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Tom Potter liked thisTom Potter liked thisWow! Another great Expo West in the books! We’re starting back at the beginning with AGRO, trying to do things even smarter this time around than with Q. And it was so energizing catching up with old friends and introducing so many new people to our brand new AGRO POWER Sticks, America’s first high-protein meatless sticks. A couple of big wins have come out of the show already and hopefully more to come!!! Thanks for a great show all!
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Tom Potter liked thisTom Potter liked thisI have launched my new business, Shokuya, with my co-founders, Eric Medsker and Jarin Moriguchi. Shokuya is an importer of artisanal Japanese kitchen staples - rice, soy sauce, vinegar, tea, and seasonings. We carefully study, select, and manage categories, suppliers, regions, products, packaging, logistics, compliance, sales, and marketing. We are selling DTC at Shokuya.com and wholesale through our website and in-person sales in New York to cafes, restaurants, and stores. We will be expanding nationally as soon as we can. We are doing a launch Pop-up in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, Friday and Saturday, https://lnkd.in/eW_KR2DE. Please stop by if you're here. I started thinking about Shokuya when I was still managing Joto Sake, the sake importing company I founded. Over the past few years, I have moved from exploration and ideation to research, development, planning, and launch. I want to thank all of my teammates, present and past, my mentors and advisors, and the amazing trade partners I have had over the years. I also want to thank the Japanese-American business community, which is so active in advancing the ties between our countries and cultures. We are contributing at the ground level by helping craft producers in remote areas, facing depopulation and generational change, revitalize their businesses and communities. We are also working with suppliers who are dedicated to positive agricultural and manufacturing practices. Please check us out! Thank you, Henry
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Tom Potter liked thisA timeless tale from Brad Hargreaves of our first entrepreneurial venture together when we were still college students... years before we started General AssemblyTom Potter liked thisI’ve had exits of $400m+. But the business I have most fun looking back on started with buying Yale’s trash for $50. Here’s the story that taught me a lesson every young entrepreneur must know: Yale University, 2005. Sterling Memorial Library is renovating and has hundreds of card catalogs. These are basically wooden cabinets filled with tiny drawers where librarians used to store index cards. They’re beautifully crafted, but obsolete. My friend Matt Brimer spotted them first. He noticed Yale was practically giving them away for $50 each. He thought it might be funny to buy one for his dorm room. So we grabbed two: one to keep, one to see if we could flip on eBay. Matt and I figured we’d make a couple of hundred bucks for beer money. The listing ended at $3,000. Excited, we rented a U-Haul, found warehouse space on the outskirts of New Haven, and went back for more. Turns out wealthy boomers had an appetite for authentic Ivy League furniture. Card catalogs, bookshelves, and desks. We'd buy pieces for $20 and sell them for $500. We befriended the staff at Traffic, Receiving, and Stores: Yale's surplus department. Every Friday, we'd show up with cash and a U-Haul. They loved us because once we cleaned them out, they’d head home. Eventually, we ditched eBay and built our own brand: Aloysius Properties. While other college entrepreneurs were calling themselves CEO, we went with "Director of Procurement" and "Director of Authenticity": titles that sounded like we belonged to an institution rather than a dorm room startup. The supply eventually dried up, and we moved on to other ventures. Matt and I went on to be two of the co-founders of General Assembly, which sold for $400m+ in 2018. Aloysius Properties wasn't my most successful business or the most scalable. But it was the most fun. Life and work are rarely linear and obvious. Take opportunities as you see them. You may not walk the straightest path, but you'll leave with great stories. I get asked a lot about my path in interviews. Entrepreneurs want the roadmap to get from ‘here’ to ‘there.’ But sometimes the most valuable experiences come from saying ‘yes’ to something that just seems interesting. My only regret? Not keeping one of them.
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Tom Potter liked thisTom Potter liked this8 years ago today I was on Jeopardy. Still have not flown Virgin since that day.
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Tom Potter liked thisTom Potter liked thisBen, Jack, and I are at Sweets and Snacks Expo! Come stop by booth #2360 to say hi! Or even better come root me on at the 5 x 5 Innovation Pitch Competition at 3pm today on the Gold Stage!!!
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Tom Potter liked thisTom Potter liked thisHonored to be appointed to the TDEC board. https://lnkd.in/gsZT3P9Q
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Jeffrey Slater
Meet Nooish: How One Founder is Redefining Jewish Cuisine One Matzo Ball at a Time Sarah Nathan, founder of Nooish, created a game-changing instant matzo ball soup brand that's challenging everything we thought we knew about food entrepreneurship. What makes this story compelling isn't just the product—instant matzo balls ready in under three minutes—but the philosophy behind it. Nooish was born from the "Great Big Jewish Food Fest," a pandemic-era virtual event that celebrated Jewish cuisine across diverse communities. That experience revealed something powerful: food is the ultimate tool for cultural connection and identity. Sarah's approach defies the typical startup playbook. Rather than racing to scale with investor capital, she deliberately slowed down, moved production in-house, and perfected her freeze-drying process for quality and consistency. She's built a diversified distribution strategy spanning direct-to-consumer, wholesale partnerships with 150 retailers, and everything from Hillels to hospitals—all without a massive paid advertising budget. Instead of traditional marketing, Nooish thrives on earned media, influencer partnerships, and community engagement. The brand is also bigger than the soup itself: it's positioning Jewish cuisine as year-round, accessible, and mainstream—something celebrated like Mexican or Sichuan food. Three Key Takeaways: Quality and profitability beat rapid scale. Sarah's commitment to perfecting her process before aggressive growth is a masterclass in founder discipline. Earned media and community engagement outperform paid ads. In an age of ad fatigue, authentic storytelling and in-person sampling drive real customer loyalty. Cultural brands need purpose beyond the product. Nooish succeeds because it's celebrating identity and connection—something money can't manufacture. It's refreshing to see a founder building something sustainable, meaningful, and delicious. And your Bubbe would be proud to see you enjoying Sarah's instant matzo ball soup. Who knew? https://lnkd.in/e4dkAfAU Sarah Nathan Mark Friedman Edward Zimmerman Amy Zitelman Julie Garber (Ozlek) Todd Goldstein Joel Teitelbaum Mike Schall Jeffrey Landsman Morris Wallack Jerry Goldberg
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Jason Reposa
One thing I appreciated in my conversation with Paul Weaver was the operator’s lens behind the headline. Paul directly addresses whether Big Alcohol and the 🌿 industry are enemies; and argues that Boston Beer’s participation makes it an ally for regulated access. For founders and beverage teams, the broader lesson is that category growth still has to meet product quality, regulatory durability, and a defendable reason to win.
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