Kara Goldin – The Founder of HINT Water

All right, we're live. This is Mike Koenigs, and this is the Big Leap. I'm here with my co partner, Gay Hendricks, and Kara golden, who is the author of Undaunted and Awesome. So, so great to have you here today.

Thanks for having me.

Yes, yes.

I love that title, by the way. I love that title. That's just.

Thank you. Yeah, well, it's. You know, it. It just kind of came to me after writing this book for four years, actually. I was in just sitting there journaling, and finally when it came time to actually get the title, that was really what it was all about.

And let's talk about where the title came from, because I think that's a good place to start. And so you know how we set these interviews up. Gay usually asks some Big Leap questions about where your biggest leaps came from and things like that. I'm going to get into a little bit of the nitty gritty of the book itself, which officially is available October 20th. So let's talk a little bit about title.

Yeah, I'd love to hear where that came from, Kara. And then I want to ask you a couple of Big Leap related questions, but did that come to you in a dream or whispered in your ear by an angel or what?

You know, as I was going through my notes and writing this book, I mean, I really started to look at, kind of looking in the rearview mirror at sort of what I had been through in building this company, which is about, I don't know, 90% of this book is really sort of sharing the journey of building. I should show you this company. Hint. And.

Kind of also out of when I would be out speaking and talking about building the company as well, a lot of people would say, wow.

You'Re fearless. You don't have any doubts. You haven't had any doubters along the way. And that's when I really realized that this book needed to be shared with people and the stories needed to be told, because I believe that, you know, clearly my journey definitely had the doubts from myself and the doubters, but also there's some failures in there and there's fears. And I think every great entrepreneur has those as well. But we need to, like, learn about those in order to really kind of get out of the gate and break down the walls in our own lives. And so that was really the kind of the epiphany when I thought about, so what do I call this book? And it's really about my hope and wish for everybody to kind of live undaunted and Go and try. And that is that. That's it.

One of the original premises of the Big Leap is the idea that at certain times in our lives and our careers, we take certain big leaps, and we're interested in what led up to that. And so, looking back through your whole career and how you got started and everything, what were one or two of your big leaps, where suddenly you were here and then suddenly you were here.

Yeah. So I would have to say my first job at Time magazine, when I actually just literally took a plane to go and try and get a job at Fortune magazine, which was part of Time, and showed up in the building, there was no security in at that point. And so I just marched into the HR office and shared my letter that I had gotten from the then editor, managing editor of Fortune magazine, who had written me kind of a Dear John letter saying, you know, if you're ever in the New York area, let us know. And I took it that very literally and ended up showing up there. And so I really think that's a story of, you know, not only big leaps, but also how do you show up and what can happen if you actually do show up. And then I would say, in starting this company, Hint, I mean, I had no beverage experience. I had never been an entrepreneur before, but I was a consumer of this product that I wanted to be in the market. And I really just decided, I'm going to go and do this. And, you know, it was definitely a big leap. I think sometimes big leaps are. You don't allow yourself to sort of focus too much in on how big of a leap is, or else you won't do it. And so that is also the story of Hint.

Well, also, it illustrates one of my things that I teach entrepreneurs, which is almost every entrepreneur has to have at some point what I call 20 seconds of insane courage, where you work up the courage to walk into the office and make a cold call at Time magazine or Fortune. And there are so many times in life that I've talked to people here in my office where they maybe missed one or two of those moments where they regretted not having that insane courage. But I honor you for taking that leap and getting your foot in the door. How long did you work there at Time?

I was just there for a few years and learned a ton about myself. I never got the job at Fortune. I ended up getting a job at Time, which was incredible. I then went on to work at CNN back in the early days when Ted Turner was still there on a daily basis.

Very, very exciting. Time to be there. And then actually moved to the Bay Area from New York and had been following this guy Steve Jobs, and had just huge admiration. Most people that I knew really didn't know who Steve was, but I just thought that his ability to actually really understand consumer behavior and also, you know, really make products that were beautiful and simple and useful or was something that, you know, I just really admired. And so that's when I found a little startup that he had kind of incubated inside of Apple. But I ended up joining just outside of, outside of Apple. And, you know, so many lessons learned there. But that was my first, like, true startup, I guess. Another leap I've been leaping my whole life, I think. Yeah, anything.

And then kind of fell six months into, was doing a great job on really building out the E commerce partnerships inside of this company called to market, which was the Steve Jobs idea. And then AOL was an investor in our company and asked me to. They acquired our company and asked me to come and run E Commerce and shopping for aol. I think they primarily gave me this, this somewhat big role because they didn't think that E commerce and shopping was actually going to start happening. And. And it did. And, and I ended up staying there for almost seven years and was really, you know, it was incredible. But, you know, I think the thing that I believed is I somehow got on this track of being in tech, which I really enjoyed. And you know, definitely it was. I felt like it was very much about disruption and development and trying to figure out puzzle pieces along the way. But for me, I really, I was starting my family and at that point I had three young kids and I really wanted to do something that focused on health because that's kind of how I was thinking about, you know, sort of my big problem in my life was there was nothing specific in that, like a diagnosis of any sort. But I thought I had gained all this weight, my skin had developed terrible adult acne, my energy levels were really low. So I really was kind of in this mode of focusing on making sure that I was as healthy as I could be. And that's when I really came up with the idea for Hint when I realized that I was drinking a ton of diet soda. And then when I gave up my diet soda addiction and started, you know, drinking plain water, I'm like, I cannot stick to plain water because it's so boring. And that's why people don't drink water. They all know that they're supposed to drink water, but water is just so boring. And so that's when I started slicing up fruit, you know, developed it in my kitchen. I wasn't, you know, a particularly great chef. I was an okay baker, but I had no idea what I was doing. But I just. I lived undaunted and just kept trying. And that was really, you know, today, Today we're the largest non alcoholic beverage in the country that doesn't have a relationship with Coke, Pepsi, or Dr. Pepper, Snapple. And we've done things very uniquely in building out this company, including 55% of our business is direct to consumer. So all the. All my previous big leaps ended up kind of coming together as well. And I always talk about, you know, the dots always eventually connect. Sometimes you don't know how they're going to, but it's definitely. I see the connection now.

I really resonate with that. I was telling Mike beforehand that I was excited to meet you because I was one of the early round investors in Cavita, which we ended up selling to Pepsi. So Kind Vibrations to Pepsi.

Oh, that's awesome.

I'm also an investor in his new one, which is Flying Embers, which is a.

Hard kombucha play.

That's great. Yeah, I knew some of the people I met. I remember when Cavita was starting there was. Did you know Doug Abrams?

Yeah, I've met him. Yeah.

Bill Moses is the guy that actually, I was friends with. Bill Moses. He lives up the road from me and he was the founder of Kavita.

Yeah. But he's friends with Doug. And I remember Doug brought him into our office and wanted to give a run. Get a rundown of, you know, how do I actually do a beverage? So, yeah, it was pretty. It was pretty funny. So that's awesome. That's great.

All right, I've got a question for you, Kara, because it seemed from my angle here, everything is about. You've just had a lot of courage. And one of the biggest leaps that most young entrepreneurs struggle with is just cold calling. So I would like you to talk a little bit about your guerilla strategies to marketing and, you know, doing things. Like you talked about hanging out at Whole Foods, not Nate taking no for an answer. So if you were starting hint today, or if you're giving advice to someone who wanted to get a product into retail or through big channel distribution, what would you do to build those relationships, the initial relationships, if didn't have the benefit of being known or having a pedigree or any connections, I think I.

Would do exactly the same thing, which is go into the stores and actually Just start talking to anybody who will talk to you, whether that's the employee that works at the store or somebody who might work for a brand that is actually stocking the shelves. And just do whatever you can to try and network and get more and more information and also just look online. I mean, oftentimes when people are doing interviews, I'm sure through many of my interviews, I share thoughts. And I also have a podcast, Unstoppable, which I interview tons of founders that they're always giving little tips along the way, too. So I think that that is like, more than anything where you can just find, you know, the ideas, you know, that that really help you to kind of get out of the gate. But I think more than anything, Mike, you and I were talking about this is that there's not. There's not one specific thing that you do that in any industry to actually build a company. I don't think any entrepreneur would be able to say, 1, 2, 3, this is exactly what you do. Instead, you know, you've got to go and gather information. You start to network with people, people. I was just interviewing somebody who has a beauty product and she was sharing with me that the way she came into the beauty industry, her name's Tata Harper, and she just started reading all these books and finally, like, she didn't know how to formulate her product. So she started calling the author of the book and of the books that she liked and started asking them if maybe they could make an introduction to some of the scientists and some of the other people that are doing things. So again, I think it's just trying to gather information and you're going to hear a lot of no's along the way. But I think you just have to just, you know, be passionate about what you're doing and likable too, I think, and try and figure out how to network with most of these people.

How about rapport building skills? Did you find you had a strategy in mind and a way of not being.

You know, a pest, but still being very, very present and also likable? Like, what? Did you have anything in particular that stood out that got you into more doors than you would have anticipated or just gave you great results?

I think, you know, just thinking back on it, that people would ask me very quickly, like, what my experience was, and I didn't have any beverage experience, so, you know, they were trying to size me up to figure out whether or not, you know, this was worth their time to even have an initial conversation. And so there were many doors shut along the way, you know, in those initial days. But then I think it once, you know, there was a little bit of a door open and I was telling people what I was curious about. Like, you know, for example, I wanted to produce a product that didn't use preservatives in it, but we used real fruit. And so I was finding that everything that had fruit actually used preservatives. So everybody with like vast experience from the beverage industry would say, oh no, you have to use preservatives in your product. And I kept asking why? And, and again, like some people may take that as like obnoxious or like why is she asking me why? But then every once in a while I'd run into people who'd say, oh, actually I'm not really sure why, I just know that that's the way it's done. And I'm like, aha, isn't that really interesting? And so, you know, you get those people to come and join your party a little bit. And you know, and also like, as I found out information, if I knew that there was somebody who I talked to in the past who would be interested, I'd email them and just say, hey, listen, can we have like 15 more minutes? You know, I found out this really interesting thing that maybe you'd be interested in too. So I think just kind of building yourself not just as a, not just as a sponge, but also as somebody who is a resource. Right. Who's out there. Value add. Yeah, that, you know, I think like, look, you pay back. Right? And I think like that is, I'm sure, you know, both you guys agree that it's like, you know, that's how business ultimately builds and that's how your, you know, reputation builds as well. That you're, it's just not a one way thing that you're constantly looking at ways that you can be helpful.

Did you originally start by getting it into one particular store at the beginning and it grew from there or how did the early days work?

Yeah, so there's a very somewhat funny story.

In the book where I talk about getting the product into Whole Foods. And so the story. So I'd written, I decided that I was going to try and develop this product and I'd written the business plan and then I went home and told my husband that I was going to do this and he wasn't that excited about it because I had no experience and I was writing $50,000 checks off our bank account, buying plastic bottles. You know, it was like he thought like, what Is she doing? You know, and like, he was like, we're going to go bankrupt with you just, like, writing these huge checks. And. And so I didn't really like his response very much. And so then I decided to share with him that I was also pregnant with our fourth child. And so you should be really, really nice to me. And, and he walked out of the room and I didn't know if he was coming back. Like, I listened for footsteps in the house to make sure that he was still there, because it was, it was kind of a scary moment. But then I knew I was having my son Justin in the next six months. And my timeline for actually creating the product, because I thought, oh, maybe I'll, you know, have a little bit of time off for maternity leave from my own little company if I can actually get it on the shelf and it'll just be super easy. I can just like walk away. Not. But that's when I got the product. We had the small bottler in Chicago that we were using and we. The, the production was a little bit delayed. So the morning that I was having a plan C section, I. I woke up, I just gotten the product the day before, and I. My husband said, so what do you want to do? We don't have to be at the hospital until 2:00 clock this afternoon. And I said, let's go see if we can get the product on the shelf at Whole Foods. And he said, I was thinking like a walk or brunch or something like that. I was like, no, no, no. Like, let's just go to Whole Foods and we' we can get it on the shelf. And so when we got there, I saw the guy that I had been talking to, and I hadn't seen him in a couple of months. And I said, hi, do you remember me? And he said, you are really pregnant? And I said, I know, I'm like, delivering today. And he said, how do you know you're delivering today? And I said, I'm having a plan C section. And he said, what's a plan C section? And I said, so it's a C section. He said, but how do you know you're having a baby today? And so I was like, oh, okay, I get it. So, all right. So there's, there's an emergency C section and then there's a plan C section and then there's vaginal delivery. And so my husband, of course, was backing up into the fruits and vegetable section, like, thinking, oh, my God, she's really going there right now. She's explaining to this 25 year old, you know, who's like, no experience in childbirth. And so I'm explaining it. And then 15 minutes later he was like, thank you so much. Like, I didn't have any sisters. My mom never explained this to me. I was like, no problem, but can you, like, get our product on the shelf too, like, now that I'm going to have a baby? And he said, I will try, but there's no guarantee. And so I left Whole Foods that day, not really knowing whether or not he was going to do what I wanted him to do, but he did. And then the next day when I was in the hospital after my son Justin was born and everything was great, we got a phone call and it was the guy from Whole Foods. And he said, you, product is gone. Of course, when he said, your product is gone, I just thought that somebody stole it. Like, I was just like, what do you mean it's gone? Like, who took it? You know, I dropped that off before I went and delivered a child. And he said, no, I mean, 10 cases that you left with us were bought. And so I don't know how long I'm going to get in trouble if I have this empty space on the shelf. So that's when it all began. And you know, frankly, you know, we thought at that point that we were off to the races, right? Like, it was all going to be easy peasy. And, you know, 15 years later, you know, we're now in 30,000 stores, we've got, you know, a huge business online. But. But all the games that are played in the beverage industry and this whole new world that I was focused on was just.

I got my MBA clearly in beverage the first two years that I was trying to do this business because I just couldn't believe the stuff that went on. But I was willing to fight and ultimately build the company that we have today.

That's one of the best pitch stories I've ever heard. Note to entrepreneurs out there go in very pregnant when you're going to do your big pitch.

Good idea. Well, that leads me to another question, which is you're the youngest of five, so one of the things you talk about in the book is you wouldn't take no for an answer. And to build a beverage company requires a lot of negotiating. So what's some of your strategies for extracting a yes out of a maybe or a no? Do you have anything else that pops in your head?

You know, I. I don't know. I. Mike, you and I have talked about this A little. A little bit. But I think part of it. My parents were a little bit older when I was, you know, born, and. And I. They. They were 40, which, you know, is not so old today, but back then.

They'Re basically throwing you in the broken glass and the dirt and say, figure it out. The other kids.

It. And, you know, I had, like, two brothers and two sisters. My brothers were actually pretty naughty. And so my parents were just, like. They. They'd say, just don't get in too much trouble and don't embarrass me when you go outside, because they were just, like, dealing with the hangover of my brothers. And. And so, you know, I think they were also very prepared to say no all the time, because they were. They had just been doing it for so many years. And so finally, when I rol. I mean, I just learned that they're. No. Like, if I just kept Adam and just kept asking why? And then after a while, they would just, you know, say, okay, like, you know, you can do this, but you can't do this. And so sometimes I would, you know, ask them for things that I didn't really want that I thought was a little reaching. And I was like, okay, how about this? Like, what if we go to this? Which is really what I wanted? And then they would be like, all right, fine. And. But the key thing, you know, was sort of. I think this is. This is kind of another story. I haven't even talked about this before, but I think it's really, really true, is that, you know, really understanding, like, what things they really cared about. Like, I mean, for me to, like, be home past curfew was, like, a really big deal to them, and so I would, you know, honor that sort of stuff. Like, I. There weren't that many, but once I knew the rules, like, I was. I was like, okay, like, you can have a few. And then when they'd try and bring in more rules, I'd say, like, okay, well, I mean, you got a lot already, like, how many more you could have? So, I don't know. I just. Like, my poor parents. I badgered them with so many questions along the way that I think after a while, they were like, just like, have fun and keep laughing and keep smiling, but just don't get us in trouble. That's all we care about. And don't get hurt.

Well, it sounds to me like the Kara Gold golden strategy for negotiating is ask for a skyscraper, settle for a house, and badger them with questions. So we'll make sure we put that in the worksheet that we've been putting together. But that's great. I love it.

Gay.

What else do you have?

I was just remembering when my daughter was little, one of her favorite toys was at the time called Bobo the Clown. I don't know what they call them now, but they're a clown. And you biff it.

She's a clown, yeah. Punchy and then Bobo and then Punchy the Clown. Yeah, I remember that.

Yeah. And I use that as an example for how entrepreneurs need to be to get through life, because there's usually some barrier. Like I remember in the early days of Kavita, we literally couldn't get the lids to stick on. And so a stopgap measure was to wrap tape around the bottle cap for a while. And Bill doesn't even like to talk about that phase of the company anymore, but there was a phase of people wrapping tape around these bottles to keep them from fizzing out. So what were some of your barriers that you had to do a Bobo the Clown get back up from kind of thing?

Let's see. Well, I think one of the most important lessons that I learned that I love sharing with entrepreneurs is, first of all, I had been told that if you get kicked out of a retailer or a big chain, that you'll never get back in. It's all over.

And one of my stories was.

Working with Starbucks. So we got into Starbucks. We're in all 11,000 stores in Starbucks. It was supposed to be 200. Then they really liked it, and then they put us into 11,000. And prior to starting even getting in there, I sort of knew all the rules, like how much we were supposed to be doing every day. And we ended up within six months, we're doing three times what the expectations were. So we were doing great. And then after a year and a half, we got a phone call from a buyer at Starbucks and they told us that we were being discontinued because.

Basically they were going to put more food into the case that we were in. And it was a higher margin business. They had just decided to focus on higher margin businesses and it didn't matter that we were doing well.

I think that the moral of the story on that is that the rules can change and Starbucks has their business to run, I have my business to run, and there's just no guarantees. And I think that the thing that I was not prepared for in that situation was that they were 40% of my overall business. So when they went away the next week, I had a ton of product left in the warehouse, I, you know, I was like super bombed. But I also appreciated the fact that they've been paying me for the product. And we have been exposed to all these different, you know, places throughout the US that we maybe wouldn't have been exposed to before. But having so much of your business with, with, you know, one partner who can like make that decision that's going to be better for their business is just incredibly dangerous. Right? The good news that came from that story though is that a couple of weeks later we got a phone call from Amazon and the buyer at Amazon had been drinking our product at Starbucks and so he was launching their grocery business at Amazon and he really wanted to put Hint in to the lineup and he thought that there was going to be significant lead time. But of course I had all this product in my warehouse that I could sell them like that afternoon. And so that ended up happening and then we became one of the top products in grocery for Amazon. And then with that, that ended up really giving me the confidence. Even though I had run AOL's shopping and E Commerce, I still didn't believe that people were going to buy a heavy product like Hint and have it sent to their home. I just didn't think that Grocery was one of those categories until Amazon sort of showed me that it was.

And so I tell the story that like with one door closing or opening, right, like they all, all these dots connect. Like I fundamentally, you know, that was a bad day when Starbucks kicked us out. But also would the Amazon buyer have known about our product if we weren't in Starbucks? You know, would I have had the courage or had the vision to actually go and launch a direct to consumer business on my own? I mean today we're hands down the largest direct consumer business in the beverage industry. You know, I don't know that I would have done that if it wasn't for Starbucks. And so I think there's, there are like, you know, if you look closely at kind of what's, what's happened and I always say look in the rearview mirror because you can, you can start to see these, you know, pieces all kind of come together.

Well, you know, when I, when I hear that, that story.

And I can remember that's how I first saw Hint was at Starbucks and it was to me a perfectly matched brand. In other words, I've always, you know, you see Starbucks as being a higher end consumer brand and then.

You know, hint, the packaging, it feels like a higher end brand. It doesn't feel like.

A Kmart or A Walmart bottle. You know, it's got heft and subst and the label, just the packaging. So my gut is that really did give you a great boost, you know, and it was sort of like this is equal to this kind of a thing. So that's, I hadn't thought of that until I just heard that now.

Yeah, no, definitely. And, and you know, it's interesting, I mean, you mentioned Walmart. We, we just, we just went into Walmart this year and that's like a whole other story where we had talked to Walmart for the last, you know, I'd say last like six or seven years and just didn't really think like the brand necessarily was like maybe the consumer wasn't quite there yet. And like mostly the brands that I would see in Walmart were not really brands that were kind of up and coming but had already been built. And so it's interesting that the key reason why we decided to go in this year was.

Was because of health and what we were seeing across the U.S. i mean, when I started this company, you know, 2% of the population had type 2 diabetes or pre diabetes. Today that number has grown to 40, 45% of the population has type 2 diabetes or pre diabetes. And the access to actually healthy and better for you food is really challenging for, you know, Americans to actually find these products. So when I looked at Walmart, I thought, you know, this is a vehicle for anyone to get their hands on this product. Yes, we're in Whole Foods. Yes, we have a direct to consumer business. We're in Costco, we're in, you know, Target, lots of brands. But there are many locations throughout the US that don't have some of those options super close by and Walmart is the option. So that was, was the real key thing that we saw that, you know, there is, was really convenience for a lot of people to be able to have access, especially in places that are, you know, more challenged. And now with COVID I mean this year too, I think it's, you know, that is I think a topic that has been accelerated for everybody, which is how do I stay healthy? Right. And every single person that I talk to today is, you know, know, doesn't want to get this right and so they want to figure out like, how do I keep my immunity up and strong and you know, and I think just making little shifts initially from drinking soda to drinking water or drinking a product like hint is the most important thing.

Well, can you talk a little bit about the book? And one of the things that we've put together is a bonus. It's going to be available to everyone. But chat about that and then we're going to tell people to go get it.

Yeah, definitely. So. So here it is. And it's even got this cute little. Did you. Do you see the little bottle, the little hint bottle right there? Oh yeah, it's very cute. But yeah, so it's Undaunted Overcoming doubts and doubters and you know, as I mentioned before, I really wanted to get this book out there to inspire people. Not just entrepreneurs, but people who are really kind of trying to figure out what do I do next or you know, how can I ultimately go and do what I want to do. I find that just in talking to people over the years that some of the challenges are, you know, breaking down walls and you know, not really knowing like, like exactly what the steps are or they feel that they don't have the right education or enough experience to go and do that. And the reality is that I didn't either. And so I just went and tried. And I think most great entrepreneurs, that's what they did too. They saw a hole in the market and then they just took baby steps to actually go and try. And I think that that's what you really need to do is that if you've got a dream, if you've got a curiosity, go and try. But also, I think it's a book that also shares with people what it's really like to be an entrepreneur. Because as I often say to aspiring entrepreneurs is that there is, there are way easier ways to make money than to be an entrepreneur. And it's hard, it's very rewarding when you get it, you know, to the, to the point of being a well known brand where, you know, people are carrying bottles around. But there's a lot of stuff that comes before that. I think it's really, really important for people to hear that. I think entrepreneurism is held up as this, like, oh, you know, like so great and fancy and sexy or whatever you want to call it. But the reality is, is that there is a lot of work that goes into being an entrepreneur. And especially, you know, if you want to take on, you know, a big industry as I did, I think that there's just, there's a lot of lessons learned but a lot of hard work and then also like being a parent. I talk a bit about that in there too, is that, you know, I never really realized that, you know, you actually going and doing stuff and taking risks and having the courage, you know, You're. If you're a parent, you know your kids are seeing that too. And I think that that's a beautiful thing and one that. That hopefully my kids will one day share that as well. That I think having parents that are really trying and living their brand.

And going out and facing their fears at times is something that is not only admirable, but it's also something that they ultimately want to replicate and find their passion and go try and go do great things.

So there's lots of good stories in the book, not just for beverage entrepreneurs or female entrepreneurs, but also for people that are just really interested in the story and how I did it.

I love the story and I particularly love the fact that you started out by creating a product that you would like to consume in your own kitchen. I know those. The first time I ever heard of Kavita was getting invited up to the head guy, Bill's kitchen to taste the actual samples that Chakra Earthsong had created in her kitchen. And so when I heard that you created yours in your kitchen, my heart leapt a little bit because I love the story of taking it all the way to wherever it's going to go next.

And I don't know if Bill had. I'm trying to remember, did Kavita. Does it all have a coconut base in it?

No.

No. I remember in the early days it did. It had a coconut base. I remember when he was in my office because I'm allergic to coconut. And so there was like the whole conversation that I couldn't try his samples because I'm allergic to it. So that's another question. People are always like, oh, you should do a coconut water. And I'm like, I will not produce a product that I can't actually like, drink. And so that is the story behind it.

Well, I want to give everyone an opportunity. So I'm going to be the responsible one who talks again about picking up the book again, which is drinkint.com bigleap and something that Kara and Marisa Brassfield, my team member and I have helped put together is a study guide that summarizes the book and a bonus video. And it's very action oriented, meaning there are how to components. So I just want you to know about that. And there is a special place, there's a way to get that as well. So when you order the book, you'll just send an email with the word undaunted in the subject line and you'll send that to vipaidforlife.com you'll get the study Guide. The video is a free gift from Kara. And the other thing that Kara is doing right now is when you order the book, you actually get a free case of hint.

Cool. Very, very cool.

Awesome. Well, is there anything else you have, Mr. Gay Hendricks?

Well, I just really want to again salute you and appreciate you, Kara, for what you've done and what you've created. It's a very rare thing to take something from the kitchen out into the big world. And I really appreciate that you put in the 20 seconds of insane courage to get you started and the whole bunch of work that it took to get you here. So may it many more big leaps.

Thank you so much. Yeah, it feels great. I mean it does. It's been a lot of work, but it's something that I'm really proud of.

Well, I've talked to close to a thousand entrepreneurs over the years, either in my office or in seminars. And one of the funniest things I ever hear is when I ask them, why did you originally go into business for yourself? Somebody in the audience will be courageous enough to say, well, I wanted more time for myself. And invariably the audience breaks into ear splitting laughter.

So true. I mean it's, it, and really it doesn't matter what industry. I mean, it's the same story over and over again. It's, you know, it's really, it's a choice. Right. And that's what I think you have to sign up for, is that, you know, if you're going to be an entrepreneur, that it really, you know, it, it can be rewarding. It can, it's very competitive. I don't think most people, you know, in our, in my category, in my industry, there's over 2,000 beverages. I mean it's, it's a very, very competitive place to be. And I think that you also have to understand what, what that means. And, and I think it's.

Yeah, I mean it's, it's an incredible feeling to know that, you know, to build a brand and, and see it in all kinds of places. And I think it's funny cause a lot of people, I'll be out by a pool at a hotel and I'll have hint and people will walk up and tell me the founder story and they don't recognize me. I don't know, I'm always kind of like, oh really? Tell me. I had no idea. And everybody knows, oh, she went into Whole Foods and she was pregnant. And they sit there and tell the whole story. And I think it's just really, really funny. If that's you. If I've run into you at a hotel and you're like, wait a minute, I think that was her now. That's what. Yeah, I just think it's. It's very, very funny.

Well, we're gonna land this. This airplane. And I want to thank you, first of all, Kara, for being here. This has been a total pleasure. It was great spending time with you up in the Bay Area this weekend. I hope we have more of those in the near future.

Yeah.

And my hope is that we get together also with Gay. He Ojai. So always a pleasant stop there. They've got. He and his wife Katie have an amazing place there. So one of my favorite things to.

Do is I love Ojai. It's such a great place.

I get up to the Bay Area frequently. My daughter lives on a boat off of Sausalito there.

So I live in Marin.

Yeah, I live real close.

Great.

That's easy. Well, that's one of the things that we have planned, too. I'll tell you more about it later. Kara, Gay and I are actually doing an annual program. We're calling it the big leap year. It's going to be Gay's last big experience event, and we work with business owners and leaders who want to have a big leap year. And some of the people that we've been talking to are real players. They just want to do more and improve their lifestyle, etc. Etc. So I'll tell you about that because I think you'd be an amazing guest.

Yay. I love it. And you guys, also, I'm all over social at Cara golden with an I. So come and visit me and let me know what you think of the book and just come say hi.

Right on. All right, well, we'll make sure that all the details to get the book, get the bonuses are in the show notes. And for everyone who is. If you're listening, if you're watching, make sure you visit itunes and rate this experience. Share it with some friends, you know, and anyone who would resonate with Kara's story, message and all the information she shared. And it's just been a great time. So thank you again, you two.

Thanks a lot, Mike. Great being with you all again, and thanks, Kara.

All right, see ya.