Proteinchips-Marke entkommt der Lieferketten-Falle

0:00Unternehmer/Gast I sell beef protein chips to athletes and outdoor enthusiasts. Uh we do about a million or revenue. We want to be at 12. Want to be doing about a million a month. >> [clears throat] >> Up until this point Up until this point uh we've been severely what I've identified as um supply constrained. It's been we've been in the supply chain purgatory for a while. I say a while period of like 6 to 9 months trying to find a manufacturer that's going to make our stuff for because we de-commoditized away from jerky. Didn't want a price race to the bottom.

0:40Um changing their lineup a little bit dissuaded so many of them. So we finally found one and we're working through that right now. >> Okay. So what else is distracting you? >> Uh the approach now that we've unlocked the volume. This new manufacturer can do about 20,000 units a month which will get us to about 280,000 a month in revenue.

1:04At [snorts] that point he has a proprietary machine that can spit out a tray of our product every 12 seconds. But that machine is too large for his facility. So we would need to kind of come together and find a solution and a location to employ that or the alternative option which I think is the ultimate end state anyways would be to stand up our own facility understanding the timeline and red tape.

1:30Alex >> How much does the machine cost? >> Uh the [clears throat] machine cost about 400,000. I hadn't thought about buying it from >> Who's that? >> I hadn't thought about buying it from him. >> Yeah. And you could probably use um Okay. So well basically how big are your dreams for this business? >> I mean large. >> to get to 12 but you want to do beyond that? Do you want this to be a big brand? >> Yeah ab- absolutely. >> Yeah. Well if you want it to be a big brand then owning the manufacturing for something that is novel or different is probably a good idea.

1:58The issue is obviously cash flow. Is it you're super constrained right now, I'm guessing? >> Mhm. >> Um so, a couple things. Um if I were to like one, there's probably a renegotiation of ter- terms if I absolutely could to just increase my my payment. So, like can I be net 30? Can I be net 60, etc. That'd be the first thing I'd look at with a company I was looking at investing in. Um just taking turn like we just really hardcore negotiated one from uh net zero to net 90.

2:25And then the company went from 2 million a year to 5 million a month in 18 months. >> Mhm. >> Not a promise or guarantee, just saying. Um the second thing, okay, so one is uh cash flow from a terms basis. Um the next one is what's your influencer game? >> Uh well, right now we're heavy in the CrossFit space. Um very heavy and we were able to secure his name is Austin Hat Hatfield. He's he has a a high high likelihood of podium at the CrossFit Games and you know, a shot at winning. And so, we contracted his head.

2:58And so, he's he's our primary influencer right now. So, we're kind of pumping everything into him. And we got a couple more athletes like that. And then we do everything else through podcasts. And on unscripted live reads. >> Got it. Um do you run You don't run any ads then? It's all organic? >> Nope. Yeah, we just kept hitting the inventory ceiling. >> Mhm. >> Um trying to solve for that and >> Okay. So, right now you have a double sitting in front of you that you think you can hit with the guys existing capacity.

3:25>> Yeah. >> How many months of that do you need in order to save up enough to buy the machine with terms and lending? >> Ooh, I mean, not that >> Not that many? >> Not that many. >> Okay. So, I mean, I think that you're spelling out kind of the plan. So, meet existing volume requirements. I also it might be worth leaning into selling out. Um because then you can just kind of pent up some demand um in the in the meantime.

3:53Just number one. You can also do pre-orders. Do you do that? >> We did before, but we just we ended up letting go of another manufacturer just a couple weeks ago because they there's a whole nightmare QA dropped everything wasn't on time. So we were technically sold out you know for this last month and we I got the team together rented we just kind of flew by the seat of our pants and solve the problem. So we did the sold out play.

4:20Um I'm sorry I forget if that addressed your question there. >> You're good. I was just trying to pull cash forward. Okay, so we have we have our terms. I think you can use pre-orders as a mechanism. You have your existing volume that you think you can hit. These new volume caps that are twice as big. Cool. So that So the three of those things bring you cash flow forward. Then it's where you based out of? >> San Diego and the manufacturer is in LA. >> Interesting. Okay. Well, yeah, ideally you'd be central so then you could get easier shipping everything.

4:48>> our 3PL is in Georgia. So that doesn't >> Okay. Okay. So yeah, then you can I mean I still just hate California is tough. Um but yeah, you can then you could basically open up the facility there. Um I'd still hate that, but but you do live there. >> Right. Originally from Montana, so that's probably more appetizing location, but if we >> Much more appetizing. >> It sounds like if we you know scale into this this guy's volume we're able to acquire the machine from him then we

5:18Alex >> Or just from whoever makes the machine. >> Right. It was it was proprietary. He assembled a bunch of things together. At least he said so. >> Yeah. >> Um and then grab the old the the new facility that we would own and then inject to that machine to a larger facility. >> like I the machine is a big question mark for me. Like I would call up a couple of really good machine guys and um say that this is my partner of marketing and roll in um and check the machine out

5:45>> [laughter] >> and be like all right, how proprietary is this? >> He he doesn't want me to see it. >> Uh cuz we might find out it's like, you know, a $75,000 machine that has, you know, a $25,000 add-on that they're pretending is $400,000. A good friend of mine was in the machine business, murdered it. Um they were do you know, they're doing 70 million a year selling machines. Uh the average cost they sell machines for was like 400 grand, cost them 17. Yeah. So, like printed, destroyed. So, I say this because like again, I mean, a smart machine uh builder prices off of value, which is if I were you know, I replace your entire workforce that cost you 2 million for 400 grand, it's a steal. And if it just happens to cost me 20 grand to build,

6:25Alex >> Mhm. >> All right. More for everybody, right? So, I would I would really lean on that cuz there's there's probably a big delta there. Because the core of your business, if it really is this proprietary thing, that machine right now is the core defensibility that you have. >> Mhm. >> So, knowing everything about how that thing works is everything. Because if you're again, like we we have to take this to a natural extreme. Let's say we hit that. Okay, then we have this machine and then we build it out. It's like, well, we're going to need more machines. And that's the only thing differentiates us from everybody else, then it's like that actually is a huge point of leverage for the business. And so, getting as much intel as you possibly can on that so that you can ultimately grow.

7:03>> Got it. Thank you. >> Yeah, you bet. >> If you're a business owner and you are not growing as fast as you'd like, I'd like to give you a free gift. So, my team and I put together the $100 million scaling road map, which is basically 200 hours of us looking over all the portfolio companies we've had and what stages of growth they went through and more importantly, where they got stuck and how they got past it. And so, we broke it into these 10 stages and we made this little kind of quiz thing where if you put in your business information, it'll tell you where you're at and the most important part for you, what to do for each of functions of the business across product, marketing, sales, customer success, recruiting, IT, human resources and finance. And so, no matter what you're struggling with, someone else has already struggled with it and solved it. And so I'd like to give you this thing absolutely free. You can go to acquisition.com/roadmap, plug in your business information, and if you want us to actually help you deconstruct the business and you're trying to scale, we'd love to help you out. On the thank you page, you can book a call with my team and we will look at the business, see if we can help, and if we can, we'll invite you out to Vegas and we'll do this in person live.