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Advice Line with Ben Goodwin of Olipop

48 min episode · 2 min read
·
Ben Goodwin Of Olipop

Episode

48 min

Read time

2 min

Topics

Health & Wellness, Remote Work, Relationships

AI-Generated Summary

Key Takeaways

  • Consumer education sequencing: Lead with taste and comparative nutrition stats before explaining novel ingredients. Ben Goodwin advises ghee snack brand GheeLish to front-load packaging with calorie and fat comparisons versus Skinny Pop, then reserve deeper ingredient storytelling for social media, QR codes, and brand evangelists who actively seek that information.
  • Traction before capital: Founders seeking investment or grants too early risk weak negotiating positions. Guy Raz advises Sarah's Gluten Free Goods — currently at $20K projected net profit — to maximize existing cottage food capacity, place products in more local shops on consignment, and demonstrate clear velocity before pursuing commercial kitchen financing or equity rounds.
  • Co-op differentiation via curation and community: Bexley Natural Market should prioritize three levers over e-commerce investment: curated local product selection customers trust, in-store and parking-lot community events like farmer meet-and-greets, and a sensory shopping experience. Kroger cannot replicate direct farmer relationships or the emotional anchor a co-op provides to its neighborhood.
  • Reject "that's market" thinking: Goodwin identifies accepting standard industry terms — whether investor conditions, distributor agreements, or quality compromises — as a trap founders rationalize as inevitable. Treating any "that's just how it's done" benchmark as a floor to beat, rather than a ceiling to accept, is a consistent driver behind Olipop's product and business decisions.
  • Remote culture at scale: Olipop operates with approximately 280 employees and no central office, a structure that emerged from COVID-era necessity and was retained after proving effective. The model demonstrates that consumer packaged goods companies can scale past $500M gross revenue without physical headquarters, provided remote culture is deliberately built and maintained over time.

What It Covers

Olipop cofounder Ben Goodwin joins Guy Raz to advise three early-stage food businesses — a ghee-based snack brand at $3.5M revenue, a one-woman gluten-free cottage bakery, and a struggling Ohio food cooperative — on consumer education, scaling strategy, and community-driven growth.

Key Questions Answered

  • Consumer education sequencing: Lead with taste and comparative nutrition stats before explaining novel ingredients. Ben Goodwin advises ghee snack brand GheeLish to front-load packaging with calorie and fat comparisons versus Skinny Pop, then reserve deeper ingredient storytelling for social media, QR codes, and brand evangelists who actively seek that information.
  • Traction before capital: Founders seeking investment or grants too early risk weak negotiating positions. Guy Raz advises Sarah's Gluten Free Goods — currently at $20K projected net profit — to maximize existing cottage food capacity, place products in more local shops on consignment, and demonstrate clear velocity before pursuing commercial kitchen financing or equity rounds.
  • Co-op differentiation via curation and community: Bexley Natural Market should prioritize three levers over e-commerce investment: curated local product selection customers trust, in-store and parking-lot community events like farmer meet-and-greets, and a sensory shopping experience. Kroger cannot replicate direct farmer relationships or the emotional anchor a co-op provides to its neighborhood.
  • Reject "that's market" thinking: Goodwin identifies accepting standard industry terms — whether investor conditions, distributor agreements, or quality compromises — as a trap founders rationalize as inevitable. Treating any "that's just how it's done" benchmark as a floor to beat, rather than a ceiling to accept, is a consistent driver behind Olipop's product and business decisions.
  • Remote culture at scale: Olipop operates with approximately 280 employees and no central office, a structure that emerged from COVID-era necessity and was retained after proving effective. The model demonstrates that consumer packaged goods companies can scale past $500M gross revenue without physical headquarters, provided remote culture is deliberately built and maintained over time.

Notable Moment

Goodwin reveals that Olipop's first human clinical research found the drink did not spike blood sugar, keeping levels stable — a meaningful finding for a product competing directly against traditional sodas containing 35-plus grams of sugar per can, and one that strengthens the brand's health positioning beyond taste alone.

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Episode Transcript

This episode is brought to you by Justworks, one platform that handles the complicated stuff, payroll, benefits, global hiring, and makes running a small business 1000000% smoother. Stick around. I'll tell you more later in the show. Building a business means being 10 people at once. The strategist, the spreadsheet person, the one fixing the office sink. US Bank made a card for exactly that kind of hustle. The creditor and issuer of this card is US Bank National Association pursuant to a license from Visa USA Inc. Some restrictions apply. Hello, and welcome to the advice line on how I built this lab. I'm Guy Raz. This is the place where we help try to solve your business challenges. Each week, I'm joined by a legendary founder, a former guest on the show who will help me try to help you. And if you're building something and you need advice, give us a call, and you just might be the next guest on the show. Our number is 1804331298. Leave us a one minute message that tells us about your business and the issues or questions that you'd like help with. Alright. Let's get to it. Joining me this week is Ben Goodwin, cofounder of the prebiotic soda brand, Oli Popin. It's great to have you back on the show. Guy, absolutely a thrill to be back with you again. So, Ben, you were first on the show, not that long ago, 2024, when you told the story of Olipop, of course. And you spent years developing a a completely different sort of brand that you then had to walk away from with with very little in return. But you eventually, after much struggle, rebounded from that experience and created Olipop, a brand that is I I it's it's so hard. It's amazing. It's now valued at at over $2,000,000,000, maybe more. That was the last I saw, which was last year. It is such a great story. And as always, for those of you who have not heard that episode, we will put a link to it in the show notes. So please do listen to Ben's episode if you haven't heard it, the story of lollipop. It is so good. Ben, before we get to today's callers, just a couple questions for you. You guys just launched a kind of a rebrand. Right? Like a a refreshed packaging and a national ad campaign. Tell me tell me about the thinking behind that. Yeah. No. Thanks for noticing, Guy. Look. I think that, you know, if I reflect on where Olipop's been stronger and weaker since its inception, I think we've always been a really great pull brand, and a lot of that is, you know, the kinda original packaging and brand ethos. And then there's a great tasting product that once you tried it, it kind of was a delight how good it actually tasted, and that kept people coming back, and that made people wanna give …

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