This is the full transcript for Episode #324 of the Wild Business Growth podcast featuring Nikki Seaman – Olive Reimaginer, Freestyle Snacks Founder. You can listen to the interview and learn more here. Please note: this transcript is not 100% accurate.
Nikki Seaman 0:00
Keep going, believe in yourself and you know, set your goals and you can accomplish them over time.
Max Branstetter 0:20
Hi, all of you. Welcome back to Wild Business Growth. This is your place to hear from a wild entrepreneur every single Wednesday morning who’s turning wild ideas into wild growth. And I’m your host, Max Branstetter, you can email me at I’m the founder and Podcast Producer at MaxPodcasting this week is episode 324, and today’s guest is Nikki Seaman. You old sailor you she is the founder and CEO of freestyle snacks, the delicious, super cool brand of snack olives, or olive snacks, if you prefer. And in this episode, we talk why olives are so damn polarizing, how to reimagine something into a delicious snack brand and beyond, and all the fun facts you could ever imagine about olives and puns. For that matter, it is Nikki Enjoyyyyy the showwwwww!
Aaaaaaaalrightyyyyy
we’re here with Nikki Seaman, founder and CEO of Freestyle Snacks, also my favorite freestyle rapper of all time. So thank you for that. You literally do work with freestyle rappers all the time, technically packaged rappers, but really, really cool, and I think the most polarizing podcasts that I’ve ever done. Nikki, thank you so much for joining. How you doing today?
Nikki Seaman 1:47
I’m great. Thanks for having me. Yeah, of course, of course.
Max Branstetter 1:51
So we’re gonna get into all things olives and all things freestyles and rap battles in the olive vein. But before we get to your actual business. Why do you think olives are so polarizing? Like it’s the it’s these quintessential love them or hate them,
Nikki Seaman 2:08
it is. Yeah, I totally agree with you as far as why they are polarizing. I think olives got a bad rap. Pun intended there.
Max Branstetter 2:17
This interview is doomed from the beginning. Thank you.
Nikki Seaman 2:21
For so long, it’s kind of been these same traditional olives coming in cans and jars that were bland and mushy, lacking exciting flavor or texture. And so you know, if you try a black olive as as a little kid, you probably won’t like them. I think people’s palettes are evolving over time, actually. And I know quite a few little ones who who are big olive lovers, but I think kind of having that as your starting point makes you really freaked out about olives, and it’s only until you get to try your first good olive, as I like to call them, where, where you understand the hype around it, and from there, they’re just kind of addicting.
Max Branstetter 3:00
That’s the key. Everyone who doesn’t like olives has just only had bad olives in their in their life, completely to try your freestyle, exactly. So you personally, I heard that you were pretty late adopter to the olive community, as we’ll call it. Can you share your personal journey with olives?
Nikki Seaman 3:14
Yes, I can. So I was a very picky eater growing up. I think, you know, my food groups were all brown as a child. It was like chicken fingers, pizza, hot dogs. And then it was only when I went to college and really kind of broaden my horizons, all of my friends around me were eating, you know, sushi and bagels with cream cheese. And I wanted to fit in, of course, and so I started to be a little bit more adventurous with my food journey, and it really opened up my love for good food and great restaurants. Back in the day, actually, I started a food Instagram called freshman 15 with a few friends. And again, that really opened the doors for me and my food world, because I got to go to all these restaurants for free, try out these really unique menu items. And so partly that journey, and then partly meeting my now husband, who convinced me to just try one good olive at a restaurant. And, you know, I tried it, thought I was going to spit it out, but I was like, Oh, this. This isn’t too bad. Tried another one, and then from there, I was just hooked. And that was, you know, probably 10 years ago, now, 12 years ago. So
Max Branstetter 4:27
again, for the olive detractors out there, if you just try one olive, you know, be open to it. It could be your next business. Like you never know what it can turn into. Exactly freshman 15, that name carries a lot of weight. Oh, God, I didn’t even plan that one. Everybody’s scared about gaining weight when they go to college, and most of us do gain weight when they go to college, but like, what types of posts and what type of content did you do for that page?
Nikki Seaman 4:50
It was, I mean, exactly as the name sounds. It was me and a few of my friends that I had grown up with. We all had gone our separate ways after high school, and. So we were kind of posting at our respective colleges and universities, just all the overly indulgent food you can imagine. It was the land of cheese pulls and mac and cheese, those, you know, Sundays that overflowed with 70 different toppings that, you know, reached the ceiling. And so it was a lot of those kind of junk foods that, you know, people called those cheat day eats.
Max Branstetter 5:28
So let’s cheat ahead here. I want to dive to the freestyle snack story. Dive into rather you hinted at it. But olives are, of course, a big, big part of this business. But what made the difference from like that moment your husband introduced you to an olive. You’re now husband to like, the belief that this can actually be like a full scale business one day centered around olives. Yeah.
Nikki Seaman 5:50
So I, again, like from earlier on, had always been really intrigued and passionate about food and beverage. I had done an internship at PepsiCo when I was a consultant, I also worked with some CPG companies, and I always had this dream of starting a snack food company. I was just kind of waiting for the right idea to come across my plate, where it was going to be totally new and different and add a lot of value to the grocery store shelf and with olives. I really got this idea during the pandemic, because I was used to going to the olive bar every week on my grocery trip, stocking up on, you know, the garlic stuffed and, you know, the mixed medleys. And when those didn’t exist anymore, because there were no buffets, no sharing, I had to turn to the traditional olive aisle, and I just felt that those options didn’t really deliver on that taste profile that I knew olives could have. And then on top of that, I found the jars so inconvenient to eat. You know, I was spilling them all over my desk when I would take them to work, so I was just eating olives over the sink. And that’s when it really hit me, you know, there must be an easier way and a more enjoyable way to get the quality olives that I know are out there. And so that sparked the itch initially, and then from there, using my consulting experience, did a lot of consumer research and interviewing people who are olive lovers, who are all of farmers, just really kind of vetting the idea from every angle, and then decided to take the leap of faith and go for it. I have
Max Branstetter 7:31
to call back, Well, you said at the start, there you you said it came across your plate. And so I think that was an unintentional pun as well. This, is setting a record. Yeah, again, terribly sorry, but that’s such a again, pun intended, like, organic journey of starting a business, and like, identifying problems and pain points there, and then you did the whole like, like, when I think back to like, Business School of how they teach you, you know, it’s like prototypes, feedback, you know, like market research, like all those things are so important. What do those interviews look like with those early, I guess, potential customers of your olives?
Nikki Seaman 8:06
Yeah, it was super interesting. So I obviously interviewed family and friends, but I wanted to make sure that I was reaching America more broadly, not just people who lived in my hometown. And so I actually went on Instagram and searched for people who had hashtag olives in their photos. Obviously, they’re an olive lover.
Max Branstetter 8:28
You saw you saw all my posts, then, yeah,
Nikki Seaman 8:30
I know you were discovered, and I DMS them, and they were, for the most part, very responsive and willing to give me 1015, minutes of their time, and just tried to understand their shopping habits, their preferences for olives. You know, what are the different things that they look at in olive product that are most valuable to them and that they make a purchase decision off of? And that was really informative to create the product that you see today with freestyle
Max Branstetter 8:58
snacks. So creating the product, obviously, the actual product, like the actual olives, are pretty essential to that. How did you go about sourcing those and identifying Olive is it olive farmers? Olive growers? However, you say that
Nikki Seaman 9:12
the industry is interesting. Where we source our olives from is Greece. A lot of the olive farmers in Greece are independent family farm. So, you know, they have their hectares of of olive groves, and they grow them each season, and they get to dictate the price for their olives, which I think is really great, and then they end up selling their olives to, I don’t know if you would call it like a processor or a supplier, but basically you can’t eat an olive straight off the tree. They have to be kind of brined and cured, because they’re very bitter off the tree. And so to develop like that delicious flushing meat you get from an olive, it has to go through this fermentation process essentially for six to nine months. So the farmers then. Call it to these producers who are doing the fermenting, and then that’s eventually who we source our olives from. As far as how we landed on the Greek olives, I had done a ton of taste testing. I taste tested olives. You know, I’ve been saying seven different countries, maybe, maybe it was more than that, across 50 different varietals, to really land on. What I thought were the best tasting it was kind of head to head Greece and Italy. But what I loved about Greece is they also had, you know, it’s not quite a black olive, but it’s a Kalamata olive, and it’s purple. And so we could source both of our olives from the same country, you know, similar suppliers. So that’s ultimately how we landed there. And I think the green olives we have from Greece as well are super mild and buttery and just like a great snacking olive.
Max Branstetter 10:48
What a fun research project. Obviously, it’s like your full time business, but it’s pretty genius. Even if you started this business just to like, you know, go to Italy and Greece and test I think that would be a good result. So you mentioned, as you’re coming up with this, this idea that you had, there were pain points in the existing offerings out there. What were the main things that you wanted to develop with, like the final skews of freestyle that would differentiate you
Nikki Seaman 11:16
as a food product. I also had experience working at wisps the cheese crisp company. And, you know, product is always King, and so taste was the number one aspect that I was solving for. And so I wanted to make sure the olives that I was going to launch were better than the market leaders. And so I, you know, set up a table in our local park here in Atlanta, and it’s a taste testing of the olives I was planning to launch freestyle with against existing brands that were in the store and were the market leaders in the category, and buy a landslide people preferred the what were to be freestyle olives, and so I knew that I was really solving for that taste differentiator. And then on top of that, from a packaging perspective, you know, versus jars and cans, obviously, the pouch is incredibly convenient. Throw it in your purse, in your bag, take it to work. It’s great for traveling. It’s a healthy snack. And so convenience was kind of the next biggest pain point I wanted to solve for Yeah,
Max Branstetter 12:22
when you think about like all time, there have been so many businesses where convenience is like the reason that it was spawned in the first place. And I think just like over time as consumers, convenience is like one of the top things that we always crave, that in olives. But I think it’s a brilliant focal point for the business. So you got your your market research, you got your olives, you got your differentiation. How about distribution? So like now you’re in some pretty big stores, and I saw that. I think this is kind of newer news, that now Delta Airlines is a customer, so you can literally eat your olives in the air, which is amazing. How did you start to get big clients like this? Yeah,
Nikki Seaman 13:06
so I again, leveraging data, just kind of worked my way up to that national scale. So initially went door to door to local businesses, whether it was a local grocery market, a local butcher shop, a juice shop, and started, you know, selling my olives in and I would check on those stores every week to see how the inventory was moving. And then I would use that sales data to go and pitch to some regional grocery pliers, like airwan or Central Market. And then from there, was able to leverage that data to go and pitch to some bigger national accounts, like Whole Foods. And these things take a really long time too. I feel like, you know, you always think it’s an overnight success, but the overnight success has taken 10 years. And so delta, for instance, you know, I’ve been in conversations with them essentially since I launched the business almost three years ago. And so it’s really exciting to see, one, the hard work, and then two, the product market fit, really hitting its stride to be able to work with some of these customers.
Max Branstetter 14:10
What was your reaction when you found out that your olives would can literally be consumed flying in the sky? Yeah, I
Nikki Seaman 14:16
was so happy. I was freaking out. I couldn’t believe it. And, you know, I’m based in Atlanta, and delta is one of my favorite airlines, and so it definitely hit very close to home.
Max Branstetter 14:27
You look at your journey overall, like it’s an incredible story. And at the time of this recording, you know, I think the business has been around for over two years now. So like, pretty new business in the grand scheme of businesses, but like, some of your achievements have been amazing. And like, packaging, literally, it’s like, you know, there’s good packaging and bad packaging, but like, if you go on your website and check out your your SKUs, it just, like, gives you, like, a positive vibe, like, there’s just something, is it like a great feeling? Speaking of Greek, I don’t know if that’s ethos or pathos, or that might be Greek. That might be Latin. No, that’s Greek. Anyway. Yeah. If you are looking back like, what would you say, if you had to pick one, what would you say is, like, the biggest driver of your like, the business’s growth and success so far. You
Nikki Seaman 15:10
know, when I was leaving my prior job before starting freestyle snacks, one of my mentors there had told me the number one thing that I need to have is grit, which consists of passion and perseverance. So you always have to love what you’re doing, and then you have to have the perseverance to just keep going and letting it roll off your back when you do get those rejections. And rejections have come in by the plenty, but I always say a no is just a not now. It’s not a not ever. And so just really having that resilience and going back, I just actually sent an email to a buyer, and I started off with like, I know I’ve been reaching out for two years, but, you know, it’s a new year, new opportunities. And he requested samples. So I think that the grit has really kept the business on fire, and, you know, has has led it to to grow as much as it has. I see that in
Max Branstetter 16:07
the podcast space as well. Like some of the, some of the guests on the show that have been like dream guests, like I sometimes it takes reaching out for like, years, and then, you know, you think they’re never paying attention. And then sometimes it’s just the right time down the line of just like, hey, yeah, Max, I can do this,
Nikki Seaman 16:25
right? I’m the green guest over here. You stole the words. You
Max Branstetter 16:27
stole the words out of my mouth. I was gonna say, like, I’ve been reaching out since before even started the business. Something good was coming so and here we are today. What does that grit mean to you? Like, what? I guess, since you got more into the quote, unquote grit space, like, how have you changed personally to make sure you have that rigor, you have that grit? Yeah,
Nikki Seaman 16:47
that’s a great question. So when I was in management consulting, I actually felt like my confidence took a really big blow. There were so many levels of hierarchy. I was reproof reading emails for two hours at midnight, and I was just like, What am I doing here?
Max Branstetter 17:04
By the way, which is what I did before sending you the email invite for this. Sometimes it works.
Nikki Seaman 17:09
Yes, I feel like starting freestyle has given me a lot of confidence in myself. And you know, if I set my mind to something, I know that I can, I can do it and I can accomplish it. So I think that has been amazing. And then, you know, my public speaking as well has gotten a lot better. I think there’s just been so many benefits personally, you know, going through some of the different business challenges that I have, whether it’s, you know, operationally or any sales challenges, has just hardened me, and I think taught me a lot of lessons to make me, hopefully, an even better business leader.
Max Branstetter 17:46
I would say, so. I would say, so. What advice do you have for any fellow food founders out there? I always think this space is so fat, like, just a fun space to be in, but it’s like, I know way more than meets the meets the stomach.
Nikki Seaman 18:01
Yeah, I know, if you don’t like puns, don’t listen to this episode.
Max Branstetter 18:04
Or, you know, this is as polarizing as olives,
Nikki Seaman 18:08
you know, kind of along the lines of, of having grit. Just, you know, keep going. It’s really challenging, but just believe in yourself and don’t take no for an answer. I think that will get you really, far in this business, I think more tactically, having you know a really strong margin story from the start is going to be critical. CPG is a lower margin industry in general. There’s so many people involved who all get a little piece of your business, and so making sure that you you can set yourself up for success to run a sustainable business, I think is, is how food founders coming into the space should be thinking about it.
Max Branstetter 18:51
So speaking of puns, I’d love to switch it up a bit and get to what is typically a segment called the unusual. And the best I could come up with is the brine usual, which I think might be the worst one yet, which is really I just want to dive more into olives, because you are certainly the most olive expert of any guests we’ve had on the wild Business Growth podcast. So think of this as kind of like a mini rapid fire on all your answers can be long, but I’ll try to keep my question short, so the brine usual, what’s your favorite color of Olive to consume? I
Nikki Seaman 19:25
prefer green olives, but Kalamata has a time and a place.
Max Branstetter 19:29
When is that time and the place? I like
Nikki Seaman 19:33
cooking with kalamata olives more for like, if it’s in a Greek salad or, like, a pasta dish or a fish dish, and then I like green olives more for snacking personally.
Max Branstetter 19:43
Speaking of snacking, so freestyle snacks, what is your your favorite your I combine that your favorite flavor that you offer personally. My
Nikki Seaman 19:55
favorite flavor is lemon garlic. We use a freshly squeeze. Lemon juice for it. And I think that freshness, like, really gives you a good zing, and then the minced garlic in it, as well as just has, like, a really nice savory taste.
Max Branstetter 20:08
Well, that sounds amazing. Now I You’re gonna hate me. I’m someone who’s like, my stomach can be a little bit sensitive to garlic, so sometimes I get scared away if there’s too much garlic in it. But obviously there’s garlic in everything. And so I always delete it. I love it, but especially the lemon is, lemon is always a fantastic flavor as well. And that’s something my wife, Dana, has kind of turned me into more and more of a lemon person, which sounds funny, lemon person, but
Nikki Seaman 20:33
olive person, lemon person at all.
Max Branstetter 20:36
What’s like a fun fact, there’s just something kind of random about olives that a lot of people don’t know, or you didn’t know until you got into the space.
Nikki Seaman 20:43
Well, I told you already about the fun fact that you can’t eat olives straight off a
Max Branstetter 20:48
tree, which I am tempted to try. Now. I’ve tried it,
Nikki Seaman 20:52
and I regret it immediately every time. Wait, wait, what’s it taste like? It just tastes very bitter. It’s like, very bitter, weird, like, strange taste, like, kind of waxy, almost
Max Branstetter 21:04
interesting. It’s like the brining process that really gets it more more edible, I guess
Nikki Seaman 21:09
Exactly, yeah, the fermentation. But another fun fact is that olives are a fruit, not a vegetable. So I feel like sometimes people confuse the two.
Max Branstetter 21:18
I’m always gonna I’m still confused on that tomato one. It still makes no sense to me. Yeah, all right, what is your personal favorite way to enjoy either eating or drinking? Enjoy olives? My
Nikki Seaman 21:30
favorite way is probably while I’m traveling, I always have a pack in my bag, of course. And so whether I’m, you know, hopping on a flight or doing a road trip, it’s just perfect because it hits all of like the salty, savory notes. But then I also feel good about it because it’s healthy and wholesome. So it’s like a really great thing to time you over in a in a long travel day,
Max Branstetter 21:53
all right? And this one, you have your work cut out for you. What’s your way to convince someone who’s an olive hater to get them to become an olive lover.
Nikki Seaman 22:03
We’ve honestly converted a ton of folks to the dark green side, as I like to you know, tons of friends and family. My mother in law, actually, she used to tell me that olives to her, smelled and tasted like dirty diapers, and she refused to try it. But obviously, you know, when I came out with the product, she’s like, Okay, I’ll try it for you. And now she’s hooked her our hot and spicy olives are her favorite. And so I think if you’re open to trying it, and you don’t have, like, a ton of food aversions, olives just happens to be one of them, then we can definitely convert you to an olive lover.
Max Branstetter 22:42
Well, you converted me into even more of an olive lover. All right. All right. Last one here, what is the most unique use of the freestyle snacks olives you’ve ever heard?
Nikki Seaman 22:52
That’s a really good question. I’m trying to think, last year we made an olive oil cake with some olives on the top of it, and it was a really cool sweet and savory mix. But I’ve seen people, you know, hand stuff our olives, which is always cool, like adding additional flavor to it, which is fun. People have made really cool different like dishes and drinks. So I love people to just get creative and freestyle with it.
Max Branstetter 23:21
Oh, that actually, that begs another one. What do you think is the the best filling to stuff an olive with
Nikki Seaman 23:28
our most requested flavor is blue cheese stuffed. So I’m not a personal blue cheese fan, but I think that’s what America prefers.
Max Branstetter 23:38
I was gonna say blue cheese ranch. Those are both other ones that I never thought were polarizing, and then I grew up and realized, like, Oh, I’m, like, growing up in the Midwest, I’m a huge ranch fan and but there’s a lot of people that are huge blue cheese fans, and now I like them both, but it’s those are pretty love hate as well, definitely. All right, as if that was enough, rapid fire, let’s wrap up. These are not limited to olives. These are actually not about olive so you’re off the olive hot seat, but you’re onto the general hot seat, which, you know, the highly acclaimed general hot seat. Let’s wrap up with some rapid fire. Q, A, you ready for it? Sure. All right, let’s get wild. I saw in your background that you went to Spanish River High School. My wife’s parent, so my mother and father in law, Cheryl and Gary, live in Delray Beach. So we’ve driven by Spanish river like all that. Like every time we go down to visit, we drive by there a ton. And so I just recognized the name. Was like, Oh my God, but, yeah, but, but how? I don’t even know where I’m going with this. But how was, like, how did you enjoy, like, your upbringing, like, in that area, and I also think it’s just a cool name for high school
Nikki Seaman 24:47
too. Yeah, no, I think it was great. Obviously, I feel like your earlier experiences are formative of where you end up. I made some really incredible friends who I’m still extremely close with today. And, yeah, I. Love visiting in the winter time. It’s super nice, especially in the winter cold. So I love living in Atlanta and excited to be raising my family here, but the Boca del Rai area definitely has its benefits as well.
Max Branstetter 25:13
Yeah, it’s an awesome place. How about Atlanta? What’s something that you didn’t know too much about, but now that you live there, you’re like, I love this aspect of the Atlanta area.
Nikki Seaman 25:21
This is kind of random, but I didn’t realize how many trees Atlanta had for a city like you never counted. Yeah, I love driving through Atlanta, like whenever the seasons are changing, and just it’s a new appreciation for how green it is, or the leaves changing, and just really beautiful here.
Max Branstetter 25:39
And what is your go to like? Are you more of like a, like night out in the city person, or more of like outdoor, like hiking, like away from the city? What’s, what’s your style? Not really
Nikki Seaman 25:51
either. Um, I’m more of like a home body, I would say. And then I love like night out in the city. For me, is more like going to, like a great new restaurant. That’s my ideal weekend plan.
Max Branstetter 26:03
Yeah, that’s awesome. Yeah, it’s spending more and more time at home over time as well. It’s there’s something nice about being home, all right, you mentioned you worked on wisps, which, which is kind of tough to say, actually, didn’t think about that till now. But the little like cheese puffs, the thingy, what’s something that’s kind of like a little known fact about those wisps?
Nikki Seaman 26:26
Um, that’s a great question. It was when I was there. It was a very small but mighty team running, running it. So there were about 25 employees when I was there, and it was a pretty sizable business. And so it was just a really incredible experience to wear so many different hats for this larger company. And so that’s really what I credit a lot of the success with freestyle too, is because, you know, I got to participate and lead different initiatives for their innovation and commercialization, working with their CO Packer consolidation plan, working with their sales team on pitch decks, and so that was just like a really great CPG boot camp, if you will. Of you know how to launch products and and market them successfully. And, you know, tried to emulate a lot of that with freestyle.
Max Branstetter 27:17
Well, you You whispered, you whispered. It wonderfully, as they say, Nikki. Thank you so much. This has been fantastic. And I love Olive everything with freestyle snacks. So really, really cool, just in inspiring what you’re doing. I know if people want to learn more, they can go to freestyle snacking.com and where else do you want to shout out for people to connect with you online or learn more about the brand? Our website
Nikki Seaman 27:44
is a great place to start. We also have our store locator on our website so you can see which stores have our product closest to you. But we’re available nationally in Whole Foods as well as on Amazon and Tiktok shop if, if that’s your preference. And then to connect with me, I am on LinkedIn at Nikki Seaman,
Max Branstetter 28:03
perfect, awesome. And then last thing, what’s the second fun fact about No, I’m just going back. Yeah, a third fun fact. I do love fun facts, but I also love Final thoughts. So what’s just kind of like a quote or, like, one line, words of advice that you know you have for fellow entrepreneurs and aspiring entrepreneurs out there.
Nikki Seaman 28:24
You know, you can do anything you set your mind to. I was just watching the Golden Globes, and I think it was really awesome seeing a lot of these women who have had careers in Hollywood for a very long time, and they’re, you know, just now, hitting their strides. So along with the themes of grit and never giving up. Just keep going believe in yourself and you know, set your goals and you can accomplish them over time. It’s exciting. Entrepreneurship is a crazy roller coaster, and you just gotta hold on until you make it off,
Max Branstetter 28:58
and a crazy Rory coaster. Thank you so much Nikki for coming on Wild Business Growth and sharing your wildly all of awesome story. And thank you all the listeners for tuning in to another episode. If you want to hear more wild stories like this one, make sure to subscribe to Wild Business Growth on your favorite podcast platform, as well as on YouTube. YouTube is @MaxBranstetter for the video versions and for anything else you can learn more at MaxPodcasting.com all things social media, podcast, newsletter, podcast production there. And until next time, Let your business Run Wild…Bring on the Bongos!!
