How Poppi’s founders built a new soda brand worth $2 billion

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0:53 Hey folks, Jeff Berman here. I am thrilled to share some of the new names who will be joining us at this year's Masters of Scale summit. This may be our biggest stage yet. Reed Hastings, Meredith Whitaker, Van Jones, Amjad Masad, and more. Will be there with us October 20th through 22nd in San Francisco. If you're building something great, or you want to build something great, We want you there with us too.

1:20 Join us at masters of scale dot com slash apply twenty six. That's mastersofscom slash apply. Twenty six. I'm standing there. on the edge of the bridge. I'm just like, should I jump?

1:42 I know I should jump, but there's gonna be all of these things that I have to do to like figure it out. There's so much risk in all of this stuff. And I donkey kink him. And she's so hard. Just kicks me right off. Mm. That's Steven Ellsworth. His co founder Allison is the one who gave him that donkey kick.

2:04 The married couple took the entrepreneurial leap together to create a healthier version of soda, one that you've probably seen if you haven't picked it up yet at your local convenience store, grocery store. Poppy. Pepsi bought the brand in twenty twenty five for roughly two. billion dollars. But the road to getting there.

2:21 Was not so easy. While you're like in the dark building and grinding, your friends are at great corporate jobs taking trips to the Bahamas and taking trips to Europe, and we're just like grinding. But also loving the grind. This is Masters of Scale. I'm Jeff Berman, your host This Week on the Show, Allison and Steven Ellsworth did the married duo that started by selling homemade soda at their farmers market. A hyper scale poppy to a truly gigantic exit and changed an entire category along the way.

2:55 We talked about what it takes to juggle a growing company and family at the same time, how savvy social media strategy helped them stand out, and what happens when you decide to run a Super Bowl ad four days before the big game. Alice and Steven, welcome to Masters of Scale. Thanks for having us. Thanks for having us. Thrilled for you guys to be here. I wanna start with a confession. Which is I had my first poppy just a few weeks ago. I had the lemon lime version. Okay and as someone who was like addicted to Coca Cola for many years and I'm now sixteen years off of Coca Cola. Wow. This was such a delight to discover Poppy. I love it. So thank you. Alison, it wasn't like you were like dying to go into beverage, right? How did Poppy come about? What's the origin story? The fact that you just had your first poppy is very iconic. And what you said is the reason Poppy exists is to give people the freedom to love soda again.

3:53 That's our purpose. But to go back to the origin story. We didn't set out to be beverage connoisseurs. We just wanted to create something really incredible, but it came from a personal problem of mine. I had tummy issues, I was about fifty pounds heavier than I am now. My skin was a mess. I spent maybe seven years trying to go to doctors, trying to figure out what's going on. And they kept telling me it was like girl problems. I couldn't really like really figure it out.

4:24 Going through that process, honestly, was really amazing for me to discover what worked for me. And apple cider vinegar was just like a key ingredient. It was almost like it was like a reset detox type of vibe, but I hated the taste. So off to the kitchen I went. created a bunch of our first versions of it. It was called Mother Beverage. It was in these like little mason jars. And so Stephen, when Allison is sort of a mad scientist in the kitchen trying to figure out are you like I love you, but what are we doing here? Or did you see the vision? Yes, I I definitely thought she was a little crazy. I would say that like for the first little bit I begrudgingly sort of went along with this idea as a supporting husband. I was really into health and fitness, but

5:04 The things that I did surrounding health and fitness and the food that I ate Like largely tasted pretty good. This was sort of too far out in left field for me. I think as Allison said, when she started making it taste a little bit better, that's when I started to get more excited about it. I was like, taking a shot of apple cider vinegar, not for me, but if it's something that I can drink and enjoy That's also healthy, then. I'm down.

5:27 And so what was the inflection point at which you said maybe I've got a product here that's worth taking out to market? I just was still just so obsessed with this idea, almost so obsessed, I just wanted people to to try it. So We signed up for the local farmers market to do it as a hobby on the weekends. I think a lot of people start at the farmers market and We just started selling it and week after week we kept selling out. And then we would spend the week bottling it and making it in our kitchen and then selling it on the weekends. Well, he's working a job to support the mortgage of the house that we just bought. And really quickly a whole foods buyer came by our booth.

6:04 Her name was Kelly. She's still Whole Foods to this day. And she gave us her card, and that moment was just like a really reassuring moment of being like, You guys need to be in Whole Foods. And I think that's the first time we realized we maybe had a business and it wasn't a hobby. And I told Steven, I was like, We're gonna do this, we're going all in, we're gonna put our life savings into this. But I think it was like our third week in at the farmer's market. Wow, so it's fast. This was really fast and friends and family had really liked the product, but How often can you trust friends and family to give you real feedback? And so this was another- I love it. It's so it's so good. Oh my gosh. That's exactly right. Like Alison said, the the forager from Whole Foods loved what we were doing. There was a big crowd around our booth. We were like the talk of the farmer's market. And so I think that was helpful, but tried the product, loved it, loved our story and was like, You gotta be in Whole Foods.

6:55 It's one thing to be bottling during the week in your home and showing it to the farmer's market. But when Kelly shows up from Whole Foods and says you should be in Whole Foods, Is it like whoa, whoa, whoa, now we've got compliance, we've got supply chain, we've got a whole set of questions we haven't begun to address. Like, what happens in that moment? The nice thing about this local forager program that Whole Foods has is they're there side by side with you to help these young and emerging products and brands sort of get up off the ground and get to retail. And so that was just a really great relationship that we developed over time with with Kelly at Whole Foods in in getting compliant and starting our own manufacturing facility. Not the wisest choice, but getting sort of all of that stuff dialed in. They were really helpful with it. We even had like at one point the bottles

7:39 Had this like metallic shine on it. She was like, that's not gonna look good in grocery stores. And so we ended up going with like bright colors instead that we knew would like pop off the shelf. And I think too on top of it. It takes time. So from the time

7:54 We got the like card to the time we're on shelf was ten or eleven months. Right. And so I love that we were naive enough to think it would happen quick because we did take our life savings and we did open a manufacturing facility. And we did start to grow even more locally and The craziest thing that we went through all that and then we finally got approval. And they're like, You guys have fourteen stores in Dallas, Texas.

8:19 And now you have to go sell Each store individually. We strapped our babies in our back and we sold into those 14 Whole Foods. And we were really successful in it, that they started to believe in us, and we just started the flywheel and I think we did like five hundred thousand in revenue.

8:35 And then that's when Shark Tank came up. Before we get to Shark Tank, neither of you had a background specifically in Manufacturing and supply chain and compliance and all the things that you have to deal with. How did you do it? Google's a beautiful thing. Right now there's chat GBT, but I think that There's templates online, there's resources, you ask people, you network. You call, you beg, like other people are like how did you guys do it?

9:03 I think like as an entrepreneur, we were just so desperate to be successful and to share This product that We kinda just did whatever it takes. And it it's almost like everyone wants that secret formula. It's just you have to just do the work. Yeah, I think the reason we work so well. is because I'm standing there on the edge of the bridge and I'm just like should I jump? I know I should jump, but there's gonna be all of these things that I have to do to like figure it out. There's so much risk in all of this stuff. And I donkey kink him off. And she just she just so hard. Just kicks me right off the the ledge. But the good thing is is that once I'm in

9:38 I'm all in. There's no turning back. It's just extreme focus and extreme intensity. Without looking back. Just Doing whatever you have to to literally get the job done. And I feel like for the first Two or three years growing the business, we just muscled through. It was just pure grit at that point.

9:59 While you're like in the dark building and grinding, your friends are at great corporate jobs taking trips to the Bahamas and taking trips to Europe, and we're just like grinding. It's tough for sure. But also loving the grind. Yeah. I always say I love that I had a co founder. I think it would be really hard to do it as a solo entrepreneur. Right, the highs are so much higher, but the lows you actually have like support.

10:23 And so if you don't have a co-founder, find someone your first hire is probably gonna be basically your co-founder. Because you can feel really alone as an entrepreneur. Yeah, and there's a growing number of stories of partners, husband, wife or otherwise who found companies together and go on to have the success you all have. It's also a decision that's fraught. Was there a moment where you just said, Like, I'm not sure this is worth it, or I'm not sure we're gonna make it as a couple through this? There was never a moment I didn't think that we wouldn't make it as a couple. I think maybe the reason that you start to see more married couples do this together

10:56 is because In theory, a married couple has already committed a hundred percent. Whereas I think other co founders or partners. I I feel like that conviction and partnership can sometimes

11:10 Waver. in the face of animosity or or any sort of challenge. So I never thought that our relationship was challenged through the growth of poppy. There were definitely moments where I didn't think we were going to make it I remember it was a slow month and we had all of this overhead.

11:28 And really no revenue to back it up and our mortgage was due. And we had our first kid at this point. And I was like, Man, what are we gonna do? I was standing in the kitchen, I opened up this letter, I didn't know where it was from, but it was a tax return from the government. Because we had had our first kid and we didn't claim it dependent on our tax return, we got a refund back. And it was almost for the exact dollar amount of our mortgage. Oh wow. But that was probably the the time that I was wavering the most was early on. Until like post exit. Why didn't you share that with Allison? I don't know, for for whatever silly reason. Yeah. Yeah, there was a there was a lot of things going through my head of of sort of like saying, Okay, exit door A, exit door B, like what's Yeah, well I'm gonna ask that question in part because to your point about being a married couple and already At least theoretically, and in your case, really being all in on it, right? You don't have one foot out. But when you're in it together

12:24 You're experiencing those highs and lows largely together. And so I'm just curious, is there an element of almost protecting each other when the energy demands that? We really like to when both of us have that drive. But we also wanted to have a family. Right, we didn't want to pick and we did decide very intentionally to do it at the same time. And so

12:48 We at that point decided that there's three things Marriage, kids, and business. That we were like Hey, we're good. Let's not focus on the marriage so much. Like I don't care if I get flowers for Valentine's Day.

13:03 Or if you forget the anniversary Or we don't have a birthday dinner. Right, those things that I think a lot of people would probably need in a marriage to like build that trust. We were building trust in so many other avenues. That for the longest time we didn't really need it.

13:19 But I will say What's been interesting Was like post exit. When we had this like Same goal for nine years.

13:27 Poppy and then we exit and now it's like he's Doing stuff. And we now don't have the same goal. There was a little bit of a learning to be like, oh wait, we're not doing everything together. We have to like Almost

13:40 Now go on those dates. I want those flowers. Don't forget my birthday, right? With everything in life, there's waves and there's challenges and change, but I think we're pretty good with dealing it and addressing and having those conversations. And so what happens that you then decide It's worth it for us to go do Shark Tank. Rather than continuing to build sort of step by step in a more traditional manner. I think we're finally ready to have

14:05 Help? Right. I think we'd maybe gotten it to a really good But it wasn't. You know, five hundred thousand is it's good, but it's not like gonna change our lives.

14:17 And We had someone reach out, they were wanting to invest in us. I think they were gonna give us like two hundred thousand dollars. But they had zero connections. They had zero knowledge in beverage. And we've always heard of the old saying, like don't take dumb money. Like any entrepreneur knows that.

14:33 And as we were like discussing if we needed it, because we needed the money. I literally opened Instagram and Mark Cuban posted that Shark Tank was coming to town. That weekend and there was tryouts to be on the show. I was three months pregnant, so it's twenty seventeen. And we went and stood in line for eight hours. I think it was like the first time we could got a real babysitter with our first and we just pitched our hearts out and they're like, This is gonna make it all the way. Really? They loved us. They're they were pumped. They were pumped. They loved us, they loved our story.

15:06 Yeah, but it still took six months from that moment to actually get on the show. Which you know. made me nine months pregnant on the show. Yeah, I was nine months pregnant on on but I was I was like I'm gonna be I don't I don't care I will have this baby on TV. Like that's how much we just it and Shark Tank absolutely changed our lives. We had resources, we had knowledge We had network, we had access to more capital. I will say the recognition of the American dream of as seen on Shark Tank, right? That stamp of approval.

15:37 Like it does so many things for a business. When used in the right way. Some people go on shark tank. I'm told knowing they're not gonna do a deal. It is purely a marketing play. Other people go on with a real clear idea of what they want to walk out with.

15:52 Where were you on that? Yeah, we needed a deal. As Allison said, we really wanted that strategic partner that could help sort of guide us and take us to the next level. And I think that we're relatively coachable. We wanted capital, we were eager for a partner, we were hungry to win and we wanted to learn. Tell us what happened on the show. Spoiler alert, we got a deal. Okay. So we got a deal with Rohan Oza. And he has A vast knowledge and beverage, right? And the history multiple exits and Really had worked his whole career.

16:19 In the space, and so it was the perfect shark for us and After getting a deal We did a full rebrand, we were mother beverage and we went into Poppy. What did Rohan tell you about the branding? Yeah, I mean he was like basically like your liquid's amazing, but your branding is shit. And

16:36 We as founders were not upset about it. We're like, Well, what do we wanna do? Like someone telling you your baby's ugly. That's not how it landed. No, because I think we knew our baby was ugly. Yeah. Yeah. But the inside is what matters. The inside is absolutely what matters whether you can sell the inside without the outside different story. Exactly. Uh it almost feels like Rohan is the perfect shark to invest, not one who's a regular on the show. Did you get lucky or was it Providence or was this part of the the programming that they wanted you in front of him? You know, contrary to what people believe, like the show wants you to get a deal.

17:11 And they do a lot of work in the back end to actually try to match you up. I know this because I was a guest shark this season. Right. So it was fun to see both sides of it and I kept thinking you guys I am pregnant. I know you're filming for three weeks, like

17:26 I think we're like the last two episodes filmed of the pod. And it was'cause they were trying to match us up with Rohan. We had no idea. You don't find out your sharks until literally, I think like midnight the night before. Oh wow. So we had no clue. We find out. We go to bed. We're up at four A. M. for for glam and to h get to set. So like you don't really even have time to process it or really dig deep or look into them. So you just kinda have to go in there with an open mind and I think Bethany Frankel was also on there and she had some experience in beverage. So

17:56 We were excited to see her and then Mark Keevan was Dallas. We were Dallas based. But I think that We would have done any deal with any shark, honestly, if it was a good deal and they weren't like Totally being sharky. We definitely needed it. If there's an entrepreneur who's listening who is either trying out for Shark Tank or is gonna be going to record an episode soon.

18:16 What's the advice you would each give that person? No your numbers. Don't go on the show if you if you can't answer Just like basic questions about your business. go on with the intent to actually get a deal. Because they can see right through that.

18:31 And I think You know, nerves get people a lot. I saw that where it was a great product. They knew their numbers But the nerves took over. So know that you are actually going on TV and you have to like be able to do that, which I think probably a lot of people struggle with. I think for the people that are wanting to go on there for marketing, I think it's great marketing short term.

18:52 I think there's a little lift, but I don't think that It's going to change their business the way that they think it's going to. Still ahead, Alison and Steven on how they built one of the most effective TikTok playbooks in CPG history. Humans will never be more intelligent than AI. There can be two types of companies.

19:23 Those are great at AI and those that went out of business because they weren't. How do we build a future? That is human centered. I'm Rana El Calyubi. And on my podcast Pioneers of AI, we answer that question and so many more. As an AI scientist, entrepreneur, and investor, I know what it takes to build AI that works for everyone.

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20:39 Welcome back to Masters of Scale. You can find this conversation and much more on our YouTube channel, and be sure to check out the link in our show notes to subscribe to our newsletter. So tell us about the rebranding journey. When we decided to do the whole rebrand. We did try to keep a little bit of nostalgic

20:56 touch of mother beverage. So at one point we were like, do we call it mom and pop? Because we knew we wanted to be a soda. Pop being that's funny. It's like a dad joke. But then we're like, is it a dad joke? Will people take us serious? And we really wanted to be a cool brand. And so We didn't rush it. We hired in different designers to come up with different designs. Do we stay in bottles? Do we go to cans? Do we do both? What is the brand? What is the vision? And really where we landed is we knew Poppy. Was revolutionizing soda for the next generation. Um we want to give people the purpose to love soda again.

21:30 I think at one point Steven wanted color. I wanted white cans. I will say it was wrong. I'm so glad we did color. Once we kind of figured out our North Star of our mission, everything else kind of just like landed in place on like what we were trying to do. Help me with the timeline. So the Shark Tank episode actually air December of twenty eighteen. December eighteen. We take off twenty nineteen is the rebranding phase. We keep things in steady state. Lunch Poppy, the first week of Covid, March third, twenty twenty. Wow. So what happens when you're launching or relaunch a consumer brand? with retail partners. I imagine you had pretty ambitious launch plans and then the world shuts down. Yes, it was at the time devastating, but I actually think

22:16 It did us well, but For a few reasons. We Had Loaded into Amazon. What is everybody doing during COVID? They're pantry loading shelf stable products that quote unquote can boost immunity. Everyone shopping on Amazon. So that business blew up. On top of it.

22:36 We had filmed an update on Shark Tank with the new brand. It aired the second week of lockdown. I think it was like April fourth. So we had a national commercial with Poppy. The second Month of business. And we hit Amazon's hot new product list. Literally overnight. It was wild what we saw from that episode versus like our original episode. Yeah, that's when we broke the internet trending higher than Kim Kardashian and Donald Trump. It was it was a wild. What does that mean from a revenue perspective in that window?

23:07 So March we did about nine thousand dollars on Amazon and I think The next month we did two hundred and fifty thousand on Amazon. Wow. Yeah. Were you able to keep up with the demand? We were able to shift inventory into Amazon because we were ready for launches and grocery store. And then another huge piece that I said that was like a blessing disguise, it made us think differently from the beginning and the way we marketed. Everything had to be digital first. And I do believe us being one of the first brands to really lean into TikTok to build that like community-based. really just helped our brand awareness because

23:41 A lot in beverage, if you think about it, or really in a lot of better for you products. They grow really big in New York and LA. And those are your hubs and those are your big markets and you really focus on it. Because we were a digital first brand, I think our largest Retailers were like Fargo, North Dakota, and Cincinnati, Ohio, and these like really middle America soda drinking places. That it just

24:04 Allowed us to really blow up really quick because of how digital first we were. Was the investment in TikTok content as marketing. Inspiration, desperation. What drove that in those early days of COVID for you? I think all of the above. I always say like The most under explored emotion for an entrepreneurial is embarrassment. Get online and make a fool of yourself. So I danced, I made taco videos. I put our kids in it. I was doing transition stuff. Steven was making TikToks. Honestly, what worked is one night I sat down, it was a Friday night. I just got in the shower, my hair's wet.

24:42 And I just told my story. And it connected. On such another level that it went viral, did a million views while we're sleeping. We did a hundred thousand dollars while we were sleeping that night on Amazon. That video now has like three hundred million views. It's just like wild. It was just like hi, I'm Allison. Poppy has five grams of sugar and I was on charcake n nine months pregnant. Like it was just so simple and so It also opened our eyes. to the power of it. So then we shifted a lot of our paid over to the platform and really just focused on that as like our community building brand awareness channel, which I think was like really

25:17 smart for us at that time. Our number one KPI was brand awareness. For the first four years of business was brand awareness. I think until we did a Super Bowl ad. We just were like never looking at the data. We used a an interesting'cause'cause we were Amazon. We didn't have our we didn't own our customer status. So we would run all of our tick toc ta ads to our website. We get their email.

25:40 And their phone and then you'd go to add to cart and it would check out on Amazon right from our website. You're getting their data as you can remarket to them, but you're leveraging all of Amazon's infrastructure. Correct. Another little crazy hack, this is like a pro tip. Because we were directing traffic to our website. To Amazon, we actually made it an affiliate link. So Amazon was actually paying us so smart to direct traffic from our website. To Amazon while also collecting the customers' data. That's an ultra heck. Yeah, I love that. You referenced the Super Bowl ad. When did you do the Super Bowl ad and why? You know, we just did things very differently at Poppy. And just to like lay the ground, like for us to do a Super Bowl ad in three or four years isn't crazy for a size of business that we were What we'd done is the year before we did a huge brand rework of really hammering in on, you know, what is our vision, and we created a an incredible anthemic ad that was called The Future of Soda.

26:37 And we got it and we started testing it. And it was just such a beautiful piece of content that were like This is a Super Bowl ad. You had the ad before you decided it was this you were gonna do the Super Bowl. Right. The ad is what triggered this We fell in love with this creative. So we didn't ever make this to be a Super Bowl ad. And I think that that's also really amazing because people get into this cycle of you making like celebrity soup super at bull ads where like everybody's in it and it's like what did they just save, right? But we really wanted to come out and just like who we were. And in the ad, I think we said we were soda 17 times. And so we go, we wanna do Super Bowl. We go to buy the Super Bowl. There's nothing for sale. What year is this? So that was twenty three going into twenty four. Okay. I remember I was part of this TikTok collective. We were at dinner with a bunch of really incredible, awesome people from like Wendy's to the NBA to Thrive Market to

27:30 Wyden and Kennedy to like just like incredible people like at this dinner. And I remember had no idea who this guy was. And I was like, anybody have a Super Bowl out? And he's like, I think I do. And it was the M group. And the time I called our CMO and I was like, I think I found this a super wad. This is the Wednesday. before the Sunday game. Four days before dayfore. Four days before the Super Bowl.

27:52 What was crazy about it too is it was a floater ad. So we had no idea when it was gonna air. It's like depending on timeouts and injuries. Because you can buy the first quarter, you can buy half time, you can buy post game, but some of the ads are sold on a non specific basis. They're gonna plug it in where they can. All it had to do was air before thank you for watching the NFL. That's how risky it is. Everybody turned off the game. And it could have been the last advantage. Yeah, forget it. Yes. And it costs the same for this, right? You don't get a discount for buying a floater ad and not knowing. But I will say we just rolled the dice. It ended up airing one minute before Usher went on, right before halftime, which is the most premium spot that anyone could. ever asked for at the Super Bowl. We tripled our awareness overnight.

28:39 And that was the year that like Travis Kelstein Taylor, it was like one of the most viewed Super Bowls and we were like one of the most viewed Super Bowl ads at that Super Bowl. So you could say our first Super Bowl was very successful. And coming out of the Super Bowl, were you able to see beyond the awareness, were you able to see in the revenue numbers the effect? Yes. I think is the short answer. We were I think forecasting three fifty. Two hundred to three fifty is really what that number was supposed to be for twenty twenty four. We hit over five hundred, north of five hundred million that year. And so I would say yes, it paid off. Our CMO actually signed the contract to buy the Super Bowl ad before we had the money to pay for the ad. Wow. Because we knew they would believe in this moment. So wait you're calling Rhan and saying, look, we're gonna need some cash infusion here to cover the cost of a Super Bowl ad that we just bought four days and for the air. Sure. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And he's like, Okay. And an eleven million dollar expense showing up overnight is not a trivial thing, even on a business at the scale that you were at. Wow. It's also just a great call back to your point about not taking down money.

29:40 Took smart money, got someone who can help you with the branding, really think through has got deep experience in beverage. And when you say this is the opportunity, we believe we've already signed the contract to do this. They're like, I'm in, I'm with you on this. Right. Okay. So jumping ahead. You've made a decision to sell the company. You've now sold the company as we sit here. What's the process that leads to a decision to sell this company? Alison and I also knew that In order for us to truly revolutionize soda and give people across the globe the freedom to love soda again.

30:13 We were going to need a partner. We are the official soda of the LA Lakers. We can't be sold there. At the stadium. because of existing contracts. And so we had made that decision and we really built this company so that we could pass the torch to a larger business that was going to be able to carry it forward and continue that that mission. You're in a category where there are two eight hundred pound gorillas. Right. There's Pepsi and there's Coca-Cola.

30:36 Did you start conversations with both of them early so that you knew that they're familiar with not just Poppy, but with U two, et cetera? It's actually three KDP when it comes to these things. And then yes, there's the option to go IPO, but then you don't have a distribution partner. So it's just a really tough situation to be in in Beverage. And so I think we did start dating. We started having conversations. We didn't actually do like official process where we're like we were for sale. It was like hey, let's take some calls. And so I think we had been talking to Pepsi

31:10 For almost a year and a half before like the actual like final offer came in, I think the reason they bought Poppy is for like our marketing and our team. And so I think when they finally gave us the offer, I think we said yes. We went a little bit of negotiation, but I think we said yes in like three days. It was really quick. It was like February and then we like Closed end of March. Pepsi bought Poppy for one point nine five billion dollars. It's so hard to not say two. So let's just say almost two, but is a monster exit. It's a monster exit. And you said Pepsi wanted Poppy in part for the team, obviously the product and the branding, et cetera. Did that include the two of you? It did not.

31:53 I think What a lot of people don't realize is we sold one hundred percent of the company. A lot of times you'll do a two step deal where I would say if it was that situation, we would have stayed in our roles and But you don't sell your company for two billion dollars and then say, Hey, here's your Pepsi employee badge. It's just not the way. those things work and we were very aware of that going in and had lots of conversations.

32:17 Now that the thing that I will say is they've kept us on as on advisory roles. you know, I'm still the face of the company. I still do a lot of ads. I was in the office two weeks ago. We were filming a super bowl commercial with Charlie X. But I can't have a team reporting into me and I can't like metal like I used to, right? Like you have to have boundaries and you have to have respect.

32:39 And there was mourning that came with that, I would say, that I think is very normal. I'm like so happy everybody at Poppy got jobs that wanted to stay. They hired on a hundred percent of anybody that wants to stay. Some people did leave because they saw what happened at Poppy. They're gonna go get another job and get equity and hopefully do it again. As Allison said, there's definitely this this mourning period. I don't think a lot of people talk about it. It was a really, really challenging time and it's like Oh, poor you, you sold your company for two billion dollars, like life must suck for you type of a thing. But it really is I think not knowing what I was going to do that day, not having like that purpose and like extreme focus on something to like wake up and get after it.

33:20 It was really, really challenging. I think we made the right decision. You rip the band aid. You separate And so I think where we are now, I think things are great. We're getting creative. A lot of folks in your situation would say, you know what, we climb the mountain.

33:36 We're gonna spend time Making investments. Guest judging on Shark Tank, philanthropy, whatever else is is meaningful for you. Is there an itch to start another company and do this again. Absolutely.

33:49 One hundred percent. I think As Allison said, I think we allowed ourselves that time to really sit And be with ourselves in process. And one of the things that I missed the most was Being with a team, building a team.

34:06 And having like this really great outlet to be creative. And to solve problems and to challenge yourself. And w I also want my kids to see me work hard at something and accomplish things. I don't wanna just be passive on the sidelines.

34:20 Playing golf. So can you tell us about what's next? We can't say what's next, but we will say The opportunity just kinda happened, right? And basically if we don't do it Someone else will because it's so simple and it's like we're like shaking ourselves, like, how has this not been done? But it is another beverage.

34:40 It is. We're gonna do what we know. Double down. Double down. And We're excited, we're working on naming and branding and packaging and just kind of that early day grind. Maybe not all the way back to like Early stage.

35:00 I hope you'll come back when you launch the new thing to tell us about it. Thank you so much for being on Masters of Scale. Thanks for having us. Yeah, thanks for having us. Thanks again to Allison and Steven Ellsworth for joining us. Poppy's scale story is an incredible example of how your toughest moments. can become your biggest opportunities. A brutally honest investor told them that their bottles were terrible.

35:23 But also invested in the rebrand that changed everything. Their retail launch screeched to a halt because of Covid. but it kickstarted the digital first marketing that allowed the brand to blitz scale. Facing the obstacles head on so often. And unlock.

35:39 Just. The right strategy. I'm Jeff Burman. Thank you for listening. Masters of Scale is a Wait What original. Our executive producer is Eve Tro. Our senior producer is Trisha Bobida. Associate producer is Masha Makatanina. Senior talent executive is Stephanie Stern.

36:12 Mixing and Mastering by Aaron Bastanelli and Brian Pew. Original music by Ryan Holiday. Our head of podcasts is Letal Mulad. Visit mastersofscale.com to find the transcript for this episode, and to subscribe to our newsletter. And please make sure. to check out our YouTube channel.

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