From Bootstrapping to Raising a Seed Round with Denise Woodard
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Meet Denise Woodard
Denise is the Founder and CEO of Partake Foods, a natural food company that was inspired by her daughter’s experience with food allergies. Launched in 2017, Partake’s first product — delicious, better for you, allergy-friendly cookies — can now be found in more than 9,000 retailers including WalMart, Target, Trader Joe's, Kroger, Whole Foods Market. In 2021, Partake released a line of Baking Mixes—Brownie Mix, Blondie Mix, and a Pizza Crust Baking Mix—all available on partakefoods.com. In January 2022, Partake introduced Pancake & Waffle Mixes in Classic & Confetti flavors available at select Target stores nationwide.
Denise is the first Black woman to raise more than $1 Million publicly for a CPG food startup.
Prior to launching Partake, Denise spent a decade in consumer packaged goods at various Fortune 100 companies. She lives in New York City with her husband, Jeremy, and daughter, Vivienne. She graduated with her BA from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and an MBA from Arizona State University.
Episode Highlights
During this episode of The Food Means Business Podcast, we discuss:
The inspiration behind Partake Foods and the event that forced Denise to tell her employer that she started a food business
Using LinkedIn to find product development help
Going from bootstrapping to a raising seed round of funding
Hiring employees and creating company culture during the Pandemic
The impact of entrepreneurship on her daughter
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00;00;00;03 - 00;00;04;07
Djenaba
All right. So, Denise, welcome to the Food Means Business podcast. I'm so excited that you're here.
00;00;04;13 - 00;00;07;25
Denise Woodward
Thank you so much for having me. Djenaba. I'm excited for our conversation.
00;00;08;14 - 00;00;35;29
Djenaba
So we've known each other for since the beginning of both of our businesses. Actually, we met during rising tide capital start something challenge pitch competition that you won that year I think it was 2016 is so exciting. It's been so exciting to see your kind of your trajectory of partake foods in the business. I would love to hear first about how you decided to take the leap from being a corporate employee to owning your own business.
00;00;36;09 - 00;01;06;27
Denise Woodward
Sure. So I think the decision, thankfully, was made for me after the start, something challenged. So I entered that pitch competition in 2016 with an idea for Partake and as you said, we ended up thankfully winning the competition. And while it came with a $10,000 cash prize, I think the thing that was more valuable was it came with some local press, which forced me to tell my employer that I was working on this business venture because otherwise I didn't want them to see me in the paper.
00;01;06;27 - 00;01;28;25
Denise Woodward
Like Woman starts allergy friendly food company. And so while they were supportive, they were also like, I was working at Coca-Cola. And so they were like, once you have an actual product, there's a conflict of interest here and you got to hit the road. I'm so grateful for that because I otherwise would have probably tried to turn partake into a side hustle because I was good for having one of those and we probably wouldn't be where we are today.
00;01;30;04 - 00;01;45;17
Djenaba
Yeah, that that's great. I, too, am kind of forced into being a business owner because I got laid off from my job and decided that I was going to not go back to corporate and just kind of start a business. So it does really they do really force you to do the do the right things and kind of with great results.
00;01;45;17 - 00;01;55;17
Djenaba
So that that's fantastic. So let's talk about you launching a cookie brand and kind of why you launched your Cookie Brand. I would love to hear that story.
00;01;55;26 - 00;02;16;10
Denise Woodward
Sure. So I have a seven year old daughter, Vivian. Around her first birthday. We learned she was allergic to eggs and corn and tree nuts and bananas, which is a really odd combination that is hard to shop for and hard to prepare food for. And so I was really frustrated with the things that we could find for her from a taste perspective, from a nutritional perspective.
00;02;16;10 - 00;02;37;04
Denise Woodward
But most of all, I thought about the emotional impact that having food allergies would have, how she wouldn't be able to confidently participate in birthday parties and playdates and all these celebrations that included food. It's like, Well, why isn't there a brand that makes products that taste good, that have ingredients you can feel good about, but is actually cool enough that someone without a life threatening allergy would actually choose to eat it?
00;02;37;12 - 00;02;42;09
Denise Woodward
And I couldn't find anything that I felt like fit the bill. And that's where the idea for Partake came from.
00;02;42;27 - 00;03;03;28
Djenaba
It's so great because both my children have food allergies. They're teenagers now. But they were. It was hard, like going to a birthday party. I would pack them a separate dessert so that they could celebrate with with the kids. So it's really nice that you kind of thought through what Vivienne would feel like as she's participating in these celebrations and created a product, I guess, for her and for everyone else as well.
00;03;03;28 - 00;03;23;22
Djenaba
So that that's fantastic. So let's talk about you actually creating the product because I talked to a lot of people, you know, having had some kitchen, I get a lot of phone calls that people that want to start businesses, but they don't have any experience with that particular type of thing. And while you have a lot of your work experience you're able to bring to your company, you still weren't baking cookies on a regular basis.
00;03;23;22 - 00;03;29;27
Djenaba
So can you just talk about how you took that from idea to actually getting a product that was created and on on the shelf?
00;03;30;06 - 00;03;50;17
Denise Woodward
Sure. So I am a mediocre baker at best. That might even be a stretch. And so I went and I spent hundreds of dollars at Whole Foods and I failed horribly. And I realized why so many of the allergy friendly products on the market have the same few ingredients in them. But I didn't feel like that was acceptable.
00;03;50;17 - 00;04;12;15
Denise Woodward
And so one of the mistakes I actually made in the business was I reached out to a blogger who had a really large following in the gluten free community, and while she followed the brief that I provided her, the product that she created would never scale from a commercial, from a kitchen at home to commercial production. And so we ended up not being able to use that formula.
00;04;12;15 - 00;04;37;09
Denise Woodward
And I spent $8,000 on it, which was a huge, huge sum of money to me then. Yes, even more so that and still now. But then it was like put you out of business kind of money. And so I thankfully was able to find on LinkedIn this woman who's an absolute dream. She has she was trained at the Culinary Institute of America, but she also led product development for one of the largest allergy friendly food companies.
00;04;37;09 - 00;04;57;00
Denise Woodward
And she responded to my cold email and I think she took pity on me after my story and she agreed to work with us. We still work with her to this day on all the new products that we launch. So I how I found a professional product developer to help bring the vision to life because I didn't feel like I could do it on my own and meet the mission that I was trying to accomplish.
00;04;57;00 - 00;05;11;06
Denise Woodward
And so I think the lesson there for me was to get creative in how we find the resource and also know when to bring resources in. There's definitely things that I feel better at doing, like sales and marketing in the business. And then there's some things that I'm terrible at, like product development.
00;05;13;12 - 00;05;35;14
Djenaba
That makes total sense. So let's talk about money. So you so we talked about the start something challenge and you got a $10,000 prize from that from that event. And then you went on to do, I Know, a Kickstarter campaign which was very successful, enabled you to kind of get the business off the ground. But after that, how did you how did you fund the business?
00;05;35;15 - 00;05;36;17
Djenaba
Can you talk a little bit about that?
00;05;36;27 - 00;06;00;12
Denise Woodward
Sure. So we launched in August of 2017. That's when I left my job and we actually had product. We had three flavors of cookies and I sold them out of my car to natural food stores in the New York and New Jersey area. And we bootstrapped the business. You know, my family probably put in about $140,000 from idea to when we first raised outside capital in the end of 2018.
00;06;01;12 - 00;06;26;02
Denise Woodward
It was from our savings. I emptied my 401k, I maxed out all of my credit cards. I opened up new credit cards to maxed out. I sold my engagement ring. We were all in for better or worse, financially into the business. We were seeing really strong business results at retail, which gave me the confidence to keep going. But I underestimated how expensive it would be, even though I felt like I was being a scrappy as possible.
00;06;27;04 - 00;06;35;08
Djenaba
Yeah. Thank you for admitting that you actually cleaned out your 41k and maxed out your credit cards. I cleaned out my four I when I was a little bit embarrassed about it.
00;06;36;18 - 00;06;49;18
Denise Woodward
Well, I don't know if I was as forthcoming with the information at that time. At the time, I was definitely embarrassed when I was like having my husband look up diamond dealers to go sell my engagement ring. But now you look back on it and it ended up working out okay. Yeah.
00;06;50;24 - 00;07;04;22
Djenaba
It's good. So then you went on to be the first black woman to raise $1 million. So talk a little bit about your journey. And I and I, from what I understand, you got a lot of nos of where you got that. Yes. So you can talk about your journey with fundraising.
00;07;05;01 - 00;07;31;14
Denise Woodward
Sure. So when we were kind of financially tapped out, I started to try to raise a friends and family round of funding. There's no accredited investors in my family, so that's pretty a pretty loose term. And friends and family, I think, you know, as my husband's old colleagues, my old colleagues, people as extended family members, like folks showing up with ten, five, ten, $15,000 checks that helped keep the lights on, but it never came at one time.
00;07;31;14 - 00;07;49;24
Denise Woodward
So we're always about to run out of money. But we raised about $400,000 over the span of maybe 6 to 8 months. And then I started to try to raise a seed round of funding. I wanted to raise $1,000,000, and I was out on the Angel Network pitching to all these different groups and got on my spreadsheet. I had at least 86.
00;07;49;24 - 00;08;04;08
Denise Woodward
I really feel like I got more than 100 no's. And thankfully in June of 2019, we closed the million dollar round in Marcy Venture Partners, which is the venture capital fund that Jay Z co-founded, led the round for us, which was really transformational for our business.
00;08;05;25 - 00;08;15;25
Djenaba
That that's great. So let's talk about you becoming were a solopreneur in 2020 and now you have 17 employees, is that right?
00;08;15;27 - 00;08;18;09
Denise Woodward
Will be 20 at the end of this month. It is.
00;08;18;09 - 00;08;36;16
Djenaba
Really. That's so exciting. So talk about that, the decision to hire your first employee. And then I also would love to hear about how you created culture within the company. I mean, kind of have been have had to ramp up really, really quickly. So I would love to hear about how you have been hiring employees and creating culture.
00;08;36;26 - 00;08;58;25
Denise Woodward
Sure. So on the hiring front, our first employee was a director of operations because that was the thing that I wasn't particularly good at and was spending a lot of my time doing everything from ordering ingredients to scheduling production to figuring out the freight situation. And then we hired a director of sales after that because we felt like we had more opportunities than I could cover from a sales perspective.
00;08;58;25 - 00;09;21;13
Denise Woodward
And the team continued to grow out from there. We used outsource consultants wherever possible to avoid having like a high overhead in payroll, just kind of given the state of the business, the cash situation. But now we've really started to build the team out more in terms of the building culture. So we grew from one turf dove during the pandemic.
00;09;21;13 - 00;09;39;25
Denise Woodward
So we, you know, there were team members that I had never met in person until 2021. But you get to know people really quickly, even virtually on the startup journey. So that's been nice. But I do also think you have to be very deliberate about building culture and I think a lot of that in a founder led company is what's modeled by the founder.
00;09;39;25 - 00;09;58;02
Denise Woodward
And so what I think about some of our values, about being kind and having integrity and treating the customer like customer first mentality, I think a lot of that exhibited hopefully through my behavior. I think that a lot of times people think culture is like putting a poster on the wall or like going to happy hours or having beanbag chairs in the office.
00;09;58;02 - 00;10;20;13
Denise Woodward
But I think it's really the consistency of how the leader and the leadership team are showing up, the policies that exist, how you're hiring folks, how you're bringing investors in investors, what investors you're bringing in. And so at partake inclusivity and lifting as we climb are really important values to us. And so when I think about inclusivity, we're making a product that over 90% of people can eat safely.
00;10;20;20 - 00;10;43;28
Denise Woodward
Our investor group is primarily women, and people of color are funds that specifically invest in those groups. Our team is 90% women and 60% people of color. And so I think the culture and the values have to show up in everything that you do for us. Also, lifting as we climb is really important. We started a fellowship program among several historically black colleges and universities in 2020 when we were just a team of three.
00;10;44;13 - 00;10;53;18
Denise Woodward
This year, we committed to provide a million meals to no kid hungry, and so, like, how do we look at underestimated underserved, underrepresented communities and how do we help lift them up and give them opportunity?
00;10;54;01 - 00;11;13;25
Djenaba
Yeah, that's fantastic. So a starting a business and running a business, it takes a lot of time. So can you talk about the impacts on your family? I mean, I think I think, you know, having seen my have my kids watch me grow a business, I think it was a positive impact. But I love to hear about about your your daughter and your husband.
00;11;14;00 - 00;11;31;04
Denise Woodward
Sure. I think for an entrepreneur to be successful, I can't see how it can be done if the whole family's not on board. There's been so many playdates and celebrations that my daughter's missed because she had to go like she can set up a trade to trade shows was probably faster than like an adult. And same with my husband.
00;11;31;04 - 00;11;47;14
Denise Woodward
Like he works in finance, but he would show up in a suit and tie at a local grocery store with a t shirt in his backpack and do a demo after a long day of work. And I think it's that type of support that I'm so fortunate to have, but that's also necessary to be successful. I do think it's had a positive impact on my daughter.
00;11;47;14 - 00;12;02;18
Denise Woodward
It's interesting will walk down the aisles of Target and she has so much and so much feedback. What do you think of the product packaging on that? Do you know the founder of that company? And like I didn't even like in my mind as a child walking through a grocery store, it was all like very abstract to me.
00;12;02;18 - 00;12;21;05
Denise Woodward
She understands, like, like you can create something at your house and then serve and help millions of people and thinks that's normal. But she also understands the hard work and sacrifice that comes along with that. So I'm really excited for her and proud of that. But I also think, you know, the people ask a lot about work life balance and that piece of it.
00;12;21;05 - 00;12;40;16
Denise Woodward
And being a founder at a startup is all encompassing. I don't think I've ever taken a day off, not Christmas, not Thanksgiving. It I'm not saying that's healthy and I'm not recommending that, but I think a lot of times people are quick to throw up like means of, you know, journal every day and then do your yoga and your workout and then have your tea and do all these things.
00;12;40;16 - 00;12;52;21
Denise Woodward
I'm like, Wow, that sounds wonderful in theory, and I'm trying to squeeze in as much of that as I can. The reality of it is, as a founder, all of the good stuff and all of the bad stuff is going to rest on your shoulders. And it's a lot.
00;12;53;16 - 00;13;01;16
Djenaba
It's true, like the highs are high and the lows are very low. Can you can you talk about more about the lessons that you learned of being a founder?
00;13;01;26 - 00;13;32;01
Denise Woodward
Sure. To try to stay in the middle because the highs are high and the lows are low and they happen in the same day, sometimes in the same hour, to have a North Star that is much bigger than like wanting to have a lot of social media followers or get rich, that there's no silver bullet magic wand. I think we I thought like, you know, once we got into target nationally or once we brought on this celebrity investor, once we got this new team member, that's not like there's not one thing, at least from what I've seen, that's going to propel a business to success.
00;13;32;08 - 00;13;51;07
Denise Woodward
It's day in, day out, consistency, putting your head down and doing the work. I think also another tidbit would be to run your own race. It's so easy to look at like Noche and Bev Net and the press releases and wonder like, Well, why is my business not growing like that? And why haven't I raised that much money? And a lot of it's smoke and mirrors?
00;13;51;07 - 00;13;55;24
Denise Woodward
And so focus on what success looks like to you and building the business that you're going to be proud of.
00;13;56;15 - 00;14;13;14
Djenaba
It's true. It's so hard because you just see what everyone else is doing and you think that you're behind when you're you know, you're right. You are just kind of running your own race. So we have a money bell at Hudson Kitchen and we ring it when we want to celebrate something. So I was wondering, what are you celebrating?
00;14;14;15 - 00;14;37;28
Denise Woodward
I am celebrating. So the business has grown quite a bit. We're in about 10,000 stores right now, so I'm excited about the fact that we've been able to take this thing from small, independent, a small handful of independent stores to the biggest retailers in the country. I'm proud of the way we've done that and how we've treated our team and how we've held on to our integrity and the quality of our products.
00;14;38;14 - 00;14;51;01
Denise Woodward
And we're in the midst of closing a Series B, so I'm proud that we were able to get this done and in a fairly challenging environment with the folks that we're excited to work with that we think will bring strategic value and also mission and vision alignment to our business.
00;14;51;20 - 00;14;59;24
Djenaba
Oh, congratulations. That's all so very exciting. So, Denise, please tell everyone where they can find out about you and partake foods.
00;15;00;06 - 00;15;09;00
Denise Woodward
Sure you can find partake on any of the social media channels and our handle is partake foods. And then you can find me on Instagram at Denise G. Woodford.
00;15;10;18 - 00;15;12;15
Djenaba
Well, thank you so much for being here.
00;15;12;15 - 00;15;13;21
Denise Woodward
Thank you for having me.
Connect with Denise:
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