The Secret to a $0 Customer Acquisition Cost

0:00We were like, honestly, we should just quit our jobs and start a pickle company at this point. Goes viral immediately.

0:07Can pickles break the internet? Lea Marcus and Yasaman Bakhtiar launched Good Girl Snacks with bold branding, guerrilla marketing, and flavors from their Persian, Egyptian, and Tunisian cultures. The clean, organic pickles are truly unique. We knew that if we didn't step in, someone else would. Good Girl Snacks has landed on shelves at Erwan and Whole Foods, and the duo still maintains a$0 customer acquisition cost. There was literally 9.5 billion views on the hashtag Pick What The Time on TikTok. The crunch just makes you hungry. Leia and Yasemin are here today to spill their secret to building in public, creating viral moments, and scaling organically.

0:41Leia, Yasemin, thank you so much for being here today. I was doing research on the two of you last night, watching your TikToks, and I was compelled to get off the couch and go to Whole Foods to buy your pickles, which I was then chomping on the end. And I kept like putting them back in the fridge. And then I would do some more research and get called back to the fridge. I mean, it is like truly, that honey harissa flavor is like truly next level. They're addicting. Yeah. We're so glad you love them. Yeah. Oh my God. Did I ever. That was like dangerous, dangerous to have in the house. You guys have managed to grow this really incredible social following.

1:23How tied is your success on TikTok and Instagram to your success as a company? It's 100 % correlated. We basically started posting on social media before we even had a product. So we quit our jobs summer 2023 and launched our TikTok and Instagram like two months after that. And so people saw us build in public. And for that reason, they really want to support the brand. so they actually go out and purchase the product whether that's online or in person at Whole Foods or Air One or wherever else and we've actually noticed that on top of the fact that people want to support the brand they have this like psychological thing which is similar to what you were just saying where if they see a video of us eating pickles on the internet it makes them crave them so then they go out and purchase it in store.

2:12I feel like we also unlocked like a secret bucket of shoppers who follow us online and don't like pickles, like maybe have never bought pickles ever. But because they like our page or, you know, they want to support the business or they're just like curious about it, they end up buying the product, trying it and then loving it. And so we get DMs all the time, even from like friends of ours who tell us like, I'm a pickle hater, but I love your product. And it's like, I've never eaten pickles until now, which is crazy to us. there are so many things to be proud of in this company. But to me, that might be like the greatest flex of all.

2:46Like converting pickle haters, like people who don't like pickles. It's like, it's usually vitriolic. It's like baked into their identity. You know, it's like not liking cilantro or something. What do you think is your ability to engage in that conversion and also that psychology piece of like people, which happened to me last night, I experienced it. Like, What do you think is at the heart of that where people are watching these videos online and they're feeling compelled to get off the couch and go to the store? I think that's just the TikTok effect in general. Like you see, you know, all of these food trends or even like fashion trends or these weird gadgets and you see other people using them or eating them.

3:29And for some reason, we want to be a part of that story, a part of that community. And so that's why you do it. But I think just with pickles in general, the crunch just makes you hungry. Like it makes you want to crunch into it as well, which we found out totally on accident. Also, we got the idea for the brand on TikTok. And so it just made sense for us to have a really big presence there. And it makes sense, again, as to why that's converting, because that's where the trend started. Like you learn about marketing and they'll teach you how to like sell a product through the senses, you know.

4:04So it's like sound and smells and taste, you know, and how to make people want to buy something. And for us, it's like the ASMR part of eating a pickle has been so unintentional, but has worked really well in, you know, leading to sales. It works. You were saying that you got the idea for the company, for the pickles themselves, from your own perusing of TikTok. Like how much was this sort of pickle renaissance and pickle trend present prior to launching? I feel like ever since COVID maybe, like when people were at home and just like snacking on everything and then showing what they were eating on TikTok and sharing sort of what their snacks were like.

4:44And I think that's kind of when it started picking up. And then we just noticed, I mean, we were huge pickle lovers as well, but we were seeing all these girls on our For You pages eat them and say they were like their favorite snack, their favorite low calorie snack. Like they were obsessed with them. They were eating them out of the jar. and there was sort of like a switch between people who were now eating them as a snack as opposed to just a condiment which was the traditional way of eating them and then at the same time you know we looked at the aisle and it felt so sleepy and homogenous and boring and like it hadn't been innovated in years and it felt really crazy to us that there was such a mismatch between you know the girl who was eating them on our for you pages who was gen z who was cool and then the brands that we were seeing on the shelf who are really targeting just like men mostly.

5:34And so we wanted to come in and cater to this niche of women that we were seeing in our For You pages. Yeah, we were literally at work, first jobs out of college, and we were scrolling on TikTok and every other video we were seeing was a pickle related video. There was literally 9.5 billion views on the hashtag pickle and pickles combined at the time on TikTok. Wow. And then, you know, we picked up on all the things that Yasaman just mentioned. And it was kind of like how avocado and avocado toast became a thing randomly in 2014. The same thing was happening with pickles. And we knew that if we didn't step in, someone else would.

6:08Who was the first one to say, I think pickles might be the thing for us? I think it was you. I think it was me. We were joking. Yeah. And Yas texted me and she goes, what if we literally started a pickle company? And then moments later, we were buying goodgirlsnacks.com on GoDaddy. Yeah. We were like initially just fantasizing about this imaginary company. We were like, honestly, we should just quit our jobs and start a pickle company at this point. Like that sounds so fun. And we were thinking about all the photo shoots we do and the flavors we'd have and what the name would be. And then I think we kind of took a step back and we're like, wait, this is really cool.

6:45Yeah. And it sounds really fun. And also we did all the research and we knew how to make a product go viral. Like we had the expertise and understanding whether that's just because, you know, we have marketing backgrounds or also just because we're Gen Z and we understand how the internet works and we're chronically online. But yeah, we felt like we were the best people to do it. And so we did. And it's been working out so far. It sure has. I mean, it's like so funny to hear you say though, like, we should just quit our jobs and start a pickle company. I mean, it sounds like a joke, but you've parlayed it into something really serious and real.

7:23You started building on social media prior to launch. At what point did you start to feel some momentum that you were onto something before there were any pickles on the shelves? probably week three of posting on TikTok. We kind of had an epiphany and we were like, we have to create kind of like a TV show that people are tuning into every single day because that's how we're going to build a community. We don't really care about views. We care about followers. And so we started the series, which is literally day one of quitting. Our corporate job, start a pickle company as best friends in our early 20s.

8:03Goes viral immediately. Wow. And we were like, oh my God. So then we just used the same format and templatized it and posted it every single day, showing what we were doing. And again, like people had a seat at the table now and they kind of were really intrigued. And they were like, why are you quitting a stable job to start a pickle company? And why are you doing that with your best friend? Like you're crazy. So people were really intrigued and following us for that reason as well. But it also gave us something to post about because we didn't have a product to show or to try. We're like, oh, we need to post something.

8:36So we were just showing. literally what we were doing without knowing what we were doing. So the initial community that you were building was really people who were bought into you, whether to support you or either maybe to criticize you. But it was the two of you they were following initially. Yeah. And still to this day, like we are the face of the brand and we will continue to be because that's the only way to maintain a zero dollar CAC in this day and age and in this industry. It is pretty wild that you have managed to maintain a$0 customer acquisition cost throughout all of this. Was that something that was a deliberate strategy on your part or more just born out of the necessity of bootstrapping?

9:21I think both, mostly out of necessity of bootstrapping transparently, but also I think we're Gen Z. I think we understand that Gen Z doesn't like to be advertised to. And because of that, we were just very careful about, you know, how we speak about our product. How do we make people want to buy the product without being too pushy, being too salesy? Because that's how we personally also react to ads and to things that we see on our phones every day. And especially with Gen Z, who spends all their time on their phone. We spend like so much time on our phone scrolling through content and we're so flooded with so many images and videos that it's like, how do you stand out and how do you make that person want to keep watching the video organically?

10:06So that's something that we really tried to hone in on. And we didn't think that we were going to be able to upkeep it this long, to be honest. Yeah. That just happened on accident. And we kind of took a step back and we were like, we don't need to spend on this right now because we are getting better results than we were if we would be spending money like on a meta ad or whatever else. So let's just keep doing this because it works. But yeah, we fully had like ads and like all this stuff baked into the strategy when we first started. Interesting. And then you've just found that you haven't needed it.

10:39Yeah. Up until now. Do you think that to some degree that that is advice that could be given to other aspiring founders in the CPG space or does it feel in some sense unique to you? I think probably a mix of both. We usually tell people in any industry, like if you're not posting every single day and if you're not the face of your brand, you're not doing your best to have a$0 CAC or to be scrappy or whatever. Like you have to have an online presence to a certain degree in this day and age. It's just as important as investing. That being said, not everyone has the personality to do so. Not everyone has the understanding of, you know, the online landscape.

11:20And so if that's not you, then you need to find someone that's going to do it for you. Like hire a social media manager, hire somebody to be the face of the brand. But whether it's you or somebody else, you definitely need to be online for sure. In the beginning, the two of you had a conversation about the necessity of posting every single day to TikTok. Do you feel like that is a core element of your success on social, just like the deep consistency? Yeah. If you don't post every day, the algorithm does not reward you. And if you post every day, you also have more of a chance of getting in front of more eyeballs every single day.

12:03It's kind of like the rule of sevens in marketing. Like the more touch points you have with a consumer, the more they're going to go out and buy your product. And so if they see a TikTok 7am and then they see an Instagram post 5pm and then they go to Whole Foods to do their groceries and they see your product on the shelf, like they're able to see all of that because you're posting every day. But and now also because we're on a shelf. And so that converts to a sale. So yeah, consistency is key for sure. Yeah. You have to stay in people's consciousness. Always. Yeah. Yeah. we want to be in your brain at all times keep the pickles top of mind I'm like thinking about them right now I know I thought we were supposed to be eating them I'm like where are my honey harissa pickles you know you were capitalizing on this TikTok trend but at the same time you two know this from being Gen Z and chronically online those trends are coming so fast and furious and they can be so flash in the pan you've been able to parlay this into something that feels like it has more heft and staying power to it.

13:08But is there any fear of like, you know, what the pickle trend ceases to be as prevalent? That's definitely something we've thought about. But I think at the end of the day, like pickles as a snack has like pickles have been around forever. It's maybe like the oldest method of preserving food ever. I think they're like 2 ,000 years old or something. And so I think for us, social media has definitely accelerated that trend and has like shed light on that trend. But I don't think it's going away anytime soon. I think it's something that people have always snacked on. And just because we now have our phones and we can, you know, share that with everyone.

13:48Now it's like become more popular, but I don't think it's something that's going to disappear in a few years. Being the face of the brand will allow us to not be just a trend because we've built a community. We haven't just built like an impulse purchase or like someone following us because they think like the images are cool. It's like they're following us because they want to support us, which seems to be the theme of this conversation. But yeah, I think creating a community kind of makes sure that your product or your brand or whatever else doesn't die out or hopefully doesn't. How are you two engaging with your community online?

14:28I mean, it's been just the two of you until very, very recently, which we'll talk about in just a sec. But, you know, are you in the comments responding to every person engaging in conversation? Do you have any kind of loyalty programs? How are you cultivating something that, though it's online, feels real to people? The second I post a video will interact with my TikTok feed or Instagram feed immediately because if you interact with content, it actually makes the algorithm show your content to the right people, interestingly. And then the second I post, I answer every single comment for at least 10 minutes.

15:08And then when people tag us in stories, we repost it. We have a private, it's called Good Girl Gossip channel for like our biggest fans. And we just chat with them there. We give them access to sales first. We have a texting loyalty program, email loyalty program. We have like keywords that you can send us in return for something. So yeah, we really engage with the community online as much as we can, but also offline. we do a lot of community events. Instead of inviting influencers to events that we do, we actually invite our followers. And we feel that tapping into those small network effects are actually a lot more successful than if we were to pay an influencer to show up to an event.

15:47Totally. Or do this extravagant event for an influencer to come to for like 10 minutes. Our followers are our influencers. And we've sent them PR. Whenever we have a question about the business or if we're unsure about how to do something, we'll open it up to our community to ask these questions and to answer them for us. And we kind of try to democratize the whole process, especially for product development and new flavors as much as we can. Because at the end of the day, they're the ones that we're catering to. And so we try to open up those conversations as much as possible. Have they played a role in your product development so far?

16:24Yeah. So we actually, we kind of like hacked the process on accident one time. So we were launching our, I think it was our bread and butter, our bread and butter flavor sweetened with dates. And we were showing, you know, the process of coming up with a flavor of trying them and we didn't have a label on it. And we said like, guess the flavor in the comments. And we got, you know, thousands of comments of people trying to answer it right. Because we also said, if you answer it right, we'll send you a PR box when it comes out. And we actually got so much inspiration and we understood what people wanted because people were commenting like, oh, a garlic one or like we want like a sweet pickle, whatever.

17:05And we still have access to all of that, obviously. So if we ever want to come out with a new flavor, we can just scroll and see what the people want, which is really cool. Yeah. We were taking notes. People were like, oh, I want a tamarind flavor. I was like, okay, tamarind. Didn't we try that one? Yeah, maybe. Yeah. Is that where the Honey Harissa came from or was that, that was your brainchild? That's where the garlic cumin came from because everyone was asking for a garlic pickle. And then we originally launched with the original Dill and Honey Harissa. Those were like the two flavors that when we started, we knew we wanted to do.

17:38I don't know why. Honey Harissa was because hot honey was having its moment. And so Honey Harissa was like our take on that with our Middle Eastern backgrounds influencing the flavor profiles. But yeah, the garlic cumin really came out of that comment section of that video, which is interesting. You both share Middle Eastern background. We all do. We're all half Persian on our test. Instantly bonded. But also Tunisian and Egyptian. Do you have the intent to bring that your Middle Eastern background into the flavor profiles some more moving forward? Yeah, I think it'll always be an inspiration because those are the flavors we grew up eating.

18:20Like those are the spices and, you know, the type of flavors that we're always attracted to, even when we're cooking at home, when we're going to restaurants, like those are the things we're always drawn to. And so I think it'll always be a source of inspiration. but we also want to make sure that the products are accessible and can be enjoyed by everyone. And we don't want to have to like educate a consumer on what something is because it's like a very niche Middle Eastern spice or something that maybe they didn't try before. So it's kind of like a fine line between, you know, trying to have that unique factor, but then still being accessible and palatable.

18:59Totally. And how is something like the honey harissa selling versus like your classic dill or bread and butter? So original dill has always been our best seller. And recently, Honey Harissa has been the leader in terms of all of our flavors. I will be contributing to that. Yeah. Which honestly, I totally get because I think it's probably the most unique one in terms of flavor profiles. I mean, they're all very unique in my opinion, but I think this one really stands out and you will never eat a pickle that tastes like that. And yeah, it's been really fun to see it being a bestseller. We also think that because of our packaging and like the interesting colors we have, colors you've never seen on a pickle shelf before, people will actually go out and grab the product, even if they're not 100 % educated on what, you know, Harissa is.

19:50And, you know, we'll say like sweet and fiery or whatever under it. But that's also been a cool part of understanding our business and like this world we've created that people will go out and purchase a product they don't necessarily even have an education around just because the packaging is cool. It's wild how much this has become a part of the conversation and the landscape just in the last several years. And, you know, I think it's like we were talking about earlier, it's like all the best ideas seem so obvious in hindsight, right? But it's like, you're at Air One and you're looking at the beverage aisle and like everything has like a beautiful, cool, super designed aesthetic packaging, right?

20:35But to some degree, then that category is so crowded. How do you stand out? It's like sensory overload. And then you go to the pickle aisle. It's like when I went to Whole Foods last night and it's true, nothing on the shelf looks like your pickles. So many people are finding you on TikTok, but TikTok is intensely Gen Z and to some degree millennial oriented. How, for the people who aren't finding you on social, how are you getting into those customer bases? We do a lot of demos and that's something that's been really successful for us. And we don't really like incentivize purchases through financial means.

21:15Like we've never really done rebates. We've never done coupons. The promos we do in stores are really just whatever the store requires. But then we love to do demos and get people to actually try the product because it's genuinely so good. And even if, you know, you wouldn't necessarily pick it up on the shelf because you're a man and, you know, you wouldn't be drawn to something called hot girl pickles. Most people who try the product actually end up loving it and then want to buy it. And so demos for us have been really successful for sure. Yeah. So we have like a couple of buckets. We have, you know, the people that found us on social media and then they see us on a shelf.

21:52We have the people that are super drawn to either the name or the packaging. And then there's another layer to it, which is we're probably the only organic pickle option on the shelf. And so if you care about ingredients and what you're eating, you're going to reach for hot girl pickles. We have, you know, a very clean ingredient label on top of being organic as well, which we didn't know this, but when we first started the brand, we realized how terrible the ingredients are in other pickle brands. I was shocked. Yeah. Which also, why? Like vinegar is a natural preservative. Totally. You don't need to put all that stuff in it.

22:30Yeah. We're happy to be that option on the shelf on top of everything else. This is an interesting part of this whole thing too, because yeah, like as somebody, I'm an Air One girly, I was raised hippy dippy. Like I really care about the food that I'm putting in my body and always have. And I had no idea that pickles were not being made with clean ingredients because it seems so, they're so obviously simple that it feels like it wasn't even a place where I was turning around and reading the ingredient label. And it was actually because of the two of you that I became hip to that. And then I thought, oh my God, like how bizarre.

23:03Is there any consumer education that you feel like you've had to engage in to let the people who are clean eating oriented know like actually the stuff that you've been eating maybe isn't that clean and we are. We're one of the few out there that does this. We do that a lot online. Yeah. Like through our content. But it's also just like very obvious on the shelf. Like at Erewhon we'll have these little shelf talkers that say organic with like a pink background. So it jumps out when you're looking at this like very boring shelf. The people that are looking for it will find it at the end of the day.

23:36How nice for you. Yeah. Let's talk about your retail expansion. Congratulations on the recent Whole Foods launch. Thank you. And I saw you're now in Nordstrom as well. Is that a permanent thing or just like a pop-up? It's a pop-up they're doing with Pop-Up Grocer. So that's been a really fun activation for us because obviously we never thought we would be in a department store. Like that's really random for a pickle brand. But again, it's a different touch point. And you get to access a consumer who's maybe not looking to buy pickles or maybe not looking to buy food. But then you come across their path and, you know, they might want to pick you up.

24:14And so being in a space where you also don't have that outside noise and competition is kind of interesting for us. Totally. You're in Whole Foods. You're at Air One. You are in Bristol Farms. You've had a long-term relationship with GoPuff. You're in Happier Grocery in New York. Do you navigate each of these relationships with retailers differently? Yes and no. I think the one thing that we always come to them with is the fact that we can bring Gen Z to your store and we have such a great grasp on our demographic and our community and our community is so ride or die that we can bring people in through your door.

24:55And that's for a lot of older stores and older retailers, I think is really appealing. Obviously, Whole Foods, Air One, like all those stores, you know, they already have Gen Z coming to them. But for a lot of other retailers that we're speaking to, I think it's definitely an added value and something that they look for in new brands nowadays. And then on top of that, I think the one thing that we always say is we are so unique in our category. There's really not that much innovation. And I think that's really appealing to buyers. And they get really excited when they see our brand because, I don't know, it's not every day that they probably come across like a pickle brand, let alone a pickle brand that has, you know, 120 ,000 followers on Instagram and like such a huge cult following.

25:40So for them, I think it's interesting. And that's kind of what we lead with when we pitch to these retailers. Right. I'm thinking about like just the absolute onslaught of pitches that these buyers must be getting and how hard it is to cut through the noise. Yeah. But when you're in a category where they're not really getting pitched in, it makes things easier. With these relationships, were they coming to you? Were you seeking them out? Is it a bit of each? It's a bit of both. It'll depend on the store. We do work with a team of sales brokers that helped us facilitate some of these relationships.