John Foraker (Once Upon a Farm) - How To Craft A Story For Retail, Why Jennifer Garner Came On Board as Chief of Brand, and Their Approach To Scale

Our guest today is John Foraker, co-founder and CEO of Once Upon a Farm. Fresh snacks with immune-boosting probiotics to keep your little one's wellness top of mind. For chilly season or any reason! Before John was the CEO of Annie’s Inc. We discuss his learnings running Annie’s for over a decade, how he became the CEO of Once Upon a Farm, what led Jennifer Garner to become a co-founder, what it’s like developing a new category, why they chose to expand to retail really fast. Without further ado, here’s John.

Some of the questions I ask John:

1. What was your initial attraction to natural foods and natural products?
2. What were some of your learnings running Annie’s for nearly 20 years?
3. What was the aha moment and led you to found Once Upon A Farm?
4. What were the first steps after realizing this was something you wanted to pursue?
5. How did you connect with Jennifer Garner and have her come on board?
6. How do you build a brand in a new category?
7. How did you approach building the supply chain?
8. What has been the hardest parts of building Once Upon A Farm?
9. How did you approach fundraising?
   1. What’s the biggest reason why a company passed on you?
10. What’s the best thing that’s happened to the business?
    1. What’s the worst?
11. How do you think about your positioning when you enter retail - natural grocery or conventional?
12. How do you approach scale?
13. What’s your fascination with NFTs?
14. What’s one thing you would change about raising venture capital?
15. What’s one book that inspired you personally and one book that inspired you professionally?
    1. Omnivore’s dilemma
    2. Ramping your brand by James Richardson
16. What’s one piece of advice you have for founders?