They Told Me My Football Career Was Over

0:00Alex Chisnall:Take me back to when you were 17 and you were told your football career might be over.

0:03Thomas Robson-Kanu:To hear that as a 17-year-old when your ambition is to play in the Premier League is, you know, quite demoralising. You know, I'd wake up as a 17-year-old and my knee would be like a water balloon. That was the first time in over two and a half years I'd woken up without any pain or restriction in my knee. A year later, I ended up making my first team debut for Reading Football Club. A year after that, I made my international debut for Wales. And a year after that, I made my Premier League debut when we got promoted to the Premier League. And pretty much every single one of them laughed at what we were talking about, said that, you know, the beverage manufacturing industry was not set up in that way.

0:38Thomas Robson-Kanu:If we were serious about it and we wanted to bring this product, we'd essentially have to manufacture ourselves.

0:43Alex Chisnall:When people remember you in 30 years' time, do you rather they remember the goal or the tumour?

0:55Alex Chisnall:what stops founders from building something meaningful isn't a lack of ideas it's the fear of getting started i'm alex chisnell and this is screw it just do it the podcast for people who are ready to stop waiting take action and make things happen take me back to when you were 17 and you were told your football career might be over was that the first moment in hindsight that you think you maybe had to think like an entrepreneur

1:23Thomas Robson-Kanu:um I would say I think entrepreneurship and you know trying to achieve anything like you're always going to face adversity and I think that's probably one of the things that you need to learn to accept in any like high performance um you know or any form of like success or anything you create in your life like you would have had to have overcome adversity and I think really accepting that and then having the tools to work through that is ultimately what allowed me to get through and overcome the pain and the inflammation I had from major surgery you know when I was told that I would you know never walk without pain again you know to hear that as a 17 year old when your ambition is to play in the Premier League is you know quite demoralizing but for me at that moment in time that my dream was very much to play in the Premier League you know I'd had a dream since I was seven eight nine years of age of you know gracing the Premier League becoming a Premier League player and you know I was in the academy system at Arsenal had been released at 15 went to Reading within a couple of months I had experienced two major surgeries on my knee you know which basically left me on the hospital and recovery bed for two and a half years and yeah I think at that moment in time beginning to think like an entrepreneur as you said is actually thinking

2:51Alex Chisnall:okay how do I get through this yeah it's problem solving it's problem solving how do I genuinely

2:57Thomas Robson-Kanu:get through this and so yeah I think that taught me early on that regardless of what situation you're in like there is a route through it it may not be visible you know you may not know it at that moment in time but there is a route through and having that resilience to persevere is really what allowed me to to overcome you know initially those real major setbacks in my football career Yeah.

3:27Alex Chisnall:And as a father myself, what was your parents like reaction? Because they obviously would have known the dream from the previous decade leading up to that. What was their reaction like with having had the surgeries and the pain that you had?

3:42Thomas Robson-Kanu:Yeah, I think they didn't necessarily think that I could overcome it because when you've been told by a surgeon in a position of power that you know you should really begin looking for a different career path for your son or you know he's going to have to learn to live with pain you know to hear that as a parent I think it's you know I don't think you can think anything other than what you're being told so the support that they offered me was amazing because not at one point in time did they reiterate that to me you know it was like well we've heard that but then what do you want to do you know and my reaction was you know I want to go through the surgery I want to you know find a solution to this and yeah I think eventually it got to a point where I couldn't recover you know I couldn't shift the pain and the inflammation the swelling in my knee you know I'd wake up as a 17 year old and my knee would be like a water balloon you know it'd be full of fluid it would take me 15 minutes just to get out of bed and, you know, let alone try and jog or run or compete at a professional level of football.

4:56Thomas Robson-Kanu:And so that was when I was prescribed anti-inflammatories and painkillers, standard medication by the doctors. And within two weeks of using this standard medication, you know, my body had a complete adverse reaction. You know, I started passing blood in my urine, severe nausea, insomnia. And so I had to stop taking this medication, but that forced me and my dad to basically ask a question like, is there another way to reduce pain, inflammation and swelling naturally? And we essentially went on a research binge. We went to the public library. We began to look at different cultures and different practices where they used natural ingredients to anecdotally reduce pain, inflammation and swelling.

5:42Thomas Robson-Kanu:And so we came across ancient Ayurvedic cultures, ancient asian practices where they use things like whole watermelons you know things like pineapples but the pineapple core was the key part things like pomegranates whole ginger roots and subsequently whole turmeric roots and in a bioavailable form so in a form where your body can actually absorb all of these active compounds inside of these raw ingredients it was anecdotal that it reduced the pain inflammation swelling and symptoms that I was experiencing and so yeah look they say true innovation is born from necessity and I was genuinely in need and so my father essentially began sourcing all of these raw ingredients you know from the local supermarket you know the local market and began trying to turn them into this sort of format that I could consume.

6:38Thomas Robson-Kanu:And, you know, after many iterations, a number of weeks, he eventually got it into this golden liquor. And, yeah, I began consuming it religiously. There was no other option, so I stuck with it. And was this 17? 17 at Reading Football Club. Was probably six months away from being released, simply because, you know, there's no point, you know, having a unfit player on your books. And obviously over the years, I've seen many a player come and go with injury and be released because of it. And yeah, like a long story short is after six weeks of religious use of this blend, you know, my father creating batches every three or four days, leaving them in my fridge.

7:26Thomas Robson-Kanu:I was taking two or three of these golden liquid shots every single day. my usual routine is wake up roll out of bed head into the bathroom into the shower and I realized at that moment in time that that was the first time in over two and a half years I had woken up without any pain or restriction in my knee and so yeah from that point on I was able to begin training again eventually began playing in the academy and then into the reserves a year later I ended up making my first team debut for Reading Football Club a year after that I made my international debut for Wales my grandmother was Welsh and the year after that I made my Premier League debut when we got promoted to the Premier League and I was able to do all of that essentially pain-free contrary to what I'd been told by the surgeons and doctors.

8:15Alex Chisnall:And so when you say like pain-free so literally nothing came back like in that like as you kind of ramped up the intensity and you obviously put through your paces you know as you kind of went up different levels no kind of setbacks along the way no I think um you know I think as I began to play and

8:36Thomas Robson-Kanu:train I was able to do that pain free from the pain that I had in my knee obviously it took a number of months to you know adapt from a um you know from a muscle perspective you know from you know my muscles weren't used to that level of intensity but but I was able to adapt and you Essentially, I was just in a place where my body could be in a state of recovery. A lot of people, even everyday people, they live in a state of inflammation. Their body is inflamed and it's inflamed because of their diets. It's inflamed because of their lifestyle, because of the stress that they lead in their life.

9:18Thomas Robson-Kanu:And then they obviously have high levels of cortisol. All of this creates inflammation of cells. And so there is no ability to combat that inflammation. Whereas I was now taking this golden liquid, which ultimately had natural anti-inflammatory properties. And so I was just in a state of almost constant recovery. So, yeah, I was, you know, hooked with this blend. You know, I didn't go longer than, you know, two days without using it. And I used it genuinely as my secret weapon throughout my career. And I was able to recover quicker than my teammates, you know, particularly during pre-seasons. I would go through winter seasons and flu was rife in the changing room, everyone getting sick and I was impervious to the cold, you know.

10:08Thomas Robson-Kanu:And so I firmly believe that, well, I know for a fact that without this blend, you know, I would never have had the career that I had. and

10:19Alex Chisnall:I was going to say what age did you so interested did you like to go from 17 with those surgeries what age remind me did you like finish your professional career so I finished

10:27Thomas Robson-Kanu:at 31, 32 so I was just turning 32 finished in the Premier League my final game was in the Premier League away at Leeds scored in the game and actually actually I physically felt better than I had ever felt at that point in time and so you know the decision to finished playing football, you know, was very much on my terms. And yeah, I think, you know, like for me personally, it was an awakening to the power of like natural nutrition and the impact that diet and lifestyle has on our health. And I think, you know, when you're told by surgeons and physios and doctors that you know you're you've got an ailment and you need to live with it you know it is i do not believe that that's right like i believe there are solutions out there and actually a lot of a lot of them are natural solutions this episode of screw it just do

11:31Alex Chisnall:it is sponsored by molten ventures one thing i've learned from speaking to hundreds of founders on this podcast is that the right partner brings more than just capital that's exactly how molten thinks about backing founders. They work with some of Europe's most ambitious technology companies from Series A and beyond, bringing experience, energy, and partnership to help bold ideas scale faster, go further, and become global businesses. So if you're building something with real ambition, Molten's mission is simple, to help make more possible. Go to moltenventures.com. It's interesting to know, like when you say, like at 17 and your parents are saying, you it's quite a responsibility, you know, like to yourself, but to think back then, you know, what do you want?

12:15Alex Chisnall:And I've got a 17-year-old daughter as well. And you think, you know, so much when you're asking them stuff, they will, you know, kind of look up to you and look for what your opinion is going to be. But I find that really cool that they were, you know, like saying to you, because it's your dream, right? And they can just guide you and help you. and I guess going back, you know, what, 15 plus years, like when your dad and you were like researching, it's not just like flipping your phone out now and scrolling, is it? What kind of stuff was he doing then? Yeah.

12:52Thomas Robson-Kanu:Well, no, it's quite fascinating because we went to the public library and we've still got a number of the books that we came across, you know, herbs as medicine, spices as medicine, um you know the power of um you know roots plants um and it's actually funny because actually the books that we have at home i can't find anywhere now anymore you know so they've almost like disappeared off the face of the planet in terms of accessibility um but yeah like you said you know now you've got you know chat gtp you've got you know google you know you can put in what are the benefits of turmeric in a bioavailable form and you're going to get hit with pain relief inflammation reduction you know may support may support the or may have an impact on cancerous cells it's like you know that's on the NHS website and so it's a really interesting world that we're moving into now because I think if if you think the intensity that me and my dad had to focus on research to try and understand the power of natural nutrition.

13:59Thomas Robson-Kanu:Like, unless you've got real reason to do it, no one's really going to do that. Whereas now, we're in an age of, you know, information, like you can access information at your fingertips. So actually, we're moving to a place where you can empower yourself, you can empower your life through making or understanding the importance of, you know, health, wellness, nutrition, lifestyle. And so, you know, I'm not a, I'm not a monk, you know, I'm very much about balance. But my point is, is that for the last several decades, we have been imbalanced in society. You know, we've been pushed down a ultra processed world.

14:42Thomas Robson-Kanu:We've been pushed down a nutrient depleted world of, you know, food and beverage, you know, our health is our most valuable asset. And unfortunately, in the society that we live in currently, I do believe it is changing. But currently, you only genuinely recognize that when it's too late. You know, when your health isn't there anymore, you would give absolutely anything to be healthy again. And so really, you know, with what we've done in making, you know, this blend that my father created available to people in all different walks of life through the Turmeric Co, you know, we've essentially, or our mission is ultimately like to democratize that access to truly functional, truly nutritious beverages and foods in a convenient format, you know.

15:35So it's like, that's really the intention.

15:37Thomas Robson-Kanu:And when I look at the food and beverage industry, it does blow my mind because it's almost like they want people to be sick. And it's hard to fathom because it's like, well, how can you put a cartoon character on a box of cereal, which is completely full of refined sugar? Like you are literally feeding your child spoonfuls of sugar for breakfast, you know, and it's like the impact that has on their development, you know, has on their ability, their cognitive ability, like their learning ability, their attention span. I think through science and through research now, we're beginning to understand the impact of it.

16:28Thomas Robson-Kanu:Like I don't think things like ADHD are fully connected or fully linked to nutrition right now. But I genuinely believe in the next decade, like it will be intrinsically linked because it is, you know, because what we all, you know, that saying, that age old saying, you know, you are what you eat, you know. And if you're eating processed, refined sugars, which go into your body, spike your glucose levels and are gone rapidly, you're not being nourished. And then that leads us to then why we've never had the levels of obesity that we do today. Because you eat something so refined, so sugary, and within an hour and a half, you're hungry.

17:18Alex Chisnall:You're hungry, yeah. One of the best parts of hosting Screw It, Just Do It is getting to sit down with incredible founders. And once a year, instead of interviewing them one at a time, I bring hundreds of them together. This November, I'm going to be hosting the Festival of Entrepreneurs at the NEC in Birmingham. You're going to be able to hear from founders including Richard Harpin, Ray Kelvin, Juliet Barrett, Piers Lenny, and over 200 speakers across two days. So if you're looking for ideas, inspiration and genuine business connections, I'd love to see you there. Just go to festivalentrepreneurs.co.uk to register for your free, yes, free ticket.

17:59Alex Chisnall:And did you always think that you would build something outside of football? I've always wanted to ask you that because you started whilst you were still playing, right? and then obviously you decided to go out on your own terms which probably less than one percent of people get to in any professional sport probably but um yeah did you always think that you would build something then i know you said that your dad had created it just for you but at some point

18:25Thomas Robson-Kanu:yeah like we we launched my dad and i we launched the termica in 2018 so while i was still playing football um and we set it up very much a scale-up business you know we had to set up everything from manufacture to the supply chain to you know distribution and fulfillment and um yeah like we we were in a place where it was very much just a passion project it was a bit of a side you know a side project alongside me playing football but you know I think I remember when we you know obviously we made our first sale um direct to consumer in 2018 um you know that was an incredible buzz it was like oh my gosh someone's found the website someone's purchased the product um and yeah we began to gradually pick up on in terms of sales and yeah like four weeks after making our first sale we had our first you know life-changing customer testimonial and that was the real validation of oh you know geez this isn't just me then you know that it can support other people and from there it really just sort of grew and we sort of got to a place where within a couple of years we were producing you know 10 000 shots a week and it was like goodness me like how are we gonna what do we do now like how do we keep what is the next step and so yeah it was it was almost like yeah we didn't really set out an ambition or an objective to you know turn it into a significant company or you know a company which you know could could scale and become a you know one of the bigger brands in the UK it was more just about making a blend available to anyone you know that was the objective and that was the remit so yeah I think looking back now there was the typical route for footballers is you know into coaching into management you know maybe into a director of football role but you would typically stay within you know the industry so you may also go into media and you know do punditry or commentary and so yeah look those are all options for me but as I said like I was just so driven by the impact that we were having and you know more and more testimonials would come in and it'd be like oh my gosh like how's it helping with this and wow like we didn't realize it would help with that and then we were like okay well let's try and begin to build some data around it so we kicked off some clinical research around the product and you know that research began to show you know reductions in health markers such as inflammation in the blood you know gut permeability and it was like yeah so that sort of validation almost just accelerated what we were doing and yeah it was essentially a bit of a snowball into into where

21:12Alex Chisnall:where we are now so was it like that testimonial that you had that you thought we're onto something

21:18Thomas Robson-Kanu:there yeah or before that you thought we're look i i believe you know believed in the product like i knew it worked for me and you know we knew it worked for a number of family members as well but then seeing it from an external person's view and hearing their stories that that was the humbling sort of moment that was like okay well actually we need to do more like you know if we're doing you know if we're doing 10 000 shots a week what's it been like building building with your dads how's that been yeah it's been good i think um you know i think from a character wise um and from a sort of vision wise we're we're very much aligned you know we're you know we want to get things done and you know we we have a vision of what we're trying to create um you know from a process perspective and from an operational perspective you know it's about finding you know what our strengths are and so without doubt you know his strength is obviously innovation right like he understands the product better than anyone because he created it and so really making sure that that's his focus was a really important step and yeah for me as CEO of the business you know it's about you know the integration of the strategy the development of the strategy the integration of this strategy and then holding you know everyone accountable for us you know moving closer towards there and look like we all want to we all want things to happen quickly you know and we live in a world of immediate gratification and so our expectations are somewhat distorted in terms of you know how quickly we think we can realize things but if you're patient and if you have a plan and if you're resilient enough um you know to overcome the challenges that you will always face in trying to build something like you eventually begin to make progress and and begin to create traction and and you know that that's the journey that we're on and correct if I'm wrong but

23:24Alex Chisnall:you originally told that manufacturers told you that it couldn't be done yeah and and this was

23:30Thomas Robson-Kanu:so this would have been two years before we launched because it basically took us two years to figure out how we would manufacture it. And because I was playing professional football at the time, I was able to get an audience with some of the directors of the biggest beverage businesses in the UK and Europe. So they were like, oh, you want to produce a beverage? What would you come to our factory and we can talk to you? And basically sat down with some of the top guys in the beverage manufacturing industry and outlined what it is that we were looking to do, what our process was, and the requirements to replicate it.

24:12Thomas Robson-Kanu:And pretty much every single one of them laughed at what we were talking about, said that, you know, the beverage manufacturing industry is not set up in that way. And that, yeah, what we're trying to do would essentially be impossible. And so again, if we had listened to them, you know, that would be the end of that chapter. and we would have had to have done something else. But yeah, we very quickly realized that if we were serious about it and we wanted to bring this product to the everyday person, to people in any walk of life, to people in any walk of life, we'd essentially have to manufacture ourselves.

24:53Thomas Robson-Kanu:And so, yeah, when you sort of talk about risk and, you know, investment, like that was where, you know, the big risk and the big investment, you know, went in setting up the business. Like we had to essentially set up our own bespoke manufacturing site and figure out how to become a beverage manufacturer and turn a kitchen process into a sort of scalable manufacturing process. And, you know, I was doing this alongside my dad while he was working and while I was, you know, playing professional football.

25:23Alex Chisnall:I was going to say, was your dad working at the time as well?

25:26Thomas Robson-Kanu:Yeah, yeah, yeah. So he was working, you know, he studied law and was working with the treasury and, you know, and it was, yeah, it was a wild, wild period. But as I said, like we were clear on what we wanted to do and, you know, we just committed to that vision and we found what we needed to at the right time. And yeah, we were able to build bespoke machinery, which replicated the kitchen process. we identified the space that we needed and yeah eventually sort of flattened some garages and build a bespoke unit and by 2018 we were ready to launch the Turamit Co with exactly the same kitchen process but in the semi-scalable manufacturing process.

26:11Alex Chisnall:And at the start with that process did you then have to go we need funding for this or did you like self-fund that from the get-go because that's quite something to take on.