Why Brightland Said 'No' to Whole Foods – Twice – And Grew Anyway

0:10Hello friends, I'm Ray Latif and you're tuned into Taste Radio, the leading podcast for entrepreneurs, makers, and innovators in the food and beverage industry. Aishwarya Iyer built one of the fastest-growing premium CPG brands by doing what many startups overlook, putting product integrity, brand trust, and strategic timing ahead of rapid retail expansion. In this episode, Aishwarya, who's the founder and CEO of admired pantry staples company Brightland, shares how discovering a major gap in the olive oil industry sparked the creation of her mission-driven, design forward brand. She dives into her philosophy for disciplined growth, reveals why she turned down Whole Foods twice, and explains why building a lasting business starts with knowing your customer better than anyone else.

1:07Hey folks, it's Ray with Taste Radio. Right now, I am honored to be sitting down with Aishwarya Iyer, who is the founder and CEO of Brightland. Aishwarya, great to see you. So good to be here. Thank you for having me, Ray. Yeah, thanks so much for taking time out of your very busy schedule. You're running one of the fastest growing CPG brands in our business. You're a new mom, is that correct as well? I am, yes. Yes, yeah, I have a seven-month-old daughter. Everyone always asks, how is she sleeping? But how are you sleeping? Honestly, she loves to sleep, and so she sleeps through the night, and therefore we sleep through the night.

1:47And so it's been, we've had our tough moments, but frankly, like it's been all right. Well, it sort of sounds like you've been through this because you've had a baby for a number of years in Brightland. You've had some tough moments. I'm sure there've been some sleepless nights in that way too. So you've been prepared for this. I think there are so many similarities to entrepreneurship and becoming a new parent, actually. Like I think about that and talk about that a lot with my friends. I think resilience, expecting the unknown, change is the constant and worrying about things that you can't control are all themes in both.

2:20And I think I've navigated that for many years with Franklin now. So I'm kind of like, okay, great. This like new human being thing. We got this. Yeah. Well, I was scrolling through your Instagram page account. What do they call Instagram? Is it, is it, is it your account? I don't want to call it your account because it makes it sound like I'm scrolling through your personal information, but you made it all public. Maybe like I was scrolling through your Instagram profile. Profile. There we go. We'll use that, your profile. And I came across something that was really interesting. I don't know if you wrote this or if you pulled it from somewhere else.

2:55And it was a multi-frame post. And one of the frames said, belief shapes your reality. And underneath that, it described belief as something where you have to decide to believe, not in a vague way, but one that's deep and intentional. And then as I read more about you, I felt like this was a reoccurring theme, the value of belief in your life, not just as an entrepreneur, but as a human being. How does belief shape what you do? Oh my gosh. I mean, belief and energy to me are synonymous. Where attention goes, energy flows. At the end of the day, we're all energetic beings. And so I look at them as the same thing because where my attention and energy goes is where ultimately my belief system and what I want to bring into this world, where that goes, and that then becomes reality.

3:48And there's just no way about it. And I've seen that play out in my life in so many ways. And so I think that it's something I feel really strongly about. And I think people always ask me the follow up to that is usually, well, how do I hone in on that? And for me, it's been a lot of practices around mindfulness, breath and meditation. And it's completely changed my entire life. So I can talk about this for hours. But yeah, I firmly, firmly believe that, especially as an entrepreneur, when you're building something, and I think that a lot of food entrepreneurs, beverage entrepreneurs are probably listening to this podcast, you have to dig deep within yourself.

4:25And you can, you can tell yourself like, hey, I'm starting this from a place of ego, I'm starting this because I I want my own validation or I need validation from the people around me, but that'll only get you so far. But A, I think like being able to name that is important, but you need that deeper reason to keep moving forward because otherwise it's just too hard. It's just too challenging. Well, entrepreneurs, I think from the definition of who they are, are people who are willing to take risks and people who are willing to try to solve a problem that is out there that hasn't necessarily been solved yet.

4:59And olive oil is such an interesting category because I wouldn't have expected olive oil to be this dynamic opportunity for entrepreneurs today. And it has become that, I think, because of founders like you and your belief that customers and consumers deserved a better product. And that, I think, is the genesis of Brightland. In fact, going back to Instagram, the announcement, your announcement of Brightland came with a real repudiation of the olive oil industry. And you said that olive oil is a notoriously rotten, fraud-ridden industry. And after I discovered this, I knew I had to do something about it.

5:43Now, that kind of indictment is fair because there is a lot of bad olive oil out there, But I don't think a lot of people knew that. So what made you confident that not only could you deliver a better product, but help people understand that your product is superior in terms of its quality? Mm hmm. Yeah. Oh, gosh. I mean, I wasn't confident. Let's be real. I'm not gonna lie and be like, I was confident every single moment. I held two things to be true. I thought this could either be something huge, or it's going to be something really small. And like, I started with 1000 bottles, I didn't raise money.

6:25And maybe that's where it'll land. But zooming out. So I want to talk about the confidence piece for a second. But zooming out beyond that, you know, I just had a lot of conviction in what I saw to be a massive industry that didn't have brand love and didn't have emotional connection. So I saw people tell me, oh, I love olive oil. And then I was like, okay, well, what brand do you love? And nobody could tell me versus like, if I were to ask you about a plunger, you'd be like, I don't want to talk about my plunger, nor do I know any plunger brands. But if I were to ask you about maybe your favorite, I don't know, pair of shoes, you'll be like, oh my God, I just went and got some shoes.

7:03I got some Nikes or I got some New balances and you'll talk to me about them. And so for me, I saw this like category affinity, but didn't see brand affinity in the space. And so I couldn't name it at the time, like the way that I'm talking about it now, but there was something there. And when I started visiting farms, olive farms here in California, I started talking to the farmers and learned about the category, learned about the industry more. And I was like, wow, there's really beautiful, incredible incredibly high quality olive oil that's being created right here in the state of California in the United States and yet it feels like that's something that a lot of people don't know and everybody's kind of trying to do the same thing like put it in like a boring green bottle so why not turn some of that on its head why not create something that is really coveted and something that from the inside out is something that I think has a lot of integrity has a lot of beauty.

7:57I don't know if people use the words charming, beautiful, elevated with olive oil before Brightland. And so when we launched in 2018, I think we really put the category on the map in a new way that people hadn't seen before. And then now fast forward to 2025, as you said, that category is ripe with entrepreneurs who are trying to do something similar, take our playbook, do the thing. Were you fully invested in the idea and the concept at the outset, I talked with an entrepreneur. His name is Paul Vogue. Paul Vogue is the co-founder of Ourobor. Exactly. And I remember him telling me, well, you know, I figured if I make 20 ,000 cans and it doesn't work out, I'll still drink all this stuff.

8:40So, you know, I'm not saying you would consume a thousand bottles of olive oil, but at least you could give it to your friends and so on and so forth. But did you really feel like I'm going to do this And, you know, going back to belief that this is something that I was motivated to do, that I had to do. And regardless of, you know, whether I started with a thousand bottles or a million bottles, that this is something that I'm committed to doing. Yes, I thousand percent felt that. I didn't know what the outcome would be. And even to this day, I don't know what our outcome, you know, what does outcome even mean?

9:12But I think it's truly at the end of the day, it's the journey. Like it's not some like end goal. So I was like, I think I want to go on this journey. and I felt really good about that. And then I did this exercise where I actually, I would recommend entrepreneurs do this. I sat down one evening and thought about my 75-year-old self, if she's still alive. And I thought, when she looks back at her life, what are the things that she's going to wish that she did or didn't do? And this came to mind. It was like, you're feeling this way about this idea. You want to put it out into the world. And one day she might look back and be like, why didn't you just go for it?

9:48What were you doing? Why were you scared? You were scared that some random girl from high school you don't talk to anymore is going to like think something about this. Like what? And so I needed to do that exercise. And that set me free. Honestly, I think that when people consider their lives in the future, it is such a critical part of their motivation to do something today. and it's, I think, a fear of failure more than it is a want of success. Would you agree? It is. I agree. But what I challenge people now and what I challenged myself with, what are you really scared of? Let's talk through it.

10:31Okay. If it's a financial, if you are betting everything in this idea and you're going to be left in financial ruin, that's something to think about, right? Like really make sure and maybe don't hedge everything, like don't put everything into it. Be careful and hold on to something. So, you know, for me, it was never like, oh my gosh, we're going to be left with nothing if this doesn't pan out type of situation. That's not how I started it. But then beyond that, I think it's actually more psychological fear of, you know, failure. And so who are you afraid of? Is it disappointing people in your life?

11:04And ultimately it ends up being people are afraid of disappointing themselves, looking at themselves in the mirror. And a lot of times it's a younger version of themselves. This is where the younger, like when you're looking out in the future, it's like looking at your older self, would she take the risk? Should she do it? And then this, I think you go back to your younger self, maybe you're like 13, 14 year old self, who's sort of judgmental and is looking at you being like, there's no way you can do that. You're going to fail. And so I always challenge and talk to entrepreneurs and say, at the end of the day, you stepped in the arena.

11:35And there's so much honor in that. One of the things from a tactical perspective that I think is so important for entrepreneurs is to make sure you're understanding what you're getting into. And I love the fact that you actually did the legwork on what it's going to take to source the best olive oil you can possibly sourced, what makes it different and how to package it. Talk about how you educated yourself about as probably, I don't know, I would think it might be a little boring, but I'm probably completely wrong. And you're going to like, you're like, right, of course, olive oil is important.

12:12What are you talking about? But how did you educate yourself about this category and the ingredient itself? I took classes at the UC Davis Olive Center. I loved it. It was, it was amazing. I went to olive festivals where a bunch of, you know, farmers and growers were there. I talked to anyone who would, you know, pick up my call and I would go and meet people. I talked to other entrepreneurs outside of olive oil. So I talked to, I remember like one of the founders of Bushwick Kitchen. I chatted with somebody who had like a women's health consumer brand, like just a lot of a lot of folks in other industries, just asking them generally quantities and minimums and what do you wish you knew?

12:57And like really also like tactical questions. And yeah. And then I said, all right, I'm going to bet on myself and see what happens. I spent, I would say like at least eight to 10 months in research, learning, development mode. When did you feel like you were ready to go? Certainly you had products in bottles, you had the labels, you had the story, but when did you really feel like, okay, we're going to launch this thing? I guess, when did you feel really comfortable and confident? I didn't feel comfortable and confident. It was more so I set the date and then I said, we're going to back into comfort and confidence by that date.

13:35And even the day we launched, we were fortunately featured in the New York Times the day we launched, which was amazing. But you know, those first few hours, like we were getting all these sales. It was exciting. But I remember looking at the bottles because I was packing each one for the customers. I packed every bottle and wrote every gift note. And I remember looking and I was like, oh, these labels are a little wonky. They're a little like they're not perfect. And so I certainly didn't feel like, oh, we just nailed it and everything's great out the gate. It was lessons on top of lessons learned over and over again, those first few months and then continues to now.

14:15You said that you were fortunate to get into the New York Times style magazine. That doesn't happen for almost any brand at the outset. How'd you make that happen? Did someone connect you with the team or did you have any connections with the New York Times? Yeah, I knew what I knew and knew what I didn't know, right? So one thing I knew was the power of other people telling your story. And so I hired a food PR firm called Becca PR. And they helped us get into the times for our first day. And it was like a four sentence blurb. It wasn't some like big feature story. But it really put us on the map and helped solidify.

14:57There's something different about this brand. And I think that has ended up like snowballing into so many opportunities for us. Bill Gates once said if he only had$10 left, he would spend it on PR. It sounds like it's worked out pretty well for you. But you have to tell that story. I think the PR team helps you amplify that message and maybe refine that message. But it's your story, right? What was the story you were trying to sell? And how has it evolved? I think the story that I was trying to tell is the same story now, which is there's something really incredible about California and American olive oil.

15:34and I would love to shine a spotlight on it. There is a world in which you can have beautiful, high integrity, incredibly high quality extra virgin olive oil that is also beautiful on the outside. So I wasn't like a influencer or a famous person. I was like a random lady who started this company. And so I think that has served as inspiration for a lot of people too. And I don't know if it's changed that much. I think that's the origin. And it's true to who we are today. I think the thing that really, however, differentiates you, Brightland, that is, from everyone else is that I'm trying to think of other brands.

16:17Maybe there's a handful of them that sell in a white bottle. Yeah. And the clarity and the cleanliness and just like the brightness, Brightland, of course, the brightness of what you're selling in terms of your package design, your label design, stands out so much more than anything else. And you've talked about the importance of the package as being a quote unquote Trojan horse to education and trial. What were the key points and the key concepts that you wanted to incorporate into your package design? I knew that when people were looking on a shelf or coming to our website, I wanted them to be delighted.

16:58I wanted them to say, oh, wow. Oh, my gosh, I feel something. This is so X, Y, Z, whatever the word is, if it's chic. Oh, this is so lovely. There were words that I was like, I wanted people to say out loud. And so we sort of backtracked from there. and I'm, you know, I'm Indian origin. And so color for me is really important. So I was like, okay, how amazingly charming and delightful can we get without using green and using white, but incorporating lots of other colors. And so if you, you know, look at our products, like we have tomato red and squash yellow and some really lovely lavender and blueberry color.

17:41And I wanted the colors to also be resemblance of a farmer's market. So I said, let's go like maximalist, but clean on the colors and the design. Let's make it white. And let's make it something that's like a showpiece on somebody's kitchen counter that they're really like proud of and excited about. And it's been really crazy to see, I don't know, hundreds of thousands, if not millions of people have them on their kitchen countertops now. Whole Foods was very interested in your brand about a year after you launched. Yeah. They came to you and said, hey, we would love to have your brand in our stores.

18:15You said no. Two years later, they came back and you said no again. Yeah. A lot of entrepreneurs right now are banging the table, taking their earpieces out and throwing them all over the place and being like, gee, I wish Whole Foods would do that for me. But that is not something where you have a major retailer like that and you say no. And that's not something that entrepreneurs feel comfortable do and can do. Why do you feel like you needed to say no twice? Because there's something to get on shelf and then to actually perform and to move on shelf. And I wasn't confident in that because my team, we didn't have the team that we needed, the retail prowess and the know-how.

18:59And there is an element of like fake it till you make it. I get that. But in that moment, we had other fish that we were frying. We had other opportunities. So I said, all right, let's really stay laser focused on that. And we'll say, you know, thank you so much. We're so honored and delighted. Give us time to do what we need to do. And when we're ready, we'd love to have a conversation if you're open to it. I would rather have enthusiastic conversations with retailers than the conversation of, oh yeah, we came in and then we just didn't perform and we didn't know Or we weren't even ready, but you asked us, so here we are.

19:39And we're sort of lackluster in terms of our own operations and capabilities. It's not working out. I don't want to have that conversation. Yeah. I was just having this conversation with a consultant in the industry, and she said something that for some reason I didn't fully get until she said it, which is that when you have more distribution, your costs actually go up because you have to market the brand more. You have to have those shelf talkers. You have to do more demos. You have to do a lot of different things. So yes, you'll probably sell more product, but your costs are going to go way higher than you might think otherwise.

20:19And yeah, and I think for you and for Brightland, the marketing expense is so important, especially at the outset, because again, why? Why am I buying this versus any kind of commodity oil? No, it's so challenging because how can I scream from the rooftops? Yes, it's beautiful, but also California has the strictest standards for extra virgin olive oil and Brightland's oils get tested almost every month and we beat those standards every time. How can I explain, oh, on average, there's a polyphenol count that's really important, free fatty acid count that's really important. On average, here's where the commodity oils are.

20:56Brightland is like 5, 10x better. Like, how do you explain all that? How do you talk through all of that? It is a huge, huge challenge. Huge challenge. Yeah. And it's not as simple as saying, hey, we're going to have a great social media strategy. Obviously, Brightland has a great presence on Instagram, but I don't think people are spending as much time reading about and trying to understand your transparency standards and your sourcing standards. Yeah, totally. I'm so glad we're saying this out loud. Like, we don't try to talk to us because ultimately, then it looks like you're talking to yourself, being like, look at us, look at us what we're doing.

21:33And instead, what I decided was, what do people care about? Oh, they care about, I don't know, sardine girl summer, let's make sure that we're partnering with a tin fish brand to like show up in people's homes. What else do people care about? Oh, they care about, I don't know, I'm making this up grilled cheese sandwiches right now in the wintertime. let's have like a month of grilled cheese month where like that's what we're spotlighting and I see both sides of it and I think maybe there's ways to in like we've done this where we've been interspersed in between like oh three things you want to know about olive oil that you may not know but making it sort of delightful and fun but I think it's arrogant to assume that people are just like staring at your social content or your website or even your packaging trying to learn everything they can.

22:21Like they're not, they're busy. Quick break. If this episode has you thinking about what's next in food and beverage, explore BevNet and Nosh Insider, our subscription platform with deeper insights from the BevNet team. Visit tasteradio.com slash insider to learn more. Just to be a devil's advocate here, then why does the product matter so much? If the brand is what you're selling, and if selling the brand is what's most effective, Yeah. Why put so much emphasis on the product? Because otherwise, what are we doing here? If the product is compromised, if all I'm doing is taking something subpar and putting it into nice packaging, call it a day.

22:59And people can tell, people can, even if they can't explain it, they can tell when something's off, when the quality isn't right. And you don't build trust and you don't build loyalty. It would be counter to why we're all here, like why I started the company for me. Well, for investors, a few years ago, it was all about top line growth and making sure that you're turning product as often as you can would get the investors interested in potentially funding your business. And now, you know, for sure, it's gone the other way and people want to hear about your path to profitability, your gross margin, et cetera, et cetera.

23:39But you really do need that money. And everyone knows this. You know, it's not a secret in our industry that it costs a lot of money to scale a CPG brand. You raised some money last year, actually quite a bit of money last year. When you're thinking about that investment strategy and maintaining the integrity and authenticity of what you do in finding the right partner, what's that thought process like? Honestly, it's having a conversation like this. If somebody were to be like, oh yeah, why don't we just get crappier oil and keep your pretty bottles, then like, it would be so nice to meet you.

24:14This clearly isn't a fit. Appreciate the conversation. And so everyone who's a part of this journey, like really is excited. And it's, it's just, there's no surprises around how much the product integrity matters and the brand affinity and the like long-term vision, how much that matters too. And so I've just been really unapologetic about that. And the people who get it, get it. And the people who don't, they don't. And that's okay. Well, I'm glad that you found people who get it because it's making Brightland more accessible to more people. Exactly. And now that you have a bit more leeway to expand distribution, to get into more retailers, I think that's also kind of a challenge because now you figure out where do we best invest our time and resources.

25:03Again, I want to get to the everyday oils and a sec, but when you're thinking about where do we have permission to go with Brightland, in what channels, at what retailers is this product, is this brand really going to shine? How do you map that out? I think about the customer. I think about her all the time. I'm like, where is she shopping? She's been buying from us for gifts, maybe for herself a little bit through our website, maybe at Nordstrom or at Bloomingdale's she found us, maybe in her local like really cute bodega, like cute gift shop. We were there. Those are the places she's used to us, but she's also shopping at Whole Foods.

25:38Maybe she's doing that once in a month Costco trip, or maybe she's going to Target and grabbing a few things. I really think about her and her life and how do we fit in and show up in her life in the best way where then she's like, oh great. Oh my gosh. I just bought Brightland's like gift set, sent it to my sister-in-law, but I'm now at Whole Foods and I see their salad oil. Great. Me and the family are making salads this weekend. I'm going to grab a couple of bottles. Being a luxury brand or having a luxury line of products, but also having an everyday line of products isn't necessarily a common thing to see in our industry.

26:16In fact, I was racking my brain. I was like, are there any brands out there that have sort of an ultra premium product and then can successfully sell as sort of an everyday product as well. And you had a pretty eloquent comparison to fashion, if you could talk about that. Yes, yes. One of my biggest inspirations in business and in brand is Ralph Lauren. And I think that he and the brand are just a masterclass in building something that is American heritage, timeless, stands for great quality, has so much meaning behind everything, and also can split ultra luxury into something a little more accessible with their purple label all the way to like polo, RL sport.