0:00

Hey folks, Jeff Berman here. If

0:02

your business is driving innovation, delivering

0:04

exceptional experiences, or making real impact

0:06

on society, or maybe all three,

0:08

we want you to apply for

0:11

the Masters of Scale Business Awards.

0:13

These awards celebrate bold organizations of

0:15

all sizes and across all industries.

0:18

Award recipients don't just get a

0:20

trophy, although yes, there are trophies.

0:22

They get a spotlight at the

0:24

Masters of Scale Summit and a

0:26

seat at the table with the very best

0:29

in business. Don't wait. Head

0:31

to mastersofscale.com/business awards dash

0:33

apply. That's mastersofscale.com/business awards

0:36

dash apply. When I

0:38

first came to Silicon

0:40

Valley, it was very clear that I

0:43

was a fish out of water.

0:45

On many levels, I showed up

0:47

in like Diane von Fursthenberg dresses

0:49

when everyone else was wearing goodies.

0:51

But of course, also I was

0:53

this sort of very feminine presenting

0:55

woman and black woman and... When

0:58

I first got to Silicon Valley,

1:00

I really tried to pattern match.

1:02

I tried to listen to the

1:04

podcast, other people listened to, I

1:06

tried to emulate them. It was

1:08

a total failure. It didn't work

1:10

in any way. You weren't being

1:12

you. I wasn't being me. Julia

1:15

Collins is a serial entrepreneur

1:17

who has thrived at the

1:19

intersection of tech and food.

1:21

Her latest venture, Planet Forward,

1:23

is a B2B platform focused

1:25

on fighting climate change. As she

1:28

embarked on this phase of her

1:30

entrepreneurial journey, Julia realized that standing

1:32

out was better than fitting in.

1:34

And I think once I realized

1:37

that, I started to also have

1:39

a better mindset because I thought

1:41

being different is actually my superpower.

1:43

And I stopped second-guessing myself as

1:45

soon as I stopped trying to

1:47

pattern match on other people's

1:49

success. This week on the

1:52

show, Julia shares hard-won lessons

1:54

from the failed unicorn she

1:56

co-founded. and it involved robots

1:58

and pizza. How in her

2:01

new business she's scaling solutions

2:03

to climate change that are

2:05

also good for her clients

2:07

bottom lines You got to

2:09

have incredible talent at every

2:11

position There are fires burning

2:13

when you're going out. Can you

2:15

believe it? Such an idiot and

2:17

then you go back to this

2:19

is totally going to be amazing

2:21

There is so many easy ways.

2:23

So I have no idea what to

2:25

do. Sorry, you made a mistake. But

2:28

you have to time it right. Oops.

2:30

Or can you have a free

2:32

bed of apartments? Stuff that

2:34

just seems absolutely nutballs 10

2:36

years later. Well, that's just

2:39

how you do it. We

2:41

haven't made just how you do it.

2:43

This is Masters of Scale. I'm

2:45

Jeff Berman, your host. Julia

2:47

Collins has always wanted a career.

2:50

that gave her a chance to

2:52

serve people while solving big problems.

2:54

We started by talking about

2:56

the scale journey she's in the

2:59

midst of with her latest company,

3:01

Planet Forward. Julia, welcome to

3:03

Masters of Scale. It's so good to be

3:05

here. I've been so excited about this

3:07

conversation because there's a lot

3:09

for us to talk about. I

3:11

want to start with what you're doing

3:13

now. Can you tell us about

3:15

Planet Forward? Absolutely. So

3:18

Planet Forward was founded with a

3:20

really simple mission, which was to

3:22

tackle climate change by decarbonizing the

3:25

global greenhouse gas emissions that come

3:27

from our consumer products. Okay. Can

3:29

I just pause you right there? What

3:31

does it mean to decarbonize it? Right.

3:34

So as you know, climate change is

3:36

caused primarily by an excess of greenhouse

3:38

gas emissions coming from just about every

3:41

part of life. What we eat, what

3:43

we wear, how we travel, AI. What

3:45

is true is that we can actually

3:48

reduce the greenhouse gases emissions related to

3:50

all of those things. And we call

3:52

that decarbonization. It is the opposite of

3:55

admitting too much greenhouse gas. It

3:57

is the act of reducing the

3:59

greenhouse gas. gases that are emitted

4:01

by all of our daily activities.

4:03

And what's an example of how

4:05

a company does that? Yeah, so

4:07

say for example you're a large

4:09

food company because let me tell

4:11

you something most people don't think

4:13

about food when they think about

4:15

climate change. Right, right. We hear

4:17

about cows in their contribution but

4:19

beyond that not much. It's not

4:21

just the cows and some people

4:23

would even say it's not the

4:25

cow, it's the how. Okay. Yeah,

4:28

it is what you're feeding the

4:30

cows. It's the fact that you

4:32

are slashing down forests to graze

4:34

the cows. So if you're a

4:36

large food company, your footprint collectively

4:38

around the supply chain of all

4:40

of these goods is about 90%

4:42

of your overall company footprint. So

4:44

if you're a large food company,

4:46

the best thing that you can

4:48

do is to look at that

4:50

90% coming from your supply chain

4:52

and look for ways to make

4:54

smart trades and swaps to reduce

4:56

the impact. For example, you might

4:58

choose renewable energy. at one of

5:00

your manufacturing processes. You might switch

5:02

from a conventional ingredient to an

5:04

organic ingredient. We did this with

5:06

one food company, and they were

5:08

able to reduce their emissions just

5:10

by making smart swaps in their

5:12

supply chain by 30%. Which is

5:14

a huge number when you think

5:16

about how much we need to

5:19

reduce and how quickly. When you

5:21

describe that, it sounds like you're

5:23

a consultant and you're helping them

5:25

figure it out. that I love

5:27

to talk about, which is called

5:29

Just Salad. They're a fantastic salad

5:31

company. They've become a really big

5:33

business operating across the country. Working

5:35

with Just Salad, what we did

5:37

was use artificial intelligence to analyze

5:39

their supply chain. So not doing

5:41

this in spreadsheets, but really using

5:43

artificial intelligence to essentially create a

5:45

digital twin. of that company's supply

5:47

chain, showing them where their greenhouse

5:49

gas emissions were coming from all

5:51

the way from the field to

5:53

the floor. How much is coming

5:55

from the growing of the ingredient

5:57

versus the processing, versus the distribution,

5:59

the consumer use, even the end

6:01

of life? Is it composted? Is

6:03

it landfilled? And as you can

6:05

imagine, that kind of very detailed

6:07

fine work is hard to do

6:10

manually. It's hard to do for

6:12

just salad. It's hard to do

6:14

for Unilever. It's hard to do

6:16

for every company with a large

6:18

and complex supply chain. That's what

6:20

makes it such a perfect problem

6:22

for machine learning in particular. Yeah,

6:24

it sounds like an incredible use

6:26

of AI, but where... I get

6:28

stuck on the logical leap and

6:30

this is why I love this

6:32

job because I get to ask

6:34

them questions with smart people. It's

6:36

not like you can just say,

6:38

upload your supply chain and will

6:40

analyze it, right? So how does

6:42

it actually work? How do you

6:44

do it? There's so much information

6:46

that lives in the financial transactions

6:48

of a company. Imagine, for example,

6:50

that we could get receipts from

6:52

every single purchase that you've made

6:54

over a given time period. What

6:56

you bought, how much it weighed,

6:58

where you bought it from. Then

7:01

we can do all of this

7:03

inference around that data point. And

7:05

we can even work with external

7:07

partners to do some additional assurance

7:09

around those data points. But so

7:11

much information coming into our solution

7:13

comes actually from the purchasing records

7:15

of companies. Have you heard of

7:17

the word cradle to grave? Yes.

7:19

So cradle to grave is the

7:21

system boundary of a life cycle

7:23

assessment. It tells you from the

7:25

very beginning of that product all

7:27

the way to end of its

7:29

life. What the impacts are. Innovation

7:31

at Planet Forward is we've now

7:33

done tens of thousands of these

7:35

life cycle assessments, but we've stored

7:37

not just those life cycle assessments,

7:39

we've disaggregated all of the building

7:41

blocks. labeled and trained those building

7:43

blocks to be able to create

7:45

new life cycle assessments using algorithms.

7:47

And this is one of the

7:49

big innovations at Planetford. We think

7:52

it's a fantastic use of AI

7:54

to help save the planet. There's

7:56

no silver bullet. We have to

7:58

work on other sectors, but decarbonizing

8:00

the consumer products industry. would really

8:02

give us a fighting chance. Maybe

8:04

this is a really big swing.

8:06

Where did this idea come from?

8:08

Oh my gosh, you know, for

8:10

me, I've always been really interested

8:12

in food and food systems. It

8:14

goes all the way back to

8:16

my grandparents who had roots in

8:18

the deep south, you know, and

8:20

were scientists while they were dentists

8:22

who moved from the deep south

8:24

to, you know, who moved from

8:26

the deep south to San Francisco

8:28

to start their dental practice. What

8:30

brought them to San Francisco? The

8:32

great migration, as you know, was

8:34

this time when those northern cities...

8:36

were segregated, and so they didn't

8:38

have dentists or doctors that could

8:40

serve all people, including black people.

8:43

So my grandparents moved to the

8:45

Bay Area to be a part

8:47

of that class of people that

8:49

built practices for everyone, everyone of

8:51

every race. But the reason why

8:53

my story about Planet Forward begins

8:55

with them was they really moved

8:57

to the Bay Area to be

8:59

of service. Right? They were trained

9:01

as dentists, but they moved to

9:03

San Francisco to be of service.

9:05

And so I have always had

9:07

this passion for serving people. So

9:09

why is this related to your

9:11

question? What better way to serve

9:13

people right now than to create

9:15

operationally sound? scalable solutions to address

9:17

climate change. Like there are so

9:19

many ways to have an impact,

9:21

but for me, I cannot think

9:23

of anything I would rather be

9:25

doing with my life right now.

9:27

Your grandparents' influential figures for you

9:29

growing up? They were incredibly influential

9:31

figures for me growing up. How

9:34

did they show up for you?

9:36

How did that manifest? Let's take

9:38

my grandpa. So my grandpa used

9:40

to wear a button. He would

9:42

wear a little button that said

9:44

serve people. You know, and it

9:46

was a homemade button. And when

9:48

the button would wear down, he'd

9:50

make another button. And it said

9:52

the same thing, serve people. He

9:54

was this incredible man, strapping man,

9:56

six foot four, beautiful man. And

9:58

he worked with so much humility,

10:00

despite the fact that he had

10:02

incredible academic. that he was really

10:04

talented in his field, he just

10:06

worked so hard for the people

10:08

who came to his practice. Sometimes

10:10

people didn't have money to pay

10:12

him, and it didn't matter. He

10:14

was about serving people. And so

10:16

I think seeing someone who was

10:18

absolutely the best in his field,

10:20

but who never lost his humility

10:22

and never lost that focus on

10:25

taking care of others, was hugely

10:27

influential for me. This is also

10:29

a man who could eat a

10:31

whole apple pie in the city.

10:33

When did you start Planet Forward?

10:35

Started Planet Forward in 2019, but

10:37

it looked a lot different than

10:39

it looks now. How so? When

10:41

we started Planet Forward, we always

10:43

had this vision for using the

10:45

power of food and other consumer

10:47

products to tackle climate change. Now

10:49

that looks like a software company.

10:51

But in the beginning, it actually

10:53

was a snack company. The first

10:55

product that we built was a

10:57

brand. And the idea was before

10:59

we go and build software solutions

11:01

and put them in the hands

11:03

of other food brands, maybe we

11:05

should understand what it actually is

11:07

to be a food brand. We

11:09

knew that we could build a

11:11

set of products that could really

11:13

create a category around, let's call

11:16

it, climate-friendly consumer. And we knew

11:18

that there would be some enabling

11:20

technology. that needed to exist to

11:22

make that happen. How did we

11:24

know that? Because we couldn't find

11:26

what we needed. I didn't know

11:28

that I was going to build

11:30

a B2B software platform that worked

11:32

with companies like Amazon on decarbonization.

11:34

I didn't know quite that, but

11:36

I knew that there was always

11:38

a something else, some kind of

11:40

enabling technology. Initially, Jeff, I actually

11:42

thought it would be a marketplace.

11:44

A marketplace for procuring more sustainable

11:46

goods and services to build your

11:48

products. Only, it's hard to build

11:50

marketplace businesses. Nothing is easy. Nothing

11:52

is easy. So what was the

11:54

product that you built? It was

11:56

a cracker company called Moonshot, which

11:58

we sold to Patagonia two years

12:00

ago, which was a wonderful experience.

12:02

and I still eat them under

12:04

the Patagonia brand. What was different

12:07

about them was we did everything

12:09

we could to minimize the greenhouse

12:11

gas emissions related to making the

12:13

product. That's not a very sexy

12:15

consumer positioning. So we had to

12:17

think about what was the right

12:19

positioning for the product. We named

12:21

it Moonshot so it would have

12:23

this feeling of like uplift and

12:25

you're fighting for something and you're

12:27

taking a chance. They were delicious,

12:29

they're a beautifully packaged. But underneath

12:31

the surface we were shortening supply

12:33

chains. We were sourcing from farmers

12:35

who were practicing regenerative and organic

12:37

agriculture. We were using renewable energy.

12:39

We were lightweighting packaging and we

12:41

were measuring all of that. The

12:43

measurement of it is what became

12:45

the foundation of the planet forward

12:47

platform. What was the inflection point

12:49

where you said, oh, wait a

12:51

second, we actually should be building

12:53

a B2B software company to serve

12:55

massive and a massive range of

12:58

companies to lower their carbon footprint?

13:00

You know. I don't know that

13:02

there was one specific day when

13:04

I like smacked my palm to

13:06

my head and said, oh my

13:08

gosh, there's a bigger opportunity. But

13:10

it was really just the culmination

13:12

of so many times realizing that

13:14

the tools that consumer brands needed

13:16

to build climate positive companies just

13:18

didn't exist. Or they existed if

13:20

you had $100,000 to pay a

13:22

consultant. And I have this like...

13:24

impatient optimism. Like yes, we can

13:26

get this done, but only if

13:28

we work around the clock, and

13:30

I felt so impatient that it

13:32

seemed like somebody's got to solve

13:34

this, you know, and it probably

13:36

should be us. I mean, I

13:38

love that framing of impatient optimism.

13:40

I feel like that's something that

13:42

entrepreneurs across the board share, right,

13:44

especially mission-driven. So had you raised

13:46

money for what almost sounds like

13:49

a different version of the company

13:51

that was making moonshot? We had.

13:53

How did you go about raising

13:55

money for that? And then how

13:57

did you go tell your investors

13:59

actually were doing something totally different

14:01

here? So what the early invest?

14:03

were betting on, I think when

14:05

they bet on Planet Forward v1

14:07

with Moonshotters, the first product is,

14:09

Julia has a vision for something

14:11

bigger, and she's impatiently optimistic and

14:13

incredibly driven, and we think there's

14:15

going to be a bigger opportunity

14:17

here. That was sort of like

14:19

the precede and the seed thesis.

14:21

I think it was a big

14:23

bet on. Well, the magnitude of

14:25

this problem is so large climate

14:27

change and consumer products related climate

14:29

change that there's probably more business

14:31

to build here than the snack

14:33

brand. The tricky thing was really

14:35

going from the seed to the

14:37

A. And that was a hard

14:40

pivot. Why is that? We still

14:42

had Moonshot. And Moonshot was growing

14:44

like a hockey stick. It was

14:46

like that classic hockey stick growth.

14:48

but it was growing as a

14:50

CPG business, so it was growing

14:52

with CPG margins and CPG operating

14:54

complexity. which is I think a

14:56

great super investable business, but the

14:58

investors who wanted to look at

15:00

planet forward as a software company

15:02

are looking at a much different

15:04

profile. They want 80% margins. They

15:06

want massive margins. They want sass

15:08

economics. Yeah, sass economics, triple, triple,

15:10

triple, triple, double, double unicorn. And

15:12

we knew that we could get

15:14

there with the software platform, but

15:16

the hard thing was holding those

15:18

two businesses together. I don't have

15:20

a magic answer for how we

15:22

got it done. I can only

15:24

say that... We were fortunate to

15:26

have investors like Acre Ventures, like

15:28

Conger Ventures, who co-led that round,

15:31

who really believed in the larger

15:33

opportunity and who trusted me, that

15:35

I would figure out the best

15:37

value-creating way to spin the two

15:39

businesses off. There was also a

15:41

bit of luck. Still ahead, Lessons

15:43

Learned from a failed unicorn tech

15:45

company, which involves the robots and

15:47

the pizza. Meet

15:55

Romeo Regali a capital one business

15:57

customer and chef and CEO of

15:59

Ross, a plant-based restaurant with two

16:02

locations in New York. We started

16:04

talking about our own restaurant. I

16:06

don't know if she thought I

16:08

was serious. But she said, you

16:10

know, let's just do it. Let's

16:12

just start our own brand from

16:15

scratch. Romeo's recalling the moment when

16:17

he and his wife and co-founder

16:19

Milka Regali decided to take a

16:21

leap of faith. I started working

16:23

as a server at Milka's mom's

16:25

restaurant. I fell in love so

16:28

much with the industry, and that's

16:30

what sparked sparked sparked it. Romeo

16:32

and Milka weren't certain how they

16:34

would bring their dream to fruition,

16:36

but they were certain of one

16:39

thing, their passion. We knew we

16:41

had a vision and we found

16:43

a space. We had to gut

16:45

the entire space and build everything

16:47

from scratch. The kitchen, gas piping,

16:49

and the restroom, the sound system,

16:52

everything. We really believed every detail

16:54

matters. As they broke ground on

16:56

their first raw's location, Romeo and

16:58

milk has soon faced the financial

17:00

reality of building something from scratch.

17:02

They looked to Capital One business

17:05

to help navigate the fiscal burden

17:07

of making their dreams come true.

17:09

We used the Spark Cash Plus

17:11

card from Capital One. The no

17:13

preset spending limit really had a

17:16

big role in helping us finish

17:18

the project. We're very happy with

17:20

what we have accomplished. We want

17:22

to expand more. To learn more,

17:24

go to Capital one.com/business cards. At

17:28

Masters of Scale, we talk

17:30

a lot about innovation. It's

17:32

an essential skill that all

17:35

industry leaders absolutely have to

17:37

develop. Our community looks to

17:39

us to stay ahead on

17:41

the latest trends in commerce,

17:44

and more and more, we

17:46

hear of businesses turning to

17:48

Ohio. That's right, Ohio. Jobs

17:50

Ohio isn't just an economic

17:53

development organization. They're matchmakers for

17:55

innovation. From town to acquisition

17:57

to site selection to infrastructure

18:00

development, Jobs Ohio exists to

18:02

empower... world-class corporations, entrepreneurs, and

18:04

talented individuals to build their

18:06

businesses and their careers in

18:09

the state of Ohio. Whatever

18:11

you're looking forward to uniquely

18:13

scale your business, you can

18:15

find it in Ohio. Go

18:18

to Jobs ohio.com to learn

18:20

more. Welcome. Welcome. Welcome. Welcome

18:22

back to Masters of Scale.

18:26

Long before Julia Collins founded a snack

18:28

brand turned tech platform. She started her

18:30

career working in the food business. I

18:32

always wanted to be in food. I

18:35

just have always felt most at home

18:37

when I'm eating or with people. I'm

18:39

like the person who will read a

18:41

cookbook at the beach or like... go

18:44

to the grocery store just to watch

18:46

people shop. I'm obsessed with food and

18:48

food culture. Any time I had like

18:51

two nickels to rub together, I'm like

18:53

buying a plane ticket to go see

18:55

the hot new chef. Oh wow. Just

18:57

always loved it. But my grandpa who

19:00

as you know was really influential in

19:02

my life was like, you can do

19:04

anything except for just don't go into

19:07

food. Because don't go into food. Because

19:09

coming up, when he came up, those

19:11

were the jobs that you could have

19:13

as a black person. And so he

19:16

associated me being in food with his

19:18

sort of roots in sharecropping. That was

19:20

the association that he had. Wow. I

19:22

think also, you know, for anybody who's

19:25

got this story, if you're an immigrant,

19:27

if you are somebody who came from

19:29

a humble background, if you are a

19:32

person of color, the grown-ups who raise

19:34

you. Really try to keep you safe.

19:36

Of course all parents try to keep

19:38

their children safe, but I think it's

19:41

doubly true if your parents have some

19:43

of that intergenerational trauma or your grandparents

19:45

have some of that intergenerational trauma around

19:48

that lived experience. And so I think

19:50

he also was like, please just be

19:52

a... doctor. If you can't be a

19:54

doctor, be a lawyer. If you can't

19:57

be a lawyer, can you please be

19:59

an engineer? So I like went off

20:01

to Harvard to study biomedical engineering because

20:04

then maybe Grandpa would be happy. But

20:06

I just, it wasn't what I wanted.

20:08

I really wanted to be in food.

20:10

So I went back to him after

20:13

I graduated from Harvard and I guess

20:15

again, Grandpa. I really want to be

20:17

a food and he said again, please

20:19

don't. Whatever you do, don't go into

20:22

food. And I was like, okay. What

20:24

if I get another degree? He's like,

20:26

yes, if you get another degree, then

20:29

I think you'll be fine. So what

20:31

are you going to get? You're going

20:33

to get an NBA? And I said,

20:35

OK, I'll get an NBA. He said,

20:38

if you go to Harvard or Stanford?

20:40

Only those two. Only those two. Then

20:42

grandpa will pay for half. Grandpa have

20:45

high standards. So that is what we

20:47

did. You ended up at Stanford. I

20:49

ended up at Stanford. And then finally.

20:51

I was like, I got a job

20:54

as an intern for the most luminary,

20:56

the best of the best of the

20:58

best in food. His name is Danny

21:01

Meyer. I think I've made it grandpa.

21:03

And he was like, okay, baby doll,

21:05

okay. You know, but what I do

21:07

think is when he passed away, he

21:10

knew that I had found my thing.

21:12

Yeah. And he knew that my thing

21:14

was about serving people. And I think

21:16

that felt really good for both of

21:19

us. Exactly. What did you learn working

21:21

with Danny? Oh, first of all, Danny

21:23

is everything that he appears to be.

21:26

So one of the things that I

21:28

learned about Danny was to walk your

21:30

talk. I really learned from Danny Meyer

21:32

to walk your talk in all interactions.

21:35

Like, if you are going to be

21:37

someone who believes that culture is the

21:39

key to success, that has to flow

21:42

through consistently. the way you show up

21:44

in every interaction. And I've known Danny

21:46

for decades now, and it always does.

21:48

And to a person, I don't think

21:51

you'll find a person on the planet

21:53

who does. say the same. So I

21:55

really learned from Danny the power of

21:57

walking your talk. I think I also

22:00

learned from Danny like now we sort

22:02

of take for granted that culture is

22:04

a you know a key competency of

22:07

an organization but I learned that when

22:09

I read setting the table. And then

22:11

that was his iconic book. He's iconic

22:13

book which they teach at business school.

22:16

Yeah. You know it's not just for

22:18

the hospitality industry it's for all businesses.

22:20

So for a lot of people you

22:23

know you have a dream of working

22:25

in food you have a passion for

22:27

the category. You're now working for Danny

22:29

Meijer. You're there. You're aspiring to be

22:32

the Olympics. You made it. Right. But

22:34

you decided to leave and go start

22:36

a company. I know. OK, so this

22:39

is a very simple calculation. So I'm

22:41

working for Danny Meijer, which is just

22:43

my dream. I wouldn't have cared what

22:45

the job were as long as it

22:48

were in his organization. I would have

22:50

stacked books, washed dishes. It didn't matter.

22:52

But when I looked to my left

22:54

and my right, there were a sea

22:57

of other incredibly talented people who all

22:59

had more experience. I just thought to

23:01

myself, it's going to take a really

23:04

long time to be an owner. It's

23:06

going to take a really long time

23:08

to be an owner. And there's a

23:10

sea of people who are frankly more

23:13

qualified than me to take that next

23:15

spot. And I just didn't feel that

23:17

I had the patients. And so I

23:20

knew that I could work within Union

23:22

Square Hospitality Group for a number of

23:24

years and gain some really good core

23:26

skills. And then I just had to

23:29

go out on my own. Yeah. So

23:31

how did Mexico come to be? I

23:33

was set up on a friend date

23:36

with these in two incredible guys, Thomas

23:38

and Dave. They had built a food

23:40

truck called Mexico. It was... The most

23:42

successful food truck this is like the

23:45

one the food truck thing was really

23:47

happening in New York City when you

23:49

would like go on Twitter Not X

23:51

Twitter and you would tweet where your

23:54

food truck was and you'd pull up

23:56

and you'd have a line around the

23:58

block and then the cops would shut

24:01

you down Yeah, so it was like

24:03

it was the place You know I

24:05

was working in restaurants, which was cool

24:07

but food trucks was like 10 times

24:10

cooler. I mean this is the movie

24:12

chef right here. This is totally. And

24:14

Tom and Dave were also just like

24:17

intrinsically cool and they needed somebody really

24:19

to build some some business discipline. And

24:21

so I agreed to do a little

24:23

side project for them and you know

24:26

how these things go. That side project

24:28

turned into years of working together. It's

24:30

a story that. you do see over

24:32

and over again where you have people

24:35

who are more on the creative side

24:37

who just desperately need a business partner

24:39

who's got the structure and can handle

24:42

the legal, the finance, etc. And it

24:44

sounds like it was a really nice

24:46

marriage of skills and passion. And that

24:48

is my passion. I love the structure

24:51

of the business. That is actually what

24:53

gets me excited is like really building

24:55

in margin and like all of the

24:58

financial. tweaking that you can do to

25:00

a business in the early stage so

25:02

that when you're scaling, you're scaling a

25:04

healthy business. People think that's crazy. They're

25:07

like, wouldn't you rather be the one

25:09

doing the creative things? But I think

25:11

building businesses is incredibly creative. I actually

25:14

consider myself to be a creative. It's

25:16

just that my medium is business building.

25:18

It also takes a certain creativity and

25:20

skill set to be. I think or

25:23

who can put those things together and

25:25

work with people who are deeply creative

25:27

and don't have that part, right? I

25:29

mean, there's almost a translation that has

25:32

to happen in there for most people.

25:34

If you can speak both, you can

25:36

kind of make magic happen. I think

25:39

it is magic. It's like peanut butter

25:41

and jelly. You know, if you have

25:43

the data person alone, they're just dry.

25:45

They're substantive, but they're dry. And if

25:48

you have the storyteller. of the world,

25:50

Mexico Q. Presumably you could have used

25:52

that as a platform to build a

25:55

lot more, but you went and started

25:57

another company. What happened there? So do

25:59

you remember how you asked me before,

26:01

well you know you're working for a

26:04

daddy Meyer and that's kind of like

26:06

the sine qua non of, you know,

26:08

working in the food business? Why were

26:10

you still not satisfied? And it was

26:13

because I wanted to be an owner.

26:15

And I wanted to do something that

26:17

had a much bigger impact. Yeah, I

26:20

mean, to go back to Danny Meyer,

26:22

there are precious few shake checks that

26:24

scale that way and a lot more,

26:26

you know, men had to, or at

26:29

best, a daily provisions where you're going

26:31

to have a little bit of scale,

26:33

but you're not going to get... Big.

26:36

Absolutely. And I wanted my shake shack.

26:38

You know, I saw the early days

26:40

of what it was and what it

26:42

became. And I will tell you, I

26:45

absolutely thought, I wonder if there's a

26:47

shake shack in me, a shake shack-like

26:49

thing. It might not be a physical

26:52

restaurant, but a thing that could scale

26:54

and have that much impact. Okay. So,

26:56

and to be clear, Zoom is not

26:58

ZOMOM, the video conferencing app that we

27:01

all use after COVID, ZUEM, which Which

27:03

was what and how did it get

27:05

started? Yeah, so the problem that we

27:07

were trying to solve at Zoom is

27:10

similar to the problem that we're trying

27:12

to solve at Planet Forward, which is

27:14

essentially how do you feed the planet

27:17

without ruining the planet? And the thing

27:19

that we wanted to do was to

27:21

use technology, all types of technology, hardware,

27:23

everything in between, to rebuild the food

27:26

system from the bottom up. Mind you

27:28

this is also 2015, right? So this

27:30

is when we're seeing the beginnings of

27:33

Dora Dash. Like this is when we're

27:35

seeing Uber start to launch Uber eats.

27:37

Like this is a really juicy fruitful

27:39

time to be building anything innovative in

27:42

the food space. And so we did,

27:44

you know, I met my co-founder on

27:46

a Skype call. He wants a CEO

27:49

to run it and he's scouting for

27:51

CEOs and there I was. And so

27:53

I think we had a similar ambition

27:55

and a similar point of view on

27:58

what the food system could be and

28:00

it was again just right place, right

28:02

time. And what was that vision? It

28:04

was that we could rebuild the food

28:07

system from the bottom up to make

28:09

sure that we could create healthy, delicious,

28:11

affordable, affordable food without... ruining the planet.

28:14

And part of that involves... robotics. So

28:16

how did that become part of the

28:18

vision? Because it really became a huge

28:20

part of the story, right? Well when

28:23

you put the word, robot is a

28:25

sexy word. And pizza is a sexy

28:27

word. And pizza is a sexy word.

28:30

And when you put robot and pizza

28:32

together, people lose their minds. Like it

28:34

is, it's even though there were so

28:36

much more to the business, that part

28:39

is, it's just indelible. It's the chocolate

28:41

and peanut butter. And so, you know,

28:43

have you ever worked in a kitchen?

28:45

Have you ever had a kitchen job?

28:48

I've served tables. I've not worked in

28:50

a kitchen. And you know when you

28:52

even cross the precipice of that kitchen,

28:55

it is hot and it is dangerous.

28:57

It's hectic. And in a pizza kitchen,

28:59

you have a gigantic 800-degree oven in

29:01

the middle of a space where people

29:04

are working. Now, that's a really hard

29:06

place to be. And so what we

29:08

were trying to solve with the robots

29:11

was how can we reduce the tasks

29:13

that aren't really good for humans. So

29:15

that those humans can be doing other

29:17

things. It wasn't about automating the job

29:20

of being a cook. It was about

29:22

automating the tasks that were a drain

29:24

on safety and that were frankly repetitive,

29:27

like sticking pizza in and out of

29:29

an 800-degree oven for an eight-hour shift.

29:31

Because we were able to get the

29:33

robot styled in, it really improved our

29:36

logistics. We could do much more predictive

29:38

inventory management and creation of product because

29:40

we could code that into the robots.

29:42

And we had much more consistency around

29:45

the product which made it easier for

29:47

us to distribute. And if I remember

29:49

right, part of it, the concept of

29:52

the pizzas was also... You would do

29:54

assembly in one location and then the

29:56

pieces actually bake on a truck on

29:58

a way to be delivered. Yes. Do

30:01

I remember that right? Totally. So the

30:03

robots were something that we co-created together.

30:05

This idea for baking on the way,

30:08

I give total credit to my co-founder,

30:10

but you know, he was solving a

30:12

real problem, which is any time that

30:14

you get. delivery food, it's never as

30:17

delicious as if you got it at

30:19

the restaurant. What if we cook the

30:21

food on the way to the customer?

30:24

And pizza's a great place to start

30:26

because it's flat. So Zoom got big.

30:28

Really big. You raised how much total?

30:30

More than $500 million. That's a lot

30:33

of money. Yeah. And you got to

30:35

evaluation of 2.25. 2.25. Okay. I mean,

30:37

that's a massive, massive business over a

30:39

fairly short period of time. Just a

30:42

few years. You were obviously catching a

30:44

wave, which is easier than creating a

30:46

wave, but I mean, this is a

30:49

massive play. How did you get to

30:51

that scale that quickly? Well, I will

30:53

say that one of the things that

30:55

we did very well at Zoom was

30:58

to understand that there were multiple technologies

31:00

that we could build that would be

31:02

reinforcing of each other, but across different

31:05

commercial vertical. So we had an opportunity

31:07

around. a pizza business that we thought

31:09

could scale to dominoes, pizza hot proportions.

31:11

We had a technology around packaging, using

31:14

robots to create compostable packaging. That's a

31:16

massive industry. We had a technology around

31:18

logistics, kitchen management systems, kitchen display systems,

31:20

in real-time inventory management, which is a

31:23

big problem to solve in any delivery

31:25

company. That was a massive business. These

31:27

were all the technologies that we built

31:30

in parallel that reinforced each other, but

31:32

that had huge addressable markets, any one

31:34

of them. And so I think investors

31:36

thought there's seven bets on the table,

31:39

even if one of these bets is

31:41

true, it's going to be a massive

31:43

business. but we like the odds of

31:46

more than one. You know, sometimes it

31:48

felt like a well-oiled machine. Sometimes it

31:50

felt like a Rube Goldberg device. And

31:52

I think it just depends on, it

31:55

depends on the day, frankly. Yeah. So

31:57

Zoom ended up not working out. It

31:59

didn't end up having. its glorious exit.

32:02

What did you learn from the rapid

32:04

rise and then the fall of Zoom?

32:06

Yeah, I mean one of the

32:08

hardest things for me and the

32:10

story of Zoom is that I

32:12

left and so so much of what

32:14

I would have loved to happen I

32:17

wasn't there to be able to

32:19

really see it through and and

32:21

that's hard. I think it's hard

32:23

for any founder to put that

32:26

much of yourself into a business

32:28

and have to leave. I will say

32:30

a good lesson that I learned

32:32

is you can't judge yourself or

32:35

measure yourself based on the valuation

32:37

of your company. 2.25 billion valuation

32:39

company. That made me the first

32:42

black woman to ever become a

32:44

unicorn. That isn't going to be

32:46

on my epitaph. That isn't

32:48

the thing that I hope my

32:51

boys remember about me. It is

32:53

absolutely how many jobs did you create?

32:55

How much good did you do? How

32:57

did people feel about? the work that

33:00

they did for you? How did you

33:02

help people grow their careers? Did

33:04

you return investors value? And so

33:06

I also will say... I think because

33:09

of that failure I have like a

33:11

little chip on my shoulder which is

33:13

incredibly motivating because I still feel like

33:15

I have so much to prove and

33:17

so if we were to kind of

33:19

link where we are now with where

33:21

I was with Zoom I think kind

33:23

of that bridge is some of the

33:25

investors who came with me and some

33:27

of the employees who came with me

33:29

and that's that's very grounding for me.

33:31

You and I are sitting here

33:33

having this conversation the first quarter

33:36

of 2025. Climate change is a

33:38

political thing right now. How do

33:40

you think about running a business

33:43

that is both obviously clearly meant

33:45

to make money and you're a

33:47

capitalist and also serving a profound

33:50

social mission? Does it change how

33:52

you talk about it? Does it

33:54

change how you pitch it? What's

33:57

different in the current world for

33:59

you? The

40:17

lobatical is just one of

40:20

the ways that local ensures their

40:22

employees feel appreciated and cared for.

40:24

And feeling appreciated is a principle

40:26

that is shared by their partnership

40:29

with Capital One business. We love

40:31

our 2% cash back card. We

40:33

can use the rewards to care

40:35

for our employees. My favorite thing

40:37

about Capital One, whenever I need

40:39

to call, there's always a caring

40:41

helpful voice on the other end.

40:43

You can't manufacture care, especially in

40:45

a big company, and Capital One

40:47

cares. AI's

40:52

impact on the environment is

40:54

one of the most pressing

40:56

issues facing the tech industry

40:58

today. People want to know,

41:00

what's the carbon footprint of

41:02

a chat cheapie-t query? What

41:04

does it mean to innovate

41:06

sustainably? And can AI actually

41:08

be used to solve the

41:11

climate crisis? I'm Rana El

41:13

Calioui. On my podcast, pioneers

41:15

of AI, we bring questions

41:17

like this to some of

41:19

the leading thinkers and builders

41:21

working in AI. Join me

41:23

each week as we explore

41:25

how this technology is leaving

41:27

its mark on humanity and

41:29

our planet. Find pioneers of

41:31

AI on Apple podcasts, Spotify,

41:33

YouTube, or wherever you get

41:35

your podcasts. Our executive producer

41:37

is Eve Trot. Our senior

41:39

producer is Trisha Bobita. The

41:42

production team includes Tucker Lagurski,

41:44

Masha Makotunina, and Brandon Klein.

41:46

Our senior town executive is

41:48

Stefan. Stern, mixing and

41:50

and mastering by

41:52

Bassinelli and Brian

41:54

Pew. Original music by

41:56

Ryan Our head of

41:58

Our head

42:00

of podcasts is

42:02

Visit masters Visit to.com

42:04

to find

42:06

the transcript for

42:08

this episode

42:10

and to subscribe

42:13

to our

42:15

newsletter. our newsletter.