Jen Zeszut: Co-Founder & CEO of Goodles

Episode 492

In this episode, Jen Zeszut, Co-Founder and CEO of GOODLES, shares the story behind GOODLES and its journey to reinvent the mac and cheese category. She discusses the challenges of fundraising and the importance of staying true to the brand's vision. Jen highlights the focus on taste and nutrition in Goodles products and the success of their unique flavors. She also explains the branding strategy and the importance of being authentic and weird. Jen shares the go-to-market strategy, including the initial focus on direct-to-consumer sales and launching with Target in the expansion into retail. Jen’s lessons are gold and you are going to love this episode. Listen now on this episode of #TheKaraGoldinShow.

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Transcript

Kara Goldin 0:00
I am unwilling to give up that I will start over from scratch as many times as it takes to get where I want to be I want to be, you just want to make sure you will get knocked down. But just make sure you don’t get knocked down knocked out. So your only choice should be go focus on what you can control control control. Hi, everyone and welcome to the Kara Goldin show. Join me each week for inspiring conversations with some of the world’s greatest leaders. We’ll talk with founders, entrepreneurs, CEOs, and really some of the most interesting people of our time. Can’t wait to get started. Let’s go. Let’s go. Hi, everyone, it’s Kara Goldin from the Kara Goldin show. And I’m so excited to have my next guest here we have Jen Zeszut. It who is the co founder and CEO of a fairly new brand that you are going to absolutely love if you have not tried it yet. It’s called, it’s called Goodles. And I was introduced to it a couple of years ago, right when they were getting going by an industry friend of mine, Deb luster, and I was just so excited about it. And I haven’t even told Jen the story, but I brought it home. And it was on the counter. And my son who’s now a freshman in college, grabbed it, he was starving. And he liked one of those other mac and cheese brands. And he tried it and he reads ingredients. He was like, I don’t know if I’m gonna like this or not, but I’m starving. And he had it immediately. And he became like one of your number one fans. And he’s told so many people about it. You guys had sent over a box recently and a bunch of his if his other college friends were over, and they were like, What is this? And he totally he was your brand ambassador. So it was yeah, it was it was so fun. And he was like this is really good. My mom knew this. You know, I mean, the whole story’s got you. He’s got it all down. And then obviously the other, the actress that will get you to chat about who has also been involved in the brand too. He had seen some of some of that marketing. So reimagining everyone’s beloved mac and cheese. Goodles is reinventing the prepared pasta aisle. So making macaroni, nutrient dense and protein packed. But we’re gonna allow Jen to do a much better job than I am of, of actually sharing a lot more about this brand. It’s only two years old. So you’re not totally hiding under a rock if you haven’t heard about it, but they’ve already sold over nine, get this billion noodles. I mean, that’s just crazy, crazy, crazy. So excited for you. And so excited to have Jen here with us today to talk about the brand and the journey. So welcome, Jan,

Jen Zeszut 3:03
thank you so much for having me. Oh my gosh, I know. Sounds like your son would do a better job of ensuring gutturals than I would. But that was Thank you. So excited. So

Kara Goldin 3:17
what inspired you to create Goodles, can you tell us the backstory? Yeah,

Jen Zeszut 3:22
well, the backstory. So I’ve been a this is my fourth time as a CEO, so And my last company was making healthy healthy food as well. And you know, love kind of the space and all of those sorts of things. And it was one of those things where I was not ready to start another company, you know, that feeling where you’re like, oh, no, no, no, I know what lifeforce goes into that thing. And I’m not. I can’t do it again. I just can’t. And my husband is like you promise so like, I promise. And sure enough. Well, you’ve mentioned Deb Deb luster. She’s one of my founding team members, Paul Earl, who is an incredible my co founder and an incredible branding professor. I got Gal Godot, who’s an old friend and also happens to play Wonder Woman and movies and things like that. And then Molly my, my Molly mache, who’s my head of r&d, like the five of us got together and it was like guys, cheese. It’s like a million boxes are sold a day of that leading brand. And you know, Deb luster, as you know, is one of the original presidents of Annie’s but that was a 36 years ago that any innovation on the nutrition front has even happened. So from a branding perspective, nothing has happened nutritionally it hasn’t evolved at all. And food science is so much more advanced you know, and then we looked at it and we said, Well, why is it that the main leading brands think that mac and cheese is only for kids and no offense to you know dubs former brands, but you know, push the bunnies tail to open the box and, you know, it was like, you know, noodle art to do with your story. You’re old and all that kind of stuff. Super cute, great and everything. But I love mac and cheese. We all love mac and cheese. And it was just this like lightning bolt. Aha that said, Wait a minute, I think there’s a chance to not just steal share the chance to grow, share, because if you think about like, I don’t know, ice cream. Sure kids love ice cream. But everybody can love ice cream is as much as you want. And a big part of that is because brands chose to have good branding, they put good ingredients, and they were innovated on flavors, all those sorts of things. Meanwhile, there’s this like multibillion dollar category is just sitting here and hasn’t evolved in 3686 years. So we it was just it was one of those things where I was like, I’m not going to do it. Again, it was a 20 minute phone call with my co founder, Paul and I walked into the room in my husband goes he didn’t even say were you just because oh my god, you’re doing it again. And I look. But it’s such a good idea, like has to happen. And like the whole thing just popped into my head on how we were going to unveil this. So I was certain from day one, that there is a massive, massive opportunity for a modernization and a re reimagining of this beloved category, which is mac and cheese. But, you know, then we went and started to fundraise. And we got hit a total brick wall. We were told no, in every possible way. We were told no. By very serious industry, people who said no way you can never go up against those big companies, they’re just going to flam you can’t raise enough money to even compete in that market. Just stay away. We were told by VCs that our branding and our boxes looked not healthy enough. They were they were they round they should be if they’re healthy. And if they have 21 nutrients from veggies, and they’ve got protein and all of that kind of stuff. couldn’t, you know, couldn’t have like some broccoli, doing some push ups or something like that on the front. And you’re like, No, what are you not hearing like it’s not for kids. And we need to modernize. We wanted to make it sexy and beautiful and fun. We want it to look like a disco party in the aisle because we’re going after young adults who don’t have little kids at home. Like we want this to be fabulous. And we’re just told now over and over and over. So, you know, it’s one of those fun stories, you know, our last round that we just closed I had 32 VCs fighting to try and lead the series A and it’s just like, we’re where you guys were in the beginning. Like you’re not visionaries, you know? So we had to stick to our guns and trust our intuition. But it was a fun fun start to all of this.

Kara Goldin 7:38
So well I think once you were actually an especially in today’s market, you have data as long as it is good data, like that’s where, you know, they’re not risk takers, right? Like so many of these VCs are you know, I mean they they are wait and see lemmings right that jump on. And there certainly there are some exceptions, but there are many VCs that have never operated a company before and won’t don’t see the new categories. So I’m not surprised to hear that at all. But I’m so happy that you did it. So did you originally just raised through angels? Yeah.

Jen Zeszut 8:16
So we started through angels. I think it was my my founding team member Molly, she’s like, my next door neighbor. He has one or buffaloes. I think he can write a check for a few 1000 I was like, we will take it that was our first check. So yeah, we started with angels and then a very, you know, we did find some incredible partners. Springdale, Genevieve from Springdale came on in the very early days we have Willow we now have incredible invest VC and institutional money around the table. But yeah, we started very catches catch can and tried to make 10 pounds a little noodles and we did all of this during COVID actually so with 2020 when we’ve incorporated so we’re you know, FedEx meeting couldn’t even be together we’re FedExing little you know, awful Brown, weird baggies of noodles all over the country trying to to make this go. But it’s we actually used we kind of leaned on our community, we actually started with 3000 what we call our do gooders, our community is called our do gooders, because we’re good old and we’re noodle cutter. So our do gooders, we have 3000 of them. So we are shipping these little baggies all over the country and tell people we’re giving us like 10 out of 10 hands down 98% likelihood to buy all that kind of stuff. So then we felt like Okay, I think we’re ready I think we’re ready to put this into into out into the world and so we did we launched it the very end of 2021 and we did just have our our second birthday we just turned our God went into our terrible tooth that we’re excited for what’s what’s 10

Kara Goldin 9:52
I love it. So obviously your product tastes great. How would you describe it to somebody how does it differ be it besides being better for you. I, I, you know, the taste is amazing. And I think that today Gone are the days where you can launch a product that tastes terrible, right? You have to, especially if you’re going up against a big category as you guys are. So what are the key things that you wanted in a product that were that you were not going to launch? Unless you could get?

Jen Zeszut 10:24
Well, you’re totally spot on. It’s just shocked me in that natural products, how many things just don’t taste good? It’s like God didn’t you have a friend who like loved you enough to tell you that that was not worth launching. So our you know, taste, taste, taste, number one, number two, number three, it has to just totally taste delicious. And even the brief was like, make something tastes absolutely awesome. And then cram in as much as nutrition as you can. And I swear, I mean, even with like our protein, we don’t round up. So it was like, you know, it was right there. It was like something point nine two, when I was like, Molly, can’t you like put in like this much more, we just round up. And we’ll just call it 16 grams of protein per cup. She’s like, probably for sure. We try it. And I swear, you can pay something. And we’re like, pick it back down. Just take it back down. It has to be delicious. And so taste is the most important thing. And that’s why the story of your son was so funny in the beginning, because I don’t love telling people what’s in it. And I love that the box is so beautiful and sexy and all those sorts of things. It doesn’t look healthy. And because if you are like, Hey, who wants to try some mac and cheese that has, you know, chlorella, which has a freshwater algae in it, you’re not going to have a whole lot of takers. But if you say who wants amazing delicious mac and cheese, and then they get at home and that’s when they start looking at it. And they’re like, oh gosh, I don’t know Is this gonna? How is this gonna be? I’d much rather you take a bite first and go what is this? I love it. And then you tell them what’s inside. And then you got to you got them hooked. So it’s like taste first and then nutrition is it’s it’s a sub bullet, but it is the reason why, you know, fitness fans, athletes, we got, you know, tons of our investors are this listless athlete community because they’re obsessed with the protein, they’re obsessed with the nutrition, they’re obsessed with the fiber, the low glycemic index, like all of those sorts of things are great. But that’s all on the side of the box. Like, if you’re a health nut, you’re gonna look and you’re gonna be like, Oh, yay, it has algae in it. Now, if but if we’re going up against Kraft and Annie’s, and we’re here to build a billion dollar company, yeah, we’re gonna hide that fact. It’s just got to be up. So I think it’s that magic. Like, it doesn’t have to be one or the other. You know, we have a little tagline, which is, you know, they lied, you can have it all you don’t have to choose between taste and nutrition. And so that’s just our founding principle. And it’s our, you know, the way that we produce every single product that we that we release. The other thing that I should mention is flavors, right? If you’re going to be say that mac and cheese is not just for kids anymore. When we launched it did sound a little crazy. We were launching with like the classic orangey ones. You know, if you love if you grew up on Kraft, you’re gonna love that one. And if the classic white cheddar, just called Shell good. If you love that one and you grew up on that one, that’s gonna be your fav. But we also launched with some weird ones we launched with with my parm we launched with a catchy Pepe, which, you know, like little kids are like, oh, whoa, black things in there. You know, like, It’s pepper, it’s, you know, it’s really relaxed. That one’s for your mom and dad may not be for you. But we’ve just, you know, continued to go with that we’ve got down the hatch, which is a hatch chili Popper, we’ve got some spicy ones, hey, hey, lotay, we’ve got shaved black truffle, which is a huge, huge hit. And there are some foodie kids who love it. But we are actually massively growing the category. So at one of our mass retailers 81% incremental to the category. So 81% of the people who are buying noodles have never purchased a box of mac and cheese ever, ever at the store. So here’s this multibillion dollar market that’s now way bigger, because we saw that mac and cheese isn’t just for kids, though. It’s really fun.

Kara Goldin 14:06
That’s awesome. What was your first store, by the way?

Jen Zeszut 14:10
Target Target, Target. Target. We did a national launch with target. But you know, we didn’t know any buyers there. We had no way to get in there. We had never launched before. We had no retail data before. So it was a it was a total total longshot. But we kind of snuck and snuck our way in and got a 15 minute meeting for the launch pad program that we totally didn’t deserve to be in but it gave us 15 minutes in front of the buyer. And she’s like you’re not getting into this Launchpad program. You’re totally ineligible. We’re like, Oh, really are we? But we got our 15 minutes in front of her and the rest is history. We did a national launch across the country. And yeah, we’re now selling not just there but across all of our stores, which just crossed a major milestone, which is selling one pocket every two seconds right now across the country. So crazy.

Kara Goldin 15:07
I love that. So you mentioned gal good dough, who you’d known for a while? How did she get involved in the brand? Well,

Jen Zeszut 15:16
she and I had known each other before I started this project. And I talked to her about other things. I knew that she was, like, kind of had never done anything like been done anything like this before and was really curious. So when I picked her, I was like, hey, what do you think about mac and cheese? And she’s like, Oh, my God. So I guess when she was growing up in Israel, her aunt and uncle would ask all of the kids, hey, what do you want us to bring from the States and some kids would ask for toys. Others were asked for music. The only thing she asked for was a giant box of at the time of Kraft mac and cheese, but like obsessed with mac and cheese. So she’s like, Are you kidding me? Like, no, I’m not kidding. And so yeah, it’s been it’s been a really amazing collaboration, you know, she’s got 110 million followers or something like that. So that really helps to get the word out, you know, because if you gotta buy all those eyeballs, and pay for those with paid media, who can’t raise that much, so,

Kara Goldin 16:14
so fun. So your branding is so fun and unique and aims to tap into the psychology I feel like but also is a little weird. And I know you’ve, you’ve talked a little bit about that. And appreciate that. Yeah. I love it. So how have you thought about branding? You’ve been involved in other brands, you’ve been around? Watching other brands? So how did you think about, you know, the branding of this? And how would you explain it to others? Um,

Jen Zeszut 16:46
well, I think that strategically, we just knew mac and cheese is joy, like it is, is there’s maybe, I don’t know, I can’t think of anything else that the world can agree upon right now, other than our love for mac and cheese, but whether you are north or south left or right, political party affiliations, rich, poor skin color of skin, everyone loves mac and cheese, and to be able to give something that tastes so good and give the nutrition, it’s just joy. And so we really wanted a branding experience that was just joy, weird. All of those sorts of things. So strategically, we just knew we’d also be going up against, you know, two very, very big corporations in Kraft and General Mills, and really well run and incredibly, you know, well financed and companies and you just can’t outspend them we can’t coupon them we can’t out slotting fee them. We can’t rent tutor kids for our commercials, we can’t afford commercials. So we kind of have to what we can do is we can be more authentic, we can and we can out weird them. So everything from the crazy colors to the crazy names. People usually just get a huge smile on their face when they see the names of our of our products. And we even go even weirder, like for example, on April Fool’s, there are so many names that we would never choose for in a commercial. You know, for a commercial enterprise. Lots of names get on the cutting room floor, let’s just put it that way. Either. They are so not PCE, or they are just like so corny and stupid. But on April Fool’s every year, we like to bring them back. So we’ll put on our website some of the names and, you know, just as an example, this past April Fool’s, you know, twist my parm became kiss my Aussie Iago we had, like, everything just switched out. And we made it clear like coming never and April Fool’s, like, we made it clear that it was a total joke. But on that day, we thought 16x, the revenue, we have 16 times the sales have our normal day, just by being that weird. It costs us no money. But it’s just, you know, it’s it’s small, it’s scrappy. We don’t have an agency. We film everything in house. Our This is the team. You can’t see my headquarters office here. But we film everything here in Santa Cruz. And I think that in general, like the world routes for underdogs, and I think they like that scrappy thing. So I don’t know, we’ve just closed a bunch of funding, but we’re not getting an agency and we’re not going to get suddenly like new fancy marketing like this is working. Let’s just keep being weird. So that’s kind of philosophically that’s all we got is to go up against some of these big, big, big brands. But really, it’s an extraordinary lineup of branding people that I’ve hired here. We have a creative director in Dan, who’s incredible. My partner Paul is a branding professor. We have so many like incredible branding minds around the table. So I think we also punch our weight above our weights in terms of talent on the brand side, which is super key to all of this. We might be Startup, but the talent is like top tier.

Kara Goldin 20:04
What are some of the most popular, Google’s Google’s flavors? I mean, you’ve talked about some of them, like the mac and cheese and what we’re, I guess what has been the most surprising to you, as you’ve, you’ve, you’ve invigorated a category, right? In many ways. But what has been kind of surprising to you?

Jen Zeszut 20:25
Um, yeah. So I think I, it’s surprised, really all of us a Cheeto. Because if you think about it, you know, craft as an example, you know, that blue box sells the vast majority, they have a very long tail of other things. But it’s more than 90% of their sales is that one, wow, that one SKU same thing with Annie’s you probably it’s the iconic the white shells like that is the vast majority of their sales. And then there’s a long tail of little thought. So I think what’s shocking here is that everything that we launch, it’s not cannibalizing anything else, like people are like, Oh, that one sounds good, too. Oh, that one sounds good, too. And it’s like, if there’s eight things on shelf there, the basket is eight things, if there’s nine things on shelves, they’re buying nine of them, they want to try all of them. And it’s, again, it’s back to the mindset, you know, little kids are locked. Their palettes are very simple. So if you’re buying for your kids, they liked the white one, or they liked the orange one. So those are always going to be our top sellers, because it’s both nostalgic, the ones that you know you grew up with. And it’s also the ones that kids kind of love. But the truth is like this, it’s not a long tail like all of these other flavors that just keep growing basket size and growing back to the size we keep thinking is it going to start cannibalizing something, and it’s not. The other one that’s surprising, all of us is vegan, we launched what I think is the Well it must be because we are the number one vegan selling mac and cheese in the country now in our format. So vegan sales are like off the charts. And I haven’t told anybody this but since it’s so close, I feel like I gotta tell you and your listeners, but that we are finally launching our gluten free Mac which has been the day we launched people of begging been begging for a gluten free noodle and a gluten free mac and cheese. And we have both a vegan one and a non vegan one that’s launching and then just the next couple of weeks. And I think those are going to be just giant hits because it’s just paste so much better than everything that exists out on the market. So anyway, sneak peek tiered listeners, there you go. Super, super

Kara Goldin 22:37
exciting. So what’s been your go to market strategy you mentioned Pardot was your initial partner. Obviously direct to consumer is such a big part of anybody’s brand. We’ve talked to many people who have started out as DTC and then gone into retail or, as we did have hint, we did retail and then went strong into DTC but I’m so curious, like, where do you see this brand overall going? And what is the strategy there? Yeah,

Jen Zeszut 23:07
well, we knew we would always want to be where mac and cheese is sold. So that is mostly in retail, it’s not mostly on DTC, we had the launch D to D, because that’s the only thing that we can control. We couldn’t get any buyers to take us in the early days. So when we launched we were a B to C only. And that was helpful just because, you know, I thought we had five months of inventory and we sold out in less than two weeks. So it was like okay, we’re gonna make some more noodle quick. So but DTC is really has always been kind of the core that’s always there to your point. It’s so strategically important because we own that relationship. We know them we can talk to them, we can pull them we can say hey, talk to us about this format, hey anyone gluten free let’s talk and movie I want to do some sampling with you so we can pull them we can ask them questions. We just can facilitate that relationship so well so we always want every new flavor launches DTC first so it might go yay to target or might be a Whole Foods coming soon to whole foods but DTC gets every flavor first so if you ever want to try the latest girdles everything [email protected] And we always launch there first and then it rolls into retail afterwards. So we knew that we were always going to be very omni channel and over time d to c would get smaller and smaller as a percentage of the whole which is exactly what has happened. But we’ve never really you know invested in to online advertising like we actually shut all of that off and those sorts of things. We just use it as a very organic channel to build brands build relationships, and really secure you know do have a great loyal following through our DTC brands but most of our sales are through retail now for sure.

Kara Goldin 24:54
So what’s been the most challenging part of growing this company you’ve you are a serial entrepreneur. But you know, have you grown a brand that, I guess has this much possibility from scratch? And, and, and what is new to you that you’re you’re like, you know, hopefully you don’t lose sleep every night. But certainly there’s there’s moments and growing a brand where you’re just like, you know, this is a lot.

Jen Zeszut 25:25
Yeah, we get that feeling all the time. You know, I think the hardest. Never before have I belt built anything or that has been this, like quickly, beloved, and we have people who have tattooed branding on their bodies. We have people dressing up like people we don’t know dressing up as mac and cheese as Cedi, Mac for Halloween. We have celebrities calling and asking if we can do bulk shipments for baby showers we are with Kardashians showing up at like our mac and cheese brunch. And we’re like, What are you talking about? So it’s, there’s, you know, people creating content for us and filming commercials. And it there’s this fanaticism that I’ve never, never experienced before. And it’s just an honor to be a part of it, for sure. To be inspiring this, I think the speed at which this is going is the part that stress keeps all of us up at night. I mean, you know, we’re the scale that I thought we’d be in and you know, eight years and here we are two years, I mean, you know, we’re growing out of a coma and moving on to another movie onto another I’d like it’s all part of how you scale a brand. But doing it this fast. It’s hard like it feels like careening around every corner as if like the wheels might come off. And I think that’s the reason why this team is so essential to success. Like this is a very veteran and senior team who has been there done this many, many times. So when you’re if you’re driving down, you know, if you’re building a brand that takes forever, and you’re going five miles per hour down the road, you can look out the window and like see a pothole and you know, slowly steer around it. But if you’re going this fast, and you’re gonna you hit a pothole going Lightspeed like this, there’s a chance for the whole thing to kind of rattle apart. So we need team members who are looking ahead who are thinking ahead who have a contingency plan, and oh, by the way, have a contingency plan to the contingency plan. Like we have to be thinking about those things in advance. And this is a team that has that. I mean, it’s like rumor is that in 2026, this one ingredient might get more expensive. And already, we’re running line trials in North Dakota in the middle of winter, and doing some foam in order to like test and make sure that we’ve got three options ready to go. So in case that happens in 2026, I’m just like, I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you. So but that kind of looking ahead, and also maintaining a culture where you’re scaling so fast, like it was so there was like six of us and we all did everything together. Oh my gosh, we can’t do that anymore. Otherwise, the whole thing would fall apart. So that’s scaling bird and keeping culture intact, who is probably 80% of my job now. And it used to be to it’s, it’s tough, you know,

Kara Goldin 28:12
are you are you primarily remote as well still,

Jen Zeszut 28:16
we have a headquarters here in Santa Cruz, and a majority of the company is here at this office. It’s definitely the full marketing team, a big part of the ops team, we have our test kitchen here. So like a core group, the one that kind of creates content together as all the physically together, but sales is remote, you know, all geographically dispersed across the country. So we have like half the company that’s, that’s, you know, out and about. So that bringing people back together, having those Touchstone moments, what we call homecoming. In doing fun things together, as is tough, like it becomes a bigger and bigger part of our day to day to day. It’s keeping keeping that connection to the spark in that thread from the very beginning. Even if it was two years ago. It’s still tons of new people who weren’t there at the BNA, didn’t hear all those the early stories. So you just become a storyteller over and over and over.

Kara Goldin 29:09
No, I love that so much. So last question. I’d love for you to share, maybe it’s a nugget of inspiration. Or somebody may have shared something with you over the years that just like you think back on, it’s really helped you to kind of get back up and grow because being an entrepreneur, there’s way easier ways to make money. It’s so hard. And you know, the risk of failure is very high. And I as I try and share with people part of the biggest reason why I love doing this podcast is because I get to hear all kinds of stories and there’s a consistent thread no matter what industry, you know, it’s it’s hard, right? It’s hard work, but maybe there’s some, you know, nugget of inspiration or success tip that you can give to somebody who’s listening who’s first time Most startup founder or maybe is thinking about starting their own business. Like what would you say to that? You

Jen Zeszut 30:06
know, um, it really is. So I mean, the guest the cautionary part is it’s takes so much lifeforce to do this. Just really, really, really run through it all on paper. Because my my co founder, and I, Paul, we like to talk, you know, if you go to Vegas, and you play a slot machine, which I don’t do, but if you did do that, you know, the only way you win anything, is if it’s chery chery, Chery, Chery, Chery. If there’s one lemon or one banana, you get nothing. And startups are like that. So if you’re assessing whether you’re going to go spend the next 12 years of your life, at least, or your the rest of your life doing this, like at least make sure that it feels like there’s a chance that chery chery chery, Chery, Chery. Because it’s, it’s like, if there’s, oh, it’s all pretty good, except there’s really no way to scale it. Figure that out, or whatever the thing is, except, it’s just hard. So I think, you know, even if you if it doesn’t turn out to be all cherries, just be honest with yourself, because it’s such a big commitment that you’re going into it with the best possible chance. But once you commit, and once you go in, I mean, I think I’ve learned this lesson so many times, and it’s just worth sharing, you know, with anyone, if you are a founder, and if you are a CEO, you are in charge. And once you if you hear no from so many people, and they’re like, No, you really should have broccoli, doing push ups on the box. And you just hear it over and over. I think that in, in earlier in my career, I want to say, maybe they’re right, maybe we do need some broccoli, doing push ups on the box, because they’re so smart. And they’re such good VCs, and they made so much money, and they touched so many things. Maybe they’re right, and I’m wrong. And it’s like, I think I learned in the early days, and I keep learning it over and over. It’s like, if you’re gonna succeed, at least do it on your terms. Do it your way, you know what? To like, take their advice, and go down a path that doesn’t feel right to your intuition. Like those are the only times in my career that I’ve really faltered is trying to follow someone else’s path. You gotta like if it’s gonna go down in flames, at least you’re gonna go down in flames because of my choices. So I guess that’s my my other thing to everyone is just listened to your intuition on this stuff. No one knows your business like you do. And just because they have more money, or titles or whatever it is, you don’t know. They don’t know like you do. So I don’t know. Those are my quick thoughts.

Kara Goldin 32:36
I love that. So Jen Zeszut co-founder and CEO of Goodles so excited for you to share all of your wisdom with us today. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, and everybody needs to grab a box or 10 of girdles for sure. And we’ll have all the info in the show notes. But thanks again for your wisdom and best of luck with everything. Thanks again for listening to the Kara Goldin show. If you would, please give us a review and feel free to share this podcast with others who would benefit and of course, feel free to subscribe so you don’t miss a single episode of our podcast. Just a reminder that I can be found on all platforms at Kara Goldin. I would love to hear from you too, so feel free to DM me. And if you want to hear more about my journey, I hope you will have a listen or pick up a copy of my Wall Street Journal, best selling book undaunted, where I share more about my journey including founding and building hint. We are here every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Thanks for listening and good bye for now.

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