#0213 - Mindy Zemrak - Shark Tank Supervising Casting Producer 🦈

Approximately 20,000 businesses apply to be on Shark Tank each season. That means, over all 14 seasons, they have received over a quarter million applications to be on the show. What’s crazy is that only about 1,200, or .43% of the applicants make it on air. Some brands apply once, while some apply every year in the hopes of finally making it on the show. In today’s episode, we chat with Mindy Zemrak, the casting producer for Shark Tank. Mindy and her team sort through all of the applications to decide what brands make the cut to be on the show. So if you’ve ever been curious about what it takes to make it onto the Shark Tank floor, this is the episode for you. We discuss:

🦈 The most memorable Shark Tank pitch that left everyone in tears

🦈 The 4 tips she tells every entrepreneur before they enter the tank

🦈 Why after years of being surrounded by entrepreneurs, she’s never once been tempted to take the plunge herself.

#0212 - Brazi Bites - Junea Rocha - (as seen on Shark Tank 🦈)

Every culture has a food it’s known for. In Japan, it’s sushi, in Italy, it’s pasta, and in Brazil, it’s Pao de queijo, or Brazilian cheese bread. While sushi and pasta have long since made their way into every town in the United States, the same can’t be said for Brazilian cheese bread. Recognizing this gap in the market, Junea decided to bring her favorite snack to America. And so she founded Brazi Bites. Initially, the growth was steady and predictable, but once they went on Shark Tank, Junea quite literally couldn’t keep Brazi Bites on the shelves. In todays episode, we chat with Junea about:

🦈 Selling out nationwide in a matter of days after airing on Shark Tank

🦈 The challenges that come with inventing a new food category

🦈 And why her deal with Lori Greiner ended up falling through once the cameras stopped rolling.

#0211 - Tia Lupita Foods - Hector Saldivar - the Shark Tank 🦈 experience!

Over the past 14 seasons of Shark Tank, $221.5M has been invested in 729 companies. While it’s thrilling to watch the negotiations happen, just because everyone shakes on a deal, doesn’t mean it will actually close. Every company wants to be the unicorn that blows the sharks out of the water, but terms change and deals can fall through. So what happens once the pitch is over, the doors shut, and the cameras stop rolling? In today’s episode, we welcome back to the podcast, Hector Saldivar, the founder of Tia Lupita. Hector was recently on season 14 of Shark Tank, and he closed a deal with Kevin O’Leary for $500,000 as a line of credit for 5% equity. We wanted to chat with him to hear about the whole Shark Tank experience from his application all the way to how the show impacted his sales once it aired on TV. In this episode, we discuss:

🦈 Why he says Shark Tank producers know him better than his wife

🦈 The secret small brand killer in retailers

🦈 The immediate impact Shark Tank has on the brand’s sales

And make sure to listen until the end. Hector drops a super exciting partnership announcement that got us fired up in the studio.

#0210 - Bricia Lopez - Asada The Art of Mexican Style Grilling - all new cook book 🪇

If you’ve been a long-time listener of the podcast, you might recognize Bricia Lopez from episode 7. At that point, she had just received The James Beard American Classics Award for the best Oaxacan food in the country. Since then, she grabbed hold of a rocket ship, and her career hasn’t stopped ascending. Here are some highlights:

• Her drink mix, I Love Micheladas, officially launched at Costco

• She started Super Mamas, a chart-topping podcast, with her sister, Paulina

• And now you can officially bring the taste of Oaxaca to your home with Bricia Lopez’s new cookbook, Asada The Art of Mexican-Style Grilling.

These delicious recipes were born out of love, heritage, and passion. It’s one of the first-ever grilling books dedicated to the art of Mexican grilling, and it perfectly captures the beauty of asada culture in LA. In today’s episode, we chat with Bricia Lopez about:

• Why she insisted her cookbook photos be shot outside of a studio

• Why we should normalize Latino kids growing up with privilege

• Why people don’t write cookbooks to make money

#0209 - Holey Grail Donuts 🍩 - Nile Dreiling

Donuts are a stale $40 billion industry, but one company is breathing new life into the vocation. Holey Grail Donuts began its pilgrimage as a burger truck in Kauai, but it wasn’t long until they developed a cult following around their taro donuts. Fast forward to today and they just raised $9M in funding to open a bunch of shops in LA, and they’ve even garnished investments from Christopher Kostow and Tony Hawk. Part of what makes eating their donuts a religious experience is that they’re freshly made with each order, and the unique flavors they offer can only come as a result of divine inspiration. Today we talk with Holey Grail Donuts co-founder, Nile, about:

🍩 Making fresh donuts in his hotel room just before one of the most important pitches of his career

🍩 Taking a leap of faith in rapidly expanding their locations

🍩 Why there’s nothing unique from one small donut shop to the next

#0207 - Blue Cube - David Haddad (ice baths and cold plunges) 🥶🛁

Does submerging yourself in 44-degree water for 6 minutes sound fun to you? I promise you’ll only shake for the first couple of minutes! Well, thanks to people like Wim Hof and Joe Rogan, this practice has actually been gaining a lot of popularity. The benefits of ice baths, or cold water therapy include reduced inflammation and pain relief, and it can even boost your immune system. Some people fill metal tubs with bags upon bags of ice, while some people, like Diego, have a BlueCube. BlueCube makes high-end ice baths that keep the water chilled, flowing, and filtered so you don’t have to refill your tub daily with a hundred pounds of ice. In today’s episode, we talk with David Haddad, co-founder of BlueCube about:

🥶 The early days of starting BlueCube in a barn in Oregon

🥶 The science behind why cold plunging is so good for your health

🥶 How long should you stay in an ice bath to reap the full benefits

So, grab your towel or blanket before we plunge into this week’s episode.

#0206 - Dave - Jason Wilk (NeoBank --> Startup to IPO)

Let me give you a scenario: you try and purchase something on your debit card, but you don’t have enough money in your account instead of declining the purchase, your bank instead allows it to go through and charges you $35 for the “convenience” Overdraft fees accounted for $5.8 billion dollars of bank revenue in the first 3 quarters of 2022. These fees harm millions of Americans every year and can trap people in a cycle of debt. Jason Wilk, the founder of Dave, also struggled with these fees. What frustrated him the most was that if the bank just looked at his transaction history, they would be able to see a scheduled paycheck coming in only a couple of days. And in that frustration, Dave was born. Dave is an online bank offering no-interest loans based on your transaction history to avoid overdraft fees. In today’s episode, we discuss with Jason about:

🏦 How Mark Cuban invested in his first company only to cap his salary at $30,000/year

🏦 Going from the euphoria of an IPO to watching the stock price tumble a few days later

🏦 What it was like to transition from the CEO of a private company to a publicly traded one

#0205 - Burn the Boats - Matt Higgins 📚 (Guest Shark Tank and Author)

To quote Arnold Schwarzenegger: “big dreams require relentless focus, and any time we spend planning for failure sets us up for failure.” Today’s guest, Matt Higgins, literally wrote the book on the subject. He grew up in poverty in Queens, dropped out of high school to get his GED, and took night classes just to finish college. At that point, Matt had already beaten the odds, but he didn’t stop there. Matt became the youngest press secretary to the mayor’s office in New York City history, Vice Chairman of the Miami Dolphins, and a guest shark on Shark Tank. His path to success was hardly linear, but for Matt, it’s always been about taking calculated risks, which is why he titled his book Burn the Boats. In todays episode we discuss with Matt Higgins about:

🦈 Why his first impression of Gary Vaynerchuck was that he could make a career out of stealing Gary’s ideas

🦈 Letting his nerves almost get the best of him during his first appearance on Shark Tank

🦈 Why you should always bet on the jockey and not the horse

#0203 - Alegria Publishing - Davina Ferreira 📚

Latinos make up 20% of the population, yet publishing is only 8% Latino, making it the worst field in media for representation according to Publishers Weekly. This underrepresented demographic has so much untapped talent, yet Latinos are always seen as “less than others”. So, Davina, the founder of Alegria Publishing, wanted to focus on supporting new, exciting, and emerging literary voices in the latine/x community. Today, we talk with Davina, about:

📚 Her journey from growing up in Columbia during Pablo Escobar’s reign to starting a luxury magazine in Los Angeles

📚 How art truly has the power to change lives

📚 Why it was a blessing to the magazine prior to the rise of social media

#0202 - Conjure - Ali Ahmed 🚚 (on-demand delivery)

Conjure has created fully automated stores, on wheels. Using the Conjure app, you can hail the store to you in a matter of minutes. The autonomous vehicles show up, the doors automatically slide open, and you choose the products you want. Using the RFID tags, your account is then automatically billed only for the items you selected. You don’t have to talk to the driver, and all the options are truly at your fingertips. In this episode we talk with Ali Ahmed, the co-founder of Conjure, about:

🚚 How they broke the internet at CES, in 2018

🚚 Why they decided to launch specifically with ice cream

🚚 The implications of store hailing for industries outside of ice cream including grocery stores, markets, and alcohol.

#0201 - CoFertility - Lauren Makler 👶

For the first time, the average age to have kids has surpassed 30. Children are getting more expensive, people are living longer, and potential parents are focusing more on their careers. This poses a unique, but severe personal problem. The older people get, the more likely they are to have pregnancy complications. The solution is to freeze the eggs, but that’s expensive, and not top of mind for those in their 20s. CoFertility is creating an ecosystem that lowers the cost and increases the accessibility of egg donation. In todays episode we talk with Lauren Makler, the co-founder of CoFertility, about:

• Why doctors are twice as likely to face infertility as the general public

• Launching Uber in States Across the Country

• How CoFertility is Reducing the Cost of Egg Donations

#0200 - Arrae - Siff & Nish

20 million Americans suffer from digestive issues every day. Whether it’s the food they eat or their lifestyles, it’s not always clear what causes these issues. This quest for better gut health led Siff and Nish, the cofounders of Arrae, down a rabbit hole of natural supplements. In their research and experimentation, they began to realize that herbs, minerals, and vitamins have the power to effectively solve the digestive problems they were once facing. It was a true Eureka moment. And from that moment, Arrae was born. In today’s episode we discuss:

• The step-by-step guide they used to close millions of dollars in funding

• Why “clinically trialed ingredients” is misleading

• Why they are investing one million dollars into paid TikTok ads over the course of 2023

#0199 - Azure - Gene Eidelman (3D Printed Backyard Studios, ADUs & Homes)

The State of California is in a housing crisis, and to meet the demand, the state needs to build 310,000 homes every year for the next 8 years. However, between the high cost of land, labor, and materials, this is a serious problem with no easy solution. So our guest today, Gene Eidelman, began to analyze the issue at a high level, and started to ask himself: why not use 3D printers to create the homes instead? Azure makes prefab units built 70% faster and 30% less expensive than traditionally constructed units, all while using recycled materials. They can be used as backyard studios, and offices, and up to 5 units can be stacked together. In this episode, we discuss with Gene about:

• How these can be used to help with the homeless crisis

• Why their early adopters were glamping retreats

• Why Gene finds strength in coming from an immigrant community

#0198 - Planta - Steven Salm 🌱 (plant based restaurant group)

Every year, more and more people are changing their diets to plant-based. There are a variety of factors for this which include health, sustainability, and climate change to name a few. The palate of the average American is evolving, and yet the restaurant industry isn’t keeping up. This gap in the market is where Planta, a 100% plant-based restaurant group, is betting on its figurative farm. Launched in 2016, they’ve expanded to 11 locations across The United States and Canada, with a whole bunch more still on the way including in California, Georgia, and New York. Steven Salm, our guest today and the founder of PLANTA, wants to alter the perception of plant-based restaurants one diner at a time.Today we talk with Steven about:

• How restaurants have the power to make or break hotels

• Re-engineering dishes v. starting from scratch

• The madness that comes with rapid expansion