Latest / The Bold Lounge / Kara Goldin: Mastering the Art of Bold Risk

Transcript

Kara Goldin: Mastering the Art of Bold Risk · The Bold Lounge

• 0:07
  Speaker 1: Welcome to the Bold Lounge podcast.
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: My name is Leigh Burgess and I will be your host.
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: If you're anything like me, you love hearing inspiring stories of people who have gone on bold journeys and made a positive impact in the world.
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: This podcast is all about those kinds of stories.
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: Every week, we'll hear from someone who has taken a leap or embarked on an extraordinary journey.
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: In addition to hearing their stories, we'll also learn about their bold growth mindset that they use to make things happen.
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: Whether they face challenges or doubts along the way, they persisted and ultimately achieved their goals.
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: These impactful stories will leave you feeling motivated and inspired to pursue your own bold journey.
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: I believe everyone has a bold story waiting to be freed.
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: Tune in and get ready to be inspired.
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: Welcome to the Bold Lounge.
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: Today I have Kara Golden.
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: She is the founder and former CEO of Hint Incorporated, best known for its award-winning Hint Water, the leading unsweetened flavored water.
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: She has received numerous accolades, including being named EY Entrepreneur of the Year 2017 Northern California and one of InStyle's 2019 Badass 50.
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: Previously, kara was the VP of Shopping Partnerships at America Online.
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: She hosts the podcast, the Kara Golden Show, and her first book, undaunted Overcoming Doubts and Doubters, was released October 2020 and is now a Wall Street Journal and Amazon bestseller.
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: Kara lives in the Bay Area with her family and three Labradors, which I love because you're the only person I know outside of me that has more than two dogs, so I have four.
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: Love because you're the only person.
• 1:46
  Speaker 2: I know outside of me that has more than two dogs, so I have four.
• 1:49
  Speaker 2: I love it.
• 1:51
  Speaker 2: I would have four.
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: If I'd have more than that, I'd have 16, if I could Exactly Well.
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: Welcome to the Bulldown.
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: I'm excited to talk to you and get to know you better and to share your very inspiring bold journey.
• 2:00
  Speaker 2: Oh, thank you, thanks for having me so we'll start off with your definition of bold.
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: What would you define bold as in your world?
• 2:09
  Speaker 2: You know, I think bold is a it's, it's something that kind of scares you, that you don't really think that you're maybe capable of doing and therefore you've been avoiding it over time of doing and therefore you've been avoiding it over time.
• 2:29
  Speaker 2: I don't think bold comes up for people immediately.
• 2:31
  Speaker 2: It's not like a thought that you come up with that day and say I'm going to go do something bold.
• 2:35
  Speaker 2: This is something that's kind of been incubating inside of you and you think I can't possibly do that.
• 2:42
  Speaker 2: That's too scary, that's something that I would never be capable of doing.
• 2:47
  Speaker 2: And I think that actually being bold is getting a hold of the reins and saying you know what?
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: I need to go do this and I need to take charge of this and stop being afraid of it, because that's the key to allowing me to do a lot of other things in addition to accomplishing this.
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I love that definition.
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: For me, bold, I agree with you, is not fearlessness.
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: I think it's stepping into it regardless and knowing that you'll learn something.
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: You might learn what doesn't work, or you might learn oh, I don't like that.
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: Or you may see that you succeed when you never thought you could, but it's that first step.
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: That's the hardest for a lot of people.
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: For me it was one of those freeing steps as well, but I think fear and freedom kind of probably are partners along the way.
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: I agree, in many places of our world, right, I love that definition.
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: So when you think about your world, your life and your bold experiences, what's a memorable bold moment for you?
• 3:47
  Speaker 2: So many bold moments, you know, I think, over time that's another thing about being bold is that once you actually go and conquer something that you had figured that you couldn't do right, you weren't bold enough to go and do it you start saying, well, what else is out there?
• 4:07
  Speaker 2: And so for me, I always tell people I'm an accidental entrepreneur because I never thought about starting a company.
• 4:15
  Speaker 2: But I think that as I started to work for other people who were entrepreneurs which I did prior to starting the company that I started Hint I always felt that they were special right, that they were fearless, that they could take on big things, that they were maybe more creative than me, smarter than me, whatever it was, more experienced than me.
• 4:39
  Speaker 2: And once I actually started to work for these individuals and add value and support them, I started thinking about well, what problems can I go solve?
• 4:50
  Speaker 2: What puzzles can I go solve?
• 4:51
  Speaker 2: And that's ultimately what came up when I started Hint.
• 4:54
  Speaker 2: So I guess, in answer to your question, the actual founding of Hint and ultimately scaling Hint, a company that I ran for 17 years, is something that I never really thought that I could do.
• 5:10
  Speaker 2: I never consciously said, oh, I'm not capable of doing it, but I think along the way, so many people were surprised, including myself, that I hadn't done it earlier.
• 5:21
  Speaker 1: Yeah, so you had the idea and your bold move was actually taking action on that idea.
• 5:26
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and when you started out, you know part of your book title is overcoming doubts and doubters.
• 5:32
  Speaker 1: Did you have doubts about yourself?
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: You kind of named a few there, but and then, certainly if your book trailer is accurate, someone actually called you sweetie and said you know, people are looking for sweet in their drinks.
• 5:45
  Speaker 1: So, out of the gate, someone may not understand you or be, you know, supportive.
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: How did you move through those initial bold moves when you're just starting off, because sometimes that's the hardest thing for people.
• 5:59
  Speaker 2: I think, first of all, when you're when you're starting anything new, you automatically think that when you see other people doing it, maybe you're starting anything new.
• 6:05
  Speaker 2: You automatically think that when you see other people doing it maybe you're seeing somebody start a company, or you're seeing somebody you know start to water ski or whatever it is you assume that they have way more experience.
• 6:20
  Speaker 2: Maybe somewhere inside of your mind you think they're natural entrepreneurs or athletes or whatever it is.
• 6:27
  Speaker 2: So you kind of talk yourself out of being able to go out and do it yourself, because you start comparing yourself to somebody so that you could form the visual of well, one day, this is what I want to be like.
• 6:42
  Speaker 2: Maybe you want to be better than that, but you're thinking, well, I didn't even have the gift that they did, so it's going to take me longer.
• 6:50
  Speaker 2: Maybe I shouldn't do it.
• 6:51
  Speaker 2: Maybe I need to go get more education, more experience.
• 6:55
  Speaker 2: You know a better ski or boat, or yeah, whatever it is, there's always a reason, right, there's always a reason yeah.
• 7:03
  Speaker 2: And I think, more than anything, once you figure out that those blocks, right, are only created in your own head, right, that they don't really matter, then I think that that's the first step to be able to move forward.
• 7:19
  Speaker 2: But certainly, as you mentioned the title, the subtitle of my book is Overcoming Doubts and Doubters.
• 7:25
  Speaker 2: When you already have your own doubts maybe you're not sharing those with everybody that you know, but you already have your own doubts.
• 7:33
  Speaker 2: When you run into people who are capable of actually skewing you towards believing your own doubts, then it's really tough and it just makes that wall even larger for you to get over.
• 7:48
  Speaker 2: So I think it's a mindset issue and it's getting over your own challenges, your own blocks about yourself.
• 7:57
  Speaker 2: It's sort of ironic because when you look at some of the biggest ideas and the best companies that have been created, it's not by people who have worked at some large company that have done incredible things.
• 8:12
  Speaker 2: It's usually some crazy story where you know it's two people in a garage who decided, oh yeah, we're going to tinker away at something.
• 8:20
  Speaker 2: Or, in my case, you know a lady with four kids and three Labradors in her kitchen starts slicing up fruit and throwing it in water and let her curiosity take her into Whole Foods and ask the guy stocking the shelves how do I get a product on the shelf?
• 8:36
  Speaker 2: And I think that if you start to learn more and more about those stories.
• 8:41
  Speaker 2: You start to realize that it's not about you know some gift or some major experience or skill set.
• 8:52
  Speaker 2: It's really about trying and being bold and getting out there and just going for it.
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I think sometimes people think also that you're always confident.
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: When you're being bold or in your world, undaunted, you know you're not letting others stop you from that idea or from the thing that you want to do.
• 9:11
  Speaker 1: I think you also learn pretty quickly who to share your idea with.
• 9:15
  Speaker 1: I think when I started off, like I was still trying to figure it out because I had unplanned, you know left my company and I was just like, how do I create a company?
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: I never thought I would be an entrepreneur.
• 9:26
  Speaker 1: It wasn't anything I ever planned, but I was like sharing my ideas with everybody and it was like Whoa, I really quickly learned like everyone doesn't need to hear it or should hear it, because they can kind of be a rain cloud on just something that's just starting to grow.
• 9:39
  Speaker 1: It's like a seedling Right and it sometimes it's harsh, you know, and I think that's really.
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: I think part of it too is being able to move through it.
• 9:48
  Speaker 1: It is a mindset, for sure, but it doesn't mean you're always confident.
• 9:52
  Speaker 1: It means you're gaining confidence.
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: Most likely, at least that was my case in just trying to figure out what the next steps are.
• 9:59
  Speaker 2: That is so, so true, and I think that you know it's another piece that I share with people that you don't have to have your idea totally baked before you actually go and try.
• 10:11
  Speaker 2: In fact, I think it's better to actually get it pretty good.
• 10:15
  Speaker 2: Certainly, if you're running research or you're, you know, developing a product like Hint, you want it to be safe and all of those things.
• 10:23
  Speaker 2: Product like Hint, you want it to be safe, and all of those things.
• 10:26
  Speaker 2: But you have to start somewhere, and you have to know that there's going to be learnings from the audience, the consumer, that are going to call you to change some aspects about what you're doing too, and I think that that's true with every great entrepreneur that they're not going to sit there and put something out there and then it's going to stay that way, right.
• 10:48
  Speaker 2: There's going to be iterations of it, because they actually saw that maybe their theory was not entirely correct, or they actually saw different audiences that this was applicable, or their packaging wasn't exactly what they should have gone out with, or whatever it is.
• 11:05
  Speaker 2: But you have to try.
• 11:07
  Speaker 2: You have to be bold and go somewhere with this first, in order to know what the true ability of whatever you're doing is.
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I think the begin before you're ready is something people have heard, but it really is true.
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: People hear things over and over, but this is definitely something like you said.
• 11:26
  Speaker 1: Everything from that point forward, something my daughter said to me when we co-founded the company together is every piece of information is more data.
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: It's more data for us to understand how to apply.
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: You don't listen to all the data.
• 11:37
  Speaker 1: You might not use all the data, but the more you have, the more informed you are to take your next step.
• 11:43
  Speaker 2: So true, so true.
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: Yeah, when you think about your doubter and your doubts of yourself or doubters, is there anyone that comes to mind for you that you've overcome, that you're like, wow, that was a big one and I did it, or that was like something that was holding me back and I was able to get through it.
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: Anything come to mind for you?
• 12:01
  Speaker 2: Yeah Well, one of the things that you and I were chatting about was early on in the founding of Hint.
• 12:09
  Speaker 2: I ran into a major executive at a large soda company who I, you know, really trusted his experience and his ability to say whether or not my company, his ability to say whether or not my company can't have legs.
• 12:28
  Speaker 2: I was not only starting a new company, but I was also testing this new theory around developing a new category called unsweetened flavored water, and so what that means is a still water without sweeteners in it.
• 12:40
  Speaker 2: And so it's ironic because today I look back on that conversation and thought why would I go to a soda company and talk to them about this?
• 12:49
  Speaker 2: Of course you know they're going to tell me that they're a hundred percent right, right Like they are.
• 12:56
  Speaker 2: You know there's nothing wrong with sugar or diet sweeteners, and but again, for me, it me.
• 13:03
  Speaker 2: It was a traumatic.
• 13:04
  Speaker 2: Traumatic conversation and in many ways a very good conversation because I was sharing my idea of Hint with him.
• 13:11
  Speaker 2: About 15 minutes into the conversation, he said something that I'll never forget.
• 13:17
  Speaker 2: He said sweetie, americans love sweet.
• 13:20
  Speaker 2: And I thought, wait, did he just call me sweetie?
• 13:22
  Speaker 2: I mean, this is a business I'm thinking in my brain like I've got to keep my cool it's all on the phone, keep myself together.
• 13:30
  Speaker 2: But I'm thinking there are a million things going on in my head.
• 13:33
  Speaker 2: And then, as I started to zone in on this conversation, that's when I realized that he thinks differently about what I'm doing and and I had seen firsthand that I had shifted away from diet soda.
• 13:49
  Speaker 2: I was looking for something that was what I was creating with hint, which was no sweeteners, no preservatives.
• 13:57
  Speaker 2: But you know, he was not going to admit that they were seeing consumers shifting away from these diet sweeteners and sugar.
• 14:06
  Speaker 2: Instead, he was going to tell me exactly, basically, what his strategy was.
• 14:12
  Speaker 2: So the longer I stayed on the phone with him talk about data I started hearing more and more of his pitch.
• 14:20
  Speaker 2: Right, and here he was.
• 14:22
  Speaker 2: I mean, as you know, you've worked inside of many large companies he was essentially telling me his internal pitch for why he believes that soda is not going to go away and why diet sweeteners are just fine.
• 14:38
  Speaker 2: And that didn't mean that he was right, it was.
• 14:41
  Speaker 2: You know, he was trying to sell, right, it was his pitch.
• 14:45
  Speaker 2: And so what I really quickly realized was I wasn't going to change his mind, I wasn't going to, or at least, if I did change his mind, he was not going to share that with me.
• 14:56
  Speaker 2: But the thing that I also realized is that when you've got somebody in front of you who, frankly, has a lot on the line, right, they're trying to convince you not to do something.
• 15:09
  Speaker 2: I think there's two reasons why they do that.
• 15:11
  Speaker 2: One, they have some sort of skin in the game, right, that they don't want you to be successful in some way, and I felt like, if that was the case, it was going to take a little while for him to turn the big cruise ship around and kind of jump onto my path.
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: Of what I saw, but he could see you as a threat right.
• 15:34
  Speaker 2: Right, but he could see me as a threat, but he did have the, he did have the ability to do that because they had lots of, even though you started with your daughter which I think is awesome.
• 16:01
  Speaker 2: But is that?
• 16:02
  Speaker 2: You know, they don't.
• 16:03
  Speaker 2: They don't necessarily want you to be bold, right.
• 16:06
  Speaker 2: They don't want you to take risks because you had a good job.
• 16:10
  Speaker 2: Right, you're rising through the ranks.
• 16:12
  Speaker 2: You know why?
• 16:13
  Speaker 2: Would you go start something and, very illogical to them hurt something and very illogical to them, right.
• 16:21
  Speaker 2: And they mean well, yeah, of course, but they don't necessarily want you to take risks because risks are hard and they love risky.
• 16:27
  Speaker 2: Right Risks are risky, right, yeah, and so I had a lot of those in the path too.
• 16:32
  Speaker 2: But I would say that you know, the big one was definitely the soda executive calling me sweetie.
• 16:39
  Speaker 2: I'm grateful because that for me was shocking dismissive.
• 16:43
  Speaker 2: But it was a wake up call to actually stop for a minute and listen to what he was saying.
• 16:49
  Speaker 2: I fully intended on going into that conversation trying to get him to believe in my idea, because how many times have you like reached out to people because they've got more experience and you think they kind of do what I'm interested in doing.
• 17:06
  Speaker 2: So therefore, I'm going to hop on the phone with them and you want their validation.
• 17:09
  Speaker 2: But at the end of the day, maybe that makes you feel better, but it doesn't necessarily help you to move forward.
• 17:17
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it doesn't help you grow, right.
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: It doesn't help you grow Right, yeah, right, it doesn't help you grow Right.
• 17:20
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I think I can relate to a lot of that.
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: Certainly, at the beginning, a lot of folks not understanding what I was doing and I always say kind of my bullseye of people who were in the center of, who I would share information with and who maybe needed to move out to the outer circles and not because I didn't love them or like them, it's just they were just not energy or information or words I needed to hear Right as I was trying to figure it out, because you're very vulnerable.
• 17:46
  Speaker 1: At least I felt very vulnerable when I was first figuring it out and that's actually I used to think vulnerability was a weakness.
• 17:54
  Speaker 1: If I had that, especially like in the corporate setting, like toughly, he's got to figure everything out, you know I could get eviscerated by anybody and I'd still be strong and still do my thing.
• 18:03
  Speaker 1: And I think that for me was like figuring out that that's actually something people want to see, that you're human, that you know you do take things in.
• 18:13
  Speaker 1: But I think you can use vulnerability as a gift and a superpower as you share your journey and share your story of boldness or being undaunted and kind of moving through it, because I think, without even knowing, I was inspiring other people, and I remember the first time that I heard someone say that to me was like in the I left in September and it was around fall and someone said, well, you just inspired me to do X, y or Z and I was like whoa, like I didn't try to.
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: I love it.
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's what you're doing and that's what you're doing as well, like in your work and like starting out and creating this incredible organization that you've created and led for so many years and the impact that it has of helping people be healthier for the good of your health, which I think is a really important part of your mission.
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: Yeah, how did that come into play with you being undaunted when you're getting this feedback or kind of hearing some of these things as you're first starting off?
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: How did that kind of drive you?
• 19:11
  Speaker 2: I remember.
• 19:12
  Speaker 2: So I was a tech executive.
• 19:14
  Speaker 2: I had started out in media and then sort of moved into tech, and it was when I started having my family that I felt like I felt like there were so many unknowns for me when I was feeding my kids that I was somewhat horrified by, you know, starting with, you know, some of the things that I was giving my kids, like formula, for example, that sort of smelled funky and I or yeah, like it.
• 19:44
  Speaker 2: Just there were things that just made me think like who would drink this, you know?
• 19:50
  Speaker 2: And what am I doing and what's in it and why does it smell this way?
• 19:53
  Speaker 2: Is it bad?
• 19:55
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 19:55
  Speaker 2: Is it rancid in some way?
• 19:56
  Speaker 2: So I think, for me, I had never really paid much attention to food or drinks, like I was not a chef, I was an OK baker, but I just hadn't paid attention and I just assumed that there was, you know, anything that was on the shelves was just fine, right.
• 20:17
  Speaker 2: I probably knew that sugar in moderation was better, but I had, you know, really been a fooled consumer in many ways.
• 20:28
  Speaker 2: So I think that that was the moment, really, when I started to think about first my kids, and then I started.
• 20:35
  Speaker 2: Then I felt like a hypocrite because I thought there were so many things after I'd been picking on their environment, all the things that I was picking for them, and they were little, so they were.
• 20:45
  Speaker 2: You know, I had a lot of control over what I was giving them, but when I was looking at my own things that I was putting into my body, the diet soda, diet Coke in particular, was really for me something that I had been addicted to since high school.
• 21:03
  Speaker 2: I never called it an addiction because I just would have it, but when I started to look at the ingredients and again, like going a couple steps back, it started with what was in my kids' food and drinks first, I had never read labels and again, this was early 2000s.
• 21:23
  Speaker 2: I was a tech executive, I was a media executive, I was not a food executive or a beverage executive.
• 21:28
  Speaker 2: So why would I read ingredients?
• 21:31
  Speaker 2: And what I found was that most of my friends didn't read ingredients either, and maybe, if somebody's listening, most of my friends didn't read ingredients either, and maybe, if somebody's listening, that sounds crazy because most people, I think, today, kind of look at ingredients, but it is very different than it was, and so it was at that time that I really thought okay, now that I'm looking at a lot of these ingredients and not understanding all these ingredients, how hard could it be to actually develop my own beverage and get it on the shelf?
• 22:01
  Speaker 2: I was curious.
• 22:02
  Speaker 2: I had never done anything like this, but I thought it might be kind of fun, and especially while I'm actually trying to figure out my next role in tech.
• 22:12
  Speaker 2: I mean, I had had a successful career in tech.
• 22:14
  Speaker 2: I enjoyed it, but I thought, you know, it's pretty fun if I could get it on the shelf and actually teach people what I've learned about ingredients, and maybe there'd be other people who would also have this issue too.
• 22:27
  Speaker 2: Separately, I also really looked at the diet industry.
• 22:32
  Speaker 2: I was never a person that went on all these different diets, but I had, you know, I was interested in them, and people would talk to me about Weight Watchers or, you know, the Scarsdale diet or all these different diets over the years that they had been on, and I thought, wow, there is millions of dollars being spent on by consumers on all of these diets and maybe it's as simple as getting them to really understand.
• 23:03
  Speaker 2: Not here's what you should eat, but instead let's first look at everything that you're doing, including all those ingredients, and try and figure out if there's just one thing that you could change that would actually make a slight difference.
• 23:18
  Speaker 2: I had no idea if I was right or not, but I thought I'm going to test it, and so I tested it on myself with my diet soda and eliminated my diet soda and I was shocked, how you know, over the course of a year, I mean, I lost almost 60 pounds, and in a year, just by eliminating diet sweeteners.
• 23:40
  Speaker 2: And again, like I would have never, ever thought in a million years, that diet sweeteners were the thing that was really causing me not only to hold on to weight that I had been trying to lose, but also it caused me to overeat.
• 23:58
  Speaker 2: I thought, you know, since I'm saving calories on my drink, then I can go and have that cupcake, or I could go, you know, and it just, I don't know.
• 24:08
  Speaker 2: It was like this game that I was playing inside of my head on you know what I could and couldn't do instead of actually focusing on sweeteners in moderation.
• 24:20
  Speaker 2: I'm very sensitive now to diet sweeteners.
• 24:23
  Speaker 2: I hate them, you know, I think that they do more harm, frankly, than good, and I always tell people, if you're going to have something sweet, do the best sugar in moderation, and that's the key thing, and then you're going to be able to do the things that you want to do around health.
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: So so sorry for the long explanation on that no, but I mean, that's really what the mission is about.
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: And the mission really came from your own experience.
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: Right, you wanted to understand what you were feeding your children and then, like, wait a minute, like what am I feeding me and how am I fueling my engine?
• 25:01
  Speaker 1: And are there things I could do, as that one step, that one thing do differently, and I'm going to wean myself off of the diet Coke or the diet drink, whatever it may be, which has, you know, ingredients that aren't healthy or aren't identifiable in the world, you know, and they're not your garden, and so like, and you think about that, like what can I do differently?
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: It's like, okay, fruit and water, and let me give it a role and let me try this.
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: So I think one of the things in the framework that I created so the bold framework is believe, own, learn, design, and we spend a lot of time in the framework looking at our beliefs and how they help us, hinder us or hold us back.
• 25:39
  Speaker 1: So there was a lot of self-belief that you had in the sense of one being curious, trying something new, and you believed in yourself, like I think this is important.
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: What other ways do you think your self-belief fueled you to be able to step into trying something.
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: Obviously, you had that conversation, but what happened next, like how did you come out of that?
• 26:01
  Speaker 1: As you moved forward with your idea?
• 26:03
  Speaker 2: You know, it's interesting when I look back and again it's.
• 26:07
  Speaker 2: It's hard when you're in it, Right?
• 26:09
  Speaker 1: But when I look back now.
• 26:11
  Speaker 2: I kept asking.
• 26:13
  Speaker 2: I was never afraid to ask questions and I found that when I asked questions and that that really allowed me to continue on the path Right, generally it wasn't going to solve the.
• 26:29
  Speaker 2: The answer wasn't going to be immediate, it was almost like a branch and it would keep branching off and allowing me to keep staying curious along the way.
• 26:39
  Speaker 2: But it was interesting, when I was looking to actually produce this product, that I would go and talk to beverage manufacturers who were actually running products for people and I would ask them so why do we need a preservative in the product?
• 26:57
  Speaker 2: And they're like well, because you're using real fruit.
• 27:01
  Speaker 2: But I'm like, yeah, but there's other industries, like the juice industry, that is not necessarily using preservatives, so why do we need to do that?
• 27:08
  Speaker 2: And so many people would say I don't know.
• 27:11
  Speaker 2: And, like I would talk to owners of these plants and they'd say I don't know.
• 27:15
  Speaker 2: And I kept thinking to myself, wow, people don't know the answers to these questions.
• 27:20
  Speaker 2: They're just doing right, but they're just doing it.
• 27:22
  Speaker 2: And again, it wasn't just a person who was just working there, I mean, these were like owners or companies that I was talking to.
• 27:30
  Speaker 2: And so it sort of like left me in this place where I thought there's a lot of people who are just kind of filling a role and continuing to do the same thing day after day after day.
• 27:42
  Speaker 2: They're not necessarily being bold, right?
• 27:45
  Speaker 1: They're not questioning.
• 27:46
  Speaker 2: They're comfortable, right, they're comfortable, and they're doing it and they're taking a paycheck, which is fine.
• 27:52
  Speaker 2: But it's not what I wanted to do.
• 27:54
  Speaker 2: So I kept thinking, just because they couldn't answer that question.
• 27:59
  Speaker 2: Again and again and again, I thought someone's got to be able to answer this question.
• 28:04
  Speaker 2: I'm going to keep asking, and it was almost like a game for me.
• 28:07
  Speaker 2: I thought someday somebody is going to come up with the answer for me and it's going to solve it.
• 28:12
  Speaker 2: But it was amazing to me and I think that sort of ironic.
• 28:16
  Speaker 2: But that's what allowed me to keep going and keep being bold and keep exploring, because I kept searching when people were owning the fact that they didn't know that and I thought, well then, I'm going to go figure it out for everyone, right, I don't know how I'm going to figure it out but I'm going to go and I'm not going to stop doing it, and again.
• 28:37
  Speaker 1: I'm just going to do it because someone else is doing it, which is also a bold move.
• 28:41
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and I would continue doing it until you know, do it to the best of my ability until I would actually find the answer.
• 28:49
  Speaker 2: But I thought I'm going to be the one that would go out and do this, and I think it's.
• 28:54
  Speaker 2: It's also interesting because, switching from the tech industry into the beverage industry, there seemed to be kind of a lot of walls, a set roadmap as to how to do things.
• 29:07
  Speaker 2: In tech, I felt like and maybe this is true in research as well where I just felt like it was okay to say I don't know the answer, but somebody probably does.
• 29:22
  Speaker 2: And in the beverage industry that at least the people that I was running into and there were a lot of them it was like this is the way things are done, and that, to me, has always been a scary statement.
• 29:35
  Speaker 2: I hate that statement, right, and maybe that's I've just never drawn inside of the lines, right, and so that for me, is fuel when I start to hear people shut something down and say, oh, it's just the way it's always done.
• 29:50
  Speaker 2: Like that to me, is just that that is an invitation to actually, you know, keep asking, keep searching, keep trying to figure out how we can do things a little bit differently, so that we can all be bold and all grow.
• 30:07
  Speaker 1: So, when you think about your mindset and we talked a little about this before how did you utilize your growth mindset throughout the evolution of your company over time to actually help you move it to the next level?
• 30:20
  Speaker 2: Well, I think you know, first of all I just wanted to start a water that actually or I should say a drink that helped people drink water, and that was.
• 30:31
  Speaker 2: I just wanted to get it on the shelf.
• 30:33
  Speaker 2: I was sort of shocked on the first day.
• 30:35
  Speaker 2: I share the story in my book too, how you know my fourth child at the hospital and got a phone call in the hospital from the guy who thankfully allowed me to get the product on the shelf at Whole Foods and he said the product is gone.
• 30:55
  Speaker 2: We had dropped off 10 cases and you know the product was gone in a day and I thought most of my friends don't even know I launched this company.
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: I mean, they're like oh, what are?
• 31:04
  Speaker 2: you going to do after you have a baby?
• 31:05
  Speaker 2: And I'm like I don't know, you know, maybe I don't know, you know, like when you're incubating a company, again to what we were talking about earlier, it just wasn't, you know, it wasn't something that I openly shared with people, Right, Because I didn't know if it was going to work out, and Because I didn't know if it was going to work out.
• 31:23
  Speaker 2: And so suddenly, you know, I had another problem, which was okay the product sold on the shelf.
• 31:27
  Speaker 2: I'm like, wait what?
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: I just wanted to get it on the shelf.
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: A good crisis to have, but still unexpected, right.
• 31:33
  Speaker 2: Exactly A good crisis to have.
• 31:35
  Speaker 2: But yeah, I mean, I think that that definitely was very, very surprising.
• 31:40
  Speaker 1: Yeah, so, moving through that, you then figured out how to mass produce, how to get things going and get the volume, and Whole Foods being the first place.
• 31:52
  Speaker 1: How did you make the steps to scale?
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: Because I think that to scale to the next level, as you saw this interest, which was unexpected, you know, I think, always keeping your attention, your communication with the consumer Right.
• 32:25
  Speaker 2: I think that that's the most important thing, because the consumer, you know it's interesting I think Steve Jobs was probably the one that honed this a bit but you can't ask the consumer what they want right.
• 32:32
  Speaker 2: That I think so often we go and have these focus groups and we ask them what they want.
• 32:36
  Speaker 2: They don't know what they want.
• 32:37
  Speaker 2: Right, you have to show them what they want.
• 32:40
  Speaker 2: But after you start showing them what they want, then I think it's at that point that you're able to really build this connection with the consumer and see what other problems you can solve for that consumer in sync with you know your consumer is the most important person because they can help you figure out, if you're on the right track, what kind of things you should be developing, what problems you can solve actually for this consumer that are pain points for them along the way.
• 33:18
  Speaker 2: And I think that you know it's interesting.
• 33:20
  Speaker 2: I was just on the phone with another entrepreneur the other day and she was asking me you know, like what's one thing that you would do over again, like in your journey, especially early on, and I think, branding and getting people to really be your advocates for your brand, because the minute that you can actually get other people to do your work for you right to be able to tell people how much Hint has helped them or how they've discovered the product, I mean words that really allow you to see that they have a connection with your product.
• 33:55
  Speaker 2: Those are the kind of commitments and vocabulary that you want to see out of a consumer, and I think that making predictions they might not be right, but what else can you do for this consumer that has loyalty to you, that is interested in what you're doing, that has belief in what you're doing?
• 34:16
  Speaker 2: That's the most important, I think, thing to look at and, however, you can be visible so that you can talk to this consumer.
• 34:25
  Speaker 2: I've been very visible on social over the years and I mean I get consumers DMing me constantly, sending me emails, stopping me on planes when they see that I have a hint phone case or a piece of luggage that says hint on it, or a sweatshirt.
• 34:42
  Speaker 2: I mean I'm constantly branded.
• 34:44
  Speaker 2: So I think, however, you can build that connection to the consumer, for them to come and tell their story to you or feel like they're part of this mission.
• 34:57
  Speaker 2: I think that's a powerful and a really great thing.
• 35:00
  Speaker 1: Yeah, so, as we close out, when you think about kind of making sure you're connected to those who you serve your consumer or your customer or your stakeholders, whatever word you use and if there's someone out there right now listening, that just is like I want to take the first step towards my passion project, or the things I'm passionate about, or something I'm curious about.
• 35:20
  Speaker 1: What would be your guidance or advice?
• 35:26
  Speaker 2: curious about what would be your guidance or advice.
• 35:27
  Speaker 2: I think the most important thing is figuring out how to start small right.
• 35:29
  Speaker 2: I had this theory early on and again, I think so many people have this when they see success stories like, oh, I've got to go raise a lot of money, I've got to go be able to immediately know what I'm doing and I've never done that before, so therefore I can't.
• 35:45
  Speaker 2: I think the most important thing, if you've got an idea figure out, is there a way to actually start this really small?
• 35:51
  Speaker 1: right.
• 35:52
  Speaker 2: Is there a way to prototype it in some way?
• 35:54
  Speaker 2: That isn't perfect it doesn't need to be perfect, but you can get it out there.
• 35:59
  Speaker 2: I've talked to a numerous people who have been on my podcast that have started with no money right.
• 36:06
  Speaker 2: They've had higher margin businesses.
• 36:08
  Speaker 2: Some people, as we did with Hint we started with credit cards and trying to just do some sort of test in order to see whether or not something was possible, and so I think that if you really want to do something and you're really curious about something, you can find a way right.
• 36:24
  Speaker 2: It's just a matter of testing it and don't get in your own way.
• 36:28
  Speaker 2: I mean, it may be that you test something and you have to figure out exactly what risk you can take financially in order to run that test too, but it may be that you tried something and you learn what you didn't want to do, right.
• 36:42
  Speaker 2: You learn what you were capable.
• 36:45
  Speaker 2: You learn something along the way, and I think that that's the most, that's the most important thing.
• 36:51
  Speaker 2: I think living with regret is not okay either, and I think you know more people that I've talked to later on in life.
• 37:01
  Speaker 2: You know regret is something that is much more powerful than actually trying, and I think most people would say that they would rather try than actually live with any type of regret.
• 37:13
  Speaker 1: Yeah, so stay undaunted, go for it.
• 37:15
  Speaker 2: Stay undaunted, stay bold.
• 37:18
  Speaker 1: Exactly.
• 37:18
  Speaker 1: Yeah Well, thank you so much for being on the Bold Lounge.
• 37:21
  Speaker 1: All the information about Kara Hintz and her book are in the episode notes.
• 37:25
  Speaker 1: Thank you again.
• 37:26
  Speaker 2: Thank you so much for being on the Bold Lounge.
• 37:27
  Speaker 2: All the information about Kara Hintz and her book are in the episode notes.
• 37:29
  Speaker 1: Thank you again.
• 37:29
  Speaker 1: Thank you so much.
• 37:29
  Speaker 1: Thank you for listening to the Bold Lounge podcast.
• 37:33
  Speaker 1: Through the continuum of bold stories vulnerability to taking a leap you will meet more extraordinary people making a positive impact for others through their unique and important story.
• 37:42
  Speaker 1: By highlighting these stories, we hope to inspire others and share the journey of those with a bold mindset.
• 37:48
  Speaker 1: We hope you've enjoyed this podcast and look forward to sharing the next bold journey with you.