Balancing Business With Family and Strategies for Growing Your Food Business With Leslie Danford
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How You Can Balance Family & Your CPG Food Business…
Does starting your food business feel like a daunting task? If you’re like most people, it’s easy to get so overwhelmed by the road ahead that you never take that first step! That’s why I want to encourage you to take action today with some insight from the expert herself.
In this episode, I’m joined by Leslie Danford, the founder of Vitaminis and a true action-taker who got her beverage product launched and out into the world in lightning speed.
Leslie shares how she saw her opportunity, dove in with both feet, and didn’t take no for an answer. From balancing family life to marketing Vitaminis for the first time, she’s spilling all her secrets to success.
Plus, Leslie also talks about her personal advice and the biggest lesson she has learned along her entrepreneurial journey.
If you’ve been dragging your feet or feeling stuck, this might be just the inspiration you need to start your business, once and for all!
Subscribe to the Food Means Business Podcast with Hudson Kitchen founder Djenaba Johnson-Jones to hear the personal stories and “secret ingredients” of abandoning your day job and starting a CPG food business.
In this episode, you’ll learn...
[00:36] How Leslie made her transition from the corporate world to entrepreneurship
[04:06] Leslie’s approach to getting her company, Vitaminis, off the ground and launched
[07:45] Concepting the name “Vitaminis” as well as the product’s branding and packaging
[14:25] Balancing work with family and strategies for outsourcing specific business tasks
[21:46] Promoting the business through social media, sampling, and email marketing
If you want to learn more on balancing family & your food business, be sure to tune into this episode:
Links mentioned in this episode…
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About Leslie Danford:
Leslie Danford, founder and CEO of Vitaminis, a clean-label functional food and beverage brand. She has always been passionate about nutrition, but she is not a foodie. For her, it's like a math equation, and it's important to cover all of your nutritional bases. In 2020 she combined her personal interests with her formal business training to launch Vitaminis. Previously she worked in beverages and consumer products at large corporations. She earned her MBA from Harvard University and her BA from the University of Chicago.
About Vitaminis:
Vitaminis is a clean-label functional food and beverage brand. These tasty, nutritional juice shots aid in immune support and gut health with no added sugar or mystery ingredients, no strong flavors, and no refrigeration required. Immune Support juice shots have as much Zinc as four avocados and as much Magnesium as 5 cups of spinach, while Gut Health juice shots have as much fiber as 1 cup of broccoli and as many probiotics as 2 cups of yogurt in delicious fruit juice. Unlike other juice shots, they have no strong flavors like ginger and turmeric, and they are easier to swallow and digest than pills and gummies. They are non-GMO, 100% vegan, and allergen friendly. At 2.5 ounces and with no refrigeration required, it's portable and can be taken anywhere, mixed in a smoothie, or popped into a lunch box.
Connect with leslie:
Connect with Leslie Danford on LinkedIn
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[00:00:03] Djenaba Johnson-Jones: You are listening to the Food Means Business podcast, which features the personal stories and secret ingredients behind what it's like to abandon your day job to start a CPG, food and beverage business. I'm Djenaba Johnson-Jones, former marketing executive turned entrepreneur and founder of food business incubator Hudson Kitchen. So in our community of fellow food business owners and subject matter experts to learn and laugh with us as we explore a startup world that's a little more culinary and a lot less corporate these days. So, Leslie, welcome to the Food Means Business podcast. [00:00:33][30.5]
[00:00:34] Leslie Danford: Thanks for having me. [00:00:35][0.8]
[00:00:36] Djenaba Johnson-Jones: I'm so glad that you're here. Before we jump in and talk about your business. I'd love to hear about your trajectory. How did you go from corporate to working in your own business? [00:00:45][9.5]
[00:00:46] Leslie Danford: Oh my goodness. It's been a long, winding journey that I could never predict and which I'm sure you probably hear from everyone. But I really wanted to be an entrepreneur as far back as I can remember. Like my mom tells me stories. When I was seven, I wrote a little book like colored a book, and I borrowed money from her to make copies of it. And then I sold it for a quarter. And then in college I was a group called the Chicago Entrepreneurial Society. She met my husband there. We talked about, like, bigotry, binaries and everything. And then I think somehow in my head I got the idea that I needed to get all of this experience and do all of these things first. And that kind of sent me down a path of like a more traditional career. So I worked for a while finance and went to business school. I went into consulting, which kind of funneled up a lot of my business school classmates. And at the time they were saying, you know, do this and you'll learn so much and then you'll have an even better opportunity doing whatever you want to do next. And it was a great experience. But it's kind of like the years went by, years of by. And I ultimately had left consulting. I was working in the beverage industry, alcoholic, for about four years, and I had this nagging thought the back of my head. I still thought and like, I really want to start a company someday. And we actually saw a lot of research coming through when I was at that company about health and wellness trends, nutrition trends, you know, foods, beverages, just different messages pointing toward the consumer wanted around healthier, clean, convenient options. And I knew we were not going to do anything at our company at that information. I actually started a slide at my computer and I started writing this down. Somebody should do this. Here's a good idea. Somebody should do that. That was probably like 2017. So like three years before actually ended up starting the company. And ultimately what made me do it was I had moved into hospitality right before Covid and I got laid off. So with kind of looking around for a job, no one was hiring. Everything was kind of thrown off the usual routine, which kept me in busy, busy mode. And it all kind of like bubbled back up. I've always wanted to do this, you know, Here's my chance. And so I finally decided to just give it a go. [00:02:54][128.3]
[00:02:55] Djenaba Johnson-Jones: That's amazing. So I also I read that you had a baby during that time also. [00:02:59][4.0]
[00:03:00] Leslie Danford: Yes, that's true, too. I know it's funny. I actually think when I look back, I think Covid threw me so out of my normal routine that it resulted in a whole bunch of different changes. But I had three boys in the city we lived in. I'm like one of those tall, skinny, like high rise paper places, and they all crammed in there. And I'd always wanted to have a fourth kid, and my husband was like, No way do you live in the city life? It was busy. It was crazy. And then we ended up moving to the suburbs during Covid as well to get away from some of the rioting and stuff that was happening. It was, was and I think when we moved to the suburbs, it was like, okay, we can actually see how we could possibly make this work. Now we have our space and everything was working yet. So that all sort of came at the same time. So I actually found out I was pregnant with my daughter basically while I was working on the formula for Vitaminis. And so I said to myself, okay, I have nine months to get this product out the door before I get like, take a little break with my baby. And so it was kind of like dual time this time. It's crazy. [00:04:04][64.1]
[00:04:06] Djenaba Johnson-Jones: Talk about that. So having like you kind of had a tight timeline, which I think makes a lot of sense, I had another client that had kind of had the same thing happen to her. So I'm just wondering like, how do you get it all done and get the product launched? [00:04:16][10.5]
[00:04:17] Leslie Danford: Oh, gosh. I mean, you know, it's funny because you always look back and you think kind of what I showed, you know? And so when I look back, I actually think I could have spent a little bit more time in the sort of research thinking perfectionism phase before I launch the product. However, on the other hand, I think you could get stuck in ATV's forever. So I think the deadline really pushed me to what I think of as 8020 principle. Like what is the 80% answer that's going to make this work? I can get something out in the world and just get going with it. It really forced that process. So I spent some time in the very beginning ideating, and because I was self-funded, I wasn't going to go like hire a company to give you a bunch of insights. Like what? I would have done a big corporate right? It's like a $200,000 study or something, right? So I just interviewed all my friends. I set up calls with them, I had an interview guy, and I said, I know we're friends and we usually just chit chat, but I'm going to interview you. And I took notes and I asked questions about their nutrition and their challenges and what their preferences were. And I basically just did that for a few weeks while I was simultaneously kind of like ideating with a formulator. And it all sort of came together with the idea in the spring of 2021. And then it took me a good six, 3 to 6 months to find the co-packer who could do it and actually do it. [00:05:39][81.6]
[00:05:40] Djenaba Johnson-Jones: And do it the way you wanted it done, right? [00:05:41][1.4]
[00:05:42] Leslie Danford: Yes. Yeah, it was a bit of a capabilities thing. So Vitaminis, these are these little bottles which are kind of unique and they're also shelf stable. So there's a lot of co-packers that do shelf stable, but mostly like eight for those bottles. Right. A lot of co-packers that do shots but refrigerated like fresh pressed juice. And so finding that intersection took I probably could call maybe like 50 or 75. [00:06:05][23.0]
[00:06:06] Djenaba Johnson-Jones: Okay. So talk about that process a little bit. I know it can be daunting, but how did you kind of land with the right one? [00:06:12][6.5]
[00:06:13] Leslie Danford: Oh, gosh, yes. So I started most of where I started at most areas where I didn't know what to do, which is a lot of areas. I did work at beverages, but I had never done anything exactly like this. So where I started for almost everything was in the community of other startup founders, because I found that if another startup founder recommended someone to me in any area, that meant that they were not only like good to work with but also worth the money. Got the results. Like I would never recommend somebody that I wasn't happy with. And so I knew any recommendation coming from that network kind of like vetted already. And that's when I started with the co-packers. In this case, I'm part of the group start up CPG. [00:06:55][41.8]
[00:06:56] Djenaba Johnson-Jones: Where, yeah, they're they're amazing. [00:06:57][1.1]
[00:06:58] Leslie Danford: Yes, they were amazing. And they had a database of co-packers. And this is now, you know, two and a half years ago. I'm sure it's still floating around somewhere. [00:07:05][7.2]
[00:07:05] Djenaba Johnson-Jones: It is, yeah. [00:07:06][0.5]
[00:07:06] Leslie Danford: There was a giant database and you could filter it by a capability. Is so like, is it a juice? Is it a little like whatever, dry goods. And then once I filtered that list, that's what I started, cold calling. And a lot of it you did have to have that conversation because on paper they may look good, but they don't tell you what their order minimums are or they maybe they don't even respond to you or whatever it is. So it just narrowed down. The one that I ended up with was actually a recommendation from my formulator. So it's funny, I went through this whole other process, but then ended up finding the one I went with through a different process. Right? You never know. [00:07:44][38.4]
[00:07:45] Djenaba Johnson-Jones: Yeah, it's true. So talk about the name Vitaminis, where did that come from? How did you come up with that? [00:07:52][6.1]
[00:07:52] Leslie Danford: Yeah. So I when I started the idea process, there was another woman that I had worked with at the alcohol company who had also left at that time, and she had left to start her own agency, like marketing, branding, marketing agency. But she's kind of like a solo person with a lot of different like connections, somebody that might do copywriting, somebody that might do this or that. So we worked together on the name and there were quite a few processes with that was a kind of a it wasn't very structure, but it took a while because I wanted something that was catchy and inspirational, but also self-explanatory, which is just sort of a hard balance because I remember some of the names in the beginning were very kind of high level, like wellness for like lifestyle. And I'm like, That sounds awesome, especially when you want to build a big platform, but like, what is it like if someone is like, Oh, have you tried? Well, listen, what is that? So I remember we went a lot of back and forth and then the last stage is really pushing out like more descriptive ness. And somebody, not me, I did not come up with it someday throughout my activities. And I was like, Yes, that's it. And then immediately I went and checked the trademark database and no. Yes, nobody got me yet. Sounds like we got it in. So I didn't trademark Vitamini and Vitaminis. [00:09:15][82.6]
[00:09:16] Djenaba Johnson-Jones: Okay, that's great. Yeah, you definitely have to check the database. Check trademark database for sure, because I know quite a few brands that have had to rebrand because of the system, desist from another company. So but boy, that's definitely, definitely crazy. So talk about the packaging. So it is like it is like a shot. And as you mentioned, like they're typically refrigerated. Like what did you how did you end up coming up with that type of packaging and what made you go with your logo? Give us the whole brand out of it. [00:09:41][25.2]
[00:09:41] Leslie Danford: Yeah. Again, it's sort of it's trial and error and it's easy to look at someone else's company and think they like had a genius idea that just happened. That's never how it works, you know? So I actually, coming from the drinks business, previously, my prior life, I had kind of gravitated towards a beverage for a number of reasons. The convenience of it, the tastiness, even. I personally I'm not a big fan of pills and Gummy is in my own like Wallace life. And so to me, like a liquid is the perfect vehicle, easily digestible. It's easy, convenient, tasty, you know, and depending on the format, you don't have to mix and measure like all that kind of stuff. And I knew it had to be easy. It tastes good. So I kind of like in the world of beverages and I did think about for a while doing a full sized drink, but I would deter it away from it for a number of reasons. But the main one was this is during Covid and it had to be e-commerce friendly. There was no retail. So that's like one of those interesting things where if I'd done it a different time, maybe I ought to come up with a different thing. But I knew I had to start an E commerce, and I thought, if you're shipping a package of 12 full size drinks, that's like $10 plus shipping in a stack of work, right? I just honestly, all of that just kind of led me. I think at one point my formulator was suggesting those powder packets, but that just didn't quite sit right with me in terms of being like really tasty and easy because then you're measuring and there's something about it too. With powders, it's like, what is in there? Is it natural? So I had this vision, so like a very natural juice with extra nutrients in it and just kind of went in that direction. [00:11:17][96.4]
[00:11:19] Djenaba Johnson-Jones: Amazing. So talk about your family a little bit. I know that your daughter had some health issues, so Yes. How you dealt with that. [00:11:28][9.2]
[00:11:28] Leslie Danford: Yeah, Yeah, I know about my kids right here and my little girl. Now I have three boys now. They're 18 months apart. So I had them when I mean all I was one of those things. So it's like, oh yeah, they'll be close to be great. Well, it's like, get the diaper phase over with, like, you know, blitz the nation. Well, this is. So, yeah, I know. And so I had my three boys when I started the company, they were fives six and seven are like four, six and seven or something and they were all like healthy. Never had any health issues, easy natural births. Like nothing like very easy pregnancy. No, nothing. So I just I think I was kind of spoiled in that sense. I was like, just whatever. Because you never know what life is throwing it to you, you know? It's the same thing. I never thought I would get laid off, for example, like I didn't get laid off that episode. Other people, well, guess what? I work for everybody. But yeah, my daughter. So I when I found out I was pregnant around the same time I was working on Vitaminis, I had a very healthy pregnancy, no issues. I did all the testing, I did all the vitamins and did all the prenatal appointments. Nothing came up at all. And then when she was born in September, everything was normal, healthy, natural, born again, nothing except that she felt her hearing screen. And because we have no hearing loss in our family at all, my husband and I were like, Oh, that's weird. And the nurse even said, Oh, it's probably just fluid in her ears. Like, don't think anything of it. So of course you get anything of it. And so it actually told us that was September, and then it actually took us about two months to get her final diagnosis that she was, in fact death. So in November, we found out she was deaf. And by that point, I had enough clues, you know, so my fourth child, like you could drop a pin on the floor of the kitchen and she would wake up right now like there's something here. But part of me wanted to believe she's just a good sleeper. But then I was like, okay. So and then we also noticed she had some delays with, like, holding her head up and kind of like this muscle strength things. So we found she's deaf in November and then they recommend some genetic testing when you have a deaf child and that took months to get results back was sometime in like February, March, we found out she's Usher syndrome. So it's a syndrome. It's jazz syndrome where you're born deaf and you have some balance issues, which is some of her balance things. And then it comes with progressive eyesight loss over time. So most people with her condition will lose her, I say, to be legally blind around age ten. So that was a crazy, crazy, you know, I would have just never even thought anything like that. I never knew any blind people, never read anything. People didn't know what a book that was. And it's crazy because now she's two and we have come so far like we know sign language. She has cochlear implant, she's speaking, she's doing all these therapies. But it's just it's just funny. You never, never know what life is going to throw at you. But yeah, that has been quite the adventure. [00:14:24][175.8]
[00:14:25] Djenaba Johnson-Jones: That's amazing. I'm so happy that she is is doing really well, so. Oh, that's really great. Yeah. So talk about how you manage the business throughout all of that because you know, we have these businesses, but then like life is happening at the same time. How are you balancing everything? [00:14:41][16.3]
[00:14:42] Leslie Danford: Yeah, I think for me it kind of comes in waves and I wouldn't say that goes with like how much time you have and energy you have, what your mental state is. You know, there's times where you're able to just pour yourself in to work and there's times where you just not feeling it. And so what I tried to do is when I'm feeling really energized, I do try to push myself back and it's like, Sure, I got to do this, you know? And that might mean outsourcing a little bit more of child activities that I might like to do. And I realize I need to focus on work or whatever it is. Or maybe it's like skipping more social events, you know, and just focusing there. But then on the other times when I don't see on, it's feel like a struggle and I don't know exactly what to do and I feel kind of drained. I really lean on sort of discipline where it's like, okay, wake up and do at least a couple things. And then in a break, take a break, you know, maybe do this social event, maybe go to the kids game. So that's kind of how I try to think about it. And I try not to like catastrophize, you know, if I have a bad day or a bad week. Brad Things are too busy or I just can't. And I'm feeling bummed about it easy by just trying to like, think, okay, well, I'm at least I'm getting more stuff done on the family side and then on times when maybe I feel like I missed a lot of kids activities and feeling the mom guilt, I think, well, I can lean into that later. At least I'm getting some progress here. So it's kind of a it's a constant back and forth and you never quite get it right. At least I. [00:16:04][81.8]
[00:16:04] Djenaba Johnson-Jones: Never feel like I hear, you know, I never get it right that my kids are older, but I still don't feel like I'm getting it right. [00:16:10][5.8]
[00:16:11] Leslie Danford: Just do the best you can, right? [00:16:12][1.0]
[00:16:12] Djenaba Johnson-Jones: Yeah, exactly. Exactly. Exactly. So since you, you know, you did you do have a I wouldn't say a large family maybe you don't think, but I have two kids or like seems like a lot to me. But I'm just wondering I can talk about staffing the business. Like, what did you do in it? Was it just you in the beginning or were you able to bring on some help to try to move the business forward? [00:16:33][20.4]
[00:16:34] Leslie Danford: Yeah, it I have always only been the only full time employee, but I will say in consumer products, everything is quite easily outsourced. Well, my husband works for a tech startup in in tech you need to hire full time developers and. Software engineers and you need millions of dollars to like build something that takes years. Whereas I think in consumer products, you can invest a smaller amount for a part of someone's time with a certain expertise, whether it's packaging, design or co-packer, whatever. And it's much easier to kind of cobble together that end product without a huge, huge commitment from a bunch of employees. So that has worked out. It is expensive, you know, developing Zoomer products. You do have to like invest in inventory in the development of it. So that's like the flip side of that. But I found really great contractors like my marketing person now is working with me for almost two years and my person helps to my Amazon account to have a lot of different people involved. And the other thing that I really leaned in on recently, especially are interns. There are a lot of really great free intern programs out there where maybe they're looking to provide jobs for someone who might not have as many opportunities. And so it's like you can hire from this pool or some of the other programs I've seen recently are actually high schoolers that are looking to get more worked around in advance, and they're willing to work for a very nominal amount because they want the experience. And so that has worked out really well for me. I mean, of course when you get someone to engage for college, you don't have a lot of expertise necessarily, but they're energetic. They get social media right where they want to learn. So I bet a lot of value out of that. I've probably had maybe six interns now over the past year on and off for a couple of months over the summer or part time while they're students. And that's been a really great way to build the business. [00:18:23][109.3]
[00:18:24] Djenaba Johnson-Jones: So I didn't really hesitant to hire intern. I'm wondering, like if you could talk about the product that you've given one of them or a group of them and that they were able to handle. [00:18:32][7.8]
[00:18:33] Leslie Danford: Yeah, it it is a challenge. I thought in the beginning I couldn't wrap my head around something to outsource because and looking back on it, the reason was I wasn't myself organized enough. I kind of fighting all the fires all the time. And so it felt like I can't really outsource the decision making. And so there wasn't like anything concrete. But within the last year, I finally have gotten the business to a place where I have some structure with it. It's been a lot easier. So I've had a lot of great success with interns on social media, which it's sort of an obvious one. But if you think about it, it's quite discreet. You know, you give someone a log into your Tik Tok and your Instagram and you say, Let's try to post to three times a week. Here's some of the content that's worked in the past. But it's like, tell me, like, what do you see trending? What do you think would work? And then also within social media, I have my interns engaging with influencers. So these spend at least an hour a day, so five hours a week just on the platform, commenting, liking whatever different people, but also go poking around, you know, like search for people that are experts in gut health or immunity or healthy eating and then connect with them and send them a note up. So that has been very easy. And that's also something where it really doesn't take that long for someone to ramp up like a week and then they need to roll off. It's pretty easy. You just not take over. So that's been a really good one. Another thing that I just had an intern helping me with recently, Vitaminis is hosting an online summit called Nourish and Flourish Summit, which is basically a bunch of expert speakers talking about different areas of holistic health and wellness. And that has been a great way the intern has been a great support and done it without her in terms of reaching out to potential speakers, you know, compiling the videos, you know, organizing emails that go out, listen, guidance from me. But my those are two examples. And then the third one is interesting because I don't think it's like maybe your typical internship, but I had two interns on sampling as well. Interesting. On the one hand, I think some people look at sampling and they're like, Oh, that's not like a professional type of project. But I really beg to differ because I have personally done 100 samplings or turning point. And it's not just like getting people to use the product, it's perfecting the pitch. Sure. Yeah. What resonates? Taking note of what customers are walking by? Are they older or the younger? What's their gender? Or do they have families? So it's almost like market research and marketing messaging testing. And so how I enter position, those internships, it's like, yeah, I do watch you in stores for 3 or 4 hours at a time, but I want you to come back to me with feedback on the product. What are some of the comments you received? What messaging resonated? What suggestions do people have that kind of thing? [00:21:18][165.8]
[00:21:19] Djenaba Johnson-Jones: I love that. That's such good information. That's good for me so far. [00:21:22][3.3]
[00:21:23] Leslie Danford: Yeah, not everybody's up for that. I mean, I think a lot of people want to work behind a computer. They want to do the social media because it's like fiber in their phone. And it really is a hard job to, like set that up and just put yourself out there. Yeah, roll their eyes at you for three hours straight. But if you're up for it, I think it's a really great experience for interns to to develop their confidence and their people skills, you know? [00:21:46][22.6]
[00:21:46] Djenaba Johnson-Jones: Sure, Sure. So you mentioned. Social media and sampling. What other things are you doing to market the business? [00:21:50][4.2]
[00:21:52] Leslie Danford: So sampling social, we do a lot of email. So I for the first year of the business was very focused on social media in my head. That was just what you did, you know? And so I did a lot of organic posts, which is extremely time consuming and very yield, I do think necessary to some extent because people go to your social media profile like your website, they want to see what they're. But no one is converting off social media. They're just like they're just not. And then I tried some paid and it was very expensive and honestly didn't really convert either. It's like, well, you got a lot of likes and comments, but no, we bought it. So after doing that for about a year, I really shifted focus to email. And it's interesting, on the one hand, email feels like this sort of antiquated technology that people should be moving away from. But on the other hand, if you think about it on social, you're sort of like mindlessly scrolling and you might look at something for two seconds and move on to an email you have asked to receive. Some information is delivered to your inbox and you are looking at it for a good amount of time. Even if you don't click it, you're reading that headline. It's putting Vitaminis in your head. So we send a weekly email that include blog posts, you know, occasional promotions, information about the products. And a lot of my email collection I do through sampling now. So I have a little QR code on my table. And if maybe people aren't ready to buy right, then I say, Well, drop your email and you'll get a coupon. And then you kind of get them into the information cycle of learning more until they maybe decide to buy it. [00:23:23][91.0]
[00:23:24] Djenaba Johnson-Jones: I love that because you have a person that raised their hand like I'm interested in this product and then you actually have a direct connection to them because you post on social and you may not they may not see it for whatever reason, but the email is the more of a chance that they're going to be able to kind of read your message and and buy something so that that's great. [00:23:41][17.3]
[00:23:41] Leslie Danford: Totally. And the other thing is I think I heard once in consumer it takes sitting seven impressions for someone to buy. And so with email, you've got them lined up. They will get seven notes from you, you know. Right. B.B. tried you at the store. There's one. And then you send them the welcome promotion coupon and then you send them five more blog posts or whatever, and then you've got a system for that verses social, who knows? And then, you know, even sampling, it's like you might catch the same person twice, but you'd have to take a year to get them started, right? [00:24:12][31.3]
[00:24:13] Djenaba Johnson-Jones: Right, right. So what piece of advice would you give somebody that's just starting out? [00:24:17][3.9]
[00:24:18] Leslie Danford: Well. [00:24:18][0.0]
[00:24:19] Djenaba Johnson-Jones: Right, so much. [00:24:19][0.4]
[00:24:19] Leslie Danford: But it's so funny because it's always like I said, it's always easy to look back and like kind of think about how you could have done things better. But I think to me, the biggest hurdle is to just get started. And so I think my piece of advice would be to just break things down instead of like getting overwhelmed by like, Oh, do I want to start a company? It's going to be a decade of work. It's going to take all this time and money and heartache, like, just try that one little thing. Now on the on the Khan side, you might get sucked into it. And then it's like you ought to do what appreciate the commitment you're making. But on the other hand, for example, vitamin E is interviewing friends and family about ideas. That was not a very big investment. It was some time, but it cost nothing. Right. That was like one step that I took in the very beginning that was very low commitment. It's like even if I decide to do nothing with this information, I was going chat with my friends anyway and it did cost and then kind of incrementally, as you see some ideas making sense and some things, you could always just take a little bit more of a step. So maybe it's researching some people that could help you formulate a recipe or doing some recipes in your kitchen for other kinds of businesses or in a kitchen like yours is like a shared space. Like just what is that one next little tiny step that you can take? And then with each of those steps, you can ask yourself, What's the worst that can happen? You know, if it doesn't work out, that's fine. If it does, great. I found that to be like the best mindset for the early stages because it can be very overwhelming if you get too caught up in the whole thing, you almost just want to break it down into these micro steps. [00:25:54][94.3]
[00:25:54] Djenaba Johnson-Jones: No, I completely agree because then you'll look back at the micro steps, you know, a month later and you just kind of see how far you've come versus like stressing out about, I don't know, getting into Whole Foods or whatever people want to do. So yeah, I think that's that's really great advice. So what is entrepreneurship taught you about yourself? [00:26:11][16.3]
[00:26:11] Leslie Danford: Oh, boy, this is like crazy. I actually just posted one on LinkedIn posts on this. I realized that when you're an entrepreneur, especially sole entrepreneur, you basically have to face every single one of your personal weaknesses every single day. And it is it's crazy because you it makes sense. But man, when you're living through it, it is brutal. You know, like for me personally, I push myself very hard. And there have been many times on this journey where I have been just like exhausted, stressed, like at my breaking way short when my kid's not sleeping, like you name it. And it's like. Well, it's my responsibility to figure that out. You know, like to pace myself, to take care of myself, like the self care, all that stuff, which has never been my strong suit. But like, I had to come to grips with that. But yeah, other things like I also a more action oriented person, so I'm more likely to jump into doing something than I am to like, analyze it 25 times. That can be a good thing. But there are other times where I've rushed into a decision maybe around like a graphics or a packaging or something where I look back and I made a mistake and ended up costing me time and money to redo it. And if I had taken a little bit more time, I could have gotten it right. So just things like that, I think you you realize like when you're an entrepreneur, it's just you. And especially if it's just, you know, co-founders, you can't give away your future. [00:27:31][79.6]
[00:27:33] Djenaba Johnson-Jones: Not at all. [00:27:33][0.4]
[00:27:34] Leslie Danford: But I wouldn't trade it for anything. Like if you think about like the personal growth from that and like also gaining the confidence that you can really do what you want to set your mind out to do, like whatever you are committed to doing, you can deal when you actually live that it's so wonderful, but it can be very painful. [00:27:50][16.4]
[00:27:51] Djenaba Johnson-Jones: But it's no, no, it's really true. Like it's been it's really fun to create something from scratch, like just to come up with this idea and like, as you mentioned, talking to your friends and I did some similar things and like kind of executing on that and having that real life thing that you can sell is really is really great. Yeah. Yeah, that's. That's a good feeling. Yeah. That's like a pressure. [00:28:11][20.0]
[00:28:11] Djenaba Johnson-Jones: So at Hudson Kitchen, we have what we call a money bell that we ring when we want to celebrate something. So I'm wondering, what are you celebrating right now? [00:28:22][10.7]
[00:28:23] Leslie Danford: Oh, well, let's see. I thought about this, and I saw your note, and I. I don't know if it's quite ready to celebrate yet, but there's a particular large retailer that's been on my target list for since the beginning of the well years. And I have followed up from every different angle. And probably coming up on 20 follow ups at this point, stop by the local store, drop a card, call the guy for local store, drop a symbol, text the guy local store and make him annoyed. Hey, get it. Just kidding. Introduce you to someone else. I mean, it's like that person is wrong person. He has a reply. And so, I mean, like 20 times and I finally just got to the corporate contact because this is a franchise business and I have to go through corporate. But after like 20 follow ups, I finally got the corporate contact. I sent symbols, I pinged him on LinkedIn and he replied right away and said, I look forward to seeing the samples and tasting. And I thought. [00:29:14][51.3]
[00:29:15] Djenaba Johnson-Jones: Amazing. [00:29:15][0.0]
[00:29:16] Leslie Danford: Seeing it yet. But I literally started with just knocking on the door at the local store and I and I couldn't tell you how many times they have tried to reject me. [00:29:25][9.1]
[00:29:25] Djenaba Johnson-Jones: I love that you just kind of kept going and kept going because that's when it comes because people don't follow up. And so like, you don't get the result you want because you just didn't take that and it just took you so maybe a little bit longer than you had anticipated, but you finally at least got some response. [00:29:39][13.1]
[00:29:40] Leslie Danford: Yeah, So really exciting. Real true. And there's this delicate balance that sometimes when things don't work out, the takeaway is like, maybe this isn't the right thing, but if you think it's the right thing, you should not let minor inconveniences or one person's opinion stop you because you know, you know it's right. So just getting that message to the right people, trying different ways, getting you know, that's laid out many, many times in this journey where I really believe that something should be the right fit. And so I just kept at it and eventually something clicked. [00:30:10][30.8]
[00:30:11] Djenaba Johnson-Jones: Amazing. So, Leslie, thank you so much for being here. Let everyone know where they can find out about you and Vitaminis. [00:30:17][5.4]
[00:30:18] Leslie Danford: Thank you. We have a website, vitaminisbrand.com. So we are of course, there we are an Amazon as well. It can be tricky at Amazon. You have to search for vitaminis juice or vitaminis immune because I think the vitamin brands bid on vitaminis. Still trying to win that search term. But we're also on Instagram, Tik Tok and Facebook, Vitaminis Brand. Yeah. Come check us out. Drop a note. They'll be me and my interns answering all the emails, social media DMs, so we'd love to hear from you. [00:30:46][28.4]
[00:30:47] Djenaba Johnson-Jones: Awesome. Thank you so much. [00:30:48][0.8]
[00:30:49] Leslie Danford: Thank you. [00:30:49][0.3]
[00:30:51] Djenaba Johnson-Jones: The Food Means Business podcast was produced by Hudson Kitchen. It is recorded at the studio at Carney Point and mixed and edited by Wild Home Podcasting. Our theme song is by Damien de Sandys, and I'm your host Djenaba Johnson-Jones. Follow Hudson Kitchen on Instagram @theHudsonKitchen and to get Food Business Bites right in your inbox, sign up for our newsletter at theHudsonKitchen.com/newsletter. Listen, follow and leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you get podcasts. Until next time.