Latest / Hurdle with Emily Abbate / Episode 44: Rachel Drori, Founder & CEO Daily Harvest

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Episode 44: Rachel Drori, Founder & CEO Daily Harvest · Hurdle with Emily Abbate

0:01
Speaker 1: Hey, Hurdler's Emily Abadi here with episode forty four of Hurdle,
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Speaker 1: a podcast that talks to everyone from entrepreneurs to CEOs
0:09
Speaker 1: and athletes about how they got through tough times hurdles
0:12
Speaker 1: of sorts by leaning into wellness. Today, I'm chatting with
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Speaker 1: Rachel Drury. She's the founder and CEO of Daily Harvest.
0:21
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Speaker 1: Another shout out to my sponsor Athletic Greens containing twelve
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1:26
Speaker 1: So now let's talk about Rachel. Rachel is a total
1:29
Speaker 1: girl boss. She's so down to earth. I loved sitting
1:32
Speaker 1: down with her. And in twenty fifteen, she was a
1:35
Speaker 1: little bit angry working at Gilt Group. She didn't have
1:39
Speaker 1: enough time to rescue, plan or cook healthy meals every
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Speaker 1: single day, and then come three pm, she'd grab whatever
1:45
Speaker 1: was available for convenience sake, like a bar or trail mix,
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Speaker 1: instead of putting good, clean food into her body. Sounds
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Speaker 1: totally familiar, right, Well, she felt totally depleted, as so
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Speaker 1: many of us do, and to make matters worse, she
1:59
Speaker 1: was diagnosed with autoimmune disease called hashimotos. In today's episode,
2:04
Speaker 1: she talks to me about this hurdle moment, which encouraged
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Speaker 1: her to start meal prepping, eating healthier, enabling her to
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Speaker 1: manage her disease, for go prescriptions and concept a brand
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Speaker 1: new company in the process. Today, frozen favorite Daily Harvest
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Speaker 1: has expanded to more than fifty recipes and this incloses
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Speaker 1: everything from smoothies and harvest hools, oat bowls, chia bowls
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Speaker 1: and soups, to activated lattes and my personal favorite cookies.
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Speaker 1: Rachel dishes today on the truth behind the fruits and
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Speaker 1: vegetables you see in the grocery store. This actually blew
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Speaker 1: my mind how she manages to fit in running one
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Speaker 1: hundred person company and raise her two boys. And she
2:41
Speaker 1: also explains what the shiggle is. You know the deal?
2:45
Speaker 1: Hit me up at Hurdle podcast on Facebook and Twitter
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Speaker 1: and Instagram. Share your favorite takeaways in your story and
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Speaker 1: I'll make sure to repost them from the Hurdle account. Also,
2:56
Speaker 1: if you have a Hurdle moment to share or just
2:57
Speaker 1: want to say hi, send me your feedback, talk to
3:00
Speaker 1: me about who you want to hear on the podcast
3:02
Speaker 1: all the things. I'm just an email away. You can
3:04
Speaker 1: reach me at Emily at Hurdle dot us. Of course,
3:10
Speaker 1: Daily Harvest wants to give you guys something special too.
3:13
Speaker 1: If you're listening, it's twenty five dollars off your first
3:16
Speaker 1: box using the code hurdle. You just head on over
3:19
Speaker 1: to Dailyharvest dot com. You can pick a box of nine,
3:22
Speaker 1: or twelve or twenty four different cups. My go to's
3:25
Speaker 1: right now, the Califlower, Rice and Kimchi Harvest Bowl after
3:28
Speaker 1: a long day, or the cacaut mitsmovie right after our
3:31
Speaker 1: workout in the morning. Again, it's Dailyarvest dot com. Use
3:34
Speaker 1: the promo code hurdle for twenty five dollars off and
3:38
Speaker 1: that's it. With that, let's get to hurdling. I'm sitting
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Speaker 1: here today with Rachel Drory. She's the founder and CEO
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Speaker 1: of Daily Harvest. Hey, Rachel, Hi, thanks for having me.
3:55
Speaker 1: Thanks for coming in. It's a it's a little bit
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Speaker 1: of an early morning for us today, but not for
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Speaker 1: you because you've got two kids at home.
4:01
Speaker 2: Yeah.
4:01
Speaker 1: I've been up since five, so you're good. And my
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Speaker 1: first question for you to kick it off is, every morning,
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Speaker 1: after obviously tending to the little ones, are you reaching
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Speaker 1: for a smoothie? I sure am so, I'm usually a
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Speaker 1: ginger green smoothie kind of gal m all right, we
4:20
Speaker 1: should probably give the people what they need. To know,
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Speaker 1: which is why don't you tell me a little bit
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Speaker 1: about what Daily Harvest is to get us going here?
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Speaker 2: Sure?
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Speaker 1: Thanks?
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Speaker 2: So Daily Harvest is on a mission to take care
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Speaker 2: of food so food can take care of all of us.
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Speaker 2: And what that means is we're all super busy, we
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Speaker 2: all have a lot of obligations. We kind of live
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Speaker 2: in this world where we live half online and half offline,
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Speaker 2: and it causes this tension where like we can't be
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Speaker 2: everywhere at once, we feel like we need to be
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Speaker 2: and we're stressed out. Food is meant to nourish us.
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Speaker 2: Food is meant to take care of us. And what
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Speaker 2: happens is in this world where you're trying to kind
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Speaker 2: of live in two places at once online and offline,
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Speaker 2: yourself or you know you, is usually what suffers. And
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Speaker 2: you know, our our mission is to really make good, clean,
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Speaker 2: nourishing food as accessible as possible so you can be
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Speaker 2: your best self in this crazy world.
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Speaker 1: All right? That sounds promising. I am sitting here thinking
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Speaker 1: about how conflicted I feel about my web self and
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Speaker 1: my real self at the moment. So what kind of
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Speaker 1: products do you guys make?
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Speaker 2: So we make smoothies, we make oat, bowls, We make
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Speaker 2: chia bowls, we make soups, we make harvest bowls, we
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Speaker 2: make cookies, and we make lock takes.
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Speaker 1: Okay, And the thing about all of these products.
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Speaker 2: Yes, so everything is delivered directly to consumers to your
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Speaker 2: front door, and everything comes frozen on the farm. So
5:50
Speaker 2: what happens is, when it's a jazzy term, right, frozen
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Speaker 2: on the farm. So when you buy something in the
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Speaker 2: grocery store, right, you buy a blueberry, you're like, blueberry
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Speaker 2: are so good for me. They're full of vandaeas and
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Speaker 2: if they're full of all these wonderful things that I
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Speaker 2: should be eating, they should be nourishing me. But what
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Speaker 2: happens in reality is that they're picked on the farm.
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Speaker 2: They're picked green before they reach their nutritional peak, and
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Speaker 2: then they take months or blueberries don't take months, but
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Speaker 2: they take weeks. Apples can take like a year and
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Speaker 2: a half until you eat them, which is gross. But
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Speaker 2: blueberries take weeks to get to you. And by the
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Speaker 2: time they get to you, the nutrients that never really
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Speaker 2: had time to develop in the first place start to degrade.
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Speaker 2: So the blueberry that you're buying the grocery store isn't
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Speaker 2: the blueberry that you really think you're eating. If you
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Speaker 2: pick a blueberry from a bush, and if you get
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Speaker 2: it from a like a farmer's market, it's a wonderful blueberry.
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Speaker 2: But for most of us, that's just not reality. So
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Speaker 2: instead of you know, going through your fridge and like
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Speaker 2: picking out the non moldy.
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Speaker 1: Berries there, Yeah.
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Speaker 2: We make everything frozen on the farm, so it's picked it,
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Speaker 2: it's nutritional peak, and it's really ready for you when
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Speaker 2: you're ready. You don't have to worry about it rotting
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Speaker 2: in your fridge. It's just there for you.
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Speaker 1: I feel as though I've been duped a little bit.
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Speaker 1: And I also, I mean, is this something that a
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Speaker 1: lot I feel like I should have. I'm stuttering because
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Speaker 1: I'm just so taken aback. I can't believe I didn't
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Speaker 1: know that picked literally up to a year and a
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Speaker 1: half before we're buying them in the supermarket. Yep. Wow.
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Speaker 2: And a lot of things are gas ripened, and there's
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Speaker 2: just a lot of.
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Speaker 1: Same with organic or not same with organica. Wow. Yep,
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Speaker 1: this is insane. Okay, So you guys, freeze from the farm.
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Speaker 1: Was that the right terminology? Yeah? That works, okay, freeze
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Speaker 1: from the farm all of these delicious eats, so then
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Speaker 1: I can get them delivered anywhere in the country.
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Speaker 2: Anywhere in the country. And what's so special to a
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Speaker 2: lot of people is when you open one of our cups,
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Speaker 2: you see all of the whole real ingredients and we
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Speaker 2: list all the ingredients in the back of the cup.
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Speaker 2: And this sounds obvious, but it's actually pretty novel. You know,
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Speaker 2: when you re that there are apples and something and
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Speaker 2: you open it and there's an apple.
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Speaker 1: Right right right lovely looking.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, so that's that's one of the things that that
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Speaker 2: we're really proud of.
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Speaker 1: That's awesome. Okay, so do you have I mean, you
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Speaker 1: obviously just said ginger green smoothie, but give me some
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Speaker 1: other favorites of yours so that the people at home
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Speaker 1: can get a better understanding of the kind of different
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Speaker 1: offerings that daily harvests, for sure. So we have a
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Speaker 1: Brussels sprout.
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Speaker 2: Lime pad tie that delicious that's made with Kelp noodles
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Speaker 2: that are actually farmed in Maine by a women owned
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Speaker 2: farm that is basically planting kelp farms under the ocean,
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Speaker 2: which is just so cool. Yeah, and it's like revitalized
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Speaker 2: an entire city it's how do.
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Speaker 1: You even find these people?
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Speaker 2: So we seek them out like our coffees, you know,
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Speaker 2: it's it's from a a cooperative farm that is all
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Speaker 2: women farmers in Columbia. And you know, we we work
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Speaker 2: on we seek out opportunities like regenerative farming and transitional
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Speaker 2: organic because we think it's really important. If our mission
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Speaker 2: is to take care of food, it can't just be
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Speaker 2: like the food that is already out there, like we
9:18
Speaker 2: have to help make food what we want it to be.
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Speaker 1: And you mentioned organic is everything from Daily Harvest organic.
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Speaker 1: So we're nine organic, okay.
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Speaker 2: And the reason we are not one hundred percent is
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Speaker 2: because we use transitional transitional organic. And we have decided
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Speaker 2: that for those few items, like we'll never use non
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Speaker 2: organic for something that is dirty dozen. What does that
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Speaker 2: mean so dirty doesn't? Is it's the list of the
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Speaker 2: of the twelve most heavily pesticided crops, gotcha, And there
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Speaker 2: are things that you just should not eat on organic.
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Speaker 1: Got it? So our?
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Speaker 2: And then there's also the clean fifteen, very rimy. But
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Speaker 2: the clean fifteen is things that like they don't really
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Speaker 2: need to be organic, and usually our transitional organic crops
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Speaker 2: are those. But we also work on things like within
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Speaker 2: the middle of the spectrum. Got it to.
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Speaker 1: Help farmers.
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Speaker 2: So usually it takes three years for a farmer to
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Speaker 2: become organic, and what happens is they're only paid for
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Speaker 2: conventional during that three hour three year period, and they
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Speaker 2: lose a ton of money because it's expensive to transition
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Speaker 2: your crop.
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Speaker 1: Wow.
10:22
Speaker 2: So we invest in those farmers in those crops, and
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Speaker 2: we say we're going to pay you for organic right
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Speaker 2: over that period. Yeah, and we're basically trying to increase
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Speaker 2: the availability of organic overall.
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Speaker 1: Wow. Well that's a pretty impressive mission that you have
10:35
Speaker 1: going on there. Have you always been into eating really healthy? Yeah?
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Speaker 2: So I'd say it kind of comes from two places.
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Speaker 2: So I was actually a rower growing up And where
10:45
Speaker 2: did you grow up in New York?
10:46
Speaker 1: Okay? Yeah?
10:47
Speaker 2: And being an athlete's I was a lightweight rower, which
10:51
Speaker 2: means you have to be you know, certain, there's a
10:54
Speaker 2: weight limit, and there's just a lot of like intensity
10:56
Speaker 2: to rowing if you've ever known a rower, So you know,
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Speaker 2: I always had access to a nutritionist and was really
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Speaker 2: well versed in in like what I should be eating
11:08
Speaker 2: that And one of my concentrations in college was the
11:11
Speaker 2: politics of food wow, And I kind of put those together,
11:16
Speaker 2: and for a while it was kind of the person
11:19
Speaker 2: that you never wanted to eat with, but be like,
11:21
Speaker 2: you know that hell of it is full, mercurious.
11:24
Speaker 1: Oh good, but enjoy it. So are you telling me
11:27
Speaker 1: that you never go off the rails? Of course I
11:29
Speaker 1: go off? Okay, I was like, how do you how?
11:32
Speaker 1: Of course I got the rails.
11:33
Speaker 2: But I mean that that's where daily harvest started. I
11:36
Speaker 2: was at I was at guilt group, and I was
11:38
Speaker 2: working incredibly hard, and I just was eating terribly. I
11:43
Speaker 2: knew how I should have been eating, but it's a
11:45
Speaker 2: hard thing to do when you just don't have enough
11:48
Speaker 2: hours in the day.
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Speaker 1: So what's that look like like? Eating really horribly for
11:51
Speaker 1: you at that time?
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Speaker 2: I mean it was eating going into the pantry and
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Speaker 2: grabbing whatever was there, whether it was like birthday cake
11:59
Speaker 2: or trail mix, because I didn't have time for lunch,
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Speaker 2: and I would just grab it and put it in
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Speaker 2: a cup and go back to my desk.
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Speaker 1: I'm so thankful I never worked at an office that
12:07
Speaker 1: I had copious amounts of snacks, although I guess, I mean,
12:10
Speaker 1: if you work at the right office, we have to
12:12
Speaker 1: really harm it sacks when you're in good cheap but
12:16
Speaker 1: I mean the offices that you walk into and it's
12:18
Speaker 1: like there are Cheetos and Lays and every nut bar
12:21
Speaker 1: you could ever want, which is like frame to be healthy,
12:24
Speaker 1: but really you should not eat five of them in
12:25
Speaker 1: a single day. Like, I'm so thankful that the worst
12:28
Speaker 1: offense I ever had was that my original startup I
12:31
Speaker 1: worked at out of college had like a fridge full
12:33
Speaker 1: of sodas. I could handle the sodas.
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Speaker 2: I mean, what happens is when you get angry, you're
12:38
Speaker 2: just gonna grab for whatever is closest true.
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Speaker 1: Okay, so you're working at guilt Group, your diet isn't
12:43
Speaker 1: exactly stellar, and.
12:47
Speaker 2: And then what And I was like, I have to
12:50
Speaker 2: make a change. Yeah, I have to make a change.
12:52
Speaker 2: I had some health things going on at the time,
12:55
Speaker 2: and I was kind of like, what is going on.
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Speaker 2: I know how I should be eating, I'm not eating
13:01
Speaker 2: that way. I'm not exercising the way I know I
13:03
Speaker 2: should be. I need to take better care of myself.
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Speaker 2: So what I did is I started meal prepping. I
13:11
Speaker 2: was gathering all the ingredients that I wanted to be
13:14
Speaker 2: consuming in a day. I'm a big believer in like
13:17
Speaker 2: eating the rainbow, and I would spend my sundays kind
13:21
Speaker 2: of meal prepping and making sure that that I was
13:25
Speaker 2: able to have the things that I wanted to consume
13:27
Speaker 2: at arm's length. And it was wonderful. Like meal prepping
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Speaker 2: changed the way I ate. I was able to, you know,
13:37
Speaker 2: that ten minute break that I had in the day,
13:39
Speaker 2: or usually ten seconds, I was able to grab something
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Speaker 2: that was really good and I felt good about it.
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Speaker 1: So what kind of things were you prepping? A lot
13:47
Speaker 1: of the.
13:47
Speaker 2: Things that you see at daily heartsts today, mostly those things, right,
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Speaker 2: you know, bowls and smoothies, and.
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Speaker 1: I mean were they at the time. So I always did.
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Speaker 2: Make them for And the reason why interesting is because
14:03
Speaker 2: I one I wanted variety. I'm not the kind of
14:06
Speaker 2: person who can eat the same thing every day.
14:08
Speaker 1: I just get bored of it. It's very hard.
14:11
Speaker 2: But if you want to efficiently meal prep, you kind
14:13
Speaker 2: of have to eat the same thing every day exactly.
14:16
Speaker 2: And the other thing is that I would hate by
14:18
Speaker 2: the end of the week being like.
14:21
Speaker 1: Is this good? Like she's still be eating this It's
14:24
Speaker 1: like a little slimy.
14:25
Speaker 2: Yeah, So frozen was this was the solve for all
14:28
Speaker 2: of that.
14:29
Speaker 1: What's interesting to me is that I wouldn't have even
14:31
Speaker 1: thought to freeze this stuff from the beginning. So did
14:35
Speaker 1: you read about it somewhere? Like how did you kind
14:37
Speaker 1: of come up with this?
14:38
Speaker 2: So I always knew it's actually from my grandmother. My grandmother.
14:42
Speaker 2: I would go over there and she would feed me,
14:45
Speaker 2: like carrots and peas from a bag, and I'd be like,
14:49
Speaker 2: why are you feeding me carrots and peas from a bag?
14:51
Speaker 2: Like my mom makes me.
14:52
Speaker 1: Fresh carrot as she says, putting her hands on her hips.
14:57
Speaker 1: I deserve the fresh. I want fresh carrots.
15:00
Speaker 2: And my grandmother would be like, you're so wrong, like
15:04
Speaker 2: these are this is the good produce, Like this is
15:07
Speaker 2: what you should be eating because you don't know how
15:09
Speaker 2: long those carrots have been sitting in the grocery store.
15:12
Speaker 2: So that's that like planted a seed for me. But
15:16
Speaker 2: also just like I used to I used to cook
15:19
Speaker 2: a lot, I used to bake a lot.
15:21
Speaker 1: It's it's one of.
15:22
Speaker 2: The stress relievers that I've always used in my life.
15:26
Speaker 2: And like, I don't know if you've ever had something
15:29
Speaker 2: like life changing loaf of bread.
15:30
Speaker 1: It's so good. No, but please tell me more about that.
15:35
Speaker 2: It's basically like a loaf of bread made out of
15:37
Speaker 2: entirely nuts and nuts.
15:38
Speaker 1: Since my whole family was talking about this the other
15:40
Speaker 1: day and I've never heard of it, and now you're
15:43
Speaker 1: the rest of it. Please.
15:45
Speaker 2: It's so good, but it's like inefficient to make one
15:49
Speaker 2: every week, right, I just don't have the time for that.
15:51
Speaker 2: So I would like make six and put the others
15:54
Speaker 2: in the freezer. I would make cookies out of you know, chickpeas,
15:59
Speaker 2: which we have daily harvest now, and you know, just
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Speaker 2: make like three dozen and keep them in the freezer.
16:06
Speaker 1: Baking specifically, is a really hard thing to be really
16:10
Speaker 1: good at. I think when you cook, you get thrown
16:12
Speaker 1: all these spices. You can do all these things to
16:14
Speaker 1: jazz it up and make it taste better, but if
16:17
Speaker 1: you don't have the ratios the right way when you're cooking, especially,
16:22
Speaker 1: I can't even imagine or would know the first thing
16:24
Speaker 1: about how to make a chickpea cookie.
16:26
Speaker 2: Right, So it's a lot of experimentation. Yeah, It's always
16:29
Speaker 2: been like a passion of mine. I have a terrible
16:31
Speaker 2: sweet teeth, and I've always been like, how can I
16:34
Speaker 2: make Like I don't know, how can I.
16:37
Speaker 1: Make a cupcake.
16:38
Speaker 2: And this is before everybody started baking with almondflour or
16:41
Speaker 2: cooking of flour.
16:41
Speaker 1: This was like way before.
16:42
Speaker 2: But I was like, how can I make like a
16:46
Speaker 2: Twinkie out of things that I know are really good
16:49
Speaker 2: for me and actually nourishing, because what happens is things
16:53
Speaker 2: like twinkies, where things like fast food were actually never
16:56
Speaker 2: meant to nourish us. These were meant to be like
16:58
Speaker 2: novelties to get a twink I believe I'm talking about twinkies.
17:04
Speaker 2: We used to get like a twinkie as a treat,
17:08
Speaker 2: or fast food used to be something that was like
17:10
Speaker 2: a novelty treat. But what's happened is this duality of
17:14
Speaker 2: like living two lives at once online and offline has
17:16
Speaker 2: forced us to like nourish ourselves with things that were
17:19
Speaker 2: never meant to be nourishing. There's nothing nourishing about a twinkie.
17:22
Speaker 2: There's nothing nourishing about vast food. So that's kind of
17:27
Speaker 2: why I tried to make these things in my own way.
17:30
Speaker 1: Got you okay, And so I want to rewind a
17:32
Speaker 1: little bit because you mentioned briefly that you had some
17:35
Speaker 1: health issues when you were working at guild groups. So
17:37
Speaker 1: what did that look like?
17:38
Speaker 2: Yeah, so I had an auto or I have an
17:41
Speaker 2: autoimmune disease called hashimotos and.
17:45
Speaker 1: It's it's like a lazy thyroid. Okay, and you learned
17:48
Speaker 1: about this when you were there.
17:50
Speaker 2: Yeah, I was crazy. I was breaking out in hives
17:52
Speaker 2: and I had no idea why. I was like always sick.
17:55
Speaker 2: I just felt really lethargic and like not myself, and
18:01
Speaker 2: I just knew something had to be up. So I
18:04
Speaker 2: went to a bunch of different different doctors, and according
18:11
Speaker 2: to like traditional like western medicine, everyone was like, you're fine,
18:18
Speaker 2: You're fine, you're friendly, right, I don't think I am.
18:21
Speaker 2: So I started going to more integrated healthcare providers and
18:25
Speaker 2: they did some tests that were like, oh, you definitely
18:27
Speaker 2: have a thyroid issue. And you know, part of that
18:33
Speaker 2: is like making sure that part of healing that is
18:36
Speaker 2: making sure that like you're really treating your body well
18:38
Speaker 2: and you're giving yourself the things that your body needs
18:41
Speaker 2: to be successful.
18:42
Speaker 1: Right, Right, So that went hand in hand with you
18:45
Speaker 1: starting to do a lot more meal prep, but bringing
18:47
Speaker 1: all that stuff to the office, maybe not reaching for
18:49
Speaker 1: the cake from the pantry, so like you're allowed to
18:55
Speaker 1: like cake. It's okay, and so wow, okay, So, aside
19:00
Speaker 1: from eating a little bit cleaner, did you do anything
19:03
Speaker 1: else in terms of maybe your exercise routine or anything
19:06
Speaker 1: for your mental health to go hand in hand with
19:07
Speaker 1: treating this autoimmune disease.
19:09
Speaker 2: Yeah, so stress is really bad for autoimmune disease. Yeah,
19:13
Speaker 2: sounds pretty intuitive, but I've always been very athletic. As
19:19
Speaker 2: I said, it was a rower, so it kind of
19:21
Speaker 2: just like translates into things like Berry's boot Camp.
19:25
Speaker 1: Especially growing up in New York and having access to
19:27
Speaker 1: all that kind of stuff. Exactly. I had Joey on
19:30
Speaker 1: the pod. I love, Oh, he's the best.
19:34
Speaker 2: So I used to work out a lot, but I
19:36
Speaker 2: decided I needed to just kind of like find time
19:40
Speaker 2: for other things that weren't intense. Like even my workouts
19:43
Speaker 2: weren't intense. You know, my job was intense and everything
19:48
Speaker 2: was just a lot. So you know, I did start
19:52
Speaker 2: taking up a meditation practice using headspace actually, and you know,
19:59
Speaker 2: just working on a lot of different ways of kind
20:04
Speaker 2: of finding balance.
20:05
Speaker 1: Right right, It's funny that you mentioned looking for ways
20:09
Speaker 1: to release stress that aren't so intense. I was speaking
20:11
Speaker 1: with Jesse Dover at a live event the other night
20:14
Speaker 1: she's one of the co founders of the bad company
20:16
Speaker 1: Digni Dover, and she too grew up an athlete, was
20:19
Speaker 1: always working out, almost to the point that it was
20:22
Speaker 1: like too much, sometimes twice a day. And we were
20:25
Speaker 1: saying that as we get older, it's been a lot
20:29
Speaker 1: easier to take a step back and realize that you
20:33
Speaker 1: need to dial it back, Like it's so important for
20:38
Speaker 1: me to find other ways to release this stress. Like
20:41
Speaker 1: you're saying that don't involve beating myself up, because then
20:44
Speaker 1: when do you recover If you're taking this time as
20:47
Speaker 1: your time to do stress and you're taking no time
20:49
Speaker 1: to chill the hell out, then when are you going
20:51
Speaker 1: to chill the hell out totally?
20:53
Speaker 2: And you know, as I've gotten even older, it's actually
20:57
Speaker 2: evolved and now like I leave work every single day
21:00
Speaker 2: at six o'clock and I spend an hour with my
21:04
Speaker 2: kids before I put them to bed, and that is
21:06
Speaker 2: for me, like better than time for meditation or better
21:11
Speaker 2: than anything else, Like it's just so smushy.
21:16
Speaker 1: Well, it's your form of self care, right. I think
21:19
Speaker 1: a lot of people have a hard time figuring out
21:22
Speaker 1: what their version of self care could be, and they
21:26
Speaker 1: base what their quote unquote supposed to be doing for
21:28
Speaker 1: themselves based on again what they see on social media.
21:31
Speaker 2: Right. Yeah, I mean I really look at self care
21:33
Speaker 2: as a self compassion and like listening to what you
21:37
Speaker 2: need at any given time. In some days, that might
21:40
Speaker 2: be like pulling an all nighter and and and like,
21:44
Speaker 2: you know, crushing it at work because that's what your
21:47
Speaker 2: body needs and that's what your mind needs at that moment.
21:50
Speaker 2: And then the next day you might be like I'm out,
21:53
Speaker 2: like I just need to take a bath, and you know,
21:55
Speaker 2: and but like that contrast, like that's okay. It's just
22:00
Speaker 2: allowing ourselves to be okay with whatever we feel is right.
22:04
Speaker 1: So let's bring it back now to guilt group. You're
22:06
Speaker 1: starting to cook for yourself, You're really taking some time
22:09
Speaker 1: for meditation and just treating your body better, and do
22:13
Speaker 1: you start to truly feel a difference.
22:15
Speaker 2: I really and truly did.
22:17
Speaker 1: Yeah. I felt well.
22:19
Speaker 2: First of all, my hives went away, which was like
22:21
Speaker 2: great number one. Yeah. I also started doing a lot
22:24
Speaker 2: of things to heal my gut. So when I was
22:28
Speaker 2: growing up, I had chronic ear infections.
22:30
Speaker 1: And when you're when.
22:32
Speaker 2: You're born in the eighties, the answer is penicillin, right, Yeah,
22:37
Speaker 2: I mean the vast amount of penicillin that that I
22:40
Speaker 2: must have taken when I was younger. It was like,
22:43
Speaker 2: you know, I think it's starting to hurt penicillin, whereas now,
22:47
Speaker 2: like you know, you wait a little bit to understand,
22:50
Speaker 2: like do you really need the antibiotics or not? Did
22:53
Speaker 2: a number on my gut, And I think that that's
22:55
Speaker 2: really closely tied to autoimmune issues. You know, eating a
22:59
Speaker 2: lot of ferment foods and taking probiotics and all sorts
23:02
Speaker 2: of other things kind of in tandem. Yeah, you know,
23:06
Speaker 2: my hives went away. I felt stronger, I wasn't so tired,
23:11
Speaker 2: and just everything felt better. I started to feel like
23:14
Speaker 2: me again.
23:15
Speaker 1: All right, so you started to feel like you again.
23:16
Speaker 1: You're still working at Guild Group, still working. When do
23:20
Speaker 1: you start to think, hey, I'm treating myself by eating better.
23:25
Speaker 1: Maybe this is something that other people would care about
23:28
Speaker 1: as well. Yeah.
23:30
Speaker 2: So for me, that moment was when I was like,
23:32
Speaker 2: meal prep is great, but where's my Sunday?
23:36
Speaker 1: It takes a.
23:37
Speaker 2: Long time to meal prep. And you know, I had
23:43
Speaker 2: a boyfriend at the time who's now my husband, and
23:48
Speaker 2: it was like I didn't see him on Sunday, and
23:50
Speaker 2: he was like, hey, like what we.
23:52
Speaker 1: Were watching football? You wanted to pay attention to me.
23:55
Speaker 2: And also, like all the things that I enjoyed doing
23:57
Speaker 2: on the weekends, I wasn't doing. So I started looking
24:00
Speaker 2: for a solution, and I was like, somebody else, somebody
24:05
Speaker 2: has to be doing this, Like, what what's going on?
24:07
Speaker 2: There's meal kit? Meal kit for me was a romantic idea,
24:11
Speaker 2: but it takes forty five minutes when you come home
24:13
Speaker 2: at the end of the day to actually make that food.
24:16
Speaker 2: I didn't have forty five minutes.
24:17
Speaker 1: What is meal kit? I'm unaware?
24:18
Speaker 2: Like a blue apron or a plated or hellow fresh.
24:22
Speaker 2: I really just it wasn't realistic for me.
24:25
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean I love eating them, but you're right,
24:27
Speaker 1: like sometimes, yes, cooking, like you said earlier, is totally therapeutic,
24:31
Speaker 1: but when it's seven forty five eight o'clock, it's hard.
24:34
Speaker 1: It's where I don't really want to eat that late anymore.
24:37
Speaker 1: So the preparing just becomes less of a stress reliever
24:40
Speaker 1: and more of a stressor sometimes.
24:41
Speaker 2: Absolutely And it's also you know, if something happens, if
24:44
Speaker 2: something comes up, you have that food rotting.
24:46
Speaker 1: In your fridge. Oh, that's the worst, right.
24:48
Speaker 2: And then you have guilt, And like, I didn't need
24:50
Speaker 2: more of that in my life.
24:51
Speaker 1: No work, no more guilt, team, no guilt.
24:55
Speaker 2: So all of this kind of came together and I
24:58
Speaker 2: was looking for a better answer, and I realized that there.
25:01
Speaker 1: Wasn't one, and I was like, why is nobody doing this?
25:05
Speaker 1: Light bulb?
25:06
Speaker 2: Wait, nobody's doing this, you know. And in talking to
25:10
Speaker 2: my boyfriend at the time, now husband, you know, it
25:15
Speaker 2: was also really working for him. I mean, this is
25:17
Speaker 2: a guy who I love him to death. He can't
25:19
Speaker 2: butter toast like he just like, the kitchen is not
25:24
Speaker 2: where he shines.
25:25
Speaker 1: Everyone has their strength, everyone has their strengths. His is
25:28
Speaker 1: not the kitchen.
25:30
Speaker 2: And he was eating better too, as as like a
25:33
Speaker 2: byproduct of my meal prep in my eating better and
25:38
Speaker 2: I realized how it had changed his life, it changed
25:40
Speaker 2: my life, and I was like, I gotta do this.
25:43
Speaker 2: So I got myself a commercial kitchen in Long Island City,
25:47
Speaker 2: and you know, I'm gonna make gestures, but my right
25:53
Speaker 2: hand employee number one and my left hand employee number
25:55
Speaker 2: two just started putting things together. Wait, at this point,
26:01
Speaker 2: he wasn't my boyfriend anymore.
26:02
Speaker 1: He was actually my husband. I'm like something's missing here.
26:06
Speaker 1: At some point along the line when I had to say, yeah,
26:08
Speaker 1: we got to get married. Okay.
26:11
Speaker 2: So started started in a commercial kitchen and Long Island City,
26:15
Speaker 2: putting everything together, and built a really rudimentary V one
26:21
Speaker 2: of a website. It was really hard to use. It
26:24
Speaker 2: was really ugly, and took all the pictures of myself
26:26
Speaker 2: like just kind of put it all together. And I
26:29
Speaker 2: said to myself once, five times more people who I
26:32
Speaker 2: don't know are buying this than than those than the
26:35
Speaker 2: number of people who I do know, Then this is real.
26:38
Speaker 2: I wanted to account for like my friends and family
26:41
Speaker 2: feeling sad for me and being like we'll support Rachel.
26:45
Speaker 1: So it had to be bigger than that, right, uh.
26:47
Speaker 2: And it happened so quickly. It happened in like six weeks.
26:51
Speaker 2: It was insane.
26:53
Speaker 1: Also, I mean when you say that you just went
26:55
Speaker 1: and rented a commercial kitchen, that's a very big financial undertaking.
26:59
Speaker 1: So where is the money coming from?
27:01
Speaker 2: Yeah, so it's actually not as expensive as you would think.
27:04
Speaker 2: I didn't rent it. It wasn't like a common space.
27:06
Speaker 2: It wasn't a space that was dedicated to me. It
27:08
Speaker 2: was a place that I rented for a few hours, gotcha, gotcha.
27:11
Speaker 2: It wasn't expensive, and I was using my own car
27:14
Speaker 2: to go pick up the frozen ingredients, and it was
27:17
Speaker 2: kind of like, at that point it was an MVP,
27:20
Speaker 2: so it was very like fake it till you make it.
27:23
Speaker 2: I got MVP minimum viable product, gotcha.
27:26
Speaker 1: Yeah.
27:27
Speaker 2: So I was like buying bags of fruit and like
27:29
Speaker 2: putting them together and.
27:30
Speaker 1: Where are you buying them? At the grocery store? Yeah?
27:35
Speaker 2: And putting everything together and then delivering everything in my car.
27:38
Speaker 1: Yeah. Wow. And so at first you were just hyper
27:41
Speaker 1: local to New York City, gotcha. And so then more
27:45
Speaker 1: and more people are discovering your product and they're interested
27:48
Speaker 1: in your product. When does it hit you that this
27:51
Speaker 1: is wow? Yeah?
27:53
Speaker 2: So because I hit that metric that I had set
27:55
Speaker 2: in like six weeks, I was like, all right, here
27:58
Speaker 2: we go my job, dove in head first and just
28:02
Speaker 2: built the brand.
28:03
Speaker 1: I have a girlfriend right now. Her name is Kelly
28:05
Speaker 1: Hi Kelly, and she's building a plant based salad, dressing
28:09
Speaker 1: and sauce company called Cai Foods. Definitely go check it out.
28:13
Speaker 1: And they are really starting from the ground up, just
28:16
Speaker 1: two sisters ones in New York ones in San Diego area,
28:19
Speaker 1: and they're going through all the same things that you
28:22
Speaker 1: dealt with, which is making in their kitchens and then
28:24
Speaker 1: working with different shipping services. I mean, so now, once
28:28
Speaker 1: you have this metric and you quit your job, there's
28:30
Speaker 1: a whole other set of things to figure out, I'm
28:34
Speaker 1: sure because so many you're like, shoot, like what if
28:36
Speaker 1: I want to get this to someone that's in Connecticut?
28:39
Speaker 1: Right right?
28:40
Speaker 2: So then the plans for daily harvest, as you know
28:42
Speaker 2: what today began, you know, and as I said, the
28:45
Speaker 2: mission has always been like how do I make the
28:50
Speaker 2: freezer the first place where somebody goes for nurishing themselves
28:53
Speaker 2: as opposed to the last place. Often people will go
28:56
Speaker 2: in their fridge and they'll be like, nothing there. Then
28:58
Speaker 2: they'll go in the pantry, nothing there, and then they'll
29:00
Speaker 2: go into the freezer. And what most people have inside
29:03
Speaker 2: the freezer is like bad gun ice cubes. Wow, maybe
29:06
Speaker 2: some ice cream?
29:07
Speaker 1: Huh. I don't keep balking the freezer. Should I keep talking?
29:10
Speaker 1: In the freezer? It's very head nods all around in
29:13
Speaker 1: the recording studio. All right, Okay, it's definitely I have
29:19
Speaker 1: frozen bananas in there too. Smoothie.
29:21
Speaker 2: Yes, okay, keep going also for an ice cream. But
29:26
Speaker 2: you know, turning the freezer into like this solution to
29:29
Speaker 2: a problem that I was facing, that that you know,
29:31
Speaker 2: all these people who had kind of bought in and
29:33
Speaker 2: the during the MVP stage saw as a solution to
29:37
Speaker 2: a very real problem, like how do you nourish yourself,
29:41
Speaker 2: keep yourself, keep like, you know, yourself moving is as
29:46
Speaker 2: efficiently as possible, keep your body strong while living in
29:50
Speaker 2: this crazy new reality that we live in. Yeah, and
29:54
Speaker 2: you know, the freezer for me was a solution. So
29:56
Speaker 2: decided that that I was going to scale it and
30:00
Speaker 2: we started with smoothies because I knew that it.
30:02
Speaker 1: Was something that would be easy for people to people
30:04
Speaker 1: to understand and give me a sense of time here,
30:07
Speaker 1: when is this.
30:08
Speaker 2: So this is the beginning of twenty fifteen.
30:11
Speaker 1: Okay, you're starting with smoothies.
30:13
Speaker 2: Yeah, starting with smoothies and still just in New York City, gotcha,
30:18
Speaker 2: just trying to figure out how all.
30:20
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31:43
Speaker 1: Are you still even though you're just in New York City?
31:45
Speaker 1: Are you guys delivering all of them?
31:47
Speaker 2: Me and my nephews do. I paid twenty dollars an
31:51
Speaker 2: hour amazing, which is very generous for somebody who's like sixteen.
31:55
Speaker 1: Hey, how many nephews?
31:57
Speaker 2: God three to live in the city. And I would
32:01
Speaker 2: just like, I'd be like, go.
32:04
Speaker 1: The latestar A Life did the same thing when they
32:06
Speaker 1: started out. Yeah, they literally would just make food in
32:09
Speaker 1: the kitchen and deliver it themselves to whoever. Yeah, okay,
32:13
Speaker 1: so do it. And during this so are they literally
32:16
Speaker 1: it's frozen where you are, they're putting it in just
32:19
Speaker 1: like regular bags, they're bringing it to where it's going.
32:21
Speaker 1: Or are you already having to pack it a certain
32:23
Speaker 1: way because obviously the product needs to stay frozen. Yeah,
32:26
Speaker 1: so we were already packing on dry ice.
32:28
Speaker 2: And you know a lot of the elements that you
32:30
Speaker 2: see today in a much more abolished format were there
32:34
Speaker 2: from the beginning because they had to be right. And
32:38
Speaker 2: you know what I was doing during this period, probably
32:41
Speaker 2: like nine or ten months, was trying to figure out
32:43
Speaker 2: how to scale it, so, you know, figuring out shipping,
32:47
Speaker 2: figuring out like a scalable production method, figuring out packaging,
32:52
Speaker 2: figuring out all of these things. And then we launched.
32:56
Speaker 2: I would say we to have it because it sound
32:59
Speaker 2: bigger than just me.
33:01
Speaker 1: Yeah, I do the exact same thing. It's the thing. So,
33:04
Speaker 1: I mean, you're launching a much bigger company. But even
33:07
Speaker 1: when I talk about me, I'm like, well, this is
33:09
Speaker 1: what we're doing, and I'm like, nope, it's just it's
33:11
Speaker 1: just me. I'm the only one here. We're boring to
33:13
Speaker 1: this podcast. It does.
33:15
Speaker 2: So we launched nationally in September of twenty sixteen.
33:21
Speaker 1: And you just went national. You didn't even go northeast.
33:24
Speaker 2: So we started northeast. Oh, you did started northeast. But
33:28
Speaker 2: by the time we were national. So we we did
33:30
Speaker 2: launch all of the I call them coasts, even though
33:33
Speaker 2: Central is there's no water, it's just easier.
33:38
Speaker 1: The three coasts.
33:39
Speaker 2: We started with East Coast, then went to West Coast,
33:41
Speaker 2: then went to Central. But it was all within like
33:44
Speaker 2: I think we launched West Coast in August, so it
33:47
Speaker 2: was all like in a very concentrated period of time.
33:50
Speaker 1: Okay, Wow, I would feel so overwhelmed thinking about where
33:57
Speaker 1: does one get dry ice? How do you know what
33:59
Speaker 1: kind of boxers supposed to ship in? These boxes are
34:01
Speaker 1: pretty heavy? How do you control your shipping costs? Did
34:04
Speaker 1: you find did you look to anyone specific for advice
34:07
Speaker 1: at this period when you were really beginning so.
34:10
Speaker 2: The only companies that were doing frozen direct consumer were
34:14
Speaker 2: Omaha Steaks, and there were like a few companies that
34:18
Speaker 2: were delivering ice cream, but it was like one hundred
34:20
Speaker 2: dollars for delivery. I still think one of the best
34:24
Speaker 2: Christmas gifts is Greater's ice cream. It's just saying, but
34:30
Speaker 2: all of these were shipped in styrofoam, and they were
34:33
Speaker 2: shipped via like overnight, crazy expensive methods, and I just
34:37
Speaker 2: knew that that.
34:39
Speaker 1: Was never going to work for us, right, So this.
34:41
Speaker 2: Was just a ton of trial and error, and I
34:44
Speaker 2: ended up hiring some incredible people in the beginning who were,
34:49
Speaker 2: you know, early startup people, so like more jack of
34:53
Speaker 2: all trades than anything, and they were just like, we're
34:55
Speaker 2: going to figure this out, and together we figured it out.
34:58
Speaker 1: It's crazy when it's not just wanting to solve a problem,
35:01
Speaker 1: but needing to solve a problem, then you just got
35:04
Speaker 1: to get it done right. Okay, so you are starting
35:07
Speaker 1: with smoothes, you're now shipping nationwide, and you're talking about
35:11
Speaker 1: hiring employees. Talk to me about what it was like
35:13
Speaker 1: to bring on your first true team member outside of
35:16
Speaker 1: your nephews.
35:17
Speaker 2: Yeah, so my first true team member is just a
35:20
Speaker 2: wonderful human and she's actually gone on to start her
35:23
Speaker 2: own business, which I'm just so proud of her for.
35:26
Speaker 2: But you know, in those early days, her name is Jess, Jess,
35:32
Speaker 2: Jess is everything. You know. It was like me and
35:34
Speaker 2: Jess in this like creepy little room and we were
35:38
Speaker 2: just like making it happen. And it was like you
35:42
Speaker 2: got that ball, Okay, I got this ball. Okay, let's
35:44
Speaker 2: just keep them in the air, all right, so you
35:45
Speaker 2: got that like okay up. Yeah, And it was total
35:50
Speaker 2: organized chaos, but we loved it. And you know, Jess
35:54
Speaker 2: was is very talented, you know, when we complimented each
35:59
Speaker 2: other really well. And then we brought on like two
36:02
Speaker 2: more team members and all of our skills were complementary,
36:04
Speaker 2: but we were all very like generalist. And then more
36:07
Speaker 2: people and then more people, and I'd say by the
36:09
Speaker 2: end of the year, we were probably twelve people.
36:11
Speaker 1: Twelve people in your first year and you're giving them
36:14
Speaker 1: a full salary and benefits. Wow. Also, I can't even
36:19
Speaker 1: I get I have a headache just thinking about my
36:21
Speaker 1: own personal healthcare. So just the idea of having to
36:24
Speaker 1: organize that for a group of employees is so intimidating
36:26
Speaker 1: as well. Yeah.
36:27
Speaker 2: I mean there's so many administrative things that you don't
36:30
Speaker 2: even think about. And I mean the good news is
36:32
Speaker 2: that there are people who can help you figure that totally, totally,
36:36
Speaker 2: and I was very grateful to the person who pointed
36:39
Speaker 2: me in that direction. But it's a lot in office
36:42
Speaker 2: space and you know, computers and all of that stuff.
36:45
Speaker 1: If you don't mind me asking, what's Jess's company. It's
36:48
Speaker 1: called Bubble. Oh so it's a it's a health food.
36:52
Speaker 1: It's like Etsy for health. Oh, I've never heard of it. Well,
36:55
Speaker 1: now all the hurdlers have heard of it as well. Yeah.
36:58
Speaker 2: Cool.
36:58
Speaker 1: Okay, so shipping Nationwari twelve employees, This is huge, This
37:03
Speaker 1: is a big deal. Yeah. But you don't just stick
37:07
Speaker 1: with the smoothie.
37:08
Speaker 2: No, because that was never the plan. The idea is
37:10
Speaker 2: to start with smoothie is because that's what somebody, that's
37:12
Speaker 2: what people would understand. That's what it just it was
37:16
Speaker 2: easier to explain than like a harvest bowl. So we
37:20
Speaker 2: started there and then.
37:21
Speaker 1: We moved to soups.
37:23
Speaker 2: And the thinking behind the soups was we wanted something
37:27
Speaker 2: one for the cold winter months.
37:30
Speaker 1: Yeah.
37:31
Speaker 2: I still drink smoothies in the winter, but some people don't.
37:34
Speaker 2: But also the soup space was so ripe for disruption.
37:38
Speaker 2: I mean you you think about the the instant soup
37:42
Speaker 2: options and you've got cup of noodle, which is horrifying.
37:46
Speaker 2: I mean you just think about what's in cup a
37:49
Speaker 2: noodle and it's like, it's not okay. So we started
37:53
Speaker 2: taking benjie noodles like voodles, noodles, whatever you want. Toodles, yeah,
38:00
Speaker 2: but are squash noodles, pumpkin noodle like all the noodles,
38:05
Speaker 2: and making these these cups of frozen vegetables with all
38:10
Speaker 2: these incredible spices and and like broth broths right, and
38:16
Speaker 2: you add hot water and you have an incredible soup
38:20
Speaker 2: that is just as nourishing as something that took you
38:23
Speaker 2: hours to make. That that you can't really get in
38:27
Speaker 2: a convenient format unless you live right next to you know,
38:30
Speaker 2: we live in New York. We're very lucky to have
38:33
Speaker 2: like ten soup options within three blocks. But even those
38:37
Speaker 2: soup options are not also good for you. So you know,
38:40
Speaker 2: these were very clean. There were very clean soups that
38:45
Speaker 2: were incredibly full of full flavor.
38:47
Speaker 1: So process wise, it's literally pour boiling water on this
38:51
Speaker 1: cup of soup that comes out of your freezer. Let
38:53
Speaker 1: it sit for how much? How much time?
38:56
Speaker 2: Yeah so so it depends.
38:57
Speaker 1: It depends.
38:58
Speaker 2: Also how hot you like your soup. Some people like
39:01
Speaker 2: yeah so, some people like to pour cold water in
39:03
Speaker 2: and then heat.
39:03
Speaker 1: It either stove top or microwave stop or microwave.
39:08
Speaker 2: But I'm more of a just pour boiling water and
39:10
Speaker 2: because I don't mind that my soup's not that cold.
39:12
Speaker 1: Faster, yeah, I mean not that hot. Okay, So next
39:17
Speaker 1: to soups.
39:18
Speaker 2: Next to soups. And then we launched our opals and
39:20
Speaker 2: our chea bowls. They felt like the next obvious choice.
39:26
Speaker 1: You know.
39:27
Speaker 2: We found that people were using daily harvest a lot
39:29
Speaker 2: for breakfast. Obviously, smoothies lend themselves to breakfast time, and
39:33
Speaker 2: what what is out there for like an overnight od
39:36
Speaker 2: or chea parfe is filled with dried fruit and sugar
39:42
Speaker 2: and like all of these heavily processed ingredients. And we
39:45
Speaker 2: were like, we can totally do better.
39:47
Speaker 1: Right and how are and how are you doing at
39:50
Speaker 1: this time? I mean, obviously you have shifted to eating
39:53
Speaker 1: healthier and being better to your body, but man, starting
39:55
Speaker 1: a company is so stressful.
39:57
Speaker 2: It is so stressful, but it's also so rewarding at
40:00
Speaker 2: the same time that you know, for me, it was
40:03
Speaker 2: like I would get home at the end of the
40:06
Speaker 2: night and I like didn't even want to put my
40:11
Speaker 2: feet up and watch TV.
40:13
Speaker 1: It was like, how can I just do more? It
40:16
Speaker 1: was it was.
40:16
Speaker 2: So exciting and so much fun. Yeah, it's just you
40:21
Speaker 2: know where it was. And I actually forgot to mention
40:24
Speaker 2: through all of this, I had my first baby, just
40:27
Speaker 2: a little little thing. Yeah, so you know I would
40:32
Speaker 2: That's when I started like leaving at six o'clock putting
40:36
Speaker 2: my kid to bed it was one at the time,
40:39
Speaker 2: and then I would just hop back on my computer
40:40
Speaker 2: at night and I was so excited to do So.
40:42
Speaker 1: How was your husband fairing with like this startup? Rachel?
40:46
Speaker 2: I think his head is still spinning on the weekends,
40:51
Speaker 2: he's like, hey, good to see you.
40:55
Speaker 1: Was there ever a conversation that he would join you
40:57
Speaker 1: in doing this?
40:58
Speaker 2: No, he's he's in finance, Like that is so much
41:01
Speaker 2: a passion for him that it just wouldn't have made sense.
41:05
Speaker 1: I don't think it would have worked. It either works
41:09
Speaker 1: really well or just does not serve anyone.
41:12
Speaker 2: Yeah, just we have very different styles, but you know,
41:15
Speaker 2: having two kids and a startup is a lot. And
41:18
Speaker 2: I do want to say that, like without my husband
41:22
Speaker 2: really stepping up and being like a true partner, like
41:26
Speaker 2: this would not have been able to happen. I mean,
41:29
Speaker 2: he like we're so in sync on the home front
41:33
Speaker 2: at this point that it's like I just know the
41:36
Speaker 2: things that he's going to take care of and I
41:37
Speaker 2: don't need to ask, and he knows the things that
41:39
Speaker 2: I'm going to take care of, and we just like.
41:40
Speaker 1: Do yeah, and it just gets it done.
41:43
Speaker 2: Yep.
41:43
Speaker 1: Nice. And I mean, of course building your company over time,
41:46
Speaker 1: that same dynamic also starts to happen over there as
41:49
Speaker 1: you bring on more and more employees. So as you're
41:52
Speaker 1: growing your team beyond those original twelve, is it hard
41:55
Speaker 1: to let go a little bit or are you the
41:57
Speaker 1: kind of person that was just so so grateful to
42:00
Speaker 1: start divvying up this responsibility. Yeah.
42:02
Speaker 2: So I've always hired people who are smarter than me,
42:04
Speaker 2: So when we hire somebody, it's like, like that's the bar.
42:08
Speaker 2: Can you do this better than the person who's currently
42:10
Speaker 2: doing it? And you know the nature of startups as
42:14
Speaker 2: they scale is that you need specialization right, you need
42:16
Speaker 2: you need more people who are like even better at
42:19
Speaker 2: specific things, and that's how you grow. So in the beginning,
42:23
Speaker 2: it's you know, when you're twelve people, you're hiring skills
42:26
Speaker 2: that like you don't even have there. It's like, I
42:29
Speaker 2: don't know how to do pr like, yeah, you know,
42:32
Speaker 2: like we should have somebody who knows how to do that.
42:34
Speaker 2: So like at that point, it's easy to find people
42:37
Speaker 2: who are better than you at.
42:37
Speaker 1: Things because it's like I'm the bar so yeah, you know.
42:41
Speaker 2: But then as you scale, it's like how do you
42:43
Speaker 2: continue to do that and continue to to get people?
42:47
Speaker 2: And you know, my role has changed so much. I mean,
42:50
Speaker 2: i'd say every three months, I feel like I have
42:52
Speaker 2: an entirely new career. Yeah, and for me, letting go
42:58
Speaker 2: isn't isn't difficult because there's always a new exciting challenge.
43:03
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Speaker 1: that's Athleticgreens dot com slash Hurdle. What would you say,
44:17
Speaker 1: over the past year or so has been one of
44:20
Speaker 1: the biggest challenges that you've faced in your role?
44:22
Speaker 2: Yeah, so, I think for for me, we're now one
44:26
Speaker 2: hundred people.
44:27
Speaker 1: Wow. Yeah, and you have more than fifty offerings fifty recipes. Yes, wow.
44:33
Speaker 1: So this is this is not twelve employees.
44:35
Speaker 2: This is not twelve employees. Complayes, and I think that,
44:39
Speaker 2: you know, I'm a first time CEO. I've never in
44:42
Speaker 2: my career managed more than three people. I know there
44:45
Speaker 2: are one hundred, you know, And I think that that
44:49
Speaker 2: for me has been just so rewarding but also such
44:53
Speaker 2: a like a crazy fun journey, you know. And what
44:57
Speaker 2: I what I There are a few things that I
44:59
Speaker 2: always said to my team and I always said to
45:01
Speaker 2: myself that I wanted to be true, and one was,
45:04
Speaker 2: you spend more time at work than you do usually
45:07
Speaker 2: with your family, and you can choose where you work,
45:10
Speaker 2: you can't.
45:10
Speaker 1: Choose your family.
45:13
Speaker 2: And I always wanted to make sure that that work
45:16
Speaker 2: was somewhere where you wanted to be. You know, I'd
45:20
Speaker 2: been in work environments previous to starting daily Harvest where
45:23
Speaker 2: that wasn't the case, and it makes it hard to
45:25
Speaker 2: do your best work. So I think for me as
45:28
Speaker 2: as like a leader, that's something that I'm always trying
45:31
Speaker 2: to cultivate. And I think that, you know. The other
45:35
Speaker 2: thing is I always wanted to be real.
45:37
Speaker 1: So you know, some.
45:38
Speaker 2: People are are very surprised by it when they first
45:41
Speaker 2: meet me, but I'm like, I don't have a filter,
45:45
Speaker 2: Like there's no pretense there's no like hierarchy.
45:48
Speaker 1: It is.
45:49
Speaker 2: It is like, if you need something for me, tell me,
45:51
Speaker 2: and I'm going to tell you how it is. And like,
45:53
Speaker 2: you know, I always allow myself to be as vulnerable
45:57
Speaker 2: as I'm feeling in any given moment. Like I will
45:59
Speaker 2: say to my team all the time, like, this is
46:01
Speaker 2: the first time I've ever done this. It's probably the
46:03
Speaker 2: first time you've ever done this too, So like, let's
46:05
Speaker 2: do this together, and let's figure it out together. And
46:09
Speaker 2: I think I've been I've gotten much better at that.
46:11
Speaker 2: And it's something that's always been It's something I've always
46:14
Speaker 2: wanted to do, but I've also had to like train
46:17
Speaker 2: myself how to do it effectively.
46:18
Speaker 1: I feel like we always feel that we're supposed to
46:21
Speaker 1: have all the answers right right, and especially now you
46:24
Speaker 1: set a team of one hundred employees, you don't want
46:27
Speaker 1: to come off like you don't know how to handle
46:29
Speaker 1: something totally. But the best thing you can do ninety
46:33
Speaker 1: nine point nine percent of the time is just be
46:36
Speaker 1: upfront and be honest, because people can see through authenticity
46:40
Speaker 1: in seconds, and if you're not being your authentic self,
46:43
Speaker 1: then what kind of message is that sending to your
46:46
Speaker 1: team totally.
46:47
Speaker 2: And I also see it is like presenting opportunities for people,
46:50
Speaker 2: right Like if I say I don't have an answer
46:52
Speaker 2: for something, but somebody does, Like, that's an opportunity for
46:56
Speaker 2: people to stretch their own limits. So you know, that's
47:01
Speaker 2: something that I've always always gotten really excited by. And look,
47:04
Speaker 2: some people will look at it and they'll be like, oh,
47:06
Speaker 2: she's so unpolished, and I'm like, Okay, I don't care.
47:10
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, but other people look at you and
47:12
Speaker 1: they're like, Wow, this woman's got it all together. I mean,
47:15
Speaker 1: you've got investors, big name investors like Gwyneth Paltrow, You've
47:19
Speaker 1: got Serena Williams, You've got Bobby Flay, Hailey Duff, like,
47:24
Speaker 1: there's a lot of them. So it's I mean, the
47:28
Speaker 1: belief is there that you've got something good going on.
47:30
Speaker 2: No, And I do think like being my authentic self
47:34
Speaker 2: is what allowed those investments to happen.
47:37
Speaker 1: Yeah, totally. When did you start seeking investment?
47:40
Speaker 2: So right before we launched nationally. Okay, we raised our
47:44
Speaker 2: seed even fundraising for me with so much trial and error,
47:49
Speaker 2: not only how to pitch dale your harvests, how to
47:51
Speaker 2: talk about it, how to explain the vision, but also
47:54
Speaker 2: like who to talk to? Right, Like I met with
47:58
Speaker 2: investors in the beginning that didn't get it, and we're
48:02
Speaker 2: never going to get in. I don't even know why
48:04
Speaker 2: I've bothered. These were like, you know, people who diversity.
48:11
Speaker 2: It was like a foreign word, and you know, they
48:14
Speaker 2: were they looked at me and they were like, this
48:17
Speaker 2: doesn't taste like jamba juice. And I'm like, I know.
48:20
Speaker 1: That's the point. That's the point.
48:24
Speaker 2: And they were like very They're like, who's going to
48:25
Speaker 2: drink this? So, you know, I just had to find
48:30
Speaker 2: my people.
48:30
Speaker 1: Has it been weird to see your advertising and brand
48:34
Speaker 1: around the city that you grew up in? It's so fun. Yeah,
48:38
Speaker 1: it's so fun.
48:38
Speaker 2: I like take my kids on the subway to like
48:41
Speaker 2: scout daily Harvest subway out and I'm like.
48:44
Speaker 1: What just just pause, like right there, excuse me, sir?
48:46
Speaker 1: Can you move over? I love it? And so now,
48:50
Speaker 1: with a team of over one hundred people, what would
48:52
Speaker 1: you say on the regular is something that you look
48:56
Speaker 1: forward to doing once you get into your office? I
48:58
Speaker 1: mean the culture in the dynam has changed so much
49:01
Speaker 1: since when you first started.
49:02
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, something that's common between among everybody at
49:06
Speaker 2: Daily Harvest is it's all just like really genuinely talented, nice,
49:12
Speaker 2: fun loving people. That was very hard to do, but
49:17
Speaker 2: now that we're there, I just love coming into the
49:19
Speaker 2: office and like smiling at people and like seeing what's
49:23
Speaker 2: going on and being like, hey, you know, what'd you
49:25
Speaker 2: do last night? And you know, it's it's like those
49:29
Speaker 2: interactions that I find so rewarding. But also for me,
49:32
Speaker 2: one of the most exciting things is seeing things happening
49:34
Speaker 2: without me. Yeah, I'm like, wow, all these things are happening,
49:39
Speaker 2: and they're happening at the same time, Like you know,
49:41
Speaker 2: we used to have to prioritize like this is going
49:42
Speaker 2: to happen, and then this is going to happen. But
49:44
Speaker 2: now with a hundred people, we can do multiple things
49:47
Speaker 2: at once, and it's just like it blows my mind
49:50
Speaker 2: every time I think about it.
49:51
Speaker 1: Obviously, you have like a very specific suite of offerings
49:54
Speaker 1: right now, but has there been anything over the past
49:57
Speaker 1: few years that you've created that you were like, eh,
49:59
Speaker 1: maybe this isn't for us.
50:01
Speaker 2: Absolutely, So, you know, one of the things that's very
50:04
Speaker 2: core to our business is we co create every single
50:07
Speaker 2: thing that we put out there with our with our community.
50:11
Speaker 1: So you know, we we.
50:13
Speaker 2: Have this whole strategy of like active listening. We put
50:16
Speaker 2: out questions to our community through social through you know,
50:18
Speaker 2: through our customer customer experience team, through you know, through
50:22
Speaker 2: our website, through things like this. I mean, we're we're
50:25
Speaker 2: just constantly talking to the people who are eating daily
50:29
Speaker 2: Harvest and we have a you know, we always feel
50:32
Speaker 2: like it's not our place to tell people what they
50:33
Speaker 2: should eat. We say, we're going to provide you with
50:36
Speaker 2: good food built on fruits and vegetables that you've told
50:39
Speaker 2: us that you want to eat. And you know, a
50:44
Speaker 2: lot of that is you know, it's been very helpful
50:49
Speaker 2: as we've kind of built things, uh to to decipher
50:53
Speaker 2: what's a success and what's a failure.
50:56
Speaker 1: So we've launched a bunch of SKUs.
50:58
Speaker 2: That are no longer around and because our community was like,
51:01
Speaker 2: you missed the mark a little bit. And then we
51:04
Speaker 2: have a ton that we continue to iterate on so
51:06
Speaker 2: people will be like, you know, I really like this,
51:08
Speaker 2: but I'd like it to be more like this. So
51:10
Speaker 2: we have an example of that is we have this
51:14
Speaker 2: an oat bowl that is cacauntibs and cinnamon, and it
51:17
Speaker 2: used to have chickpeas in it, and we added the
51:20
Speaker 2: chickpeas because you couldn't really taste them and they were
51:22
Speaker 2: filled with protein, and we were like, this is an
51:24
Speaker 2: awesome addition. And the people, the customers who we used
51:29
Speaker 2: to have like a year ago, like more of the
51:34
Speaker 2: early adopter crew, was really into the chickpeas. And now
51:37
Speaker 2: what we're finding is, you know, as our community has broadened,
51:42
Speaker 2: the chickpeas became very polarizing. So we reached out to
51:45
Speaker 2: our community and we were like, all right, you don't
51:48
Speaker 2: like chickpeas, that's totally cool, but you really like this bowl,
51:51
Speaker 2: so let's work together and let's figure out solutions. So
51:53
Speaker 2: we just swapped out our chickpeas with butternut squash and
51:56
Speaker 2: it's like heavenly interesting. Yeah, And then we had ice
52:00
Speaker 2: cream at some point. We called them Sundays, and they
52:04
Speaker 2: were so fantastically delicious if you made them. But what
52:09
Speaker 2: we were finding is that at that time of the
52:11
Speaker 2: day when you're usually eating ice cream, which is like
52:14
Speaker 2: post dinner, pre Netflix, you know, your feeder up, you
52:19
Speaker 2: don't really want to do the work that was necessary.
52:21
Speaker 2: I don't know if you've ever made an ice cream.
52:23
Speaker 1: It takes.
52:24
Speaker 2: So we coined a term called the shiggle with a blender.
52:28
Speaker 2: A shake and a jiggle.
52:29
Speaker 1: Oh, a shake and a shiggle. I'm gonna start using that.
52:32
Speaker 1: It's good. It's good.
52:34
Speaker 2: I have a whole video about about the definition of
52:36
Speaker 2: shiggle that I can show you. But we created this,
52:40
Speaker 2: this ice cream that needed to be shiggled, and we
52:43
Speaker 2: realized that, Yeah, we realized people at that hour and
52:45
Speaker 2: the day, I don't always.
52:46
Speaker 1: Want to shiggle. No.
52:47
Speaker 2: So you know what, even though it was delicious and
52:50
Speaker 2: people who did want to shiggle were huge fans, and
52:54
Speaker 2: it was disappointing to them that we discontinued it. It
52:57
Speaker 2: didn't it didn't serve our entire community, right.
53:00
Speaker 1: And then I also feel like I also feel like
53:02
Speaker 1: to reiterate when you said ice cream, because I remember
53:04
Speaker 1: when I first got my first Daily Harvest ice cream.
53:07
Speaker 1: I don't know what I was expecting, but I got it.
53:09
Speaker 1: It's just the same format as your smoothie cops. It's
53:12
Speaker 1: a bunch of stuff that comes in a cop that
53:14
Speaker 1: you blend to make the right consistency. And I think
53:16
Speaker 1: to your point about the shig ale, it's like you
53:19
Speaker 1: want it to be a little bit thicker, which is
53:21
Speaker 1: why you need to shake wonder because you can't put
53:22
Speaker 1: as much like weod.
53:23
Speaker 2: Inside totally and it did come with toppings. Yeah for
53:26
Speaker 2: your ice cream, it's true. But yeah, so where are
53:29
Speaker 2: you thinking?
53:29
Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, all right, and now but now so you
53:32
Speaker 1: replace that like sweet tooth graving and you guys have cookies, right,
53:35
Speaker 1: we have cookies, but you don't have the one the
53:37
Speaker 1: cookies yourself.
53:38
Speaker 2: So no, So the cookie is it's we're based in
53:42
Speaker 2: selling cookie dough. But it's plant based, so you can
53:44
Speaker 2: eat it raw. I actually prefer it raw, but you
53:48
Speaker 2: can also bake it and it's kind of like do
53:49
Speaker 2: what you want with it. But they're made out of
53:51
Speaker 2: things like black beans and avocado and chickpeas and chia,
53:56
Speaker 2: sunflower butter, just like all of these incredible whole ingredients.
54:00
Speaker 2: When you look at a lot of plant based cookies,
54:01
Speaker 2: the ingredients are usually not too great.
54:05
Speaker 1: Right.
54:06
Speaker 2: There's a lot of oils that I'm not such a
54:09
Speaker 2: fan of. There's a lot of flowers that I'm not
54:11
Speaker 2: such a fan of.
54:12
Speaker 1: We don't use any of that, gotcha, gotcha? Okay, So
54:15
Speaker 1: we talked about products that you made that may have
54:18
Speaker 1: been a little bit of a flop here and there.
54:20
Speaker 1: What if anything can you reflect on over the past
54:23
Speaker 1: few years that has been a really tough decision that
54:26
Speaker 1: you've had to make that has actually made you or
54:29
Speaker 1: maybe even just daily harvest better.
54:32
Speaker 2: I mean, there's so many of them. Yeah, one that
54:35
Speaker 2: was I mean, even the ice cream decision was so
54:38
Speaker 2: hard for me personally because I still to this day
54:41
Speaker 2: I believe in the categories so much and the collection
54:44
Speaker 2: and it's so good, Like I miss it every day,
54:47
Speaker 2: like I just need this ice cream. But it didn't work.
54:51
Speaker 2: So that was one of the that was absolutely a
54:53
Speaker 2: hard decision for me, you know. And then I would
54:56
Speaker 2: also say, like as we as the business scaled and
55:00
Speaker 2: and as it grew, a hard decision was actually not
55:03
Speaker 2: to compromise on everything that we do. So as as
55:08
Speaker 2: we've scaled, like making daily harvest has become exponentially harder,
55:14
Speaker 2: but we do not compromise on the quality. We do
55:16
Speaker 2: not compromise on the cleanliness, like and when I say cleanliness,
55:20
Speaker 2: I mean like clean eating, not like you know, I mean,
55:24
Speaker 2: we don't compromise there either, but yeah.
55:27
Speaker 1: You know, we don't. We don't compromise on anything.
55:30
Speaker 2: And you know, that is a hard decision when you
55:33
Speaker 2: know investors are saying, you know, like look at your margins,
55:37
Speaker 2: and I'm like, I don't care, right, Like we have enough? Yeah,
55:42
Speaker 2: you know that's that's a constant battle.
55:46
Speaker 1: When you look at where it's come and you think
55:49
Speaker 1: about where it's going. Uh, do you have any spoiler
55:52
Speaker 1: alerts of what could be coming down the pipe for
55:55
Speaker 1: daily Harvest?
55:56
Speaker 2: So we just launched a new oat bowl which we're
55:59
Speaker 2: really excited about. So it is an apple cinnamon oat
56:02
Speaker 2: bowl where we replaced a bunch of the oats with
56:05
Speaker 2: cauliflower rice. And what's so exciting about this is sometimes
56:10
Speaker 2: and for some people, oats can kind of put you
56:12
Speaker 2: in a food coma, and by replacing some of the
56:14
Speaker 2: oats with cauliflower that no longer happens. It's also delicious.
56:19
Speaker 1: And then we also have a.
56:20
Speaker 2: New collection of harvest bowls coming out in a few weeks,
56:23
Speaker 2: which are really excited about.
56:24
Speaker 1: I think a lot of people also don't think about
56:27
Speaker 1: Like they hear cauliflower and they're like, oh, but what
56:29
Speaker 1: they don't realize is that you really can't taste it
56:31
Speaker 1: and taste it at all and you're definitely not the
56:33
Speaker 1: first like plant based company to offer this kind of
56:37
Speaker 1: variation on a classic to either reduce calories or up
56:40
Speaker 1: the nutrient quality or whatever the case may be.
56:42
Speaker 2: Absolutely, I mean, we've had smoothies forever that uses cauliflower,
56:46
Speaker 2: but we decided to move it into oat bowls, which
56:49
Speaker 2: is really exciting.
56:50
Speaker 1: Where do you draw a lot of your inspiration from.
56:54
Speaker 2: So I usually draw inspiration from my own life, you know,
56:57
Speaker 2: As I said, I've always been very hell conscious, but
57:01
Speaker 2: I've also been a huge foodie. So at least once
57:05
Speaker 2: a day, I'll be eating something and I'm like, wait
57:07
Speaker 2: a minute, new idea. You know, in our entire h
57:11
Speaker 2: our entire culinary team, we feed off of one another.
57:16
Speaker 2: So you know, somebody will come in and they'll be like,
57:18
Speaker 2: oh my gosh, we need to make this, and I'm like, wait,
57:20
Speaker 2: but what if it has this? And then you know
57:21
Speaker 2: the third person will be like, oh my gosh, this
57:23
Speaker 2: is genius. Let's let's go into the kitchen right now.
57:26
Speaker 2: So you know, it's it's a collaboration, but a lot
57:28
Speaker 2: of the inspiration just comes from you know, my my past.
57:32
Speaker 2: And we have a list of so many things that
57:34
Speaker 2: we still have to do, like we've barely scratched the surface. Yeah,
57:38
Speaker 2: and it's really exciting.
57:39
Speaker 1: Obviously you've I've grown that kitchen in Long Island City.
57:42
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, well outgrown that.
57:45
Speaker 1: So where are you? Where are you producing all this
57:47
Speaker 1: stuff now? And so we produce all over the country.
57:49
Speaker 1: We have multiple facilities. Awesome, awesome. Okay, what would you
57:52
Speaker 1: say has been one of the best pieces of advice
57:54
Speaker 1: that you've been offered in your career?
57:56
Speaker 2: Okay, so my favorite piece of advice comes from from
57:59
Speaker 2: a friend who's who's like pretty well known, but he
58:04
Speaker 2: he had can't just say that, oh okay, okay, So
58:08
Speaker 2: the best piece of advice for me actually came from
58:12
Speaker 2: from a friend who who's pretty well known. His name
58:14
Speaker 2: is Scott Belski, and he has an he has a
58:17
Speaker 2: great Instagram account, and he once posted this graph that
58:21
Speaker 2: was about it's called like the life of an Entrepreneur
58:24
Speaker 2: or something like that, and it is this zig zag
58:28
Speaker 2: up and down crazy line, uh that ultimately goes up
58:33
Speaker 2: like if you were to normalize that, it goes upwards
58:35
Speaker 2: into the right. And it was about how how we
58:38
Speaker 2: should just aspire for the upward slope that, you know,
58:41
Speaker 2: the life of an entrepreneur has so many highs and
58:44
Speaker 2: so many lows. You know, you can be on cloud
58:47
Speaker 2: nine one day and like barely able to pick yourself
58:50
Speaker 2: out of bed the next day. But as long as
58:53
Speaker 2: you you aspire for that upward slope and kind of
58:55
Speaker 2: keep your eye focused on that north star, that it's
58:59
Speaker 2: all going to be ok and it all just seems
59:01
Speaker 2: more manageable totally.
59:02
Speaker 1: And So, now, if you have the opportunity to give
59:07
Speaker 1: the Rachel who is probably still a guilt group, she's
59:10
Speaker 1: struggling with those health issues, she is trying to figure
59:13
Speaker 1: out how to just be better, if you have the
59:15
Speaker 1: opportunity right now to give her one piece of advice
59:18
Speaker 1: looking back on that hurdle moment right now, what would
59:21
Speaker 1: that be.
59:22
Speaker 2: Yeah, So something that I always live by is I
59:24
Speaker 2: like to think of the worst case scenario for everything
59:27
Speaker 2: that sounds that sounds dark, but it's not meant to be.
59:30
Speaker 2: It's it's like you know, walking into a room, let's
59:33
Speaker 2: say it's a boardroom and there's you know, you are
59:37
Speaker 2: you're with people who are more senior than yourself, and
59:41
Speaker 2: you know.
59:41
Speaker 1: It can be intimidating or whatever.
59:43
Speaker 2: The things are that that kind of like keep you
59:46
Speaker 2: from being the best you and from doing the things
59:48
Speaker 2: that you want to do in life. I always look
59:50
Speaker 2: at the worst case scenario, and it's like, what happens
59:52
Speaker 2: if I speak up? What happens if i'm my genuine self?
59:54
Speaker 2: Like what happens if I go take a leap? What
59:56
Speaker 2: happens if I if I, you know, quit my job
59:58
Speaker 2: and start a business. That's the worst thing that can happen.
1:00:01
Speaker 2: And I play that out and most of the times,
1:00:05
Speaker 2: most of the time, you can actually live with that
1:00:08
Speaker 2: worst case scenario. You're like, that's not so bad. And
1:00:11
Speaker 2: that has always given me confidence to go forth and
1:00:15
Speaker 2: try things and be bold.
1:00:17
Speaker 1: Wow. What a mic drop to end us on. Thank
1:00:19
Speaker 1: you so much for coming in here. We're recording at
1:00:21
Speaker 1: the Smile Radio inside the Smile to go at the
1:00:24
Speaker 1: Freehand Hotel. Please take a moment to leave a quick
1:00:27
Speaker 1: review by clicking the link with the description to this episode.
1:00:30
Speaker 1: We all face multiple hurdles in life. I want to
1:00:33
Speaker 1: hear about yours. Reach out to me Emily at Hurdle
1:00:35
Speaker 1: dot us. Connect with the podcast on Instagram and Twitter
1:00:38
Speaker 1: and Facebook at Hurdle podcast. Rachel. Where do they find you?
1:00:41
Speaker 1: Where do they find daily Harvest, give me the four one.
1:00:44
Speaker 2: One Dailyharvest dot Com.
1:00:46
Speaker 1: That's it. That's it, Social at daily Harvest, at Daily Harvest,
1:00:50
Speaker 1: beautiful and they'll see beautiful, beautiful smoothies and bos there.
1:00:53
Speaker 1: I can promise from that, I am at Emily a body,
1:00:57
Speaker 1: Another hurdle conquered. Catch you guys next time