Ep202 – Josh Ball (Co-founder – Farmers Pick) on using tech to save 7 million kg of food waste

My guest for Ep202 of The Startup Playbook Podcast was the Co-founder of Farmers Pick, Josh Ball.

Farmers Pick helps save food waste by rescuing wonky food that is often discarded by supermarkets and making it available to order by consumers.

Since launching in 2020, they have saved 7 million kilograms of produce and the company now has 120 employees and generated $16M in revenue last year. 

In this interview we covered a range of topics including:

• The importance of having a strong mission and values to help guide strategic business decisions
• balancing frugality with 100% YoY growth
• Why they decided to go down the equity crowdfunding path rather than raising from traditional VC funds
• Scaling storytelling to both their staff and to their customers
• And much more!

Timestamps:

• 1:45 Josh’s background
• 7:12 The origin story of Farmers Pick
• 12:29 How he validated the initial idea
• 18:27 The operational complexities of growing a physical goods business
• 27:52 Finding the balance between focussing on new customers vs expansion of existing customers
• 29:50 Using social media to grow the brand
• 31:05 The decision to crowdfund vs raise venture capital
• 35:29 Negotiation advice
• 37:41 Making sure the vision/mission stays consistent across whole company as you grow
• 42:43 Thinking about expansion
• 48:04 How his role has evolved as the business has grown
• 54:00 Staying out of the weeds and making strategic decisions
• 55:40 What’s next for Farmers Pick

Our partners:

A big thank you to our partners for the show:

Scendar 

Scendar is the OG startup accounting firm in Australia catering to all stages of your business’ life. If you’re busy running your startup, you don’t have time to do your own books and forecast. Instead, fully outsource your finance function, giving you time and resources back to focus on what you do best in growing your business. Find out more at Scendar.com

Vanta

Vanta helps businesses get — and stay — compliant by automating up to 90% of the work for the most in-demand compliance frameworks. And with over 300 integrations, you can easily monitor and secure the tools your business relies on.
Join over six thousand fast-growing companies that use Vanta to manage risk and prove security in real time.
Startup Playbook Podcast listeners get access to an exclusive offer of USD$1000 off their plans. Head over to vanta.com/playbook to get access to this exclusive discount.

Links mentioned:

Josh’s links:

• Josh’s LinkedIn
• Farmers Pick

People mentioned:

• Joshua Brooks-Duncan
• Simon Griffiths
• Adrian Osman

Companies mentioned:

• PromisePay
• Xero
• Misfits Market
• Who Gives A Crap
• MILKRUN
• Playbook Ventures
• me&u

Feedback/connect/say hello:

Rohit@startupplaybook.co
@RohitBhargava7 (Twitter)
/rohbhargava (LinkedIn)
@rohit_bhargava (Instagram)
My Youtube Channel

Credits:

Music: Paycheck

Other channels:

Find all of the links for the podcast on Linktree here