Hitting The Mark

Brian Sheng is the CEO and Co-Founder of Aquaria, a tech startup that literally makes water out of thin air. The company supplies premium drinking water for homes, businesses, and outdoor spaces and backup water generators that are completely independent of plumbing infrastructure. The brand was named one of TIME magazine’s best inventions of 2024 and has secured 102M in funding for large-scale Aquaria Air Water Infrastructure projects.How to tell this story, the many A-HA moments across his journey and why a founder-led brand voice is crucial are all topics Brian and I dive into in this episode.

Ben Christensen founded Cambium, a company that is building better supply chains, starting with wood, to make it possible to source every material in a regenerative way. This approach creates local jobs and is done just as efficiently, if not more efficiently, than it is today. And Ben and his team put storytelling at the core of their business, so not-surprisingly, their brand design and messaging stand out in an industry that is not known for getting either right.In this episode, we discuss the power of storytelling, the importance of giving customers a sense of ownership, and the smart move of repositioning something mundane into something attractive. This is a conversation not centered around wood, but around brand, with wood at its core.

Before starting chocolate brand Spring & Mulberry, Kathryn Shah was a brand strategy consultant who served as the Vice President of Global Marketing at Pantone and the Brand Manager for Veuve Clicquot Champagne, two brands 99% of us love and look up to.It was a trip to India and a cancer diagnosis that led to her launching her startup Spring & Mulberry, a line of date-sweetened chocolate bars. After having Jeni Britton of Floura on the last episode, this is part 2 of another serendipitous series where I have two highly accomplished female founders of innovative health food brands on the show back-to-back.This episode is filled with insights from Kathryn’s brand-building journey - from working at Unilever on building the Ragu Pasta Sauce brand, to driving brand growth at Veuve Cliquot to launching her own brand in a very poetic and decisive manner.

Many of you know Jeni Britton from episode 28, where we did a deep dive into Jeni's Ice Creams, which she started at age 22 and now sells in 80 scoop shops and 12,500 retailers with an annual revenue north of 125 million. Today, we dive into a new chapter of Jeni's entrepreneurial journey with Floura. Floura is a next-generation fiber company that currently offers fiber bars, which she calls Fruit Crush Bars, in multiple flavors.As was the case in my previous conversation with Jeni, this episode is us nerding out on all things branding, from focus groups to customer perception, from deriving your brand DNA to naming to organic branding. At the same time, you learn about the power of fiber. A delightful and inspiring conversation you do not want to miss.

This is the first time I get to say ‘welcome back’ on Hitting The Mark as I had Till Janczukowicz, the founder of Berlin-based IDAGIO, which is often described as 'the Spotify for classical music,' on episode 21.But this is not a Let’s catch up with Till episode to check in on IDAGIO. Instead, I recently saw that he is preparing for an exciting brand launch that features none other than John Malkovich to kick things off.The idea? Spend a month with John. Hello Genius is the brand's name, and it fosters a whole new level of mentorship, access, and community.On this episode, Till shares his vision for the brand in his typical intellectually stimulating and curiosity-evoking manner.

Ilay Karateke is on a mission to bring Labneh to kitchens around the United States, or maybe this is more of a sprint than a mission because her brand, BEZI, is moving fast.Product development started in the kitchen a year ago. Today, they're in stores across New York City with e-commerce starting in December, and I can almost assure you that national distribution will follow shortly.This is one of the very few super early-stage startup brands—BEZI has only been on the market for a few weeks—that I invited to this show. And very quickly, during this episode, you will understand why.We talk about the power of design, data, photography, brand strategy, social media growth strategies, and so much in between. If you are a founder, a marketer, or someone working with brands, this is an episode not to be missed as it will leave you inspired and ready to push on all things 'brand.'

Together with his brother, Ben Checketts co-founded Rhone, an athleisure wear brand inspired by the quality of Lululemon and the urge to craft a stand-out label for men. The brand is driven by the pursuit of mental fitness and Ben’s philosophy on branding is both refreshing and insightful. We talk about naming, focus groups, how brands are shaped yet set free – a lot like children are being raised – and why Rhone's Co-Founders bought out their investors to see through the next chapter of the fast-growing clothing brand.   

Matt McLean ventured into the organic juice business 25 years ago with one goal: to fuel families with uncompromised nutrition. Today, Uncle Matt’s Organic produces the #1 bestselling organic orange juice nationwide. Matt is hustling the same way he did 25 years ago with new product launches and market expansions happening as we speak.We talk about how his initial packaging design was hitting the mark for his ideal customer but left the rest of the country wayside, the very moment he learned that his juice would be accepted by a major grocery store chain, and how he exited the business just to repurchase it a few years later. Get ready for a highly entertaining episode with a true entrepreneur who has his heart in the right place and it shows through so many aspects of the Uncle Matt’s brand.

Aleksandra Medina and Katrin Kaurov co-founded Frich (which stands for 'F***ing rich'), a financial literacy app for Gen Z that breaks the money taboo and makes it a social topic. Frich busts into the world of corporate finance backed by a brand that could not be any more differentiated and authentic. With their fists in the air, Aleksandra and Katrin lead with transparency in an opaque space and share the truth about how one compares to their peers financially. The app uses social media to gather that truth while social media is at the very heart of why so many feel financially inadequate. A fascinating startup and an equally fascinating conversation filled with brand insights any founder or marketer should grab onto.

Episode 109 brings us Rockwell Shah, the CEO, and N.B. Patil, the Co-Founder & CTO of Ozlo, an innovation startup in the sleep technology space.All three of Ozlo’s Co-Founders are former Bose veterans and they acquired and licensed assets from Bose to resurrect the discontinued but beloved Sleepbuds.This episode is a fascinating conversation about building a new brand on existing IP, the fragile tension between what customers say they want and what they actually need, building a brand not on a singular product but a grander vision, how most consumer startups fail because they are not telling the right story, and how branding, in the end, is all about alignment – a simple but deep thought that we are exploring further together today.