GoodPop

0:00Daniel Goetz:Welcome to the Emerging Brands Podcast with Kelly Bennett. This is the podcast to discover stories behind your new favorite CPG brands. Each episode brings you behind the scenes of the brand and founder story, learn what sets them apart in the marketplace, and their strategy going to market. We talk about plans for growth, practical advice for an emerging brand founder, and where to shop products that are making waves in food, beverage, wellness, beauty, and beyond. You'll also hear from industry experts, brand builders, investors, and operators you should absolutely have on your radar if you're building a CPG brand today.

0:44Daniel Goetz:I'm your host, Kelly Bennett, a Brooklyn-based brand strategist with a front row seat of what makes an emerging CPG brand stand out. Whether you're building a brand of your own or love supporting what's next, you're in the right place. This podcast is brought to you by Hummingbirds. Hummingbirds is the go-to platform built for creator-powered retail activations. They are connecting everyday creators with CPG brands to generate shelf-level awareness, drive in-store momentum, and generate authentic content in markets that matter the most. Go to hummingbirds.com for all the details and let them know I sent you.

1:29Daniel Goetz:Now, let's dive into the new episode. Hi, everyone. Welcome back to a new episode of Emerging Brands Podcast with Kelly Bennett. Today's guest definitely got me cool points in my family. I have the founder and CEO of Good Pop, Daniel Goetz. Thank you so much for coming on the show today. Hey, Kelly. Thanks for having me. So excited about this. So I have a nine-year-old and a 12-year-old in my life who are obsessed with Good Pop. They're always stocked in my fridge, in my girlfriend's fridge, wherever we are, we have Good Pop. And so I'm really excited to hear how you essentially built the brand.

2:14Daniel Goetz:It really stands out in the marketplace. So I would love to first hear the inspiration around Good Pop. Like what made you want to create this type of product? Yeah. Well, first of all, you've got a very cool 12-year-old and 9-year-old in your life because they know. They do. They are. They know what's good. They are professional taste testers at this point. They know what's good. They know what's good. Okay. Well, yeah, it goes back. So my personal sort of like entrepreneurial journey goes back to when I was younger than the kids in your life. When I was like three and four, I was always doing like little entrepreneurial things like setting up lemonade stands, like squeezing the lemons and just giving out cups to my neighbors.

3:05just like that interaction and like that community and having those little conversations and making people smile was just something that has always made me feel really great intrinsically like internally just it's just something that my entire life I felt really great about and so that's kind of going back to the core of like, you know, my first memories like were lemonade stands. But then kind of fast forward to middle school, I was doing lawn mowing. I got my friends and I together. We started this little lawn mowing business called the Lawn Rangers. Okay.

3:47Daniel Goetz:Great name. Such a good name and good business model too. We just went around our neighborhood to people who had tall grass and then knocked on their doors. And people who have like 18 inch grass, like you never know who is going to open that door. It was really interesting. But where did this take place that people had 18 inch grass? This is this is in Houston. Yeah, this is yeah, this is in Houston. So there's always a couple neighbors that just like don't do their grass. And we would knock on the door and they'd open the door and say, what are you doing here with a lawnmower and we would be there with our stuff.

4:26And we just said, Hey, we noticed that your lawn is super long and we'd be happy to cut it for you. Whatever you think is fair price. And so it was like name your own price. Yeah. And be like 10 or$15 and we spend four hours out there kind of thing. Um, and then, so fast forward to college, I am where I'm in Austin. I go to the University of Texas and Austin is the epicenter for the natural foods movement. It always has been just with Whole Foods being here.

5:00Daniel Goetz:Right. So I'm super interested in what's going on the natural food side. And at that time in like 2007 and eight and nine, there was this like really interesting sort of insurgence of, of social enterprise and being done in a different kind of way so um and sort of like bringing bringing social enterprise into like woven into the why a company exists and there were so many inspirational things happening at that time and then i went to mexico um over the summer mexico city and i fell in love with these fresh fruit paletas on the street just like these popsicles with locally grown produce that the person who was selling them was also the person who'd grown the produce and cut it and blended it, put it frozen on a stick.

5:54And that joyful interaction was, it was there because these people, they grew the fruit and froze the fruit and got to watch people enjoy a better pop. So I get back to Austin and I'm in class and I can't stop thinking about all of these things, social enterprise, natural foods, and just like these popsicles. And I took what was left of my middle school lawn mowing money and made my first batch of good pops. Um, wow, is it still in school? And that was just for fun.

6:29Daniel Goetz:So you were in college and I remember that time too. I was in college around that time of like 2007 to 2009. It was like Tom's of Maine. I feel like it was always like the the example I would share in class too of this is a brand that cares and Whole Foods was always the case study I used as well so I very distinctly remember this chapter in business and so when you were in school around that time traveling getting inspiration you make your first batch what was the thought process there just give it out to friends and family or did you want to start a business right off the bat? Like what was your perspective of creating that first take on GoodPop?

7:16The thought process at that time was I had this major desire to figure out how I can make an impact on the world in a positive way as a college student and was trying to figure that out. And it was like a serious pressure that I felt personally, like, I feel like I'm here to do something really good. And, and I know that doing good makes me feel really good. So I wasn't sure what the outlet was going to be for that. And with with these paletas in Mexico, like you can't help but just be happy when you're eating one. And I was looking at like, yeah, Tom's of Maine and Patagonia and Ben and Jerry's and Tom's Shoes.

8:04Wonderful missions, but the products don't necessarily just immediately just put a smile on your face no matter what. You know, a lot of times it's a better product that has, once you find out about the mission, then you have a smile on your face versus something that just inherently makes people happy. And so I was thinking that a product that just inherently makes people happy, that's delicious, that's better for you and could have a social mission to it would be something that would be so fun and so rewarding. And so before I started making the pops, I designed a logo and just, and started and wrote a business plan, like little, you know, mini thing and, um, mocked up some, some flavors and it was just a branding exercise for me in class.

9:00I was just like imagining.

9:01Daniel Goetz:Right. And, and then one day I was like, you know what, like, let's make these and get some feedback. So, um, the, the push to take and liquidate all of the the lawn mowing savings that were left from middle school was there there's austin city limits music festival so like acl here it's always super hot every year we had gone every year for the previous four or five years and it's 100 degrees you're walking around the heat and i was thinking that i could make pops and take them out to acl outside of the fest and sell them to people who are walking by in and out of the fest. And if that was successful and if we got really great feedback and if people love this concept, then maybe that would kickstart this business, this little good pop idea.

10:01Daniel Goetz:So also I just have to say your point of view around product placement from even the lawn mowing business to the lemonade stand and even just having the pops ready for music goers in the Austin heat. So smart. And it totally makes sense even how I find your products today. So I just had to say, I love that through line that you have. Yeah. Another through line to all three of those businesses that I'm constantly sweating because I'm outside. So I'm like, I'm sweating, selling lemonade, and then I'm sweating, doing the lawn mowing and then selling the pops. So I guess there's something. There's something there.

10:40Daniel Goetz:There's something. I need to be outside. Yeah. So what happened at the music festival? Yeah, this was 2009. So I made, I spent three weeks straight making 18 ,000 pops and I was thinking, okay, we could say. Wow. Yeah, just like making them nonstop. And it was in this little commercial kitchen that was a like hair salon that had been converted to like a food, tiny 400 square foot food kitchen. So we're making them very slowly, putting them away, handbagging them, handstickering them, hand sealing them, putting them in a freezer as we gear up for this. and um we it was hot every day for those three weeks we go out and set up a tent outside on Barton Springs Road in Austin and uh saw that the weather report was horrible like cold and rainy no so so so we set up out there with all these pops and it was the year if you look at acl fest 2009 um it's like kind of infamous for being this mud fest where there was so much rain day one and it was so cold that the entire park got torn up and all of the all of the fertilizer underneath the grass was exposed.

12:10So it was like this Dillo dirt. So people were, it was a mud fest.

12:14Daniel Goetz:Oh my gosh. Yeah. So, so that's what, that's of course the day that I'm launching this thing. And we sold four pops the entire weekend. Four. Four pops. Out of 18 ,000. 18, sure. 18 ,000. What you thought was going to be slam dunk, hot music goers ended up being a legendary mud fest that was cold and rainy. You sold four. Okay. I need to know what, what were you thinking at that point of like, oh my gosh, what the hell did I just do? Or Or just, yeah, what was going through your mind at that point? Yeah, I mean, that was a major, it was like the most dejecting feeling I had ever felt at that point.

13:08It was just like I spent so much time thinking about this, all of my life savings, and had this vision of like hot weather and creating all of this joy through these pops. and it just did not, it was the polar opposite. So that was the beginning of the 16 year journey that I'm on today. But I'm happy to go into that.

13:39Daniel Goetz:I know we have, this episode is 20 minutes long and I can talk about it as quickly as I can. Yeah, well, I would love to hear, yeah, I would love to hear one, just how you made that next step to actually launch the business after that failed to launch kind of moment or feeling, and then really where the business is today. Yeah, I think the biggest thing, so this was 2009. I was a senior and I was kind of delaying graduation sort of. I was like six hours left and just kind of taking my sweet time because I didn't know what I wanted to do. This happened. And I took those 17 ,996 pops and found, put them in my car, like in my Toyota, found cold storage.

14:37The closest one was in Taylor, Texas. And I just like cranked my AC and took them out there, put them on a pallet and put them in there. And then I spent the next six months trying to figure out what I was going to do with my life and with school and everything. And, um, I was thinking about, I was thinking about, I was not thinking about good pop. Um, I was thinking about what am I going to do with my life? And I kept coming back to the thought of good pop and like, yes, this, this idea. Um, and one day I, we had, we had nothing except those pops and a website. Um, this is like eight, this is 10 months after that failed

15:25Daniel Goetz:thing. And I did a little bit of SEO on the website at like two in the morning randomly. And then a few days later, when you searched organic popsicles, goodpop.com was the first result because there was no organic popsicles at that time. And then about a week after that, I got an inquiry from a marketing agency that wanted custom popsicles for their client. And they asked me to put in a bid. I put in a bid even though I had no company, no money, no place to really make them. Still put in a bid, of course. Of course. Like any good entrepreneur. Obviously. And I ended up getting awarded the bid for these pops.

16:09So I had to figure out how to do this. And through some help of a local palateria in Houston, they helped basically. I took a 50 % deposit from the marketing firm, bought all the ingredients. This little piloteria believed in what we were doing and we made, we made all these pops and then shipped them, saw them, hand them out all around the country. And then we get our final payment. And the second that we did, I took that and I had all of my boxes designed on my, like I designed all my boxes on my on my student version of Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop. The second that final payment came in, I ordered packaging for Good Pop and kickstarted the business.

17:05And we've been operating that way ever since. So that was our kickstart. We haven't raised capital.

17:15Daniel Goetz:You never raised capital? Wow. And you've been in business for 16 years. That's really incredible. I think that's the first story I've heard, well, on the podcast of that. So I would love to hear how you've been scaling because your distribution, like I said, your product placement and how you bring your product to where consumers will need it has been so great. I would love to hear just how, I know top level, but how you then went about actually scaling the business. Yeah. I mean, for the first, so initially the thought was, okay, let's get this thing going and then we'll get to like a million dollars in revenue and then we'll raise money and go build.

18:00Daniel Goetz:Right. And then, and then I got to, we got to a million without raising and we were profitable. I was like, okay, well maybe let's try to go to five. And then, and then at that point we'll raise money and go build this business. And you think that that's the model because that's what you read. Right. You know, you think that's it. rule of thumb. Right. Now, during those years, we had to be, well, one, I slept on couches for like four or five years. You know, so I did it like that in my early 20s, you know, is different, different time. Right. But really, just being really scrappy, really lean, and then also making sure that we didn't have to say yes to everything.

18:46You have to make when you're forced to make profitable decisions, it's kind of a great limiting factor for you.

18:53Daniel Goetz:That's a really good point. Any emerging brand founder listening to that, that's a really good perspective and rule of thumb when you have to make profitable choices. The second you take outside capital, you know, I think that there's strengths and weaknesses to both sides of things and there's not really one right way to do it. But when you take outside capital, it just creates another type of pressure to either gain market share or grow the business. And so from my experience, not having that external pressure has made it harder in some ways. We've never had any doors open for us. Everything that we've done is all grassroots built from the ground up and it's been harder and it's taken 16 years.

19:49But when things get tough or challenging, like it's, we can make, we can make the right decision, whether it's a profitable decision or saying no to a retailer, walking away from top line because we know it's not profitable today and it probably won't be because if that's how a retailer treats you from day one, it's not a real partnership. Right.

20:15Daniel Goetz:That's a great point too. And I think that a lot of emerging brand founders put pressure on themselves to just say yes at anyone and everyone, especially in the beginning. And I like that you're emphasizing that point of how a retailer treats you from day one. It's pretty telling of how the partnership could be and would look like. Totally. A hundred percent. That's a really good reminder. Yeah. If they, if a retailer believes in what you're doing and sees that, that, uh, understands that you're an emerging brand and you're trying to challenge the status quo and create something for the next generation of consumers, finding someone who is wanting to pioneer with you versus just take your money and put pressure on you to perform right away.

21:14You see that time and time again. It's a short-lived transactional relationship rather than a long-term partnership to change the future of food.

21:24Daniel Goetz:Love that so much. I'm going to send this to many founders, clients and friends of just having this as a good reminder that you could do things differently and build in a way that feels really aligned as well. What is the vision for, say, the next 16 years of Good Pop and where you are now? I know your team was awesome and sent me a bunch of your new flavors. We did a full on taste testing the other night. We tried all the different flavors. It was really cute. Um, personally, I love that creamsicle, uh, skew and the, uh, the tri colored with the chocolate also. Neapolitan. That was really popular in our informal taste test at home.

22:12Daniel Goetz:I would just love to hear what you have on the periphery or what you're excited about moving forward. Yeah, I think the, so we didn't touch on this at the beginning, but the, I guess just to go back 16 years, like, um, you can't, you can't start something without a secondary purpose or a why or a passion, you know, you just can't, it's just too, it's too, it's every day is too challenging. So if you're just doing it to sometimes, like if you're just doing it to just to make money or just to, um, or maybe if it's just like, just to sell a food that you don't have a passion for that, you know, that's where you see, that's where you see entrepreneurs just throw in the towel.

23:03It's not worth it. And for me, it's always been about this desire to make an impact on the world. And this was my vehicle to be able to do that. And, and so everyone that I work with today, everyone at Good Pop, you know, they're here for the same reason. We're building this together to build a better food system, to build a better labor system for growers of the food where food comes from to build better health outcomes for kids that, you know, we're playing in a category that's always been sugar water.

23:38Daniel Goetz:Right. Right. And so, so finding those secondary whys is so important. And so from day one, the, the idea was create this social enterprise that can find different areas along the way that every area that our business touches and challenge a status quo and figure out how we can do better. So that's been extremely rewarding. The last decade, we were the first brand in our category 12 years ago to be non-GMO and the first to be fair trade certified. Incredible. And yeah. And so those things, those things are our why and they keep us going. And, um, the next 16 years looks like doubling and tripling down on the impact that we're having.

24:29It has to. Um, and you know, it's, it's, we're not just out here to sell pops. We're here to reduce added sugars going to kids into kids bodies um we're here to help other food companies challenge status quo in their categories so we've we've just launched um we've just launched with some friends of 25 different brands the good food collective yes that looks really cool too so yes what is going on there it's so cool i mean the the thing is that you get into the food industry to try to bring a better something into some category, right? And then you start to realize there's all these different sort of structural issues going on in that category.

25:18And usually it's your head ends up hitting a ceiling, which is like special interest groups or the FDA or the USDA or food policy in DC or the food system within schools. And we, as we got further into this, you start to realize that there are over 600 special interest groups that go in and lobby the government every year around food policy. And none of them are advocating on behalf of consumers. And so here we are as good pop, just trying to solve one problem in sugar, water, popsicles category. And then we have all these friends trying to do the same thing in whether it's beverages or in salty snacks or frozen food.

26:09And it has always historically been a disjointed effort. There's no natural food lobby of the 600 groups, right? So we decided to change that and try to bring a collective voice to this little movement that we have in each of our own subcategories and see if we can't impact some real change in this country. So off to a pretty good start. We launched with 25 amazing companies. And after one article, we had another 120 apply.

26:52Daniel Goetz:Incredible. So what type of brands are you looking to connect? Because I know many brand founders listen to this podcast? There's no criteria on size. There's just, if you, if you go to our Good Food Collective site, you can kind of see the guardrails, you know, real food being a first ingredient and a commitment to not clean wash or green wash with your packaging, kind of operating this, this gray area that big food has been able to operate in. for so long and a handful of other sort of high level concepts that just very easy to understand and it can be anyone from it can be a consumer it could be a brand it could be an md where we want to get as much momentum behind this effort as possible and and just keep it as simple for people to join or brands to join as possible.

28:00And the overarching theme is just is transparency. And it's a commitment to that transparency coming from within the food company themselves.