Speaker 1: This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Masser and Jason
Speaker 1: Kelly on Bloomberg Radio. Well, our next guest understands both
Speaker 1: the private and public sector. She's a former executive at
Speaker 1: a O Well during the Obama administration, she worked to
Speaker 1: create jobs and stimulate the economy, and today she is
Speaker 1: the CEO of Hint. It's a non alcoholic flavored water
Speaker 1: brand that grew out of really a personal mission. I
Speaker 1: love the story behind this sites John legend as an investor,
Speaker 1: sold across major retailers including Amazon, Whole Foods, Target, and more.
Speaker 1: Joining us right now is Kara Golden. She's the CEO
Speaker 1: of Hint, and she joins us on the phone from Main. Kara,
Speaker 1: delighted to meet you virtually, Um, and have you joined
Speaker 1: us here on Bloomberg Radio. How are you? I'm good,
Speaker 1: I'm good. Nice to meet you. Well, tell us a
Speaker 1: little bit about your story. Um, you have a great
Speaker 1: website and it's fun to read. But for our listeners,
Speaker 1: give us a little bit a quick kind of uh
Speaker 1: snippet of how you came to create your company. Yeah. So,
Speaker 1: as you mentioned, I was a tech executive prior to
Speaker 1: starting hands. I I never you know, thought I was
Speaker 1: going to be starting a beverage company, and and honestly,
Speaker 1: I didn't even think about being an entrepreneur or or
Speaker 1: starting my own company. But I was trying to solve
Speaker 1: a problem for myself around health a few years back
Speaker 1: and realized that I was drinking a ton of diet
Speaker 1: soda and that I wasn't getting as healthy as I
Speaker 1: wanted to be. I had some various health issues, including
Speaker 1: weight issues and skin issues and some other things. And
Speaker 1: after seeing a bunch of doctors and nobody could kind
Speaker 1: of come up with a conclusion, I just decided to
Speaker 1: really look at what I was putting inside my body
Speaker 1: and and the what really surprised me the most. As
Speaker 1: I went through kind of an elimination process of trying
Speaker 1: to eliminate things and see what would happen, I recognized
Speaker 1: that the diet soda was the thing that was really
Speaker 1: kind of stopping me from as healthy as I wanted
Speaker 1: And and uh, you know, the once I actually swapped
Speaker 1: out Diatesota for plain water, I also realized that I
Speaker 1: knew that water was was, you know, better for me,
Speaker 1: but I really just never liked the taste or was
Speaker 1: kind of bored with the taste. So I started throwing
Speaker 1: fruit and water and and looking for this product. And
Speaker 1: you know, what I really realized was that sugar was
Speaker 1: not the issue for me. It was these diet sweeteners
Speaker 1: that were actually causing me, you know, all kinds of issues.
Speaker 1: So that that was really the beginning of it. And um,
Speaker 1: you know, and and again when I decided to just
Speaker 1: go ahead and figure out how to do this product,
Speaker 1: I got it into my local Whole Foods. I live
Speaker 1: in San Francisco, um normally and uh, and you know,
Speaker 1: really realized that that there were a lot of other
Speaker 1: people like me who were really looking for a water
Speaker 1: and things that were calling themselves water and kind of
Speaker 1: healthier for you that just didn't have all the sweeteners
Speaker 1: in it. And you know that was gosh, almost fifteen
Speaker 1: years ago now, um and uh and you know, but
Speaker 1: it really stemmed out of, like frankly, a lot of
Speaker 1: other brands that stick desire to not only get myself healthy,
Speaker 1: but also, um, you know, help other people as well.
Speaker 1: So what's the biggest thing that you've learned in those
Speaker 1: fifteen years? Because I know you you've been very generous
Speaker 1: in giving advice to other entrepreneurs, and I wonder and
Speaker 1: I know that they're legions of things. Are many things
Speaker 1: that you could say, reads and stuff, um, but like,
Speaker 1: what's one thing that you just sort of distill it
Speaker 1: down to uh that you tell folks as they're trying
Speaker 1: to start companies. You know, I have no matter what industry,
Speaker 1: if you have a story in your own personal story too,
Speaker 1: or you know, could be your family story to to um,
Speaker 1: you know, sort of back up why you did something,
Speaker 1: then I think it's it's very relatable, maybe not to everybody,
Speaker 1: but to you know, many many people, and it's just
Speaker 1: a way to kind of get the message out there
Speaker 1: about why you ultimately did something. And you know, I
Speaker 1: think today you drinks need to taste good, right, you
Speaker 1: can't just go and launch a product that that doesn't
Speaker 1: taste good. I mean that's sort of a given. But
Speaker 1: beyond that, actually talking to people about what your story
Speaker 1: is is a competitive advantage for any entrepreneur in any
Speaker 1: industry because you know, there's these large UH companies typically
Speaker 1: public companies and every sector that are Nobody knows who
Speaker 1: started these companies anymore. You know, it's way long ago,
Speaker 1: so they don't have a founder story of sort of
Speaker 1: why they did something, and so I think like that
Speaker 1: that's a real key thing that I've learned. And then
Speaker 1: and then also I think it's just look, there's a
Speaker 1: lot easier ways to make money. I always share with
Speaker 1: entrepreneurs that you know, the ones that you know hit
Speaker 1: it out of the ballpark and you know, have the
Speaker 1: multi billion dollar sales of the company are few and
Speaker 1: far between, and so you really have to have a
Speaker 1: passion for wanting to do something. And so tell us
Speaker 1: what business life has been like in the pandemic? Director
Speaker 1: consumer is your main business model, but I wonder like,
Speaker 1: have there been supply chain issues? Have there been sourcing
Speaker 1: like what's been going on? How have you felt it
Speaker 1: in your business? Yeah? So actually we're nationwide and lots
Speaker 1: of stores, but also direct to consumers is now over
Speaker 1: fifty percent of our overall business. I mean I think
Speaker 1: business for us, Yeah, I mean that business for us,
Speaker 1: you know has grown significantly almost tripled um since really
Speaker 1: March fifteen, UM, so it's been absolutely crazy. I mean
Speaker 1: we had started that business about five years ago at um,
Speaker 1: you know, on our own website as as well as Amazon,
Speaker 1: but primarily our own website. And you know what we
Speaker 1: decided again on March fifteenth, as the world was changing,
Speaker 1: was let's just go out to our customer base and
Speaker 1: let them know, hey, you know, we're still available in stores,
Speaker 1: but if there are supply issues, just go to drink
Speaker 1: king dot com. And having a database of over a
Speaker 1: million customers in that database on March fifteen was just
Speaker 1: you know, a godsend in many many ways because it
Speaker 1: really helped the consumer to you know, make it easier
Speaker 1: for them to actually get product right right rather than
Speaker 1: rather than going to stores and trying to find our product.
Speaker 1: And and so I mean that was really really helpful. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I agree with you, you know, and and I know
Speaker 1: just from our own shopping, like we went you know
Speaker 1: to places where we knew we could get stuff and
Speaker 1: stuck with those brands that we know that we like
Speaker 1: and that we could easily access. You know. I do
Speaker 1: also wonder though about you know, your business going forward,
Speaker 1: and I'm curious about, you know, leveraging the model I
Speaker 1: think you guys are doing sunscreen. My understanding as you're
Speaker 1: looking into maybe deodorant, like you have kind of a
Speaker 1: thinking about how you the kind of products you want
Speaker 1: to create. It's different from what a lot of other
Speaker 1: folks are doing. UM, tell us a little bit about
Speaker 1: how you grow the brand and expansion. Yeah. So, I
Speaker 1: mean the brand started with health right and just trying
Speaker 1: to get me to drink water. And and as we
Speaker 1: a couple of years ago, I started looking at the
Speaker 1: sunscreen market again for myself and my family, and there
Speaker 1: just wasn't a great experience with the sunscreen that I
Speaker 1: could find that smelled great other than coconut. Um it
Speaker 1: was either you know, uncent unscented or coconut that was
Speaker 1: on the market. So um, So we came out with
Speaker 1: a sunscreen using our you know, real fruit actances from
Speaker 1: the water to scent the sunscreen. So we have it
Speaker 1: in pear and pineapple and grape fruit. It's amazing. And
Speaker 1: then we actually did come out with a deodorants this year,
Speaker 1: um in in January and actually was just in U
Speaker 1: L magazine as actually today as as one of the
Speaker 1: best deodorants in the market. UM. I was really looking
Speaker 1: for a deodorant that didn't have a luminum in it
Speaker 1: and uh, and you know it's not easy to find that.
Speaker 1: And again that smells great and actually works and so
Speaker 1: um that you know, that's really the halo for the brand,
Speaker 1: and it was from day one was just health. And
Speaker 1: so you know, while it might be confusing to people
Speaker 1: initially thinking Okay, this is a beverage company, what are
Speaker 1: they doing watching a sunscreen or a deodorant, I think
Speaker 1: you know, once people actually see what we're doing around health,
Speaker 1: and today, you know, more than ever. I mean, every
Speaker 1: single day I run into people who are like, you know,
Speaker 1: just trying to stay healthy. Right. I mean you talked
Speaker 1: about the oreos and some of the other stuff. I mean,
Speaker 1: I think you know, there's definitely a little bit of that,
Speaker 1: but I think more than more than ever, I mean,
Speaker 1: it's the question of the hour for people as how
Speaker 1: do I stay healthy? Yeah, and have to put you know,
Speaker 1: you have to exercise and do all of that stuff,
Speaker 1: but you have to put this stuff in your body. Well,
Speaker 1: what has come out because of the virus is that
Speaker 1: you know, if you have underlying health problems, and some
Speaker 1: of them sometimes are genetic and you can't control, but
Speaker 1: things like weight, uh and some other issues, we know
Speaker 1: it made you more vulnerable, certainly to the virus. And
Speaker 1: you're right, I think Jason and I and I've had
Speaker 1: a lot of conversations with folks in the wellness and
Speaker 1: fitness world about how this has been front and center
Speaker 1: for people, uh as they've been dealing with the pandemic. Absolutely, yeah,
Speaker 1: and and you know you talked about supply chain as well.
Speaker 1: I mean that for us. You know, again, we had
Speaker 1: no sort of crystal ball to say, okay when the
Speaker 1: pandemic comes. But you know, we we were very well
Speaker 1: prepared in that we do everything that we do in
Speaker 1: the US. We weren't you know, taking taking packaging from
Speaker 1: another country in order to produce us our product. We
Speaker 1: produced everything here. All of our bottles are here, all
Speaker 1: of our labels are here. And then in addition to that, UM,
Speaker 1: not all water bottle water is actually FDA regulated. Ours
Speaker 1: is because we used fruit in our product. UM, but
Speaker 1: we don't have that. We actually use a clean room
Speaker 1: when we're bottling the products, so there's no people in
Speaker 1: the room, which has been sort of a huge conversation
Speaker 1: around the food industry in particular, especially with coronavirus UM.
Speaker 1: So we were very well prepared to not have any
Speaker 1: interruption and our production and supply chain. And we actually
Speaker 1: got a phone call late March from Costco and they said, hey,
Speaker 1: you know we're having some supply issues. We have some
Speaker 1: uh companies that we work with that are trying to
Speaker 1: get cans from Asia and some of the other places,
Speaker 1: and uh, we were just curious, can you guys go
Speaker 1: national with Costco? So we just rolled into Costco wide. Um. Yeah,
Speaker 1: So you know that was the last thing months for us. Right,
Speaker 1: it's pretty big deal for for us. In addition to
Speaker 1: you know, tripling that direct to consumer business very exciting.
Speaker 1: So care before we let you go. I gotta ask you,
Speaker 1: especially given some of the work you did with the government.
Speaker 1: You know, everyone is talking about job retention, job creation,
Speaker 1: the changing workforce, a workforce that is very much on
Speaker 1: the sidelines right now. You know all the figures like
Speaker 1: we do as you think about this as a CEO,
Speaker 1: what do we do as a country? I know it's
Speaker 1: a big picture question and I only am going to
Speaker 1: give you about a minute to answer it. But what's
Speaker 1: one thing we should be thinking about as we try
Speaker 1: and make our way through this? Well? I think, first
Speaker 1: of all, if you are in a situation where you
Speaker 1: need to go find a job, I think now versus waiting, um,
Speaker 1: is there's no better time to go out and find
Speaker 1: a job. Especially when people think like, you can't get
Speaker 1: a job right now right, it's it's now is the
Speaker 1: time to go out and because if you wait until um,
Speaker 1: you know, the government is no longer issuing checks, and
Speaker 1: then you know you're gonna have that many more people
Speaker 1: out there. And and you know, I also think I
Speaker 1: was at an event a couple of weeks ago with
Speaker 1: my senior in high school hearing a bunch of parents
Speaker 1: talking about how, oh, it's too bad you know, new
Speaker 1: college grads can't get a job. I'm like, don't help
Speaker 1: them that. And that's the worst thing that you can
Speaker 1: found it. I mean, look, there's always going to be
Speaker 1: a job out there, right, and and get out there
Speaker 1: and try and find it. So I think, you know,
Speaker 1: we need to keep going and there will be you
Speaker 1: might have to look under a few more rocks, right,
Speaker 1: but you you've got to get out there and go
Speaker 1: do it. Yeah, that's a good optimistic tone to end on. Carol,
Speaker 1: Thank you so much, and hopefully we can check back
Speaker 1: with you again, uh in the future. Carrot Golden, she's
Speaker 1: the CEO of HINT, joining us on the phone from
Speaker 1: Main