Full Transcript – Sameer Mehta & Sean Kane – Wild Business Growth Podcast #339

This is the full transcript for Episode #339 of the Wild Business Growth podcast featuring Sameer Mehta & Sean Kane – Smash Kitchen, Organic Condiments. You can listen to the interview and learn more here. Please note: this transcript is not 100% accurate.

Sean Kane 0:00
If you have an idea and something interests, you just go do it.

Max Branstetter 0:17
Hello, hello. Welcome back to Wild Business Growth. This is your place to hear from a new wild entrepreneur every single Wednesday morning who’s turning wild ideas into wild growth. I’m your host, Max Branstetter, Founder and Podcast Producer at MaxPodcasting. That’s . And this is episode three times three equals nine. Today’s guests are Sameer Mehta and Sean Kane, the co-founders of Smash Kitchen, along with the third co founder you might find in the big screen, Glen Powell, they are on a mission to modernize the American pantry, starting with clean, organic condiments that taste delicious. Think ketchup, think mayonnaise, think barbecue sauce, mustard, whole line of delicious smash kitchen items. In this episode, we talk their amazing backgrounds themselves at The Honest Company. Hello Bello Casper and Jinx. We talk how they’re seeing amazing success at Walmart, even though they’re launching products that have some competitive brands that have been around for quite some time and are pretty well known, and their insights from working with celebrities like Glenn, like Jessica Alba, like Kristen Bell, like Dax Shepard, like Chris Evans, a whole lot in the star studded episode, it is Sean and Samir enjoy this year. Already, we’re here with Samir Mehta and Sean Kane, co founders of Smash kitchen. Shout out for any of you familiar with the Wild Thornberrys back in the day, Nigel Thornberry would always say smashing. So we have a smashing interview here today, but Samir and Sean really, really cool story that will, that will get to, and you guys up to some pretty cool things even before this. But thank you both for joining. How you doing today? Great. How are you good? Great, great. I’m feeling as real as real mayonnaise. So extra real today. So thank you guys. But before we get to everything with smash kitchen. So I want to hit on each you put each you through the gauntlet real quick, so that, like we could do a whole separate interview about what you guys have been up to before smash kitchen, because you each have very impressive backgrounds and some really cool game changing companies. Samir, we’ll start with you. One that jumped out to me was Casper. And I think Casper like, if anybody thinks to like the brand that totally changed the mattress game, which sounds funny. Mattress game sounds like such a gangster hardball game, but Casper comes to mind for that. What did you learn from that high energy, you know, industry shifting experience? There

Sameer Mehta 2:56
a on your first note, the real mayo. I’m actually in the real Mayo room we have here at the Smash kitchen office. But yeah, no at Casper. You know, it was a really interesting journey to really kind of look at a category that’s pretty boring. You know, back in in 2014 when we were launching Casper, you ask anybody what, what kind of mattress they sleep on, nobody really could tell you it’s kind of a mattress that they were passed on, or something that they bought online, or kind of walking down the street, or their parents gave them. And I think, you know, even today, now, if you ask anybody, you know, people will start bragging about their mattress. They’ll tell you where they got it from. And so I think, you know, at Casper, you know, we really learned how important it is to really kind of take that customer experience and turn that into a category that’s really never like had that before. You know, when buying a mattress, it’s really boring, you know, it’s typically a car salesman like experience. So if you can make that a little bit better, people start to really get excited about the brand and really fall in love with it. I guess,

Max Branstetter 3:58
if you were to apply that to like any industry out there, how do you kind of come in as, like, an outsider brand in a traditional, not much innovation category and, like, really create

Sameer Mehta 4:10
momentum? Yeah, I mean, I think it’s really just creating a brand that people love and want to share and respect. You know, of course, it always starts with the product. You know, the mattress has to be, has to be great. People often enjoy sleeping on it. They have to get better sleep. And once you kind of solve that, it’s really making sure the experience kind of lives up to its standard, whether you’re ordering the mattress, whether you’re receiving it the mattress, or even if you really need to return the mattress, just having a positive experience with the company goes a long way, especially for a category that is typically, you know, the opposite of that. When you go into a mattress store, you know, you’re kind of fighting with a salesman. If you sleep on it for a night or two and don’t like it, it’s almost impossible to return it. So really, kind of making it a frictionless experience, really, kind of helps elevate. Category as a whole.

Max Branstetter 5:01
Most of the time when it’s sleep on it, it’s like you sleep on an idea and think about it, you know, noodle on it a little bit. And you guys, literally, you’re in the business of sleeping on it. So pretty unique there. Sean, unfortunately for you, you you also have an incredibly boring resume. So we’re just gonna skip over that. No, but really, really cool, huge runs at, you know, huge companies there as well. We’ll start with the Honest Company. So honestly, how do you think honest was able to break through in the CPG space? Because it’s just like, so tough for anybody who’s been any part of that. Going

Sean Kane 5:36
back, we launched a company in 2012 and it was at a time when Shopify didn’t exist and there wasn’t this notion of established platforms for subscription commerce. So, you know, in large part, we had to build everything from scratch. We ended up, over the years, having an engineering QA programming team of 80 plus people customer service in both Santa Monica and Austin, and we probably had 100 people total. There we expanded warehousing and systems. I mean, it was really all from scratch, and it was at a time where the omni channel brand didn’t, didn’t really exist yet. Now it’s kind of commonplace, but when we first set out to make diapers, none of the diaper manufacturers wanted to talk to us. It was an established category that was dominated by Kimberly Clark and Procter and Procter and Gamble for many, many years, and we had to convince them that that we could really be a challenger. And we did so over the course of, you know, several years, we grew that company to several 100,000 subscribers. We were in target and Costco, and really all of the major retailers that took us a little time to gain momentum, but we were really kind of the springboard DTC brand that crossed the bridge into retail, and really one of the first that did it. You know,

Max Branstetter 6:51
you’re just up to your knees in diapers too. So that’s, that’s a nice perk.

Sean Kane 6:55
Well, the nice thing was, especially during those years, I had three kids, and so it was a we got basically the lifetime supply of diapers. I don’t know if you know that knew this, but I think you just had a child, and over the course of any child’s life, they’ll use probably more than 10,000 diapers total. So you become an expert in your own right after changing 10,000 of them yourself.

Max Branstetter 7:18
I have to say, appreciate the call out there. I have to say, like being a new dad, changing diapers was, like the number one thing I was most dreading, because I had never done it in my life before. And I think within the first morning of your baby’s life, it’s like, okay, you know what? Just rip the band aid off. You know, we got this down. And then obviously it’s like second nature after a while. So by the way,

Sean Kane 7:40
we exploited that to some extent. That experience of changing the diaper that was that’s not fun. But when you get to have that moment with your baby, and you get to choose a design, and you’re caring for your baby in this, you know, deeply intimate way, you’re pairing up and you’re personalizing the designs and the experience. You know, if you’re into music, we had diapers with guitars and musical notes on them. If you’re into sports, we had sports teams. If you’re into art. We had art. It was really a way to customize and turn an experience that people somewhat dreaded into a really special, fun moment.

Max Branstetter 8:19
So let’s smash our way to the kitchen, smash kitchen at that. And talking about your backgrounds just a little bit, it’s clear that both you would end up in the condiment space. I think that’s everybody would have guessed that, right? How in the world did you guys? Well, first of all, how did the two of you connect? But then how did you connect in this crazy condiment space as well. Probably

Sean Kane 8:42
a year after I launched another business in close collaboration with Walmart called Hello Bella. We launched out with Kristen and DAX. It’s also a baby company. I got this call from Samir and and he said, Hey, we’ve never met, but I’d love to talk to you about your launch and your experience at at Walmart and beyond. And I said, Cool. And you know, the way that Samir reached out to me is, is through LinkedIn, and he is probably the power user out of everybody at LinkedIn. He’s a LinkedIn assassin. He will find you, he will convince you, he will stick with it until you get back to him. And so I did, and we became friends throughout the years while he was launching Jinx, which is why he called to compare notes on and probably four or so years after he called and said, Hey, I know that you’ve recently, you know, stopped running. Hello, bello and and I’m thinking about my next transition from jinx. When you go to a burger, a burger restaurant, you know, you order a burger, you order a fries. You don’t order ketchup, because it’s just there, and it’s so mechanical. You take your fry and you dip it in your ketchup. But what I didn’t know at the time that I’ve that I’m very familiar with now, is most of the ketchup out there is laden with high fructose corn syrup, which is linked to so many so many terrible health concerns. So the more I started to learn about condiments and as kind of like the building blocks. Or how we flavor and how we taste foods that we don’t even think about. And it ranges from condiments to dressings to barbecue sauce, kind of you name it, the more I was interested in being a part of a solution to that, because at the Honest Company, that’s that’s very much what our playbook was, was taking a product that had chemicals that were less desirable from other things that you could add, and so it’s more about what’s in the product versus what’s not in the product. For

Sameer Mehta 10:25
us, yeah. And just to kind of add to that, you know, part of the reason, I think, what really intrigued us about the category, if you’re familiar with kind of the grocery aisle, you know, there’s a ton of products out there that taste really good, but just have a ton of nasty ingredients, of course. You know, high fructose corn syrup is at the top of the list in not only ketchup, but in barbecue sauce and many other kind of condiments out there. You know, there’s a lot of dyes and artificial flavoring within relish, and just a lot of products that people don’t really understand, or kind of, know, you know, we like to kind of call them kind of hidden poisons that, you know, people are buying what they think is healthy or clean or okay for them, but it’s filled with a lot of junk. And so I think, you know, that’s what really excited us, is to figure out, how do you create a brand that not only tastes good and really kind of taste with what you’re you’re expecting it to taste like, but also price better and affordable price points, so people don’t have to spend too much time thinking about if they can afford to buy it. But also is clean and healthier and better for you at the same time. I

Sean Kane 11:31
think the biggest compliment that we’ve received over time and and one that we really appreciate is, well, I bought your ketchup, and it tastes like ketchup. You know, it’s very much, it’s very much hits on what you expect it to be. And we’re not trying to reinvent ketchup. We’re just trying to reinvent the way that it’s made and the and the ingredients that it’s made with.

Max Branstetter 11:51
Well, it’s good that they’re saying that about your ketchup and not saying that your mustard tastes like ketchup. So, yeah, so, so it all sounds almost like too good to be true. Like, it sounds amazing. Like, I think anybody who starts to want, who wants to start a brand, would love to provide, you know, high quality product at very friendly price point to the consumer. How do you guys make that all work on the back end,

Sean Kane 12:17
it’s really scale. We launched this in close collaboration with Walmart, and that provides us with 1000s of distribution outlets. And those 1000s of distribution outlets really allow us to build a pricing structure that, from day one, resonates and helps to build a company that is a standalone company, not just a venture backed capital company. So every decision that we make, we look closely at ROI, we look closely at cost of goods sold, and so far, the math is working out the right way, without the scale. This becomes an incredibly difficult exercise, because manufacturers are reluctant to work with you, and if they are, the costs are just they’re kind of out of sight, which is why you’ll see a lot, lot of you know, new and upcoming brands, they generally offer products that are are more expensive because, in large part they have to be so

Max Branstetter 13:07
so scale is obviously super important. Another building block of of actually having a product that hits the shelves and is able to hit that many shelves is being, like, very decisive on the SKUs that you’re actually offering. And if you look at your site now it’s pretty cool. You have kind of, like the main, you know, we’ll call it like the Mount Rushmore of condiment options, especially in the US. What was your process for, at least up to this point, deciding, like, Okay, we’re going to go all in on ketchup and mustard and, you know, yada yada yada. How do you decide what you’re going to offer and ultimately get to shelves?

Sameer Mehta 13:40
Yeah. I mean, I think, you know, when we were starting to kind of venture out into kind of this category, we know, the long term vision was, how do you modernize the the entire kind of American pantry, starting with condiments as kind of the first pillar, if you, if you ask anybody about condiments, you know, ketchup is really kind of the first thing that comes to mind. You know, people are eating ketchup on burgers, hot dogs, french fries, whether you’re at a restaurant or at home, you know, ketchup is typically a staple. And so I think we really knew it’d be important to kind of innovate and start there, knowing it’s a product that people are using every day. The current brands that are out there right now are filling ketchup with a ton of sugar, a ton of high fructose corn syrup. And so if we can start there, we can really make an impact within kind of the American consumer and the American family. And then we really went after all the other staples, like mustard mayo, and then created a line of hot honey, which is our version of spicy ketchup and spicy mayo and spicy barbecue sauce as well. You

Max Branstetter 14:40
guys have perfect timing with that, by the way, because I feel like now you can’t, you can’t go to any like restaurant or bar without there being some sort of hot honey special meal or or hot honey cocktail. Like, it’s really something that’s growing like crazy. Like you hinted at the competitiveness. Chair, well, any food space, but especially in the condiment space, I’m going to be nice to you guys and not name some of the competitive brands out there, but anybody knows that you name ketchup, you name mustard, you name mayo. I mean, there’s a ton of different ones of barbecue sauce, but typically there’s like one or two iconic brands that comes to mind for that that have been around for seemingly hundreds and hundreds of years, that is, like, really bold and really creative and confident as a brand, to be able to kind of say, Hey, we’re going to go in and disrupt these markets. What’s your approach? Like, some of the behind the scenes of how you kind of rack that, and say, hey, you know, these brands have been there forever. They’ve been doing this forever, but, like, here’s another option for you that we totally believe you’ll love.

Sameer Mehta 15:45
Yeah, I mean, I I kind of on that note. You know, when you when you talk about all of these other brands, I think that the big thing you kind of kind of hit on was, you know, there’s a there’s typically one brand that’s really big and ketchup that you can think of. There’s one brand in mustard that’s really big that you can think of, and there’s one brand in Mayo, or a few brands in Mayo that you can think of, but there hasn’t been a brand that’s really a brand that you can trust across the full set of condiments. And I think that’s our our goal is to really, you know, not become a ketchup brand, a mustard brand or a mayo brand, but a brand that’s kind of known to be better for you, and also giving you that taste that people want and are excited about. And so I think for us, it’s really, you know, exciting the consumer and the person to really enjoy all of our condiments knowing, you know, whether you get our ketchup or you get our mustard or mayo, you know, you expect kind of the same quality and cleanness attached to it.

Max Branstetter 16:40
I love that way of going about it, because it’s kind of like, well, you know, these other brands have been there forever. It’s like, quietly, there’s, there’s a new guy coming in here that actually, you know, does all these things pretty well. And I’m sure there’s ways you can bundle them. And if you like the brand, if you like one thing from us, you’ll, you’ll like this from us as well. So it’s a really creative way to go about

Sean Kane 17:00
it. You know, also, there’s a little bit of a challenge for the incumbents, because they have the shelf space that they have, they have the products that they have. And in order to to innovate or make new products, or make make products that align more with our ingredient values, like organic, typically, they’re going to have to take one product off the shelf and replace it with another one. So that comes at the great expense of what is the opportunity cost of removing that product? What is the revenue impact, and what is the velocity impact, and how does that impact our anniversary of our revenue from last year? And so there becomes this, I think, an economic conversation of, what does it cost us to change out an item or add an item? And for us, we don’t come with that baggage, because we’re brand new. We’re starting from scratch, and we’re kind of laying a foundation for what the brand represents, what the ingredients are in the product. And that gives us a certain amount of freedom and flexibility to really, you know, hone in on our mission.

Max Branstetter 17:56
Walmart is a, well, first of all, it’s like, amazing that you have this partnership with Walmart, and obviously, from like, the early days, it’s been a part of everything, I think, for so many brands. If you get Walmart distribution, it’s like, holy cow, wow. You know, we made it to x level or whatever. So it’s really cool that you’re on the shelves there in so many different places. Can you speak a little bit about the mindset of, like, making a product that’s going to be great for the Walmart consumer.

Sean Kane 18:23
What I’ve learned about Walmart is Walmart cares deeply about their customers. The buyers care deeply about what they’re putting on the shelves. In many cases, the buyers have families and kids that are younger, and what you really realize is they want to put products on the shelf that they themselves, are excited to buy, believe in and the organization, in total, wants to, wants to improve, and wants to bring the best of everything to the WalMart customer. So they’ve been very collaborative in extremely positive ways about bringing the best products and the best and the best value they really are. Are serious about that mission, yeah.

Sameer Mehta 19:00
And I think just to kind of add to that, I think, you know, I grew up, you know, shopping at at Walmart. You know, my parents are still there every, every other day grocery shopping. And so I think inherently, you know, we are kind of a shopper within Walmart. And I think, you know, we as consumers also just value not only newness, but products that are cleaner, products that taste good, and also products that are affordable. So I think partnering with the with the grocery retailer like Walmart, really kind of helps us not only elevate the mission, but also be able to kind of interact with customers across all these different categories and really kind of work with them to see what’s what’s kind of missing, and what consumers and shoppers are looking for.

Max Branstetter 19:44
And be honest, I can’t stop with the honest puns, but how often are your your parents just shopping there versus doing store checks and making sure that the everything in your product assortment looks great on I

Sameer Mehta 19:56
get photos every other day if there’s ketchup missing for. Them

Sean Kane 20:01
and smear. It’s like the same photo every day.

Sameer Mehta 20:05
And any if you go to the Porto ranch Walmart, I’m sure you can see my dad fixing the shelf set.

Sean Kane 20:14
Yeah, it’s fun to have a product like this on the shelves, because you know my mom as well. She’ll go to the she’ll go to Walmart. And she goes probably every other day. And every other day she’ll say, you need an end cap. I need to see this on an end cap.

Sean Kane 20:29
It’s really great

Max Branstetter 20:31
you get customer marketing help and brand brand ambassadorship from the parents. So that’s that’s right. We haven’t mentioned another one of your co founders yet, Glen Powell, so anybody who’s like me very much enjoyed Twisters and Top Gun: Maverick gets an extra kick about learning of his business prowess as well. By the way, I have to say Glenn does a phenomenal job of playing characters that you like want to punch at first, and then somehow you’re like, Okay, this guy’s actually charming. I don’t know what, how he does it. Maybe he’s that way in the business world as well. But how did you two connect with Glenn and decide to partner with him on this taking over the condiment space? Yeah.

Sameer Mehta 21:13
I mean, you know, the three of us met, what was it two years ago at an event that was hosted by a common friend of ours, and we were all just kind of talking about, you know, different businesses we’ve worked on. And, you know, I think something that was really stuck out as passionate from Glenn was figuring out, you know, healthier products that he can eat and enjoy. You know, he grew up in Texas, so barbecue is really a staple, not only kind of in the community, but also at his home, where, you know, they would cook and barbecue weekly, if not daily. And really finding kind of sauces that weren’t filled with a ton of sugar, with a ton of high fructose corn syrup, was really difficult. And so I think that was really just kind of the kickstart of figuring out what it could be, and then eventually, kind of leading to not only barbecue sauce, but ketchup to mustard to Mayo, and all these other categories and products as well.

Max Branstetter 22:06
And how are you partnering him, like, what’s kind of like his role and focus these days, as far as the brand goes? Yeah, I

Sameer Mehta 22:13
mean, he’s, he’s a real co founder, you know, he’s super involved in the innovation pipeline. So anything that we launch in terms of flavor, flavors and new products and skews. You know, he’s really been adamant and and fruitful about making sure we really have the best tasting products out there. Because I think at the end of the day, we know you can sell a product or a bottle of ketchup, but you really need the consumer to love it and enjoy it, to really get them to return back. And so not only is he been been awesome in helping us kind of create and craft these new recipes, but also just really pushing out content and really kind of telling our story to the masses that you know, we can stand for good flavor and being clean at the same time.

Max Branstetter 22:56
And are the three of you just kind of arm wrestling for who gets to taste test things the

Sameer Mehta 23:03
most. We do have a group chat of fitments coming every week and where to send them to.

Sean Kane 23:09
He’s been really, really incredible to do this with, because he is enthusiastic. He’s authentically motivated, and he wanted to be part of this pantry revolution because he’s learned how to eat himself and things that he shouldn’t be eating. And so this hits home very, very close to him in terms of of tasting products. It’s pretty funny actually. You know, he sends us recipes on a regular basis. So a line of things that we’re working on right now are his mom’s actual recipes that we’re going to commercialize, and and they’re gonna hit the shelves next year. So it’s been really fun. A lot of the marketing ideas and stunts. He’s the one ideating those I’ve worked in the past with, people like Samir that will text me in the middle of the night, but Glen is also one of those people that is now texting me in the middle of night. Hey, I have this idea on on how we should talk about this product or this category, and what are we doing about this specific channel? Like, it’s been really fun to work with him. And yeah, like Samir said, super involved.

Max Branstetter 24:14
So that brings us swimming fully and tastefully, trying to think of how else we can work in food. We’re going to sizzle to our next segment here, because I’m curious, you know, in addition to, you know, not as if working with Glen and CO, founding company with Glen isn’t enough, both you have partnered with celebrities in the past for previous brands, and I think it adds a really interesting like, addition to the business. I’m just kind of curious the inside baseball, inside celebrities of that E Hollywood stories, Samir with with Jinx, I know you’ve done a lot of stuff with Chris Evans, and I know Sean, obviously, whole background with Kristen and Dax and Jessica and everybody there, like really, really cool names that you’ve partnered with. What would you say? Is kind of like a common misconception about brands working with or being co founded by celebrities, that actually it’s a bit different when you’re on the inside.

Sean Kane 25:09
What initially comes to mind is, is really what I think makes the ones that work stand out, which is authenticity. You know, in the case of of Jessica Kristen and DAX, they are and were legitimately concerned about everything that went on in the company as a reflection of themselves, their values, their work ethic. And to that end, they were all very tireless in the pursuit of really succeeding at those businesses or having those businesses succeed. So I think that you know, the misconception is that often the celebrities are just attachments, and that’s probably why you asked the question. But in my experience, they haven’t been attachments. This has been a focus of each and every one of them. I mean, really, also, if you look back at Jessica, being an entrepreneur, being on the cover of Forbes, she really became the poster person of like business entrepreneurship from the celebrity world. So I think it’s, it’s when it’s done the way that, that I’ve seen it done these co founders and partners of ours. They work hard and they put in time. It’s a grind. It’s not just they’re slapping their name on it. Every piece of the puzzle is important to them and and it’s a reflection of who they are, and they want to make sure that they’re providing everyone with positivity and great products and lots of opportunity and options,

Sameer Mehta 26:29
yeah. And unlike, you know, I guess, unlike the celebrities we work with, you know, there’s a lot of celebrity and kind of talent led brands out there. And I think a lot of times, you know, some celebrities or talent creators will kind of think, hey, if I put my name or face to it, it’s going to sell a ton of volume, and it’s going to be a billion dollar business override. And I think, you know, a lot of the talent and celebs that we’ve worked with in the past really kind of understand the nuances that, you know, it’s not only kind of your your name and likeness, but it’s really looking at things like CPA, looking at things that’s what’s impactful. You know, a lot of the talent that we’re working with are going into the Facebook Ads Manager. They’re looking at what’s working and what’s not. They’re talking to their their kind of fans on social to see what they’re looking for and really being engaged on that kind of one to one

Max Branstetter 27:19
level. Yeah, that’s a huge difference from probably what many think about in in years passive like, All right, let’s just get, you know, an influencer or celebrity to be the ambassador for this brand. Like, there’s, there’s way more to it when you go hands on like that, but also on that. Like, no question, obviously, if you’re, if you’re a brand, and you have, like, a strong celebrity endorsement, and you’re, they’re authentically promoting your product to their audience, more likely than not that you know, they have a huge audience that could have great effect on the sales numbers as well. In this day and age with the crazy changing world of social media and content as we know it and marketing as we know it, what would you say is like the best way to partner with celebrity, partner with a celebrity who is, you know, actively talking about your product and making sure that comes across authentically.

Sameer Mehta 28:08
Well, I think it’s finding a partner that actually, you know, comes up with the idea in partnership with you. I think it’s a lot different. When you’re you’re pitching kind of a celebrity or talent an idea and kind of convincing them to buy into the brand. Because at the end of the day, you know, the brand should become kind of more to that person, you know, as they’re going to be living, breathing and kind of talking about it a lot, and really kind of pushing it out there. And so I think at the end of the day, finding somebody that really aligns with the mission that you’re trying to build and really aligns with the product that you’re trying to build at the same

Max Branstetter 28:42
time. And how about you guys? So how did you, how did you find it? Find yourself at the point that you’re starting and building businesses, along with a list celebrities like that, you know, was that, was that out the womb? You guys were just kind of like, you know, we’re gonna walk the right carpet from the business standpoint too. Like, how did, how did you get first, kind of introduced to these types of co founders? I guess you could call it. Well, I

Sean Kane 29:01
was not out of the womb. I I went to school for accounting, and so

Max Branstetter 29:06
the accounting all stars now. Yeah, yeah. I got out

Sean Kane 29:09
of Loyola Marymount University, and I went to work for Arthur Andersen, absorbed at this point by Ernst and Young but, but really my account, my my background was in public accounting, and I worked to work for an internet company back in the early 2000s called price grabber. It was a shopping comparison website. After price grabber, I called up Brian Lee, and Brian was the the CEO and co founder of shoedazzle, a company that he built with Kim Kardashian and Legal Zoom. I had met him at some point through the years, and I said, Hey, I have the I have this amazing idea for a company in the baby category. And he said, Oh, let me, I need to talk to you about it. And I told him my idea a couple days later, and he said that that’s a pretty good idea, but mine’s better. And I’m going to start a business with Jessica, but why don’t you start it with us and run it? And I said, Okay,

Max Branstetter 29:55
I’ll do that. That’s like a godfather offer you can’t refuse. Yeah, yeah.

Sean Kane 30:00
So that was, that was kind of my foray into it. And really, ever since then, I learned a lot from Brian. I owe him a lot of you know, where my experience has gone through the years, and that’s kind of how we’re

Sameer Mehta 30:11
here. Yeah, I think, you know, I didn’t, I didn’t kind of fall into it. I think, you know, growing up, I think, you know, a lot of folks are kind of fascinated by, you know, celebrities and kind of TV and movies, you know, I think ironically, you know, in college, I interned at a few talent agencies, and so kind of got a sense of of, kind of a little bit of behind the scenes of what goes on with a lot of these, these talents and kind of managers. And I think that I kind of took some of that learning, and as we were starting kind of businesses, you know, even at Casper, you know, we didn’t specifically have talent that was front facing, but we just naturally had a ton of talent that was posting and kind of talking about the brand, and you kind of see, you know, how much that can kind of not only drive awareness to the business or to the product or the brand, but also provide validity, especially for new brands that are looking to kind of make a big impact. You really need to kind of find ways and ways to signal to the consumer you know that what you are doing is really important and actually makes

Max Branstetter 31:14
sense. And what would you say is the biggest difference working with a movie star, co founder versus not. At

Sean Kane 31:23
the Honest Company, we had four co founders. At hella Bella, we had two. And at smash kitchen, there’s Sameer and I and Glen and I think it’s, it’s generally, it’s a, it’s a dynamic that everybody provided that their vision and mission are aligned. It works really well. Samir and I and Glenn, we like to win. We like to figure out ways to win together. It’s really symbiotic. We are all on a shared mission, and none of the three of us are looking for credit. We just really want to build that’s where we find the most pleasure and get a lot of satisfaction out of

Sameer Mehta 31:57
that. Yeah, and I think, you know, of course, you know, we’re fortunate enough to have a movie star, kind of co founder, and I think, you know, not only is it, is it fun and really awesome to kind of see, you know, his meteoric rise as well, but you know, I think it’s really special when you can kind of find moments, kind of within his kind of movie schedule, to figure out the right kind of tie in our partnership within our brand, and kind of what he’s doing out there. And so I think, you know, you know, as we start to kind of expand and scale, and he starts to go into kind of more movie, movies and shows, there’s going to be a lot of synergy across kind of both. And I think when you can kind of bring that internally, you know, you’ll start to see a huge effect.

Max Branstetter 32:44
Well, you guys have been troopers. Got one more painfully awkward run of questions for you. We’re gonna wrap up with some rapid fire Q and A. You ready for it? Great. Love it. All right, let’s get wild. You first, Sean, so you talked about your riveting accounting background, and everybody’s tongue in cheek about accounting, but there’s, there’s a lot of positives that can come out of that part of your career, too. What would you say is a skill that accounting taught you that you applied today, other than the actual accounting that’ll

Sean Kane 33:13
apply today? I’m probably overly involved in the accounting of the company to our head of finances.

Max Branstetter 33:21
I should have known that was coming. Yeah,

Sean Kane 33:25
probably that. And I’m really fast at a 10 key, so there’s that,

Max Branstetter 33:30
all right. And you, Samir, I saw that you, you studied some at New York Film Academy. What’s, what’s this interest in film? Where did that come from?

Sameer Mehta 33:40
Yeah, just, I think, kind of growing up, and, you know, in college, I interned at a lot of talent agencies. I think I went to, you know, New York Film Academy to really experience more, kind of the business side of creating films. It was in on the the producing side. And so, you know, definitely learned a lot about creating content and how to kind of put the right teams together for it.

Max Branstetter 34:01
Awesome. Okay, totally different. I call them weird talents, but it’s Think of it like a party trick. We’ll go you first, Samir, what I just combined your names, by the way, Shamir, that’s the power dynamic.

Sean Kane 34:13
That’s good, that’ll that’ll stick inside the company at this

Max Branstetter 34:17
what Samir, what is a party trick or weird talent you have that really has no impact? On anything, but you’re really good at

Sameer Mehta 34:25
it. That’s funny. I think we were just talking about it. I have a really weird double joint in this that adds no value to me. But whenever I do it, people kind of get grossed out or weirded out. I can kind of turn my finger all the way back. I figured it out in the first grade when I was just sitting down, and everybody was kind of kind of grossed out by it. So again, it doesn’t really do anything other than I’ve never had a broken

Max Branstetter 34:53
finger. Oh, my God. Well, if there’s ever like a finger gymnastics Olympic competition, I. You got it. So congratulations. How about you, Sean, How flexible are your feet? No, I’m just kidding. What’s a party trick? You have

Sean Kane 35:09
party trick. I can make a rose out of $1 bill. Oh,

Max Branstetter 35:13
how did you learn to you? Left me speechless. How did you learn to do that? A little

Sean Kane 35:17
bit of origami. A friend of mine in college. His name was Luis. He was making them one day. And I said, How do you do that? So I can make your dollar bill rose today,

Max Branstetter 35:30
all right? And then each of you, we’ll go with you. First Sean, I like Shamir. I’m just gonna say Shamir. No, first Sean, besides french fries, the obvious, what is your favorite food pairing for any of the smashed kitchen products?

Sean Kane 35:46
Oh, you know, generally, the hot honey barbecue sauce. We like to say the hot honey is is money, and it goes on everything. So I’ll put it on salads and pizzas and even tacos. I mean, it’s, we’ll send you some. It’s incredible.

Max Branstetter 36:02
You’ll love it. I appreciate it. Yeah, that sounds delightful. How about you? Samir,

Sameer Mehta 36:07
my favorite pairing is a grilled cheese with the hot honey ketchup. I’m just a huge ketchup fan, so the hot honey ketchup is something I eat all the time.

Max Branstetter 36:17
Perfect. Hot honey. It’s it’s hot and it’s money, and it’s money, all right? And last one, if the two of you were starring in a movie, what genre of film would it be in?

Sean Kane 36:31
I would say, for us, action.

Sameer Mehta 36:34
I like the action. Maybe, maybe it’s a comedic action. But nonetheless, action, Shamir

Sean Kane 36:41
goes Shamir goes to White Castle.

Max Branstetter 36:44
Shameer goes to White Castle. There could be a whole franchise on that. Shout out, the lovable character, freak show from the first one, iconic. All right. Well, thank you, Shamir. Thank you Samir and Sean, so much for sharing your story and and laughing a bit or a bunch, and doing what you’re doing, really, really, really cool. And shout out Glenn as well. Just awesome line that you have, and you’re you’re cracking the code of seemingly doing the impossible, going against some of those brands that have been up there forever, and adding a really cool alternative in the in the condiment space, across the condiment space. So, so thanks for revolutionizing the pantry. I know anybody, if they want to learn more, can go to smash kitchen.com, and for each of you, where’s the best place, if anybody wants to connect with you guys online, Samir is great, great at LinkedIn. That’s true. That goes without saying, perfect. All right. LinkedIn, all around and then last thing, final thoughts, it could be a quote. It could be, and you have to say this with a mouthful of, man, no, I’m just gonna, but FINAL THOUGHTS could be quote. Kind of words of wisdom. I’ll let each of you get a stab at it, but just kind of a final note, one line to send audience home with. Take it away.

Sameer Mehta 37:54
You know, we’re really excited about what we’re building. You know, condiments are just the start. If you kind of look at the category and you kind of go grocery shopping, definitely look at the back of of a lot of these labels and these bottles to see what you’re kind of feeding yourself and your family. And kind of make a conscious decision, kind of going forward

Sean Kane 38:10
in the realm of entrepreneurship, many, many people have ideas and want to pursue something my wife has a podcast and and really didn’t pursue for many years until she did. So to that end, it’s if you have an idea and something interests, you just go do it. Nobody else is going to if you don’t, and just try to go for it, see what happens.

Max Branstetter 38:30
Real quick. Let’s shout out your wife’s podcast. What’s the name of it? Again? I know it’s true

Sean Kane 38:35
crime. Yeah, it’s called housewives of true crime.

Max Branstetter 38:39
Dun, dun, dun, dun.

Sean Kane 38:42
It’s great. Everybody’s gonna love it. Go check it

Max Branstetter 38:47
out. Thank you Sean, the Househusband of True Crime, and Sameer, Mr. Real Mayonnaise, for coming on Wild Business Growth, sharing the smashing Smash Kitchen story. And thank you wild listeners for tuning in to another episode. If you want to hear more wild stories like this one, make sure to follow or subscribe to Wild Business Growth on your favorite podcast platforms, as well as on YouTube. YouTube is @MaxBranstetter for the video versions and to learn more about MaxPodcasting, my podcast production business, Wild Business Growth, or the Podcasting to the Max newsletter, which hits your inbox if you so choose. Every Thursday, you can learn all those things and subscribe at MaxPodcasting.com Until next time, Let your business Run Wild…Bring on the Bongos!!