August 22, 2024 • 37 mins
Are you looking for a Third Growth Option ℠ ?
We sit down with Adam Baker, founder of SodaPup Dog Toys, to uncover the strategies that took his brand from concept to success.
Adam shares how his background with top brands like Nike and Under Armour informed his approach to building a customer-centric brand that resonates deeply with its audience. You'll learn how rapid product development and fashion-inspired cycles can keep offerings fresh and exciting, helping them yo stand out even in traditionally slow-moving industries.
Laslty, Adam discusses the importance of an omni-channel strategy and how to adapt to the shifting digital landscape to scale your business globally as well as leveraging direct sales on platforms like Shopify to forming partnerships with subscription services, like Bark Box, for growing a brand’s reach.
Whether you’re a seasoned entrepreneur or just starting out, this conversation offers actionable advice on how to build a brand that not only captures attention but also fosters lasting customer loyalty. Tune in to learn how you can apply these strategies to grow your business and thrive in today’s market.
Always growing.
Benno Duenkelsbuehler
CEO & Chief Sherpa of (re)ALIGN
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Hey, welcome to the Third Growth Officer podcast,
where we talk about all thingsgrowth, yes, even and especially
those hard parts where you shedsome skin and pick yourself up
by the bootstraps.
Hey, I'm Benno Dunkelspüler,growth Sherpa and OG hashtag
growth nerd.
We're on a mission to redefinesuccess inside and outside the
(00:23):
business.
One TGO episode at a time,pretty much.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
All right, I'm Adam Baker, I am the founder of
SodaPup Dog Toys and I amcalling in from beautiful
Boulder, colorado, and I amcalling in from beautiful
Boulder, colorado.
Speaker 1 (00:46):
Hey, adam, I'm so glad to have you on this podcast
.
I enjoyed getting to know you alittle bit before this podcast
and doing some research on yourstory, your journey, your
company, and I really want tofocus this conversation on four
different things I want to talkabout.
I want you to give us a littleflyover of your journey.
(01:11):
You spent the first 20 or soyears of your career on the
corporate side with big brandnames Nike, under Armour, crocs
and then, 12 years ago, youstarted SodaPup and I want to
talk.
You know I want you to talkabout the product, the brand and
how you built the brand, yourdistribution and throughout this
(01:36):
, I know you're going to weavein your entrepreneurial journey
and I came up with a veryhigh-tech device.
Everybody knows what we'regoing to talk about today.
We're going to talk aboutproduct brand distribution and
the journey, and I'm going touse that as a cue card if you
(01:57):
talk too long.
Speaker 2 (01:57):
That's an impressive chart, Benno.
Speaker 1 (01:59):
I know it's an impressive chart right.
I made that all by myself.
Speaker 2 (02:05):
10 minutes ago um talk about the.
Speaker 1 (02:10):
Uh, maybe let's start with the brand, the soda pup
brand.
You found it 12 years ago.
Speaker 2 (02:16):
Talk about the brand so, um, I wanted to create a
brand in the pet space that hadpersonality.
I wanted something that wasplayful, whimsical, beautiful,
and of course, you know mythinking about the brand has
(02:38):
evolved over time.
But, yeah, we wanted to.
I saw a lot of opportunity inthe pet industry when I first
started exploring thepossibility of starting this
business, and I saw a lot ofslow moving brands in the pet
space.
The assortment was always thesame.
The assortment was the sameregardless of whether you're a
(03:01):
big box or a small pet specialtydistribution same regardless of
whether you're a big box or insmall pet specialty distribution
.
And so I wanted to createsomething that was more dynamic,
that moved more quickly, thatintroduced more product newness.
Essentially, I wanted to applythe kind of the fashion cycle
(03:22):
that we used in the sportinggoods industry you know, new
collections at least every sixmonths, if not every three
months, and see if I could usethat kind of product development
cycle in a relativelyslow-moving pet space.
So that's kind of how we gotstarted.
Speaker 1 (03:42):
And you really focused the brand.
I mean you talk a lot aboutbeing customer-centric and
customer-intimate and using theNike playbook of really getting
to know the customer.
How do you do that?
How do you know who yourcustomer is and what he or she
(04:07):
wants?
Speaker 2 (04:09):
Well.
So, again, the opportunity thatI saw in the pet space was that
most of the products I saw wereeither shaped like paws or
shaped like bones.
You know fairly straightforward, not terribly creative types of
designs, and so you know.
One of the things you learn atNike when you're on the product
(04:30):
side like I was is that you knoweverything is about the
consumer, consumer, consumer,consumer and in the case of a
brand like Nike, there's the youknow what does the consumer
need for their specific sport?
There's the you know what doesthe consumer need for their
specific sport?
So I looked at the pet industryand I thought none of this
(04:56):
really looks geared towards aperson.
And so, you know, we have aShopify store, and so I get data
on who's buying from our site,and it was pretty clearly a
female-dominated populationabout 70% women and so I thought
well, what if we really focusour energy on designs that will
(05:16):
create some sort of emotionalconnection with her?
At the end of the day, the dogis not the consumer, the person
with the purse is the consumer,and so we want to Certainly not
the decision-maker, maybe theconsumer, but not.
Is not the consumer the personwith the purse?
Speaker 1 (05:25):
is the consumer, and so we want to Certainly not the
decision maker.
Maybe the consumer, but not thedecision maker.
Not the decision maker.
Speaker 2 (05:30):
Yeah, so you know.
So our approach was quitedifferent.
We wanted to literally createan oh my God, gotta have it.
Moment at retail.
You know, I'm sure you knowyou've heard that you have like
one and a half to two seconds tocapture a person's attention at
retail, and so if everythinglooks the same, you know it's
(05:55):
difficult to do that, and so youknow we're relying on, on
beautiful designs that are verydifferent from anything else in
the space to capture theirimagination and kind of pull
them in to take a closer look,and then they discover, you know
, great quality, beautiful color, as well as the design, and
great functionality as well.
Speaker 1 (06:16):
So now is a great you know I had asked you, hey,
let's do this video podcastrecording in front of your magic
wall, behind you, talk aboutyour product.
I mean, you have this sort ofassortment matrix in your head,
(06:37):
right where you have collections, you know, within collections
and across categories.
I found that fascinating.
Just talk us through yourthought process on building the
assortment over the years.
Speaker 2 (06:52):
So you know again.
You know I think traditionallyin the pet industry pet brands
are selling things, items, andyou know there's nothing wrong
with that.
But there's so much more youcan do from a merchandising
perspective to accelerateselling by adding layers of
(07:15):
storytelling.
In the enrichment categorythere were brands that were
making Lickmats and there werebrands that were making slow
feeder bowls, but nobody reallykind of pulled it all together
into a bigger story and so wecreated a broad enrichment story
and then we created producttypes that roll up into that
(07:39):
story.
So for instance, our Lickmatswe call E-mats, the E stands for
enrichment.
And then we have E-bowls, whichis a slow feeder enrichment
bowl.
And then we created otherproducts E-coins, which can be
used for separation anxiety fora dog, an E-tray, which is a
shallow slow feeder.
(07:59):
Even our nylon bones havepatterns on the surface that you
can smear food into.
So we've taken traditionally adurable nylon chew bone and
turned it into an enrichmentdevice as well as a chewing
device.
We call those e-chews.
We have e-cups, like ourhoneypot.
(08:19):
It's basically a cup that youcan put food inside.
And so through our namingconventions e-cups, e-mats,
e-trays, e-bowls everything'sbeing pulled together into a
bigger story that the consumercan understand.
And then, even within that,we've got certain design themes
(08:44):
that will run across ourmultiple product types.
So, for example, honey plays abig role in some of our products
.
So we have a honeycomb slowfeeder bowl, we have a honeycomb
lick mat, we have a honey beartreat dispenser I don't know if
you've ever gotten the honeydispenser, so it's shaped like
the honey dispenser.
(09:04):
We've got honey bones, we'vegot, you know, honey pots, and
so what we're doing is giving aretailer so many different ways
to build an assortment in theirstore that that tells a bigger
story.
So you know, the basic idea isthat when you combine these
(09:29):
things in this way, the sum ismore valuable than the
individual parts.
We don't want to sell an item,we want to sell a bigger idea,
because when you do that they'llbuy multiple items.
We have people that buy all ofour Likmats.
They collect our Likmats.
We have degrees of difficultybuilt across our products.
So if you're a skier, you knowthere's a green circle is the
(09:55):
easiest slope, a blue square isan intermediate and a double
black diamond is the mostdifficult.
So we've lifted thatcommunication system.
Speaker 1 (10:04):
I'm a skier, so the double black diamond is the
woohoo we diamond is going downthe mountain and we're going to
break a knee Hopefully, not.
Speaker 2 (10:11):
So we've taken that rating system and applied it to
our lick mats so then you canchoose the right mat for your
dog, because different dogs havedifferent levels of food drive.
You know different levels offood drive, so you know we have
lots of.
At the end of the day,merchandising is about
storytelling, and so we havematerial stories.
(10:33):
We have design themes stories,we have level of difficulty
stories, we have color stories.
We have color stories.
Yeah, you know, we use more ofa kind of a home decor color
palette versus traditional dogtoy colors, because we're
appealing again to to a woman ina lot of what we make our
(10:57):
feeding systems, which will beon the kitchen floor most likely
, so you want it to look nice.
So you know, I've basicallybrought a lot of the bag of
tricks from my prior experiencein footwear and apparel and
tried to, you know, drive thoseinto this industry where it
(11:17):
hasn't historically existed.
Speaker 1 (11:25):
I love the you know product that I see in the
background hanging on the walland because I can see that
product.
Look, you know, I think of ourkitchen and living areas and the
house and those colors wouldn't?
You know, I would like them andthey wouldn't bother me and I
think that they would be kind offun.
(11:46):
Um, and you know, they sort ofinject energy and into the home
environment as opposed to, youknow, as you said, the, the pet
industry is a.
There's a lot of commodityproduct out there where, uh,
brands and vendors are justtrying to compete for shelf
space by price and by, you know,shelf fees and it's not.
(12:12):
People are not that passionateabout making it look like fun
and cool colors and cool storiesbehind it and you're just sort
of, you know, the Willy Wonka inthe chocolate factory about
approaching your productcategory right and I think that
translates People get that right, that your passion for the
(12:34):
product shows up on your websiteand on the shelf at the end,
don't you think?
Speaker 2 (12:40):
Well, hopefully, you know we don't want to be a
commodity business, right, it'svery difficult, it's a race to
the bottom, and that's not whatI was interested in.
You know.
The reality is I started thisbusiness as sort of a, as an
academic challenge for myself,for some great entrepreneurs
(13:05):
like Kevin Plank at Under Armour, and I always thought, you know
, do I have the right stuff?
Can I create something fromnothing, you know, and so I
picked an industry where I hadno experience, I had no contacts
, basically started at groundzero and then, you know, slowly
but surely started to figure itout, and you know the things
that we've talked about.
You know, thus far in thisconversation, I didn't start
(13:26):
with all of those ideas.
You know we it's been a longand winding road.
You know a bit of trial anderror to see what works, what
doesn't work, and you know I'vebeen pretty committed to not
doing a raise, not taking otherpeople's money.
I do have one investor who's awonderful partner, but beyond
(13:47):
that I've been committed togrowing organically.
And so what that means is Ihave to be profitable, right,
and I love the constraint ofhaving to be profitable because
it forces me to make.
(14:08):
I can take risks, but they haveto be prudent risks.
I don't have a pile of moneysitting somewhere, and so it's
forced me to be creative, it'sforced us to, you know, try new
things and and some things aredead ends and other things
really take off, and then, youknow, you kind of switch gears
(14:31):
and and chase the thing that'sworking, and so, like I said,
it's been a long and windingroad to get where we are today
but here you are, 12 years intoit.
Speaker 1 (14:41):
You know you've got I mean you, you, you have seen
some great successes and youhave.
You know you are, you're, yourproduct is in 50 different
countries.
You've got a number ofemployees helping you.
I mean this is not a one manband any longer.
Right, and talk a little bit onthe product side.
(15:07):
I thought it was interestinghow to you the product cycle
like the more introductions youhave in a given year, the more
opportunity you have for makinga splash in the marketplace,
giving you an excuse to postsomething on social media or do
(15:27):
a press release.
Talk a little bit about thepower of product introductions
as really an advertising vehiclefor you.
Speaker 2 (15:36):
Yeah.
So let me just back up a littlebit and say we produce
everything in the United States,and there's some challenges
with suppliers who can fulfillorders very quickly, and so what
(16:02):
it allows me to do is have abroader product offering that is
shallow on inventory, and thenI can chase demand as I need it,
whereas most of my competitorswho produce in Asia, they have a
narrow product offering, andbecause they're producing in
Asia, they have to go deep oninventory so that they don't run
(16:23):
out.
Speaker 1 (16:24):
And so so we've kind of have to fill a 40 foot
container.
Speaker 2 (16:28):
They got to fill a 40 foot container and then they
got to wait 45 days for it toquickly, and they can't.
There are barriers toexperimentation, right, because
(16:51):
they have to swing for the fenceevery time to make model work.
What we can do, what we havedone, is we have built injection
molding systems that haveallowed me to lower the costs so
that, as long as I operatewithin one of the systems that
we created, I can make a newproduct introduction relatively
(17:13):
inexpensively and quite quickly,and so it's allowed us to have
a much broader product offering.
For a company our size.
A lot of people scratch theirheads, I think, and look at us
like how the heck are they doingthis right?
So, because we produce in theUSA, it allows us to do certain
things.
(17:35):
The other thing is that we havegrown around the world because
of our social media following,primarily our Instagram account,
but also Facebook and, to acertain extent, tiktok, and so
you know, if I have the choicebetween spending money on a new
product mold or a print ad in apet trade magazine, most of
(17:58):
which are going digital now,I'll do the new product every
day of the week because I canpost it on Instagram and get
enough sales within the first 30days to cover the cost of the
mold.
And so the kind of the lightbulb went on for me and said
well, if I can continue to putnew products into the market
(18:19):
like every month, or a couple ofproducts a month, then I always
have something to talk about.
I always have people lookingforward to what we're going to
do next and I'm still going toget coverage in the pet trade
magazines because I'll be in thenew product section or I'll get
interviewed and so and I dolike to support them with
advertising when I can.
(18:40):
But the reality is we'recreating our own weather because
we keep introducing new things,and so there's a lot of
conversation about Soda Pop.
We're, like I said, in arelatively slow moving pet
industry.
We're pretty exciting becausewe have a lot going on all the
(19:03):
time, and so it's beenfascinating how we can use new
product development as amarketing vehicle.
It basically is the in a senseit is the Nike model right, make
cool product, put it onathletes in our case put it on
social media with influencersand consumers and distributors
and retailers, and then pullthat product through the retail
(19:24):
channel.
So our first order of businessisn't to launch a new product
with a retailer.
It's to launch the product onour website, sell it to
consumers and then pull itthrough retail.
So we have retailers calling us.
How do I get that?
How do I get that?
So it's a pretty differentmodel.
Speaker 1 (19:43):
Pulling is a lot better than pushing.
Speaker 2 (19:45):
Yeah, because, like you said, it's a commodity
business, right, and so if Ihaven't already generated the
demand, then the retailer wantsme to give them a discount to
offset their risk.
Right, because they don't knowif the product is going to sell
or not.
But if they already know it'sgoing to sell and I know it's
going to sell I know I don'tneed to discount in order to get
(20:08):
the product placed.
So it's a much better, it's amuch healthier brand building
experience to not be promotionalall the time.
Speaker 1 (20:18):
Of course.
Of course, because nothing youknow.
I mean you refer to thatearlier correctly, as you know a
race to the bottom where youknow you're just, you know, out
discounting and out promotingand out, you know, sale, sale,
sale, sale.
Instead of talking about, hey,this is really cool, hey, look
at the color, look at thefunction, look at the, you know
(21:04):
how this fits in.
Crazy, um, alchemy, right ofproduct and design and
distribution and branding.
That you understand you get.
And when I look at your websiteand I look at the products
behind you and and I look atyour face describing your, your
product or brand, your business,you're excited about it.
You're just experimenting.
Speaker 2 (21:24):
It's a bit of an obsession, I'll admit.
But the other thing is, I thinkthat we can really help
retailers too, because noretailer really wants to
discount themselves right.
Why give away margin if youdon't have to?
So you know, the broader visionis that if we do great
storytelling and we createbeautiful designs, they command
(21:48):
a higher price that people arewilling to pay for it.
You know if, if I'm justcompeting with a stainless steel
bowl against another stainlesssteel bowl manufacturer, I don't
really have a reason for being.
But if I have a beautiful, likea flower bowl, which we just
(22:10):
launched this week in pink andpurple, you know, and that's
what I'm offering in opposition,I guess, to the stainless steel
bowl.
Those are radically differentand higher perceived value
because of the beauty and thecolor and the design, and so we
can help retailers improve theirmargins at the same time.
Speaker 1 (22:33):
So talk, give us more background or maybe an overview
of your distribution model.
So you mentioned Shopify, youmentioned retailers, you
mentioned I know you're unfair,right, so talk.
How do you think about yourdistribution model?
(22:54):
How did you get into 50countries?
Speaker 2 (22:58):
Yeah, so distribution is an interesting thing because
the pet industry is largelydriven through distributors.
If you go back to the beginningof the pet industry, people
were selling dog food and catlitter.
It was a replenishment type ofbusiness with consumables, of
(23:24):
business right With consumables.
But no distributor wants tocarry a brand unless there's
demand for the brand.
So it's up to any brand, anynew brand, like we were, we have
to create the demand ourselves.
And so before any distributorwould touch us, we had to get
into enough retail stores tomake it worthwhile.
They didn't want to build itfor us, they wanted it in place
(23:49):
beforehand.
So you know, in the beginning we, we sold through the Shopify
site and then I did some, some.
Like I said, it's a long andwinding road and you do what you
, what you have to to beprofitable.
And so way back in thebeginning, um, I was introduced
(24:11):
to a subscription box calledBark Box and they were in their
very early years, like they'rebehemoth, now publicly traded.
But at the time they were asmall box and they needed new
products that fit a theme, amonthly theme, every month.
And you know, I got a series oforders from them, um, ranging
from 20,000 units to 130,000units, um, and so I quickly
(24:37):
realized it's like oh, theseguys can drive a lot of volume.
Maybe I should look at othersubscription boxes and see if
anybody else needs this type ofsupport.
So I went to the second largestsubscription box and I said
look, we can be your easy buttonas you grow.
It was a.
It was a box called Bully Makeand they specialized in durable
(24:59):
rubber, in durable products forpower chewers.
And as they were growing it wasgetting harder and harder for
them to find products that fittheir theme, that fit their
price point, where they coulddeliver the volume that they
needed in a very short window oftime.
And so I went to the founder ofthat box, the owner of the
(25:21):
business, and said listen, I candesign you a new rubber dog toy
every month and I'll sell it toyou at my cost.
The only catch is I own thedesigns and I own the molds, so
you'll get an exclusive productfor 30 days and then, when
you're done with it, I'll rollit into my product line and then
we're on to the next toy forthe box.
(25:42):
So I did that for years, forover three years, and then he
got big enough and wanted hislogo on the toys, which is all
understandable and they startedto produce their own because I
wasn't interested in producingtheir product and I was selling
it to them literally at cost,including the cost of the mold,
but at cost.
(26:02):
So there was no way for me tomake money building his toys
with his logo.
So they went off and did thatthemselves.
But then I had, you know, 35,36 beautiful American made
natural rubber dog toys and so Iturned my attention to building
my own brand.
So that was one of the kind ofthe first things we did to
(26:24):
survive.
And then we expanded into nylontoys and brought a lot of
innovation to that category.
You know, most nylon toys arebone shapes.
We think outside the bone dolots of other fun shapes with
enrichment capabilities.
And then we expanded into othertypes of enrichment toys lick
(26:47):
mats and slow feeder balls andthen the business just took off
enrichment toys, lick mats andslow feeder balls and then the
business just took off.
And the reason it took off isbecause those types of products
really allow you to do some funlike graphic design.
I think of our lick matbusiness like a graphic t-shirt
business, where everybody hasmore than one graphic t-shirt,
right?
You buy it because you like thegraphic, and so that's what's
(27:09):
happened.
We've turned a pet supply intoa collectible by putting really
fun graphic designs on theproduct.
Did I answer the question?
Absolutely, I don't rememberwhat the question was.
Speaker 1 (27:24):
No, we started talking about distribution,
distribution, and look all fourof these things on my highly
technical chart here of productbrand distribution and your
entrepreneurial journey.
They're all related to eachother right?
Speaker 2 (27:45):
Yeah, they really are .
So just to close the loop onthat so the work with the
subscription boxes allowed us tobuild our assortment.
It funded our productdevelopment for years.
But I wasn't really doing a lotof distribution.
I was doing some, but not muchoutside of supplying the box.
But when that went away then itwas like, okay, I really need
to shift gears here and Istarted marketing the brand.
(28:06):
And then we started openingindependent retailers and then
we expanded into nylon and itstarted to build on itself.
And then I had a retailer emailme and say have you heard about
FAIR?
Your brand would be great onthis platform.
And I'd never heard of them.
And they had just startedexpanding into pet.
They started in the gift space.
Speaker 1 (28:28):
So this is back 2018-ish.
Speaker 2 (28:30):
Yeah.
So we joined FAIR and I wasstunned by the volume we did
right out of the gate on FAIR.
And so I worked hard tocultivate the FAIR business,
because if you introduceretailers to the platform then
they're commission-free for life.
So I had a stake in getting asmany people on board as quickly
(28:54):
as possible to take advantage ofthat.
And then they expanded toEurope and then our business
started to expand pretty quicklyinto Western Europe through
FAIR.
And then, once we startedestablishing that independent
pet retail footprint, then thedistributors started calling and
(29:14):
saying hey, we keep seeing yourproduct in these stores, we're
interested in distributing yourproduct.
And so we started openingdistributors as well.
So we sell direct, we selldirect to retailers, we sell
through distributors, we sellthrough platforms like fair and
wholesalepetcom, um, so we'rereally kind of omni-channel at
(29:37):
this point terrific which Ithink you have to be honestly
nowadays.
Speaker 1 (29:43):
Well, I, I, I agree, uh, that you know the.
I agree that the more channelsyou're covering, the safer your
business is, certainly from aperspective of not being, as the
PE guys say, disintermediated,and one beast can feed the other
(30:08):
in terms of channels.
One beast can feed the other interms of channels, right?
So I love how you've built astrong brand with a fresh
perspective from the productdesign perspective, an
entertaining way to get yourname known through social media,
(30:34):
through, you know, monthly orso introductions, product
introductions.
It's a really great story thatyou probably had no idea 12
years ago when you said you knowwhat, I'm going to see, if I
can start, you know if I canmake my product and branding
brain work in an unknownindustry called pet industry.
(30:56):
And I think the fact thatyou're constantly thinking about
all the challenges productdistribution, brand from the
consumer's, the decision maker'sperspective which, again, a lot
of your competitors do not, alot of them are sort of locked
into the business cycle and theproduct development cycle and
(31:25):
the sourcing matrix of well, wehave to do it this way and that
way, sourcing matrix of you know, while we have to do it this
way and that way, but you'reconstantly thinking of new ways
to solve the Rubik's Cube right.
Speaker 2 (31:37):
Yeah, I think, even beyond the pet industry, one of
the challenges for a maturebusiness is figuring out how to
behave differently.
You know how to get outside oftheir.
You know the structures thatthey've built, the processes
that they've built, and thebeauty of being an upstart is, I
(32:06):
don't have any of that, and youknow, the funny thing to me is
that in a sense, I'm ane-commerce entrepreneur.
We do all of our businessdigitally.
In a sense, I'm an e-commerceentrepreneur.
We do all of our businessdigitally, right, even our
distributor orders are coming indigitally.
Our fare orders go directly.
You know the workflow isdirectly through our Shopify
store.
So in a sense, I'm ane-commerce entrepreneur.
We didn't even have personalcomputers when I was in college,
so I'm 62.
(32:28):
So the fact that I'm ane-commerce entrepreneur kind of
cracks me up.
But what it says is that you donot have to build a business
the same way today that you did10, 15, 20, 30 years ago when I
(32:50):
worked at Nike.
Nike was primarily a domesticbusiness.
They weren't even in the sportof soccer or football, as you
would call it, but they feltlike they couldn't expand into
Europe or Latin America or Asiauntil they had firmly rooted the
brand in the United States,until they had firmly rooted the
brand in the United States,whereas what I'm doing is I'm
(33:12):
growing the brand everywhere allat once.
Speaker 1 (33:15):
Right, and it's because of social media.
Right, the world has gotten alot smaller.
And I would even phrase it.
You said you don't have to runthe business the way you used to
10 or 15 years ago.
I would say you have to run itdifferently.
Speaker 2 (33:36):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (33:39):
Don't be constrained.
It's like no, the way you'rerunning it the next I mean the
way you're running it this yearis different from pre-COVID, and
the way you're running it nextyear is different from this year
and last year.
It's things are.
I mean, technology and digitaltransformation and digital touch
points are changing so fast andfaster and faster and faster
(34:00):
that you know, you and I have toget you know, stay young or
stay with the times and keephaving fun, and your business
has gone through a number ofinflection points where, of
course, you're actingdifferently.
You know, zero to the firstdollar, the first dollar to the
first million dollars the firstyou know, and then at $10
(34:22):
million it becomes a differentgame, At $20 million it becomes
a different game.
And I mean, that's what I love,right?
That's what I love about yourstory, that's what I love about
my business is figuring out howto act age appropriate,
essentially.
Speaker 2 (34:39):
Yeah, for sure it's.
The nice thing aboutentrepreneurship is that no day
is like a prior day.
It's always changing and you'relearning new things and, like
you said, as we continue toscale, my focus will have to
change, or I will have to, forsure I'll have to hire people
that help with the operations ofthe business so that we can
(35:01):
fulfill, you know, greater andgreater demand.
The interesting thing now iswe've created this great, this
really great foundation ofindependent pet specialty
retailers around the globe andnow we're bringing on a lot of
regional chains.
(35:21):
We haven't gotten to big boxyet no Petco, no PetSmart but
we're bringing on these regionalchains, but not just in the US
but other parts of the world,and it's it's all kind of
happening at once, and so we'rewe're taking big bites of the
elephant.
Speaker 1 (35:38):
You know, at this point, one bite at a time, but
big bite at a time.
Yeah, yeah, Terrific.
Well, I think we'll have to doanother podcast.
You know a few elephant biteslater on, you know, maybe in a
year or two years.
I think your brand isfascinating.
Congratulations on what you'veaccomplished so far in the first
(36:00):
12 years.
Let's see what the next 12years bring.
Speaker 2 (36:03):
right it's going to be a great ride.
Speaker 1 (36:06):
Yeah, thank you so much, adam.
Thanks for being on ThirdGrowth Option Podcast.
Speaker 2 (36:10):
You bet.
Speaker 1 (36:11):
And I will put the website, your website, into the
show notes so folks can check itout.
Well, we can just say it hereit's SodaPupcom, right.
Speaker 2 (36:25):
S-O-D-A-P-U-P SodaPupcom.
Speaker 1 (36:29):
SodaPupcom Perfect Adam.
Thank you so much.
Speaker 2 (36:33):
Thanks, Benno.
Speaker 1 (36:43):
Take care.
Thank you for listening to thisepisode of TGO Podcast.
You can find all episodes onour podcast page at
wwwrealign4resultscom.
You can find me, benno, host ofTGO Podcast, there as well.
Just email, benno B-E-N-N-O atrealign4resultscom.
Let's keep growing, thank you.
Hey, welcome to the Third Growth Officer podcast,
where we talk about all thingsgrowth, yes, even and especially
those hard parts where you shedsome skin and pick yourself up
by the bootstraps.
Hey, I'm Benno Dunkelspüler,growth Sherpa and OG hashtag
growth nerd.
We're on a mission to redefinesuccess inside and outside the
(00:23):
business.
One TGO episode at a time,pretty much.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
All right, I'm Adam Baker, I am the founder of
SodaPup Dog Toys and I amcalling in from beautiful
Boulder, colorado, and I amcalling in from beautiful
Boulder, colorado.
Speaker 1 (00:46):
Hey, adam, I'm so glad to have you on this podcast
.
I enjoyed getting to know you alittle bit before this podcast
and doing some research on yourstory, your journey, your
company, and I really want tofocus this conversation on four
different things I want to talkabout.
I want you to give us a littleflyover of your journey.
(01:11):
You spent the first 20 or soyears of your career on the
corporate side with big brandnames Nike, under Armour, crocs
and then, 12 years ago, youstarted SodaPup and I want to
talk.
You know I want you to talkabout the product, the brand and
how you built the brand, yourdistribution and throughout this
(01:36):
, I know you're going to weavein your entrepreneurial journey
and I came up with a veryhigh-tech device.
Everybody knows what we'regoing to talk about today.
We're going to talk aboutproduct brand distribution and
the journey, and I'm going touse that as a cue card if you
(01:57):
talk too long.
Speaker 2 (01:57):
That's an impressive chart, Benno.
Speaker 1 (01:59):
I know it's an impressive chart right.
I made that all by myself.
Speaker 2 (02:05):
10 minutes ago um talk about the.
Speaker 1 (02:10):
Uh, maybe let's start with the brand, the soda pup
brand.
You found it 12 years ago.
Speaker 2 (02:16):
Talk about the brand so, um, I wanted to create a
brand in the pet space that hadpersonality.
I wanted something that wasplayful, whimsical, beautiful,
and of course, you know mythinking about the brand has
(02:38):
evolved over time.
But, yeah, we wanted to.
I saw a lot of opportunity inthe pet industry when I first
started exploring thepossibility of starting this
business, and I saw a lot ofslow moving brands in the pet
space.
The assortment was always thesame.
The assortment was the sameregardless of whether you're a
(03:01):
big box or a small pet specialtydistribution same regardless of
whether you're a big box or insmall pet specialty distribution
.
And so I wanted to createsomething that was more dynamic,
that moved more quickly, thatintroduced more product newness.
Essentially, I wanted to applythe kind of the fashion cycle
(03:22):
that we used in the sportinggoods industry you know, new
collections at least every sixmonths, if not every three
months, and see if I could usethat kind of product development
cycle in a relativelyslow-moving pet space.
So that's kind of how we gotstarted.
Speaker 1 (03:42):
And you really focused the brand.
I mean you talk a lot aboutbeing customer-centric and
customer-intimate and using theNike playbook of really getting
to know the customer.
How do you do that?
How do you know who yourcustomer is and what he or she
(04:07):
wants?
Speaker 2 (04:09):
Well.
So, again, the opportunity thatI saw in the pet space was that
most of the products I saw wereeither shaped like paws or
shaped like bones.
You know fairly straightforward, not terribly creative types of
designs, and so you know.
One of the things you learn atNike when you're on the product
(04:30):
side like I was is that you knoweverything is about the
consumer, consumer, consumer,consumer and in the case of a
brand like Nike, there's the youknow what does the consumer
need for their specific sport?
There's the you know what doesthe consumer need for their
specific sport?
So I looked at the pet industryand I thought none of this
(04:56):
really looks geared towards aperson.
And so, you know, we have aShopify store, and so I get data
on who's buying from our site,and it was pretty clearly a
female-dominated populationabout 70% women and so I thought
well, what if we really focusour energy on designs that will
(05:16):
create some sort of emotionalconnection with her?
At the end of the day, the dogis not the consumer, the person
with the purse is the consumer,and so we want to Certainly not
the decision-maker, maybe theconsumer, but not.
Is not the consumer the personwith the purse?
Speaker 1 (05:25):
is the consumer, and so we want to Certainly not the
decision maker.
Maybe the consumer, but not thedecision maker.
Not the decision maker.
Speaker 2 (05:30):
Yeah, so you know.
So our approach was quitedifferent.
We wanted to literally createan oh my God, gotta have it.
Moment at retail.
You know, I'm sure you knowyou've heard that you have like
one and a half to two seconds tocapture a person's attention at
retail, and so if everythinglooks the same, you know it's
(05:55):
difficult to do that, and so youknow we're relying on, on
beautiful designs that are verydifferent from anything else in
the space to capture theirimagination and kind of pull
them in to take a closer look,and then they discover, you know
, great quality, beautiful color, as well as the design, and
great functionality as well.
Speaker 1 (06:16):
So now is a great you know I had asked you, hey,
let's do this video podcastrecording in front of your magic
wall, behind you, talk aboutyour product.
I mean, you have this sort ofassortment matrix in your head,
(06:37):
right where you have collections, you know, within collections
and across categories.
I found that fascinating.
Just talk us through yourthought process on building the
assortment over the years.
Speaker 2 (06:52):
So you know again.
You know I think traditionallyin the pet industry pet brands
are selling things, items, andyou know there's nothing wrong
with that.
But there's so much more youcan do from a merchandising
perspective to accelerateselling by adding layers of
(07:15):
storytelling.
In the enrichment categorythere were brands that were
making Lickmats and there werebrands that were making slow
feeder bowls, but nobody reallykind of pulled it all together
into a bigger story and so wecreated a broad enrichment story
and then we created producttypes that roll up into that
(07:39):
story.
So for instance, our Lickmatswe call E-mats, the E stands for
enrichment.
And then we have E-bowls, whichis a slow feeder enrichment
bowl.
And then we created otherproducts E-coins, which can be
used for separation anxiety fora dog, an E-tray, which is a
shallow slow feeder.
(07:59):
Even our nylon bones havepatterns on the surface that you
can smear food into.
So we've taken traditionally adurable nylon chew bone and
turned it into an enrichmentdevice as well as a chewing
device.
We call those e-chews.
We have e-cups, like ourhoneypot.
(08:19):
It's basically a cup that youcan put food inside.
And so through our namingconventions e-cups, e-mats,
e-trays, e-bowls everything'sbeing pulled together into a
bigger story that the consumercan understand.
And then, even within that,we've got certain design themes
(08:44):
that will run across ourmultiple product types.
So, for example, honey plays abig role in some of our products
.
So we have a honeycomb slowfeeder bowl, we have a honeycomb
lick mat, we have a honey beartreat dispenser I don't know if
you've ever gotten the honeydispenser, so it's shaped like
the honey dispenser.
(09:04):
We've got honey bones, we'vegot, you know, honey pots, and
so what we're doing is giving aretailer so many different ways
to build an assortment in theirstore that that tells a bigger
story.
So you know, the basic idea isthat when you combine these
(09:29):
things in this way, the sum ismore valuable than the
individual parts.
We don't want to sell an item,we want to sell a bigger idea,
because when you do that they'llbuy multiple items.
We have people that buy all ofour Likmats.
They collect our Likmats.
We have degrees of difficultybuilt across our products.
So if you're a skier, you knowthere's a green circle is the
(09:55):
easiest slope, a blue square isan intermediate and a double
black diamond is the mostdifficult.
So we've lifted thatcommunication system.
Speaker 1 (10:04):
I'm a skier, so the double black diamond is the
woohoo we diamond is going downthe mountain and we're going to
break a knee Hopefully, not.
Speaker 2 (10:11):
So we've taken that rating system and applied it to
our lick mats so then you canchoose the right mat for your
dog, because different dogs havedifferent levels of food drive.
You know different levels offood drive, so you know we have
lots of.
At the end of the day,merchandising is about
storytelling, and so we havematerial stories.
(10:33):
We have design themes stories,we have level of difficulty
stories, we have color stories.
We have color stories.
Yeah, you know, we use more ofa kind of a home decor color
palette versus traditional dogtoy colors, because we're
appealing again to to a woman ina lot of what we make our
(10:57):
feeding systems, which will beon the kitchen floor most likely
, so you want it to look nice.
So you know, I've basicallybrought a lot of the bag of
tricks from my prior experiencein footwear and apparel and
tried to, you know, drive thoseinto this industry where it
(11:17):
hasn't historically existed.
Speaker 1 (11:25):
I love the you know product that I see in the
background hanging on the walland because I can see that
product.
Look, you know, I think of ourkitchen and living areas and the
house and those colors wouldn't?
You know, I would like them andthey wouldn't bother me and I
think that they would be kind offun.
(11:46):
Um, and you know, they sort ofinject energy and into the home
environment as opposed to, youknow, as you said, the, the pet
industry is a.
There's a lot of commodityproduct out there where, uh,
brands and vendors are justtrying to compete for shelf
space by price and by, you know,shelf fees and it's not.
(12:12):
People are not that passionateabout making it look like fun
and cool colors and cool storiesbehind it and you're just sort
of, you know, the Willy Wonka inthe chocolate factory about
approaching your productcategory right and I think that
translates People get that right, that your passion for the
(12:34):
product shows up on your websiteand on the shelf at the end,
don't you think?
Speaker 2 (12:40):
Well, hopefully, you know we don't want to be a
commodity business, right, it'svery difficult, it's a race to
the bottom, and that's not whatI was interested in.
You know.
The reality is I started thisbusiness as sort of a, as an
academic challenge for myself,for some great entrepreneurs
(13:05):
like Kevin Plank at Under Armour, and I always thought, you know
, do I have the right stuff?
Can I create something fromnothing, you know, and so I
picked an industry where I hadno experience, I had no contacts
, basically started at groundzero and then, you know, slowly
but surely started to figure itout, and you know the things
that we've talked about.
You know, thus far in thisconversation, I didn't start
(13:26):
with all of those ideas.
You know we it's been a longand winding road.
You know a bit of trial anderror to see what works, what
doesn't work, and you know I'vebeen pretty committed to not
doing a raise, not taking otherpeople's money.
I do have one investor who's awonderful partner, but beyond
(13:47):
that I've been committed togrowing organically.
And so what that means is Ihave to be profitable, right,
and I love the constraint ofhaving to be profitable because
it forces me to make.
(14:08):
I can take risks, but they haveto be prudent risks.
I don't have a pile of moneysitting somewhere, and so it's
forced me to be creative, it'sforced us to, you know, try new
things and and some things aredead ends and other things
really take off, and then, youknow, you kind of switch gears
(14:31):
and and chase the thing that'sworking, and so, like I said,
it's been a long and windingroad to get where we are today
but here you are, 12 years intoit.
Speaker 1 (14:41):
You know you've got I mean you, you, you have seen
some great successes and youhave.
You know you are, you're, yourproduct is in 50 different
countries.
You've got a number ofemployees helping you.
I mean this is not a one manband any longer.
Right, and talk a little bit onthe product side.
(15:07):
I thought it was interestinghow to you the product cycle
like the more introductions youhave in a given year, the more
opportunity you have for makinga splash in the marketplace,
giving you an excuse to postsomething on social media or do
(15:27):
a press release.
Talk a little bit about thepower of product introductions
as really an advertising vehiclefor you.
Speaker 2 (15:36):
Yeah.
So let me just back up a littlebit and say we produce
everything in the United States,and there's some challenges
with suppliers who can fulfillorders very quickly, and so what
(16:02):
it allows me to do is have abroader product offering that is
shallow on inventory, and thenI can chase demand as I need it,
whereas most of my competitorswho produce in Asia, they have a
narrow product offering, andbecause they're producing in
Asia, they have to go deep oninventory so that they don't run
(16:23):
out.
Speaker 1 (16:24):
And so so we've kind of have to fill a 40 foot
container.
Speaker 2 (16:28):
They got to fill a 40 foot container and then they
got to wait 45 days for it toquickly, and they can't.
There are barriers toexperimentation, right, because
(16:51):
they have to swing for the fenceevery time to make model work.
What we can do, what we havedone, is we have built injection
molding systems that haveallowed me to lower the costs so
that, as long as I operatewithin one of the systems that
we created, I can make a newproduct introduction relatively
(17:13):
inexpensively and quite quickly,and so it's allowed us to have
a much broader product offering.
For a company our size.
A lot of people scratch theirheads, I think, and look at us
like how the heck are they doingthis right?
So, because we produce in theUSA, it allows us to do certain
things.
(17:35):
The other thing is that we havegrown around the world because
of our social media following,primarily our Instagram account,
but also Facebook and, to acertain extent, tiktok, and so
you know, if I have the choicebetween spending money on a new
product mold or a print ad in apet trade magazine, most of
(17:58):
which are going digital now,I'll do the new product every
day of the week because I canpost it on Instagram and get
enough sales within the first 30days to cover the cost of the
mold.
And so the kind of the lightbulb went on for me and said
well, if I can continue to putnew products into the market
(18:19):
like every month, or a couple ofproducts a month, then I always
have something to talk about.
I always have people lookingforward to what we're going to
do next and I'm still going toget coverage in the pet trade
magazines because I'll be in thenew product section or I'll get
interviewed and so and I dolike to support them with
advertising when I can.
(18:40):
But the reality is we'recreating our own weather because
we keep introducing new things,and so there's a lot of
conversation about Soda Pop.
We're, like I said, in arelatively slow moving pet
industry.
We're pretty exciting becausewe have a lot going on all the
(19:03):
time, and so it's beenfascinating how we can use new
product development as amarketing vehicle.
It basically is the in a senseit is the Nike model right, make
cool product, put it onathletes in our case put it on
social media with influencersand consumers and distributors
and retailers, and then pullthat product through the retail
(19:24):
channel.
So our first order of businessisn't to launch a new product
with a retailer.
It's to launch the product onour website, sell it to
consumers and then pull itthrough retail.
So we have retailers calling us.
How do I get that?
How do I get that?
So it's a pretty differentmodel.
Speaker 1 (19:43):
Pulling is a lot better than pushing.
Speaker 2 (19:45):
Yeah, because, like you said, it's a commodity
business, right, and so if Ihaven't already generated the
demand, then the retailer wantsme to give them a discount to
offset their risk.
Right, because they don't knowif the product is going to sell
or not.
But if they already know it'sgoing to sell and I know it's
going to sell I know I don'tneed to discount in order to get
(20:08):
the product placed.
So it's a much better, it's amuch healthier brand building
experience to not be promotionalall the time.
Speaker 1 (20:18):
Of course.
Of course, because nothing youknow.
I mean you refer to thatearlier correctly, as you know a
race to the bottom where youknow you're just, you know, out
discounting and out promotingand out, you know, sale, sale,
sale, sale.
Instead of talking about, hey,this is really cool, hey, look
at the color, look at thefunction, look at the, you know
(21:04):
how this fits in.
Crazy, um, alchemy, right ofproduct and design and
distribution and branding.
That you understand you get.
And when I look at your websiteand I look at the products
behind you and and I look atyour face describing your, your
product or brand, your business,you're excited about it.
You're just experimenting.
Speaker 2 (21:24):
It's a bit of an obsession, I'll admit.
But the other thing is, I thinkthat we can really help
retailers too, because noretailer really wants to
discount themselves right.
Why give away margin if youdon't have to?
So you know, the broader visionis that if we do great
storytelling and we createbeautiful designs, they command
(21:48):
a higher price that people arewilling to pay for it.
You know if, if I'm justcompeting with a stainless steel
bowl against another stainlesssteel bowl manufacturer, I don't
really have a reason for being.
But if I have a beautiful, likea flower bowl, which we just
(22:10):
launched this week in pink andpurple, you know, and that's
what I'm offering in opposition,I guess, to the stainless steel
bowl.
Those are radically differentand higher perceived value
because of the beauty and thecolor and the design, and so we
can help retailers improve theirmargins at the same time.
Speaker 1 (22:33):
So talk, give us more background or maybe an overview
of your distribution model.
So you mentioned Shopify, youmentioned retailers, you
mentioned I know you're unfair,right, so talk.
How do you think about yourdistribution model?
(22:54):
How did you get into 50countries?
Speaker 2 (22:58):
Yeah, so distribution is an interesting thing because
the pet industry is largelydriven through distributors.
If you go back to the beginningof the pet industry, people
were selling dog food and catlitter.
It was a replenishment type ofbusiness with consumables, of
(23:24):
business right With consumables.
But no distributor wants tocarry a brand unless there's
demand for the brand.
So it's up to any brand, anynew brand, like we were, we have
to create the demand ourselves.
And so before any distributorwould touch us, we had to get
into enough retail stores tomake it worthwhile.
They didn't want to build itfor us, they wanted it in place
(23:49):
beforehand.
So you know, in the beginning we, we sold through the Shopify
site and then I did some, some.
Like I said, it's a long andwinding road and you do what you
, what you have to to beprofitable.
And so way back in thebeginning, um, I was introduced
(24:11):
to a subscription box calledBark Box and they were in their
very early years, like they'rebehemoth, now publicly traded.
But at the time they were asmall box and they needed new
products that fit a theme, amonthly theme, every month.
And you know, I got a series oforders from them, um, ranging
from 20,000 units to 130,000units, um, and so I quickly
(24:37):
realized it's like oh, theseguys can drive a lot of volume.
Maybe I should look at othersubscription boxes and see if
anybody else needs this type ofsupport.
So I went to the second largestsubscription box and I said
look, we can be your easy buttonas you grow.
It was a.
It was a box called Bully Makeand they specialized in durable
(24:59):
rubber, in durable products forpower chewers.
And as they were growing it wasgetting harder and harder for
them to find products that fittheir theme, that fit their
price point, where they coulddeliver the volume that they
needed in a very short window oftime.
And so I went to the founder ofthat box, the owner of the
(25:21):
business, and said listen, I candesign you a new rubber dog toy
every month and I'll sell it toyou at my cost.
The only catch is I own thedesigns and I own the molds, so
you'll get an exclusive productfor 30 days and then, when
you're done with it, I'll rollit into my product line and then
we're on to the next toy forthe box.
(25:42):
So I did that for years, forover three years, and then he
got big enough and wanted hislogo on the toys, which is all
understandable and they startedto produce their own because I
wasn't interested in producingtheir product and I was selling
it to them literally at cost,including the cost of the mold,
but at cost.
(26:02):
So there was no way for me tomake money building his toys
with his logo.
So they went off and did thatthemselves.
But then I had, you know, 35,36 beautiful American made
natural rubber dog toys and so Iturned my attention to building
my own brand.
So that was one of the kind ofthe first things we did to
(26:24):
survive.
And then we expanded into nylontoys and brought a lot of
innovation to that category.
You know, most nylon toys arebone shapes.
We think outside the bone dolots of other fun shapes with
enrichment capabilities.
And then we expanded into othertypes of enrichment toys lick
(26:47):
mats and slow feeder balls andthen the business just took off
enrichment toys, lick mats andslow feeder balls and then the
business just took off.
And the reason it took off isbecause those types of products
really allow you to do some funlike graphic design.
I think of our lick matbusiness like a graphic t-shirt
business, where everybody hasmore than one graphic t-shirt,
right?
You buy it because you like thegraphic, and so that's what's
(27:09):
happened.
We've turned a pet supply intoa collectible by putting really
fun graphic designs on theproduct.
Did I answer the question?
Absolutely, I don't rememberwhat the question was.
Speaker 1 (27:24):
No, we started talking about distribution,
distribution, and look all fourof these things on my highly
technical chart here of productbrand distribution and your
entrepreneurial journey.
They're all related to eachother right?
Speaker 2 (27:45):
Yeah, they really are .
So just to close the loop onthat so the work with the
subscription boxes allowed us tobuild our assortment.
It funded our productdevelopment for years.
But I wasn't really doing a lotof distribution.
I was doing some, but not muchoutside of supplying the box.
But when that went away then itwas like, okay, I really need
to shift gears here and Istarted marketing the brand.
(28:06):
And then we started openingindependent retailers and then
we expanded into nylon and itstarted to build on itself.
And then I had a retailer emailme and say have you heard about
FAIR?
Your brand would be great onthis platform.
And I'd never heard of them.
And they had just startedexpanding into pet.
They started in the gift space.
Speaker 1 (28:28):
So this is back 2018-ish.
Speaker 2 (28:30):
Yeah.
So we joined FAIR and I wasstunned by the volume we did
right out of the gate on FAIR.
And so I worked hard tocultivate the FAIR business,
because if you introduceretailers to the platform then
they're commission-free for life.
So I had a stake in getting asmany people on board as quickly
(28:54):
as possible to take advantage ofthat.
And then they expanded toEurope and then our business
started to expand pretty quicklyinto Western Europe through
FAIR.
And then, once we startedestablishing that independent
pet retail footprint, then thedistributors started calling and
(29:14):
saying hey, we keep seeing yourproduct in these stores, we're
interested in distributing yourproduct.
And so we started openingdistributors as well.
So we sell direct, we selldirect to retailers, we sell
through distributors, we sellthrough platforms like fair and
wholesalepetcom, um, so we'rereally kind of omni-channel at
(29:37):
this point terrific which Ithink you have to be honestly
nowadays.
Speaker 1 (29:43):
Well, I, I, I agree, uh, that you know the.
I agree that the more channelsyou're covering, the safer your
business is, certainly from aperspective of not being, as the
PE guys say, disintermediated,and one beast can feed the other
(30:08):
in terms of channels.
One beast can feed the other interms of channels, right?
So I love how you've built astrong brand with a fresh
perspective from the productdesign perspective, an
entertaining way to get yourname known through social media,
(30:34):
through, you know, monthly orso introductions, product
introductions.
It's a really great story thatyou probably had no idea 12
years ago when you said you knowwhat, I'm going to see, if I
can start, you know if I canmake my product and branding
brain work in an unknownindustry called pet industry.
(30:56):
And I think the fact thatyou're constantly thinking about
all the challenges productdistribution, brand from the
consumer's, the decision maker'sperspective which, again, a lot
of your competitors do not, alot of them are sort of locked
into the business cycle and theproduct development cycle and
(31:25):
the sourcing matrix of well, wehave to do it this way and that
way, sourcing matrix of you know, while we have to do it this
way and that way, but you'reconstantly thinking of new ways
to solve the Rubik's Cube right.
Speaker 2 (31:37):
Yeah, I think, even beyond the pet industry, one of
the challenges for a maturebusiness is figuring out how to
behave differently.
You know how to get outside oftheir.
You know the structures thatthey've built, the processes
that they've built, and thebeauty of being an upstart is, I
(32:06):
don't have any of that, and youknow, the funny thing to me is
that in a sense, I'm ane-commerce entrepreneur.
We do all of our businessdigitally.
In a sense, I'm an e-commerceentrepreneur.
We do all of our businessdigitally, right, even our
distributor orders are coming indigitally.
Our fare orders go directly.
You know the workflow isdirectly through our Shopify
store.
So in a sense, I'm ane-commerce entrepreneur.
We didn't even have personalcomputers when I was in college,
so I'm 62.
(32:28):
So the fact that I'm ane-commerce entrepreneur kind of
cracks me up.
But what it says is that you donot have to build a business
the same way today that you did10, 15, 20, 30 years ago when I
(32:50):
worked at Nike.
Nike was primarily a domesticbusiness.
They weren't even in the sportof soccer or football, as you
would call it, but they feltlike they couldn't expand into
Europe or Latin America or Asiauntil they had firmly rooted the
brand in the United States,until they had firmly rooted the
brand in the United States,whereas what I'm doing is I'm
(33:12):
growing the brand everywhere allat once.
Speaker 1 (33:15):
Right, and it's because of social media.
Right, the world has gotten alot smaller.
And I would even phrase it.
You said you don't have to runthe business the way you used to
10 or 15 years ago.
I would say you have to run itdifferently.
Speaker 2 (33:36):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (33:39):
Don't be constrained.
It's like no, the way you'rerunning it the next I mean the
way you're running it this yearis different from pre-COVID, and
the way you're running it nextyear is different from this year
and last year.
It's things are.
I mean, technology and digitaltransformation and digital touch
points are changing so fast andfaster and faster and faster
(34:00):
that you know, you and I have toget you know, stay young or
stay with the times and keephaving fun, and your business
has gone through a number ofinflection points where, of
course, you're actingdifferently.
You know, zero to the firstdollar, the first dollar to the
first million dollars the firstyou know, and then at $10
(34:22):
million it becomes a differentgame, At $20 million it becomes
a different game.
And I mean, that's what I love,right?
That's what I love about yourstory, that's what I love about
my business is figuring out howto act age appropriate,
essentially.
Speaker 2 (34:39):
Yeah, for sure it's.
The nice thing aboutentrepreneurship is that no day
is like a prior day.
It's always changing and you'relearning new things and, like
you said, as we continue toscale, my focus will have to
change, or I will have to, forsure I'll have to hire people
that help with the operations ofthe business so that we can
(35:01):
fulfill, you know, greater andgreater demand.
The interesting thing now iswe've created this great, this
really great foundation ofindependent pet specialty
retailers around the globe andnow we're bringing on a lot of
regional chains.
(35:21):
We haven't gotten to big boxyet no Petco, no PetSmart but
we're bringing on these regionalchains, but not just in the US
but other parts of the world,and it's it's all kind of
happening at once, and so we'rewe're taking big bites of the
elephant.
Speaker 1 (35:38):
You know, at this point, one bite at a time, but
big bite at a time.
Yeah, yeah, Terrific.
Well, I think we'll have to doanother podcast.
You know a few elephant biteslater on, you know, maybe in a
year or two years.
I think your brand isfascinating.
Congratulations on what you'veaccomplished so far in the first
(36:00):
12 years.
Let's see what the next 12years bring.
Speaker 2 (36:03):
right it's going to be a great ride.
Speaker 1 (36:06):
Yeah, thank you so much, adam.
Thanks for being on ThirdGrowth Option Podcast.
Speaker 2 (36:10):
You bet.
Speaker 1 (36:11):
And I will put the website, your website, into the
show notes so folks can check itout.
Well, we can just say it hereit's SodaPupcom, right.
Speaker 2 (36:25):
S-O-D-A-P-U-P SodaPupcom.
Speaker 1 (36:29):
SodaPupcom Perfect Adam.
Thank you so much.
Speaker 2 (36:33):
Thanks, Benno.
Speaker 1 (36:43):
Take care.
Thank you for listening to thisepisode of TGO Podcast.
You can find all episodes onour podcast page at
wwwrealign4resultscom.
You can find me, benno, host ofTGO Podcast, there as well.
Just email, benno B-E-N-N-O atrealign4resultscom.
Let's keep growing, thank you.
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