a female founded startup like there’s lots of reasons why I don’t bring you products yeah 21st century completely agree that they’re do that is marketing and I’m just saying like that that is one where I think nobody’s really thought like I mean we’ve we value those relationships and you know like that is so big and and it doesn’t cost you any money yeah it’s company money yeah and so that’s that’s amazing yeah I’d love to talk a little bit about the other categories that you’ve launched into uh early on we talked about hint water boat that was I’m not sure if you call it flat water or like non-carbonated carbonated still water so still water carbonated you know hint fizz we talked about caffeinated since then you’ve also launched a couple other categories I know you’ve launched hints sunscreen which smells absolutely amazing it’s a spray sunscreen I think you’ve launched nto ruin as well are there other categories that are sort of coming up and how did you think about those cash you know for us I think you know it was this it was really again looking at how can we help the consumer get healthy right and we felt like there were a lot of consumers who were coming to us who were drinking our product and they would you know reach out and say hey you know what kind of you know makeup should I wear or what we were like wait what like we’re water you know that’s what we’re doing and and so we’ve we felt like we could start to touch on you know these these categories that were in our opinion and not doing what you know we needed or what our consumer needed and so I’m allergic to coconut and so a lot of the you know natural units that are out there have coconut yeah and in them and so for me like I was totally on board with the concept of a natural deodorant but I wanted something you know free coconut oil right and so that was something that you know I just started to play around with the home and then I just thought huh this is really interesting and then you know for us to it’s primarily sold online I mean we were and you know on Amazon as well as on drinking calm but you know for us it’s really helped us to kind of understand this consumer a little bit more and what more they would be interested in as well I mean we we I and I think the same is true with the sunscreen I mean sunscreen was way harder than actually we embarked on it I mean you need FDA approval you’re like I mean we use you know we’re using the same essences that we’re using in in the water for the sunscreen which you know they actually needed to do the FTA needed to do shelf-life testing when we ended up before we actually got the approval because most companies use fragrances they don’t actually which is a whole other topic and you’re using natural essences well yeah I mean and it was like it was crazy I mean that we were like what I saw in the beauty and personal care industry was so much further behind than what the food industry what what people were talking about and so but we were one of the first companies non mineral based sunscreens that was really calling out oxybenzone and so there’s and so I really believed I had you know some pre-cancer stuff on my nose that wouldn’t go away and I started you know really looking deeper at the sunscreen industry and you know I had grown up in Arizona have red hair way too much Sun early on and I had read about the stuff oxybenzone and I was like you know this stuff is really bad I mean there’s the Center for Disease Control back in the late 70s that actually told the FDA that that oxybenzone may actually enhance pre cancer cell growth and they had recommended to the FDA not to approve it and somehow it got approved and so there’s many places in the world where oxybenzone is not approved but in the u.s. it is approved and so you know we started calling it out and and I think for me this goes back to sort of like the big company strategy the number of people after we launched it from large companies who reached out to me and said hey you know we’ve always known that this oxybenzone stuff is not so great but it’s hard because we have all brands that are housed in our house and for us to actually call out that means we have to reformulate everything to show you and so like that’s really tough and so I was like okay well you know we’ll just keep doing that right well we’ll keep calling it out and so eventually you know you’ll have time to go and reformulate or not and you will just have more runway to just go and build your company and so you know that’s the thing that I also realized that I had done with hint water which was you know we really focused on ingredients and and you know that the ingredient was sweetener right if doc man look and then you start to look at the rest of the product and you know all the great stuff around it but I think it’s no different for products to and more and more I think people are you know looking at their products it’s not just about being organic or not organic it’s really about people are getting smart about ingredients yeah I think you know I was speaking to on an interview earlier this morning and I was talking about you know the world today and and what is the biggest thing that I’ve noticed and I think that you know for the last few weeks since we’ve been in shelter-in-place I mean the number of conversations that I’ve had with people not only you know friends of mine but also business colleagues around health like people are realizing you know the health is is like such a key thing and everything yeah right it’s everything right and so and and I think that you know people are trying to you know make sure that they’re getting their exercise every day but then also eating right and eating well and I have not heard this conversation like you know everywhere where I go like I’m hearing it now yeah I mean people are just so focused on it which is perfect there been have there been first I I think that’s absolutely true and I think you’re right and I think like we’ll have that conversation a lot more when the Kobe crisis sort of dies down because right now I think it’s a struggle in order to make sure your fridge is stocked and in a way that you know where you can get food in a easy healthy safe way yeah once it becomes easy again it’ll be a lot more important to people are there other beverage companies that have sort of crossed this Rubicon and gotten into personal care yeah look I I’m trying to think of other beverage companies that have launched personal care products do you know of any you know I feel like vitamin water or way back when did I mean chopsticks we had always had like a great lip balm or chapstick or whatever you want to call it so but I you know I don’t I don’t really know I know of any others that that really crossed over I mean I think like the challenge of course is that the soda you know companies like I mean look most we are today the largest independent non-alcoholic beverage in the country that doesn’t have a relationship with Coke Pepsi or dr. peppers now so I think like you know a lot of companies and a lot of founders that I’ve talked to I mean they could not figure out to do what we’ve done nationwide without you know the trucks the coke trucks or the Pepsi absolutely no one beyond ten million you know it’s like I mean beverages are just like sunscreens are heard beverages are harder I mean beverages are you know you have to like when you go into major markets in addition to the Cisco’s and the UNF eyes and all the rest of it you have to have you know a DSD Network that is going into these stores every day that make sure that your shelves aren’t wiped out and if you you know if you don’t know that now if you’re starting a beverage like you learn it really quickly whatever I’m sure focused on you know the 7-elevens of the world or or whatever you cannot rely on the stores no matter what category they’re in whether it’s club or whatever you have to have teams of people that are you know in those stores and actually helping to build out K stacks and and do you know in merchandise and make sure that your reorders or you’ll fail and so that’s why you know the teams are bigger it’s sort of you know it’s just what ends up happening and so I think when I look at these other categories too it’s it’s probably tougher to build the sunscreen and you know and we really haven’t put a whole lot of marketing into any of this here I mean we’re really sort of in the infancy stages of it but I think it’s for us it’s really I mean it’s not take any more people to do it I mean we’ve got like a small group inside internally that can focus on it because it’s just it’s not as high touch as beverages you think it’s a little bit like giving people haven’t done it as much in the past because they’re afraid of like you know coca doesn’t want to buy a deodorant business or a chapstick business or do you think it they’re afraid of dilution of brand or do you think they just haven’t had the right story they haven’t been focused on ingredients or do you think it’s just because you know people haven’t thought of it or like is there a reason that hasn’t done that sir no I think there’s definitely people have said you know you’re starting these categories and you know the soda companies like won’t like that when they’re looking at you to you know to buy but I think that there’s there’s two things that I would say number one you know my my goal is not to figure out like how to get my company perfect so that really Pepsi will buy us right we have we have built a standalone company that is now profitable that has grown every single year for the last 15 years I mean we’ve built this really solid company and I think in addition to that we have a direct-to-consumer business that is I don’t think there’s any other you know company in our space that is doing what we’re doing offline as well as online and I think soon people are these large brands are going to figure out that you know hint is a brand name that can stretch across multiple categories I mean I would love to do a home product not necessarily to go you know super broad on it but just to actually figure out because I’m all I’m all about consumer permission to and and you know and I think unless you test it you just don’t really know you know and whether or not and and I think there’s I see products every single day where I’m like if it just had that or like just be a little bit better and for me it’s just really trying to understand you know when we talk about lifetime value I mean that’s just extra bands the lifetime value of a consumer and if you can if you can do that in a way that doesn’t jeopardize the rest of your sales that doesn’t you know get get your team focused on stuff that they shouldn’t be focused on then it makes sense and and I don’t think it happens like I wouldn’t go launch a company today and go into multiple categories yeah definitely say but we gotten super permission to do that yeah and the consumer and and I don’t think I would have even like had the you know courage to go do it if I didn’t keep hearing from the consumer help me you like help me just like you I have a coconut allergy just like you I had read about oxybenzone you know you should go you should go do this you should go do this so I not only feel like with our products we’re helping consumers but I also feel like we’re helping large companies really understand that this consumer like wants health right and they’re no longer going to be fooled by you know these words like diet or you know natural or oxybenzone or like feeling like it’s a you know plus it’s like it’s like these these things are engineering our health and and I think that you know that is the time we stand up to that we we stand up to it and I fundamentally believe it every single day that that’s what we’re doing and if and if there’s products that I think we can do better you know I don’t plan on having this company under my leadership be the next you know honest company the Jessica Alba’s honest you know not the honesty that I just I don’t think we need to do thousands and thousands of skews I think what we need to do is do a few skews well and really try and understand where the consumer you know wants us to go yeah what kara we’re way over time I really appreciate you spending the time I’m gonna ask you a bunch of just really quick forward quick questions one what is the best-selling flavor of mint water it’s a close tie between blackberry and watermelon okay what is your favorite flavor of mint water uh we just launched Clementine Clementine that’s certain favor right now amazing yeah okay cherry cherry fizz is also I’m okay when you aren’t drinking hint water what do you drink it coffee so I’m a coffee snob I love you waiter coffee another San Francisco great female founded brand so I’m very uh yeah I would say you know coffee and finally if somebody is um wants to start a beverage brand today what do you recommend and the first thing they do to get into a brick-and-mortar store is is it just trying to go into bodegas in New York is it to try and get a you know a meeting with your local Whole Foods buyer is it to try and get a booth at Expo West what is the first step that they should think of when they’re like I’ve got a beverage brand or a food brand I want or beverage brand let’s focus on beverage brands I have a beverage friend I want to get this into brick-and-mortar stores what’s the first step there I think it’s finding who you’re on dances because I I think that if you don’t you know if you’re launching an energy drink and a whatever 22 ounce can that you know that’s probably not the market for Whole Foods I mean maybe maybe not it depends on the ingredients but I think you just need to find out who your market is and then and then you know go and try and get in there I mean when I got into hold 15 years ago they had a program where you could actually go in to the local store and try and sell it in and they would test it out I’m not sure since am acquire them whether or not they’re doing that or not but you know don’t focus on the targets or the Costco’s I mean start small and just keep doing well and just keep building and building a building and then I would say also you know social having social channels has just become you know absolutely critical and if you can you know do that right I think that that’s the most important thing and whether that’s you know figuring out who influencers are you know there’s there’s highs and lows and pluses and minuses to that but I think also just you know are you doing something from a messaging standpoint that you think an audience would really relate to yeah that that you know they would tap into and I think you know don’t be afraid I know many days you actually you know delivered cases and you were you know at the trade shows and and showing up I think it’s it’s a you know I still see handi you know not necessarily delivering javonni you know everywhere but every once in a while you know showing up and and definitely at the trade shows and Daniel from kind bar as well and and I think it’s like never be afraid to you know take care of your product and and make sure that it’s being cared for and yeah that’s the biggest thing fantastic thanks so much Gareth people want to hear more from you where should they like where should they here where should they follow you should it be is it on Instagram it’s it on Twitter can you provide you yeah I mean I’m on all social channels at carat golden kar a gol di n I’m probably most active on Twitter and have a pretty robust audience there that’s lots of fun and and so yeah that that would probably be the biggest place and then if you are interested in buying hinted at stores but also on our site at drinking calm as well as Amazon fantastic thanks so much for your time John really appreciate it this is fantastic awesome