Seth Goldman – Co-Founder & CEO of Eat The Change
Episode 249
How do you create and scale over and over again? Honored to share my interview with Seth Goldman, Co-Founder of Honest Tea, PLNT Burger and now Eat The Change. Learn how this disruptor and creator does it and more about his newest venture. In 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 thrilled to have my next guest. Here we have Seth Goldman, who is the co founder and CEO of eat the change. I actually know SATs from very long ago, when we shared a distributor in New York City, big geyser. And we used to see each other as we were getting there early in the morning to get those cases on the trucks to go out to New York City for everyone to drink, when he was at honest and very, very thrilled to get him on the show today to hear about his journey. Not only is he the co founder of eat the change, but the co founder of plant burger, and Chair of the Board of Beyond Meat. And so he has incredible experience. And we’re going to hear a lot more about what he’s done to not only create these incredible companies, but also just overall his mission to really help the planet, change it for the better. And by doing that with incredible products, and in some cases, incredible entrepreneurs, as well. So thanks for coming on, Seth.
Seth Goldman 1:52
Great to be with you, Kara. So nice to reconnect after those days that big guys are
Kara Goldin 1:58
Yeah, definitely. So yeah, we both used to see each other at the distributorship in New York and the good old days. But before you created that success, and sold it, share a bit more about who was Seth Goldman, as a kid.
Seth Goldman 2:16
I was certainly active, I was doing all types of different activities. I was in singing groups and sports teams and student government. And I realized that the time and musicals, so I was kind of a multitasker. Even at an early age, and yeah, I probably did some studying along the way, as well. But my parents were both academics. And so they were often I don’t always say critical, but surprised that I wasn’t spending as much time in my schoolwork as I wasn’t doing all these other activities. But I did take those activities seriously. So for me, that was, you know, work as well. And I think the other piece is I always thought of myself as an activist. And what I mean by that is that issues I care about, I really want to do something about. And so I’ve found a way and all the work that I’ve done to make sure that it’s purpose driven work, whether it’s about the environment or about labor conditions in the developing world, or about diet, these are things that I ingrain into the purpose of the businesses. So I think of myself, I guess, as an activist and an entrepreneur as body,
Kara Goldin 3:21
that’s an incredible, incredible combo, for sure. And I definitely saw that when you were running honesty, but share a little bit more about where did the inspiration come for come from for that company? And and Yeah,
Seth Goldman 3:36
well, I was at a stage where I was really eager to find the right idea. I knew I wanted to go create something. I was working in a a mutual fund company in Bethesda, Maryland. And I enjoyed the work. It was a it was called Calvert, and they did socially screened investments. So they weren’t investing in tobacco or companies with bad environmental records. But that was and I enjoyed that work. But it was kind of passive, you know, I said, rather than be the investor, I want to be the actor, I want to be the activist who’s, you know, helping create different models and helping change behavior. So I was just trying to find the right business. And I actually got to a place where I actually had a few different ideas, and I’ll share them with you since you’re an entrepreneur. Yeah, appreciate it. One idea was to launch an organization that helped Public Schools raise money from alumni, right? So when we look at Think about how private schools raise ridiculous amounts of money, especially high schools, from their alums, and there’s, there’s more wealth held by the alums of public schools, they just never have a way to organize it. And so that was an idea that was sort of noodling around. Another idea was for a, a diagnostic company when I was at the Yale School of Management, a friend of mine, and I had developed a business plan that had won a competition and so could we sort of commercialize that and then, kind of out of nowhere, they went to give a presentation in New York. Diddy on behalf of the mutual fund company about socially responsible investing. And after the presentation, I went for a run in Central Park. And after the run, I went to a beverage cooler. And I said, wow, there’s nothing here for me. And this was this is before Honest Tea and hint existed. So you know what that beverage cooler look like. And I and I said, this is something I could actually get excited about. And I reached out to my professor from business school berry nail buff. And when I had been his student, we had done a case study of the beverage industry, we both agreed there was something missing. And so that was kind of the catalyst for me to take action, I reached out to Barry. And he had just come back from India, where he had been studying the tea industry and among other things had come up with a name on his tea. And that kind of crystallized for me this idea of how to ingrain purpose into into a brand around tea, and a less sweet drink. And then from there, I left my job in the investment world and started out of my house and started brewing tea in the kitchen. And our first break was getting an appointment with whole foods in the mid Atlantic. And I had five thermoses of tea that we had brewed and I got an empty Snapple bottle, I pasted the label on and presented to the buyer, he got that order for 15,000 bottles.
Kara Goldin 6:16
That’s so wild. Oh my God, that’s such a great story. And you guys write about that in your book mission and a bottle that I’ve read a couple of times? And actually, I’ve gotten to know Barry a little bit as well. And and yeah, I mean, it’s it’s a really incredible book that you should pick up definitely, if you have not read the book, it really shares a lot of the story in a very fun way, actually. So I it’s a comic
Seth Goldman 6:42
book. So we really wanted to make it have a wide appeal, not just being a sort of standard text
Kara Goldin 6:48
when you first started on us, did you think, okay, it’s a couple years, and we’re gonna be off to the races or,
Seth Goldman 6:55
you know, we really didn’t, we hadn’t done this before. So we didn’t know what to think we we knew what we wanted to build, we knew the scale of the ambition for the for the brand, we didn’t know how to get there. And so, you know, as I’m sure you learned it, distributors play a really important role. And we didn’t really even understand that role when we started. So I guess we just felt like, let’s just build something that’s meaningful to us. And that connects with consumers. And then sort of underneath that there’s a whole lot of work that has to be done. And we figured it out along the way. But you know, what’s interesting about the beverage industry is that so many of the successful brands are, are created by people who never were in industry before, you know, just like you right, and, and it you just because it starts from a vision that is sort of outside the industry. And there is a lot to be learned along the way and a lot of pain points around production and around distribution. But I think that vision entering is just so important. And that’s kind of we knew we knew what the vision was, we didn’t necessarily know how to get there.
Kara Goldin 8:10
I mentioned it just because whenever I meet with entrepreneurs, and I’m sure you do as well, I mean that when I see a plan that says, oh, in four years, we’re going to sell the company and oh, yeah, like that. It’s just I mean, time flies, for sure. And, you know, I think the main thing is to focus on the progress that you’re making along the way. Yeah, I totally agree with you. I mean, how many people? You know, Jerry Camuto, who writes an incredible newsletter called beverage Business Insights, I remember meeting him at the first trade show, and he heard we were from Tech, and he said, You guys are going to be roadkill? For sure. I mean, and I now I remind him of that every time I see him and and, you know, definitely, I think that it’s the people to worry about are the ones that really like are the underdogs that more than anything, they have an idea to change something that they really believe I mean, you guys in the unsweetened tea industry and and I’m so curious, like, what did you learn from building on us? And like, maybe what do you regret? What do you think about in that company that you that when you built it that years later, you regret?
Seth Goldman 9:16
Well, the only real thing I regret and we tell this story in the book is that for six years, we owned a bottling plant or a portion of a bottling plant. And it was the sixth longest years of my life because it was, it was in Pittsburgh, and which is about four hour drive from where I am in Bethesda, Maryland. And I would usually go there and back in a day. So I would have these grueling days. And all of that energy was focused on work that first of all, I wasn’t particularly well, you know, good ad I wasn’t passionate about and wasn’t building my brand. And it was only after we divested the bottling plant that our growth really started to take off. So for, for me, it was a really Important lesson in my leadership, how I spend my time I’ve got to do things that I’m passionate about that I’m doesn’t have to be, I’m perfectly willing to learn new skills, I need to learn new skills and be able to adapt. But, you know, the work of the bottling plant was how do we optimize production? How do we find ways to, you know, get parts at a low price, it just wasn’t. And it was really work. But it wasn’t any of the work that when I signed on to build a brand, I was, you know, particularly excited about Yeah, and so eventually, you know, we ended up selling the plant, or what was the assets of the plant to someone else who took it over and has done quite well with it. But for me, the real lesson there was make sure you’re doing the work that you’re passionate about, that builds your brand. And basically, all the rest is kind of can be a distraction. And so, and the other lesson, and this is something I still very much think about is the biggest asset that I have, that I bring to a company is my energy. It’s not necessarily my time, because I was still working on the, you know, the company when I was driving there and back, but I was draining my energy. And so I had, in order for me to be fully present and engaged and excited about the business, I had to not be involved in that bottling plant. And so that was also a really important lesson. And it certainly made me feel better about you know, I, I continue to exercise a lot. And for me, it’s great. I know, I know, it’s actually good for the company when I do it, because I’ve got to make sure I have enough energy to really inspire and excite the rest of the team.
Kara Goldin 11:47
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Seth Goldman 13:55
So coke invested in 2008 and then they bought the company in 2011 but we created an arrangement where I actually hold on to a piece of the company through basically 2019 And so I still very much acted as if I was you know the owner of the company and and a minute even though I’m no longer connected I still feel a good sense of ownership of honesty and I in a hopefully a friendly way I still send notes to the brand manager when I you know see our product missing on a shelf where it’s supposed to be and you know my name is still on the bottle and I still feel that sense of of ownership.
Kara Goldin 14:34
I love that what do you think is the key thing that entrepreneurs can learn from your experience, you know, integrating your company and to a large company.
Seth Goldman 14:45
I really do think the the entrepreneurs presence continues to be important. Obviously most of the time an entrepreneur will the company will be sold in the entrepreneur may have a few months as one friend put it to me he said well for The first few months, they want to know what you think, the next few months, they want to know your phone number after that they don’t want to know. Yeah. And actually, yeah, but it’s also it depends on the stage of the company. So for an early stage company like honesty, it was really important for me to continue to be there. And they helped shape and make sure that the brand and the business made decisions consistent with what we were trying to do. It was too easily influenced if I wasn’t there to stand up for things. And there were plenty of times when I did have to sort of literally meet with the president of Coca Cola North America and say, we we should not do this, or we should do this. So by the time I left in 2019, the brand was more formed. And all of the things that stood about were kind of guardrails that had been fully established. And so, you know, today, I’m still very proud of the brand that honesty is it’s still, you know, fully organic, and Fairtrade certified for the tea. And the kids product is, you know, organic and lower calorie. So those things that that that we work to embed in the brand are there and they’re not they can’t really be compromised, because they’re that’s what the brand is
Kara Goldin 16:09
really interesting. So you so you left and then I don’t know if I have the timeline. Exactly. Right. But I just all of a sudden saw you as the chairman of a company called Beyond Meat. And, and one of the most successful IPOs of that year, definitely. So did. Did I miss anything in between there? How did you get to be on me?
Seth Goldman 16:33
Yeah, so that’s kind of interesting. So I’ll take a few steps back back in 2002, I got my first chance to get involved in another company besides on his T and I joined the board of a company that was just for me called Happy Baby and credible to wonderful entrepreneurs building that business. And I really enjoyed the work is there a board member there, their first board member and advisor and, and that was got my first chance to have a toe sort of beyond honesty. And I enjoyed that. And then they sold to denote, I think around 2011, ish, or 12. And then I thought, Well, okay, what would be another way I could get involved. And in 2012, my wife read an article about this company getting started out in California called beyond me, that was seeking to replicate the taste and texture of meat using all the plants. And our family has been vegetarian now for 16 years. But at the time, we were vegetarian and often disappointed with the choices never never regretted the decision, but felt like sometimes, veggie burgers just were disappointing. And so I sent an email to info at beyond meat.com and said, you know, if there’s any way I can help, you know, be happy to talk. And I got an email back pretty quickly, they needed help in a lot of different ways. And so I became an advisor, board member. And then this is what’s unusual in 2015, I was able to create a unusual arrangement where I worked halftime for honesty. And then halftime is Executive Chair of the Board of beyond me. And so for those next five years, I was able to play both roles. And there was a lot of growth, you know, when I joined Beyond Meat in 2000, as a board member when sales were under a million dollars, and so we grew really quickly over those next five years and still growing quite a bit. And it’s been a, it’s been really fun and satisfying to not just create tastier options for dinner, but to take such, once again, a mission driven business and see it come to scale. See it widely adopted, you know, today, we’re doing tests with McDonald’s and Pizza Hut and you know, other national chains, Kentucky Fried Chicken. So seeing this real whole movement, sweep across the world has been really exciting. That
Kara Goldin 18:52
is still a founder led company, which is, which is really great. Actually, I would love to get him to come on and share a little bit more Ethan’s great Ethan on here as well. He’s I’ve met him a few times. He’s really terrific. So then you co founded plant burger, and co founded bethesda green, before starting your company that you’re doing right now eat the change what inspired you besides, I mean, you were living this way. Obviously, you wanted to create plant based snack foods along the way. I mean, what was it that was really like, I gotta go do this myself.
Seth Goldman 19:30
Yeah, I’ll tell you an interesting story. I haven’t really talked about this, but I around 2020 This is before the whole pandemic, but just sort of toward the end of 2019. I did go through a process of thinking about what is the next stage of my life, what are career what does that look like? And I I actually did toy with going into politics. I was a government major in college and so I sort of thought, Oh, well, maybe that would be the right next step. And then I thought more about and talked with my wife and you know We thought about climate change being such a defining issue of our time. And when we think about if we ever had grandchildren, you know, when people look back, like what were you doing at that moment, and especially seeing a lot of politics kind of just moving back and forth, and not really making impact, I thought, you know, it feels like the right. Next step for me personally, is to go back, even though I could have used sort of the honesty transition. And, you know, I shifted that beyond meat from being chair, Executive Chair of the Board to chair of the board, which means I’m not an officer of the company. It could have been the right moment to say this is a transition where I will take that step into politics, but I said no, it’s it’s, it is the real next step is to go after climate issues in a more focused way. Because honesty, while it’s certainly through organic ingredients, has a clear Climate Commitment or environmental commitment. It isn’t exclusively focused on climate. And so I had gotten approached a few years earlier, I had been on a food panel with Spike Mendelsohn, the chef and like any good salesperson, I brought along some beyond burgers and some honesty and a cooler bag. I snuck in under his tears, you know, to have these in your stores. And he had he was carrying on his tea and I didn’t know that spikes wife was a vegan. And so she loved the beyond burgers and and he’s, you know, Spike has cooked some of the best burgers in the world. You know, he’s beat Bobby Flay. I mean, he’s, he’s a, he’s a. So he cooked up beyond burgers in a way. I’ve never tasted them before. And I said, that is amazing. And so he said, Well, let’s create a restaurant called plant burger. I was like, wow, that’s really exciting. I just haven’t, I’ve never launched a restaurant, I have no all I’ve done and seen restaurants, you know, go out of business. I don’t know that. That’s for me. But I introduced him. And I was at the time conflict because I was working at Coke and Beyond Meat, so I couldn’t direct get involved directly, but I, my wife got involved. And then our son got involved as the head of marketing. And our son came up with this phrase, eat the change you wish to see in the world. And for me, it was like, Wow, that really encapsulates what I think needs to happen. People need to think about what they eat and understand it is a climate decision. And so the more I got around that phrase, I thought, Okay, well, I was happy to turn through my transition with Beyond Meat, I was able to join as plant burger as a founder. And then working with Spike. And on the recipes, I said, there’s there’s enough of an idea here and a creativity from a chef, that we could create a business called Eat the change. And the first step was just thinking about our purpose, and what could we do around environment? And how would we bring to life as a brand? These concerns and so then we know, I guess, partially because we, during the pandemic we couldn’t we knew we went wasn’t the right time to launch a business, we really thought hard about what would be the five areas that guardrails for the change. And then we went after him. And so one, of course, is plant based food plants and fungi based food one is organic ingredients. One is thinking about food waste, how do we make sure we’re using crops that we can use the whole food like for our mushroom jerky will use the stem will use the brews mushroom, the small mushroom, any whatever, oversized? Another and then also looking at water footprint, how do we make sure our crops are not like almonds, which are over 1000 pounds gallons of water to make a pound of a product? And then how do we ensure that this business represents democratizing plant based foods, the goal is not to just sell, you know, planter friendly foods to the wealthy or the highly educated, let’s make them available wherever we can, at affordable price points and that distribution in a way that makes it accessible. And they’re
Kara Goldin 23:53
really, really good. So, yeah, especially I tried the carrot chews, they’re Yeah, they’re super, super nice. And we’re really excited about that. And you can eat them too, knowing that, you know, you feel good about it. And I think that the other thing is you’ve done an incredible job just on the packaging and the marketing, just actually educating. And I think more and more people want to understand not only who’s behind the brand, but they want to know a little bit about the brand. And I think the transparency and all of those things you just cover really, really well. What do you think you’ve worked? You’re an entrepreneur yourself. You know, you’ve worked in large companies, you’ve been on boards, etc. What do you think is something that as you’re starting these new businesses, one or two things that you think are really the key things that entrepreneurs need to be focusing on? You’ve got a great idea, you’ve got a great product, but where does it fall off the rails? Where do you think where do you think like, you know, or maybe you’re you’re counseling your your kids who are starting businesses. In your, you know, what, where do you think is the the key thing? Is it? Is it investors? Is it marketing? Is it getting into? I mean, one of the things that I’ve said to somebody the other day that I noticed and building Hant is, you know, there’s we had opportunities early on to be in Walmart. And we never believed, like if we went into Walmart too early, first of all, we didn’t want to fail. And, and, but we also believed that we hadn’t been in other stores first. So there’s like a, there’s a an order that goes on. And I explain that to entrepreneurs all the time. That you know, it’s okay to say no, sometimes to retailers, if it’s not, if you’re not going to have enough skews, if you’re not going to have the right arrangement and some way, but what would you say is sort of the thing that you look at when you’re trying to advise companies and entrepreneurs,
Seth Goldman 25:58
I lean toward the consumer, I always, the voice of the consumer is what makes or breaks a business. And so I always want to feel like we’ve got the consumer on our side, one great example is, you know, with Beyond Meat, there was a few years ago, and they actually still now, some interests, some some of the meat interests, were trying to restrict the way we could talk about our product. They said, Well, you can’t call it sausage, because there’s no dead animal in there. And, of course, you worry about that. And you do try to, you know, do what you can to constrain that kind of legislation, which really is about restricting freedom of speech. But But I always sort of knew that the consumer was on our side, like, if this is what consumers want, you can make me call it a bathtub. But you know, so addressing a consumer need to me is always the most critical piece. So for example, with our, our kids snack, the carrots, we, we looked at the shelf, and we saw that what was mostly selling in the lunch box for kids are these fruit snacks, which aren’t fruit at all, they’re called fruit snacks. And yet, you know, well, what would be the answer, of course, maybe you just sell raw carrots. Well, that’s not where the consumer is, you know, parents currently are buying more than a billion dollars worth of things packaged in a package, calling it fruit snacks, and it’s empty calories. And so we had to find a solution that could basically function in the same way it had to come in a package that had to be five in a box, it had to work that a kid could, you know, open up a little pouch and be able to snack alongside their friends. And that is what led you know, obviously, we found a way to make a much more nutritious snack, our carrot snacks are made with carrots, not really, I was gonna say fruit, but that fruit snacks aren’t made with fruit. They’re made with starch and tapioca. And so it was important all along the way to keep in mind, the consumer. And the other thing that’s important because of course, I know you share this as as a mission driven consumer, you want to always, you can’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good. And so on the one hand, we say, wow, it’s feels wasteful to have five different pouches. What if we just did a bulk package, but once again, that’s not what the consumer is, wants the parents buying this, they need those five little pouches, so one for each day of the week to put in the lunchbox. And if we ask the consumer to change too much of their behavior, if we say, okay, instead of buying fruit snacks, we’re gonna sell you carrots, but instead of selling it to you in five pouches, we’re gonna sell you a bulk bag and ask you to, you know, then we lose them. And so we’ve got to find we’ve got to make it as accessible as we can the same with Beyond Meat, right, we’ve got to make sure our product is a burger that behaves on a patty the same way, unlike the veggie burgers of the past, it has to hold up in a grill, it can’t fall apart, and it still has to sizzle and it still has to give up literally what is the noise of the sizzling of a beyond burger. And if I close my eyes and I and I’m grill, you know, if I’m grilling a beef burger and a beyond burger, do they sound the same? Yeah, and the caller transformation, all these things that are are part of the consumer experience. And so I always let that guide product design and thinking,
Kara Goldin 29:07
yeah, and I think paying attention to the consumer constantly and no matter what channel they’re getting your product in, either. So what’s your feeling on direct to consumer, obviously, you know, started honest versus where it is today. I mean, what’s your what’s your feeling on that?
Seth Goldman 29:26
Oh, it’s an amazing new opportunity. Yeah, for honesty, it just wasn’t something that was around when we started and then of course being so much in glass bottles it was even if we could do it, it would be really heavy and obviously worrying about breakage and then with Beyond Meat because the product is refrigerated and you have to worry about dry ice. But today it’s totally different. And of course now with our mushroom jerky, which is in a packet and our characters, we can do more direct. So we hope to get there. Right now we just been scrambling to make enough for the retail shelf. So I really admire what you’ve done at him. It’s incredible how much direct business you have. And I believe we will get there. But we knew for our product, we wanted at least make a presence in retail first, and then you know, we’ll build out that direct overtime. But it’s, it’s exciting to see what you can do in terms of having that direct relationship with a consumer to be able to get their feedback to learn their behaviors, so much more. So I’m looking forward to that part of the business.
Kara Goldin 30:30
Yeah, definitely. It was game changing, I think for Hant. I mean, having that direct to consumer business. And, you know, one of the things that I talk about in the book I wrote undaunted is that, you know, when things happen along the way, and they will, you’ll have challenges. Our challenge was at Starbucks, when Starbucks decided to change strategy and put more food and the case, they had to make room for the food. And, you know, they very politely said, it’s not you, it’s us. And you know, you guys are doing great. But it was suddenly we were faced with a situation where that was, that huge chunk of business for us was going to be going away. And as I always say, to entrepreneur entrepreneurs, it’s like, if you don’t spread out what you’re doing when one of those when somebody changes strategy, and you’re not going to be a part of that strategy anymore. Yeah, having your own direct to consumer business where you can alert the consumer to the fact that you’re no longer available in Starbucks, but they can still find you on your website, or they can, you know, go to these other retailers, it actually puts a lot of control back in your hands when these situations happen, that you really can’t do anything about it. So I think it’s, it’s a powerful tool for all entrepreneurs in every industry to have,
Seth Goldman 31:57
you know, we even have a form of that plant burger because we have an app. And so we have that ability to have direct connections with our consumers. And so to the extent we can, you know, some of these eating delivery services are super expensive. And so when we can connect with them on the app, we have the chance to gain a little more direct relationship. And so that’s also really powerful.
Kara Goldin 32:19
That’s awesome. So what is it? So I’d love to hear a story where you had a challenge or a failure and all of these businesses that you’ve been starting or CO founding and helping, I mean, what, what was one where you felt like, Oh, this is this is a bad one. I don’t know if we’re gonna get out of here. And what did you learn? Oh, like,
Seth Goldman 32:41
goodness, so many? Well, certainly, the bottling plant is the one that’s most emblazoned on me just because it’s, you know, it was such a challenge was a such a long period of time. But I think probably the, the one that I’m, I still keep with me is the first time I had to fire somebody. And that that was a really challenging moment. And I don’t certainly never like to have to fire anybody. But I will say that doing it, I’m proud of the fact that I if I ever have to, as I’ve had to do it, I’ve gotten much better at it. And I think it’s really important to do it well for the person and for, you know, certainly for the company. And this was super early on at honesty’s evolution, we had a sales leader, we only had two salespeople, and one of them just was really super distracted, he was going through a terrible time personally. And you know, in retrospect now, what it would probably been right is having take a leave of absence and, and sort things out. But it was literally like the worst case scenario for someone where his wife had an affair with a priest and got pregnant. And it was just a sort of a horrific series of events. Wow. And, but he didn’t he I only found out about the sort of afterward. And so in the middle, I just like, I just, he’s just not doing his job. And and as such a small company, we don’t have the resources to you know, just sort of carry. Yeah. And so I did fire him. And I did it on a Friday. And over that weekend, I got a call from his brother, he had a heart attack and was in the hospital. So I just felt horrible. You know, what’s nice at the end is that he actually recovered and went on to do great things and I’m quite, I’m still quite friendly with him. But but that was just such a brutal time. And, and along the way, I just, I wasn’t as firm as I needed to be. And so, you know, clarity and clean decision making becomes a really important skill. And you know, like any, any startup entrepreneur there were those skills I had had not fully developed. So that was certainly a challenge.
Kara Goldin 35:04
Yeah, well, two things come to mind when you say that. And I totally agree with you that it’s, you know, when you, when you allow people like that to stay in your organization, it filters, right. It’s the rest of the organization and you allow, you know, people who are not coming in and giving 100% into the situation for sure. And also, you know, it sounds like you allowed somebody to go and do something that they were meant to go do right, and maybe have a wake up
Seth Goldman 35:37
call was better, it was a better decision for him to at the end of the day.
Kara Goldin 35:41
That’s awesome. Well, thank you, Seth, for all of this wisdom and all of your stories. And yeah, and everyone order from eat the change.com. And definitely give the carrots and the mushrooms that I know there’s other products coming out as well. They’re really, really incredible. And, of course, still support honest and Beyond Meat, and definitely go to plant burger as well. And all things that Seth is doing, and we really, really appreciate you coming on where do people follow you, Seth?
Seth Goldman 36:18
Oh, yeah. So I’m on Twitter, on a Seth and on LinkedIn as well. And of course, eat the chains is across all the platforms.
Kara Goldin 36:25
Incredible. Well, thanks, everybody, for listening. And don’t forget to subscribe to the Kara Goldin show where you hear amazing interviews from great creators like Seth Goldman, and everybody should give this episode five stars because those algorithms love five star ratings, and it just boosts SATs episode up a lot more. This podcast is now trending globally as one of the number one entrepreneurial podcasts and incredible leaders like Seth and creators, like Seth can be found on our show. So I really, really appreciate you coming on South for sure. And definitely, as I mentioned in the podcast, pick up a copy of undaunted my book. And it’s also on Audible, too. And we are here every Monday, Wednesday. And we’re actually launching another day on Friday because we’ve got so many incredible entrepreneurs that we want to talk to. And definitely everybody. Thank you again for supporting the show. And thank you, Seth, and have a wonderful week. Before we sign off, I want to talk to you about fear. People like to talk about fearless leaders. But achieving big goals isn’t about fearlessness. Successful leaders recognize their fears and decide to deal with them head on in order to move forward. This is where my new book undaunted comes in. This book is designed for anyone who wants to succeed in the face of fear, overcome doubts and live a little undaunted. Order your copy today at undaunted, the book.com and learn how to look your doubts and doubters in the eye and achieve your dreams. For a limited time. You’ll also receive a free case of hint water. Do you have a question for me or want to nominate an innovator to spotlight send me a tweet at Kara Goldin and let me know. And if you liked what you heard, please leave me a review on Apple podcasts. You can also follow along with me on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and LinkedIn at Kara Goldin. Thanks for listening