Vested Interest Episode 6: Repurpose is the Big Winner

Catch the replay of our sixth episode of Vested Interest, where three real ecommerce brands pitch three real investors for a private call to help secure funds for BFCM, and scale their operations. 

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Investors Featured in this Episode: 

Stephen Daubert: Stephen helps manage Echo Capital Group, where he provides financial analysis, due diligence, deal sourcing, board support, and deal execution. Stephen currently sits on multiple boards and provides portfolio companies with strategy and financial guidance.

Hannah Shore: Hannah works with Greycroft’s portfolio companies to accelerate their growth by identifying potential customers, connecting them with key vendors, and supporting their board director searches. She cultivates relationships to drive business development and revenue opportunities.

Brands Featured in this Episode:

First up, we had Kween pitched by Ali Bonar and Eric Katz.

Kween makes the first ever oat-based spread, called Granola Butter. They’re creating a new category within the spreads space and offering a delicious, healthy, allergen-free alternative to nut butter. Since launching in 2018, they’ve realized success through their D2C, retail and food service channels. Their product is top 8/12/14 allergen free, vegan, non-GMO, organic, and with no preservatives or additives, making it a go to option for anyone looking for a healthy and safe alternative to seed/soy nut butter or peanut/almond butter already on the market. By focusing on their brand, they’ve been able to outline a solid plan to expand their categories and lines to diversify and continue to scale. 

Key Investor Questions: 

1. Stephen: What barriers do you have on granola butter that would prevent a private label from creating a competing product?
2. Hannah: What are your plans for your marketing strategy and how are you collecting customer data?
3. Adam: As you scale to additional channels, how do you think about the brand evolution as it relates to your target consumer?

Second, we had Repurpose, pitched by Lauren Gropper. 

Repurpose is the leading national brand of plant-based compostable tableware, and they’re available in an impressive 15,000 locations nationwide. They strongly believe in plants over plastic and are doing everything they can to tackle plastic pollution with plant-based compostable alternatives – by making all of their products from plants, they are effectively a zero waste solution. Since launching in 2010, they have grown substantially and have made waves in establishing themselves as the #1 brand in eco-tableware. With big plans to expand their brand and category, they are certainly leaders in shifting sustainability from a perk to a priority. 

Key Investor Questions: 

1. Stephen: How are you going to navigate the pricing environment on your different channels?
2. Hannah: How do you educate your customers on how to use and dispose of the plant-based products?
3. Adam: Within the tableware category, how are the big players in the space evaluating sustainability to create less waste?

Finally, we had Jammy pitched by Oleg Domanksy. 

Jammy Instruments is a music-tech startup building and selling digital guitars that allows for translating guitar skills into any instrument to create in any genre, so anyone with even basic guitar playing skills can play the whole orchestra using just one instrument. They’ve been making huge strides to expand their reach, both through their hardware and software ecosystem. Keyboard synthesizers and controllers have become industry-disrupting products, heavily influencing the music scene for decades amongst piano players, and Jammy is here to do the same with the most popular instrument in the world – the guitar. 

Key Investor Questions: 

1. Stephen: What are the details on the cost improvements from the old model to the new model?
2. Hannah: Have you thought about developing software that you can sell independently of the hardware?
3. Adam: Why hasn’t something like this been developed for guitar players, and what are you seeing in the market that allowed you to capitalize here?