#224 - The Rise of NeuroGum with Kent Yoshimura

In this episode of the Startup CPG Podcast, host Daniel Scharff sits down with Kent Yoshimura, co-founder and CEO of Neuro Gum, to explore how a rejected Shark Tank pitch turned into a nine-figure functional supplement brand pioneering the chewable energy category. Kent shares the journey of scaling Neuro from $3 million to over $100 million in revenue while competing against legacy giants like Mars Wrigley in one of CPG's most competitive spaces: the checkout lane.

The conversation reveals how Neuro built direct-to-consumer dominance through TikTok virality, organic influencer partnerships (including Joe Rogan's 40+ mentions), and strategic collaborations with F1 drivers, DJs, and professional athletes. Kent explains the science behind cold-compressed gum, why microdosing caffeine works better than traditional energy products, and how thoughtful brand building and operational excellence drove exponential growth.

Throughout the episode, listeners gain actionable insights on e-commerce fundamentals, new customer acquisition strategies, and how to build brand equity beyond paid advertising. Kent shares candid lessons on breaking into retail, navigating checkout space negotiations, and why staying humble while hiring experienced operators accelerates sustainable growth.

Listen in as they discuss:

• How Neuro Gum scaled from $3M to 9 figures after Shark Tank rejection
• The science of chewable energy and why format innovation matters
• Neuro's surprising consumer demographics and why older buyers convert
• E-commerce fundamentals: LTV/CAC optimization and customer acquisition strategy
• Building brand equity through organic partnerships over paid ads
• Joe Rogan's repeated endorsements and the power of strategic product seeding
• Partnership strategy: leveraging athletes and creators for credibility
• Breaking into retail: competing for checkout space against Mars Wrigley
• Supplement trends: established ingredients over novel compounds
• Scaling to $100M: staying humble and hiring people smarter than yourself

Episode Links

Website: https://neurogum.com/ 

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kentaro/ 
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kentyoshimura/ 

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Show Links:

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• Episode music by Super Fantastics
  
  

Creators and Guests

Host

Daniel Scharff

Founder/CEO, Startup CPG

What is The Startup CPG Podcast?

The top CPG podcast in the world, highlighting stories from founders, buyer spotlights, highly practical industry insights - all to give you a better chance at success.

Kent Yoshimura
I visit our farms up in Washington for the mint yield every single year. And we see what the best yield is, we see what the best flavor is. And it's not consistent year to year, which becomes one of the hardest things to get flavor right when it's not artificial. But I know for a fact that it's like, all right, this is the best yield of mints from this year. Let's use this flavor and see how it fits into our pieces.

00:33
Daniel Scharff
Welcome to the startup CPG podcast. Today we have a very special guest. It's Kent Yoshimura. He is the co founder of Neuro, which is the brand that brings energy and functional ingredients to gum and mints. Yep, that's right. Chewable energy. So Neuro went from just an idea to a viral sensation. They were on Shark Tank. They built a huge direct to consumer presence and Amazon following. They're now scaling in retail in one of the most competitive categories out there. Check laying gum, mints, all of that stuff. And they're also competing with the energy category. They're doing it with science, loyal super fans and some huge cultural moments along the way that you're going to hear about. So today on the podcast we dig into their early traction.

01:13
Daniel Scharff
The science and consumer psychology that makes people choose their energy, how they've built partnerships with athletes and major creators and Kent's learnings along the way. You are going to love this episode. All right, here we go. Let's get into it. All right, Kent, welcome to the show. So to kick things off, could you just give us a quick intro of yourself and Neuro?

01:36
Kent Yoshimura
Yeah, I'm Kent Yoshimura, the co founder and CEO of Neuro Gum and Mints. We launched about 10 years ago because we wanted to see how we can make supplements more accessible and approachable.

01:47
Daniel Scharff
All right, and tell me about the rest of your team.

01:50
Kent Yoshimura
So, I mean, our team is growing pretty rapidly. I guess we're about like 70 something people now. But you know, we have a killer chief commercial officer that used to work at Hugh conagra. Before that, Megan, who is our integrated brand manager, worked at Claire's, was a VP there. And then my co founder, Ryan, you know, who I've been on this very long journey with, who leads partnerships now. And I don't know if you see on Instagram and LinkedIn, but we have some pretty cool partners. We just announced Andrew Schultz today actually as part of our professional athlete roster. So that's our latest partner. Cool.

02:23
Daniel Scharff
All right. Okay. And Ryan, I saw on the Shark Tank episode with you and that's right. Yes. It was such a. You guys did such a good job. Honestly, when I watched that, I think the thing that I like the best about it is your guys's friendship. Even at the end, you know, you guys, like, gave each other a hug and you're like, I love you, man.

02:41
Kent Yoshimura
Oh. It's like a very, like, pervasive thing across the entire business where we have our principles and everything too, like every other company. But at the end of the day, someone said this best where it's like our authenticity and how genuine we are through the brand comes from that core. Where Ryan and I started this because were friends, I was sleeping on his couch and we had this idea and it's like, how do we keep developing that into something more? And now we're this real business, you know?

03:09
Daniel Scharff
Well, it's really beautiful and it just seems like you guys really support each other very nicely and that is an incredible thing to have in this rough CPG road. So getting back to Shark Tank in 2020. You went on Shark Tank, The Sharks passed on the opportunity. Robert said, like, he thought the valuation was too high. He actually gave you an offer at like a 7 million valuation, but he is like 2 million. I just can't get there. It's, you know, too rich. But, you know, your numbers were awesome. Like, you were at 3 million in revenue. You had doubled versus the year prior. I don't know your exact margins, but in my head it sort of sounded like you were at like 60% margins or something. Awesome.

03:46
Daniel Scharff
And then you were asking for 750k because you were going to grow into retail and, you know, had a bunch of marketing things that you wanted to do. So they passed. Catch us up. What happened from then to now? Did the Sharks make a mistake? Where's the business today?

03:59
Kent Yoshimura
Oh, man, it's so crazy. I mean, the whole Kevin Leary stinky poo thing went like viral, which is hilarious. But, yeah, I think we're doing around 3.5 that year and just continue to more or less, you know, double or double plus since then. And the business continues to grow. E commerce is our strong suit, but retail has always been the next frontier. How do we activate it properly? How do we get an understanding where our consumers shop and enter into the right markets? You know, it's crazy because we now have one of the Sharks as our advisor and there's going to be a big announcement like whenever that is going to show up online. It's a cool little redemption arc for doors are never Closed until you actually close them. And our team's grown.

04:49
Kent Yoshimura
We moved our entire business over to Vegas after things shut down during COVID in California. And we continue to make strides across the online space as well as the physical retail space.

05:00
Daniel Scharff
And where are you guys at on revenue now?

05:02
Kent Yoshimura
We are approaching, I guess it's nine figures.

05:06
Daniel Scharff
Yeah, nine figures. Okay. So Robert, Mr. Wonderful didn't like that valuation when a business was at 10 million with 3 million in sales. Now you're over a hundred million in sales. And now one of them decided to come back and be an advisor. So excited to hear who it is. And then later, when we do the next round of this podcast, you can tell me what all those discussions were like and if they liked the taste of the crow that they were eating afterwards.

05:34
Kent Yoshimura
That's right. I'm not sure if information is embargoed on that front yet, because there's all these contracts and things flying in place.

05:41
Daniel Scharff
I love it. But I mean, as somebody who roots for brands, what better outcome or story is there than somebody who went on there? And, I mean, I'm sure you got a lot out of the appearance. You guys represented yourselves incredibly well and the product and, you know, didn't get a deal, but looked amazing doing it. And I'm sure everybody supported you and your sales probably went crazy from that. But what better outcome than like, aha, look, you were wrong. Look how well they're doing. So I love that. I'm really excited for you and just congrats to you guys for everything that you have achieved. Now can we just dive into the product as well? So you guys sent me an incredible sample pack here. So I've got all of the neuro gum flavors. I've got all of the mint flavors.

06:24
Daniel Scharff
I was chewing on some of this. Man, I had a long day today. I was recording a webinar and an interview. And so I was just crunching on this gum, which is tasty and fun, and you're, like, aware when you're chewing it. Like, oh, this is helping me be very alert. So really cool stuff, but can you just take me back to, like, how did you get the idea for energy gum and mints and everything? How did that all come to life?

06:45
Kent Yoshimura
Yeah, you know, I mean, energy gum existed before in the form of things like military energy gum or jolt, like, way back in the day where they try to take this energy drink model and place it into a confectionary format. And when I was training, I used to be more or less a professional athlete. I was Fighting in Thailand since I was like 15, like martial arts has been a big part of my life. I was training with the judo Olympic team, so I was traveling out to Japan, staying in the dorms, out in like the top colleges out there, training like all summer. And when you're training at that level, one, you get tested, but two, you don't want to be taking energy drinks or all these substances that were people were taking, like the gym rats were taking about 15 years ago.

07:23
Kent Yoshimura
15 plus years ago. And I got into the world of nootropics because like everyone else during that time I was reading Tim Ferriss books and this was the thing that was helping him for becoming a serial entrepreneur. So in my dorm room, I started buying supplements on my own, mixing them, seeing how they do with my body while I was performing at my highest level and realized that there's this combination that's pretty straightforward, but natural. Caffeine and L theanine, which you find in green tea, but amplified a little bit, has a very positive effect on cognitive performance. So when Ryan got in his snowboarding injury, he used to be captain of his cross country and track team, one of the fastest kids in California. But he got injured in a snowboarding accident that left him paralyzed from the waist down.

08:07
Kent Yoshimura
I provided him with these supplements and it worked amazingly for him to get back into school, get going on what he wanted to do. And after college he wanted to go get scuba certified because that was the one thing that, you know, would allow him to be active despite his injury. And these pills were great on our trip, but we realized that it could be more shareable, portable, and look a little bit better and less stigmatized if we're not carrying a bag of pills around in public. So we set out on this journey, launched our product, beat our goal in three days on Indiegogo. For our initial funding, I was packing everything out of my apartment with our now CEO Tyler. And really the rest is history.

08:51
Kent Yoshimura
And our mantra really now is how do we continue to make supplements more approachable, accessible, a part of your lifestyle, more so than something that sits in your medicine cabinet that is collecting dust or you typically tend to forget about.

09:05
Daniel Scharff
That's amazing. Thank you for sharing that. And it just was reminding me about nodos. If you ever had that, like, you know, that was a thing that we knew about that in high school. They were just basically caffeine pills.

09:14
Kent Yoshimura
It's caffeine pills. It's like 200 milligrams of caffeine.

09:16
Daniel Scharff
Yeah, yeah, I guess that was a lot I remember like taking that to stay up and study. But I probably didn't study. I was not a good student. I probably just took it and then played video games. But I mean it's. Yeah, I wouldn't call that the most accessible format. Cause it just, yeah, it feels like you're straight up to taking a drug and like it's just kind of like a weird like, oh, I'm gonna take these like pills, I don't know.

09:35
Kent Yoshimura
But.

09:35
Daniel Scharff
Oh, like gum, okay, yeah, that's much more accessible. That's something I'm much more used to doing recreationally. And let me ask you something else, which is interesting to me because, okay, take something like Celsius, right? Which obviously just has brought so many people into the energy drink category. Like I was living in LA at the time and just seeing like how many 20 to 30 year old females were walking around the equinox with a Celsius can, like as if it was an accessory. I'm like, whoa, this is pretty interesting. And these are not people who would say even that they're like energy drinkers. They're just like, no, but I drink the Celsius. That's like a different thing. But part of it, I think Celsius is just so like flavor forward. It's a very strong fruity flavor.

10:19
Daniel Scharff
I feel like there is something about flavor that gives people energy. Not just like straight up the caffeine that is in it and all that stuff, but there's just something about flavor that gives people energy, you know. And so obviously with the gum as opposed to something like pills, like you get the functionality, you get the caffeine, but there's also flavor that's coming in. Do you feel like that is true? Like there's just something about flavor and like a flavorful experience that can energize people.

10:43
Kent Yoshimura
Oh, definitely. Like even if you think about like vixa, like the nasal whatever things that just blasts you with the menthol, I mean there is something to be said about sensory experiences and how they transform how you view the world within that moment, you know, so when you're chewing gum1, you're activating your brain just from the act of chewing, but being able to have that like minty freshness. It's funny because we talk about the five gums or all these other Wrigley products from back in the day and they lean so much on what that experiential moment with flavor was to try to prove out all these extra benefits that gum would have for you. And now we're actually just doing it with the ingredients inside our products.

11:25
Daniel Scharff
It's so interesting. And your flavor holds also. That's, like, the least cool thing about a gum is if you have a gum and after maybe it's, like, old or whatever, and then you put it in and it's flavorful, and then a minute later, you're like, oh, the flavor went away. Now I'm just chewing literal gum. This kind of sucks. So, yeah, the flavor part of it is just so important. Yeah. So interesting to think about. Hey, can you tell me how gum is made?

11:48
Kent Yoshimura
Yeah. So there's different types of gum bases that you could get a lot of. Gum bases that are used contain things like bht, which is very bad for you, and microplastics. So we try to move away from that. And we have a proprietary way we develop our gum base. But most people use heat extraction or heat extrusion to basically heat up the gum, put in all the ingredients, like, the flavors and whatever you have, and then it cools down. And that's why you get your stick of gum that lasts for, well, like, 30 seconds and then gets super hard because just is going through this chemical process. For us, we're slamming everything in with pressure using a process called cold compression. That's why you get, like, the longevity of the flavor, the longevity of the gum chew and the texture.

12:31
Kent Yoshimura
And even with the mintiness, like, I visit our farms up in Washington for the mint yield every single year, and we see what the best yield is. We see what the best flavor is, and it's not consistent year to year, which becomes one of the hardest things to get flavor. Right. When it's not artificial. But I know for a fact that it's like, all right, this is the best yield of mints from this year. Let's use this flavor and see how it fits into our pieces.

12:55
Daniel Scharff
And it can be very different. Different kind of mints can add such a different.

12:58
Kent Yoshimura
It's crazy.

12:59
Daniel Scharff
Yeah, yeah. There's so many different kinds of mint.

13:01
Kent Yoshimura
It's like a Somalia level. Like, when you go up there and they know all for mints, it's like, wow.

13:06
Daniel Scharff
Yeah. Ones that, like, open up your palate more. Ones that kind of are like more of like a spearmint. Yes. That's really interesting.

13:14
Kent Yoshimura
Like, top of mints and all the stuff, too. It's like the dirt and I don't know. It's all science, like, food science that I don't really understand. I dress up.

13:22
Daniel Scharff
All right, let me ask you a childish question, which is if you had to pick a gum that you love other than yours that was around in your childhood to just gorge on, irrespective of any health impacts or, you know, quality things, which would it be? Because I remember so many of them fondly from my youth. Like Juicy Fruit, Big League Chew. I could never get into Big Red. I don't know, it's too spicy for me.

13:46
Kent Yoshimura
I'm not a Big Red guy. But, you know, I have this like really fond memory of going toys R Us, Rest in peace, getting the zebra gum. Do you remember that?

13:55
Daniel Scharff
Oh, it was layered or was it just a stick that was striped?

13:59
Kent Yoshimura
It was like a stick pack, but it was like it had like a zebra on it. I don't even know what it's called, but it was like the zebra gum. It tasted kind of like Juicy Fruit and it was so good. And I just remember having like really fond 25 cent gum pack memories of that gum. And I don't find it anywhere anymore, but I would say it's like a core memory of mine.

14:20
Daniel Scharff
Okay. Some service provider out there who really wants Kent's business, go find that on ebay and send it to him and he will give you a meeting for sure. I just also remember buying those like 20 packs, you know, like the double mitt or whatever, like the really tall one that just single stack, like 20. You walk around with one of those, you're the most popular person at the party. You know, just handing out sticks like that left and right. Gum is.

14:43
Daniel Scharff
It's just such a fun and social thing too because, you know, unlike a lot of snacks or foods or it's just so shareable with people and it's to like sit on your desk or in your car, cup holder kind of product that's just like out there and really just part of our social structure to like, that's something that you share with people and if you have it, like some people carry mints and just love offering people mints, you know, I.

15:06
Kent Yoshimura
Mean, you're talking about high school. It's like transactional in high school, you know, it's like a form of currency.

15:11
Daniel Scharff
Yeah, I guess it is in prison also, isn't it? Yeah, like cigarettes and gum. Like you can trade that for just about anything. All right. I don't know from personal experience, but I've seen the movies. Okay, so coming back to you and your product, you know, the reason for the podcast, one question that I have for you is like, who is the core consumer? Like, who have you found is the most open to chewing their energy.

15:34
Kent Yoshimura
So it's really interesting because there's like this 24 to 35 year old demographic, which is I guess my demographic that definitely not on the 24 side, but you know, on the older side of that spectrum that has been so health conscious but looking for new innovative ways to get functional food. And I think, you know, you and I within the CPG world has been through kind of that renaissance of what we saw where it's like, how do we put function into existing formats? So we've been able to tap into that market. Obviously with TikTok we got a younger demographic. But funny enough, with TikTok, although there's a Gen Z audience that's there, we get this older demographic of 55 and over that is more attracted to our product and converts better on that platform.

16:17
Kent Yoshimura
So our hypothesis is that when people see a Red Bull or a monster or even celsius for like 240 milligrams plus of caffeine, there's like, if I'm like 60 years old, I'm just assuming, but it's like if I'm 60 years old, I don't need to be a monster or a rock star. You know, I don't need to have like the Red Bull running through me. But something as like balanced as a neurogum for them to be able to get through their day makes a lot more sense. And I think the communication, the messaging, the positioning that we do to that audience and I guess entire audience space just resonates a lot better.

16:50
Daniel Scharff
So let me ask you this though, but my guess would be that they chew your gum for a different reason than the younger people. The younger people may be more for the energy aspect and the older people, maybe they're really focused on cognitive health for the long run. Like they want to stay sharp. Is that possible?

17:04
Kent Yoshimura
A hundred percent. And it's funny because like, you know, in CVS to I guess shout some retail numbers out the first half this year, we don't have data for second half this year yet, but first half this year we outsold Five Hour Energy and Aulani New combined in unit sales and revenue sales. So it says a lot about like the audience that goes when we're in the pharmacy section, especially the audience that goes to a CVS is looking for something like a Prevagen, but then finds a product like ours, realizes the price point is so much more accessible to them while also getting them cognitive benefits and then they end up buying that versus say like the energy drink departments and going necessarily to the those options.

17:45
Daniel Scharff
So interesting to me. And I mean to be at the scale that you're at with such a heavy direct to consumer presence, I'm sure you just know this inside and out. And specifically which messaging works on which kind of people do you know about how people use your product? Like when are they chewing it? Like do they have rituals around that or is it like sporadic and impulse or you know, how often all that kind of stuff?

18:10
Kent Yoshimura
Yeah, I mean our power users are chewing this like five plus times a day, which is pretty crazy. It's like consistent work thing for them. Almost in the same way that they would use, I would assume like a Zen, you know, where it's like a habit that they've developed throughout the day when they need to just microdose on energy. Funny enough, we try to do the messaging of like replace your morning coffee. But breaking habits down like that as a product like ours is not necessarily the most effective, which is interesting. So it's not necessarily replacing energy, it's incrementally adding an energy option to their day that doesn't blast them through the roof.

18:50
Daniel Scharff
And I feel like that's been the case with most successful energy brands coming out the last few years. I don't know how many of them are just stealing share from something else that was out there versus bringing a lot of new habits and new people. Like were talking about Celsius. I really feel like so many of those people are new to the energy category. They were not like ripping monsters before they started drinking Celsius. They were like, you know, just part of this like hustle culture and you know, working hard and talk about this a lot.

19:18
Daniel Scharff
But like, because, I mean, I worked in energy for a long time, like it just seemed really like especially okay, there's hustle culture and yeah, really things like Shark Tank and all of the success of startups that like everyone kind of has something going, they're trying to work harder, do cool stuff. Pandemic hits, everybody's at home all of a sudden and now they have to still work hard and maybe even harder than before because they are not commuting. They just kind of start working earlier, but also take care of their kids and make lunch at home and do all this other stuff that's still also hustle. And now they're not as healthy and they need to work out more and they overall maybe just need more energy.

19:49
Daniel Scharff
But I think overall you would just see people's caffeine intake and I don't know the numbers on this having gone up drastically over last few years. Like still doing that morning coffee again. There's pretty much nothing in the world that could get me to break my morning coffee. But I am open to other stuff later in the day. And now I've added in some supplements that sometimes have energy to try to, you know, get the most out of the workout. And I pay attention to what some of the experts say about it. Kind of permissible levels of things, but also that like from what I read, I'm not a doctor or an expert, but it seemed like overall some people recommend like up to 400 milligrams per day of caffeine. Some people say you can go kind of higher than that.

20:28
Daniel Scharff
Probably it's more of a like feeling thing. I don't know.

20:30
Kent Yoshimura
Yeah, I wouldn't go more than 400. And what's crazy is like I say the saying to it all the time. But if you get a venti Starbucks, which is the largest, there might be a larger size now, but the large size Starbucks coffee is 400 milligrams of caffeine. And it's like if you're starting your day off with that, of course you're like burning out your denising glands. You know, you're burning out all those things that are supposed to give you natural energy and you have to keep it going. You know, we're not advocates for that obviously and we always use the term microdosing energy inside our company. But it's like how can we find a balanced approach when you're constantly getting your attention span distract like taken in different directions and providing us better focus.

21:10
Daniel Scharff
So one stick of your gum has 40 milligrams of natural caffeine that comes from green coffee bean extract. So like a normal, like an 8 ounce coffee might have like 80 milligrams. Yeah, 80. So it's like half of a kind of not venti cup of coffee, but half of a. I think they call that a.

21:27
Kent Yoshimura
It's like an espresso.

21:28
Daniel Scharff
Yeah.

21:28
Kent Yoshimura
Okay.

21:29
Daniel Scharff
And so you could chew on that. You know, five a day would be up at 200, which is kind of half that max level that we talk about. Although you know, people have different tolerances of course. But that's an interesting number to think about. It's funny, I just remember like when I was one of my first jobs, I had a friend who said his dad, who's like an epic lawyer, had almost no vices. Like he didn't drink, he didn't do smoke, he didn't do any drugs, but he just Drank the hell out of coffee and he would just drink like just be chugging ventis like all day. And so he ended up in the hospital for some problem, I think. I don't know if it was like a stroke or any, I don't know.

22:03
Daniel Scharff
But when he woke up he was like going into convulsions because of caffeine withdrawal because he was so high on caffeine that they had to go and get him coffee to like normalize him. So anyways, I always just remember that. But the way that caffeine works, you will know better than me. I was just always really bad at, you know, biology and stuff like that. But my general understanding is that like caffeine, what it does is it basically interrupts the re uptake of energy, stuff like in your brain, the way that works. So like it's really like changing something systemically. It's just pretty probably like delaying reuptake, which maybe means you're going to get tired like later. But it can like give you that energy so you don't have that reuptake now. So it'll sustain you for longer.

22:49
Daniel Scharff
But like, I don't know, maybe there's some impact later in the day. Like when it's time to be tired, you might get more tired. Something like that. Is that right? Is that way off?

22:56
Kent Yoshimura
Yeah, I mean there's an often an equal reaction to anything you do, you know, in your body and there's different ways of doing it. So you could obviously take less amounts at specific moments during the day. So there's obviously our awaken sleep cycle throughout the day. And as you're waking up, the worst thing that you could do first thing in the morning is chug a cup of coffee. Because your body's naturally trying to get out of its sleep cycle and go into its awake cycle. So a lot of people from the very beginning of the day are adding immense amounts of stress to their body by like forcing it to wake up. When the body's natural process is to ease its way in. And then you can maybe take your caffeine to prolong the effects of wakefulness.

23:35
Daniel Scharff
Well, this like kind of uncomfortable look I'm giving you is because that's what I do. I wake up. That's how I get myself out of bed. I'm like, oh, I'm gonna go get Starbucks and have breakfast sandwich and the coffee. And also it like really keeps you regular, if you know what I mean, like coffee.

23:50
Kent Yoshimura
It does, it does. And it becomes routine, it becomes habit. I think that's why, like, you know, to the earlier point, it's hard to break people's rituals away from them. But there are better methods around how you could dose caffeine. How effective as like a performance enhancer for you so that you don't get tired, you know, at like 3pm or get that afternoon slump.

24:10
Daniel Scharff
Yeah, I'm. It's definitely part of my ritual. I actually like so much so that I made a health change at the beginning of this year. Cause I was in like horrible shape before. I was like, all right, new year resolution. I'm only drinking coffee black. Cause I was going to Starbucks like twice a day and getting this like oat milk thing that had like some sugar in it too. And probably just doing that. Like if you drink two of those a day, I mean they do. They really add up. So probably that was like 400 calories a day I took out of my diet just by switching to black. But I do love the taste of black coffee. I'm so like.

24:37
Kent Yoshimura
And all the money you save too. It's like Starbucks is pretty expensive. I went like last month and it was like seven for one of those.

24:44
Daniel Scharff
Yeah. I was just in Vegas for supply side and I think it was like $9 for a like our grande cold brew. All right, guys, congratulations. They've got that new CEO. I think he's doing well. Okay. So speaking of supply side, pretty interesting to be there. You know, supply side, which is really heavily focused on supplements in general. And you see a lot of the trends that are happening there. And like, yeah, Neuro is making supplements in a more accessible, approachable format. What do you see going on overall in that supplements and functional department? Any predictions on where things are headed?

25:20
Kent Yoshimura
Yeah, I mean, I just wrote an article on this, funny enough as like a guest writer for a magazine, but I don't think novel ingredients are going to be as popular running into the future. Like people have an understanding of like what works for them and where it fits into their day versus looking for the new miracle pill, like outside of GLP1s obviously, like the new miracle pill that's going to promise them to relieve stress or give them energy or whatever it happens to be. And when you look at like there's protein in everything now, I think that's like, it's almost like a meme at this point. But there are things in creatine as well, which has been around for like 20 plus years. It's like, what are these things that have been effective but we haven't found the full potential of them?

26:02
Kent Yoshimura
Yet including caffeine and L theanine as a combination which we use. And how do we apply that into different moments in our day versus the new miracle supplement that they're going to spend all this money on to force it into your day? You know, I go to supply. I was only there for, like, maybe an hour, this most recent one, but it seems like the entire industry is moving towards that as well. Like, you got the ashwagandha, and KSM is doing their, like, new shilajit or whatever. They're trying to push some new thing. But outside of that, like, everyone I saw was still existing ingredients that, you know, are healthy for you. But how are you reformatting it in a way that applies to your consumer?

26:39
Daniel Scharff
Like magnesium lotion for kids.

26:42
Kent Yoshimura
Yeah, yeah, exactly. Or fish oil, but from kelp, you know, whatever it is.

26:46
Daniel Scharff
Yeah, that's pretty interesting to think about because, I mean. Yeah, I definitely feel like just new. Okay. Creatine. Yeah. Which has been around forever. And it was that kind of stuff that was. Yeah. Like, only the gym bros used it when were in high school and were all kind of afraid of it. And I remember that south park episode where Cartman just starts taking a bunch of it, but I don't think he's working out. And he just keeps going beefcake. It's a great episode. And, like, what is it? But, like, this year, I also started taking creatine and just. I don't know. Honestly, I'm not that good at science, but for me, it feels like it's actually pretty effective. Like, I've gotten a lot stronger because of it. I don't think I could feel cognitive effects of it, which I know are like.

27:24
Daniel Scharff
People are talking about more now.

27:26
Kent Yoshimura
Yeah. But you had to take, like, 20, 25 grams of it, which is an insane amount.

27:31
Daniel Scharff
Yeah, I don't know about that stuff, but, yeah, I mean, I see, like, just people talking about that stuff in new ways. Yeah. Pretty interesting to see how it'll all make its way into, you know, food and beverage versus how much. Kind of like, you see all the.

27:42
Kent Yoshimura
Creatine drinks that supply sidewest this year. I feel like they're everywhere.

27:45
Daniel Scharff
Yeah. Which is. That stuff is pretty interesting to me, too, because creatine, like, you can look at these charts about ingredients, and they're for your keger that are included in, you know, food and beverage kind of stuff and, like, the penetration of it in different categories. Creatine's very underpenetrated compared to other ingredients that I hear about at that Level, like, the stuff that it's in is not that, like, lists creatine as ingredients, has not yet grown, like, crazy. It's not in so much stuff. But it is talked about a lot by influencers that, you know, like, a lot of TikTok hashtags on it, and a lot of people that I know are taking it, but they're taking it in supplement form.

28:20
Daniel Scharff
They're not necessarily like, I know it's coming in cereals and all this other stuff, but also there's kind of this, like, low limit for your daily recommended amount of it. If we're not. Unless we're talking about that, like, cognitive side where it's like, yeah, you can just have this in a clear, tasteless form in the morning and just put it in whatever. Yeah, you don't need to go buy, like, a Gatorade with creatine in it or whatever, because from what I understand, it's not helpful to have, like, more and more creatine every day. You just, like, hit that low amount, and that's what you're good. Unlike protein, where everyone's like, I just need more. I need it in everything. I need it in the air that I breathe now. Like, I need to have as much protein as possible.

28:54
Kent Yoshimura
I wonder if, like, companies are realizing, outside of the creatine gummies, where you have to take, like, an insane amount of them because of the load size that's the limiting factor on gummies. It's like, how much incremental revenue can you really make by adding creatine to your product? And is it worth switching people over to that? Like, the cereal I saw on, like, I forgot where it was. It was like CPG wire or something. But it's like $20 a box. So expensive for what it is. And it's like, I don't know if I'm gonna spend 10, 20 a box if, like, one scoop of creatine for me is, like six cents, you know, for my daily intake.

29:28
Daniel Scharff
Yeah, I don't know, but I really am not an expert on this stuff. But it is interesting, and I will look forward to your upcoming creatine gum launch. Okay, Very interesting. Anyways, obviously that's all just kind of broader supplement stuff, but I mean, just for me in general, I see such heat coming in overall supplements. I just feel like there's so much more awareness, so much more interest from people in adding things into their routine, which, to me does feel like incremental. But I guess we'll see where all of that stuff lands going forward. So, Ken, one thing I wanted to ask you because I know very little about E Commerce.

30:03
Daniel Scharff
Honestly, in that Shark tank pitch from 2020, you were talking about 20 to 30% repeat rates on Amazon and your website, like, people coming back to purchase, which I think is actually very good. Although it sounds like you're like, wait, what about the other people? Almost like in baseball, you know, if you hit like 20, 30% of the time, that's really good. Like, can you just explain for maybe other people who are at my low level of knowledge about this, what does that really mean? What is a good benchmark for something like that?

30:29
Kent Yoshimura
Yeah, you know, I think it's like, while the 20, 30% repeat customer rate is good, the way we look at it is how are we building a brand advocacy as a whole and how are people who take our product, like, how can we calculate back into them from an LTV to CAC ratio model as we continue to scale the business? So this is something that every E. Comm company says, but there's different calculations for it. What is the payback period on the amount you're spending and how much are you willing to invest to make sure that customer until that customer pays themselves back on that initial acquisition?

31:03
Daniel Scharff
Okay, so just to baseline that for everyone, like ltv, lifetime value of a customer cac, which is your customer acquisition cost. Basically, like you want LTV to be as high as possible, which means that when you get a consumer, they are coming back and purchasing you a bunch of times. And it also has to do with how much they actually buy. And then the customer acquisition cost is the cost of your marketing to actually get them to come and make a purchase. So basically, like the math has to work out. Whatever it is, whatever your repeat rate is, whatever your average order value is, and the people coming back and how much they buy and how often they buy and everything, it just has to make sense for you overall as a kind of growth model.

31:35
Kent Yoshimura
Yeah. And but with that being said, you know, like, as the company's matured over the last five years, a lot of our focus has gone into new customer acquisition as a whole beyond just ltv. So while the repeat customer rate is a good metric to go by when it's too high, we know there's something wrong because it means we're not getting enough new customers and the majority of our revenue is being built by just retargeting and retention. I'm sure you've read, like, how brands grow, but the biggest thing that they talk about on the majority of Big brands being able to grow is incrementally building new customer acquisition through different channels by creating availability and creating level positioning that allows them to go to where your product is available.

32:19
Kent Yoshimura
So for us, you know, TikTok was one of those PR was always one of those media appearances. We still do, obviously a lot of Facebook ads and things like that. But these last few years have been focused on how do we maximize availability for consumers that we're targeting so that we could get them at least once and then continue to grow our business that way. And then we could always retarget them as long as our brand equity continues to grow.

32:42
Daniel Scharff
You know, speaking of getting your product to be more available, I wanted to ask you about retail in a second, but just because at the level that you're at, you are one of the D2C Amazon kings that you know, certainly of people that we've had on this podcast achieving the most success in that. Do you have any tips for early stage brands that are hoping to get on that same journey as Neuro? Like, really cool tactical stuff or strategy that you think might be interesting for brands to know about?

33:08
Kent Yoshimura
Yeah, so a lot of people fall into the trap of giving all their money away to Facebook, meta, Amazon. You know, I think there was like some crazy stuff that like 80% of money being raised by VCs just end up back in those three companies. And for us there's always like, how do you have more novel ways of making sure your brand equity stands out wherever you are? So that could be simple as getting PR out into the world and educating consumers in like, specific niche demographics that a product like yours exists all the way to, I guess, pushing for Shark tank, getting partners that are aligned with your vision so you can get that initial pop.

33:47
Kent Yoshimura
And from there, how do you leverage that brand equity you built through someone that already has equity or a credibility source that has equity to continue amplifying your brand. And I don't know if that's like a direct answer on a tactical perspective, but it's something we've been able to leverage. Well, to say, hey, Neuro, as this new product that requires education and a new format is taking over an already existing category of goods that have a similar effect, but doing it in a better way. And now, you know, I'm going to keep quoting books, but in crossing the chasm, right? Like that's how you start crossing the chasm for a lot of these people. Getting them away from different resources, getting them away from different categories and associating them more so with Your brand itself.

34:34
Daniel Scharff
Yeah, I like that advice. I do wonder if everybody would have as much success with it because it seems like that definitely was the right strategy for you. And you hit some things that probably drove tons of awareness with new segments of consumers that wouldn't have found out about you through other mediums. But I think the brand that you've built and the like use cases you're talking about are very interesting to people. So that kind of PR stuff I feel like would be especially helpful. But there also are probably plenty of brands where like, you're not going to get PR hits. What you're doing is not so novel and interesting and you might just waste all the money on PR that you could have used just to acquire customers.

35:13
Kent Yoshimura
No, I totally agree. I think PR could go many different directions. We experienced that before because there's no like attributable revenue directly to a PR hit. Right. But at the end of the day, it's like it goes so many different ways. Because I've also spoken on another podcast about is the main goal at the very beginning, getting exposure as much as possible. And then you focus on bottom of funnel stuff later, which is marketing 101. I know, but it's like is you could be top of mind for the majority of customers in whatever way it is by. For us, it was like we dominated on TikTok and that was our big top of funnel push over these last few years.

35:50
Kent Yoshimura
Prior to that, it was media and the PR stuff were just talking about, how are you then breaking down all the attributes of your product and positioning and the messaging and retargeting them in the right way so that you at least hit them on what they want, when they want it. And that takes somewhat of a science. And for Facebook and a lot of these platforms, it's all algorithmically done for you, but there are ways to be able to target people at very specific moments. As long as your positioning is on target, is hitting them at that exact moment.

36:23
Daniel Scharff
Yeah, it's always a bit of a dilemma. I think the thing that I hate seeing is like, I feel like you, for new founders, you come up with this product and you're like, I need to get prior. Because everyone in the world, of course, is going to want to write about this and when they do, everyone's going to want to buy it because this idea is so incredible. And I mean, honestly, most of the time we're like, all right, calm down.

36:41
Kent Yoshimura
Like this. You're number like 38 on a list of 50 on Buzzfeed.

36:44
Daniel Scharff
Yeah.

36:45
Kent Yoshimura
Yeah.

36:46
Daniel Scharff
And like, even if that happens, I feel like your product is well suited to that. People are going to find it intriguing and then they're probably going to want to try it. I don't think that's true about every product. I hope that people are honest with themselves or can try to because the PR person, like, maybe they will be, but maybe they're just like, okay, great, pay my retainer, I'll get some hits. And like, they don't really know if it's gonna sell through or what the impact is gonna be for the business. And then, you know, you can also get plenty of awareness. But if it doesn't lead to sales, you may have a tough time raising money when you run out of that. Those funds. So anyways, good for everyone to keep that stuff in mind.

37:20
Daniel Scharff
But obviously it worked extremely well for you guys.

37:24
Kent Yoshimura
You know, on a more boring front, like the way we operate our business from just annual operating plan like system is what are the temple moments that we could hit on a monthly basis or a quarterly basis, which, like, if you're an Amazon business, Prime day is a pretty big day for you. So what are the plans that you're doing to activate around very specific moments throughout the year where you know you're going to get amplified exposure and spend and people are in that shopping moment that you're really tapping into that mindset. So I do think just like a pure business perspective, it's like, how are you planning against big activations throughout the year and really building your firepower for those times versus what?

38:03
Kent Yoshimura
I see a lot of like, and I did this myself, you know, everything feels important at the very beginning and you feel like you need to do everything to get the exposure, to get all these audiences. But there are moments when people will buy and that is your opportunity to really start building at least one cohort that could expand into so much more. Whatever activations that you do.

38:24
Daniel Scharff
I mean, you guys are getting to be a big brand, so it makes sense that you're thinking about it that way. I feel like that is how the pros do it. Like, I worked at Mars Chocolate that M and M's, and they would have, you know, you'd have your kind of yearly calendar left to right, and then the big occasions, like back to school, like Halloween, all that stuff, and then the big campaigns that were going to hit around them that needed to be reflected in everything that you're doing. You need to have the big commercial going on tv, you need to have your promotions lined up you need to have your in store displays that are going to hit around that time, but really like specific campaigns. I feel like you see really the really sophisticated marketers do it that way.

39:00
Daniel Scharff
Obviously hard to do that as a small brand where you're just really even trying to like get a promotion to actually happen and be planned, but you're.

39:07
Kent Yoshimura
Like the only person doing it.

39:09
Daniel Scharff
That's very good that you guys are thinking about it that way. That sounds really smart to build up those moments for you. So now I know like still you guys just so much of your revenue and growth comes from online and TikTok and all that stuff. But I know you're also making big strides in retail. What has that been like for you? What are the learnings for you on that end? What are your goals? How do you think about it, man?

39:32
Kent Yoshimura
Like so you probably see with our packaging, I'm going to criticize ourselves right now, but we're going through like a big branding exercise that is launching pretty soon. But our colors on our box are associated with our flavor. So this, you can imagine the scalability of that once you start expanding into more and more functions becomes impossible. Like it's going to get so convoluted. So something you don't have to necessarily worry about when you have like an entire educational funnel and a flow on D2C. But when you're going into retail, the consumer needs to understand exactly what they're getting the second they see your product on the shelf.

40:08
Kent Yoshimura
And having to re approach the way we're activating on shelf, especially when we're not a household name yet, although we're getting there is a pretty critical piece of how we had to rethink everything from a marketing perspective, a brand perspective, messaging perspective.

40:25
Daniel Scharff
That is interesting. You know, people who know a lot more about marketing than I do, which is most people, I'm not a big marketing expert, said to me at times like, yeah, it's hard for you to own a lot of colors as a brand. That can be really difficult to even own more than like three colors for people to associate all those with your brand. But then you also see now some brands doing that though if you look at Poppy for example, that really has a lot more colors and that is kind of what defines them. And I mean I agree with you about the colors and matching and stuff. And I mean even like orbit gum, right? You have the like pink one, you know, kind of more like bubble gum ish flavor and then like the green one, the mint.

41:02
Daniel Scharff
But I can see what you're talking about because you guys do have multiple products, product lines. You have the gum, the mint, and you have different package sizes and formats and you have the pouch and you have the stick packs.

41:14
Kent Yoshimura
Like, I think with poppy it's a little bit easier because they could lean on their brand marks a little bit and they have such strong brand blocks that they could own even with all those colors that you know that it's flavor oriented because it's not like one drink is for energy and focus and one drink is for probiotics or whatever it happens to be. I mean, they do like poppy. I know Chris hall and Steven Ellsworth super well, but they're like a masterclass. And how do we own that shelf by dominating with the loudest colors possible versus someone like us would be. How do we get our neuro blue as a brand block to stand out altogether in like a school of fish mentality way?

41:54
Daniel Scharff
Yeah, again, it's not like they don't have different things that they have to communicate aside from the flavor. And you do, because you've got your calm and clarity neurominths, you've got your sleep and recharge mints, and then you have energy and focus mint. So it's not just about the flavor, it's also about the functionality that's different. And you really have to like kind of read the label to understand all those. So I know that is a challenge and also can be like when you're demoing product and you're trying to hit people with the like 2 second line about what it is. Like, you're like, no, I need like a second to explain all these different things to you. So I know how that goes. Okay.

42:31
Daniel Scharff
So speaking of that retail, cause, yeah, I worked at Mars and you know, Mars Wrigley, they have all the gum space also. But like checkout, I was always really interested in just how competitive and expensive checkout is. This is something that probably is not so familiar for brands that aren't in checkout, but like that in checkout, when you negotiate your annual plan with a retailer, there might be a percentage of spend that you just have to give them for checkout space because you know they can sell that to a lot of people who are very interested in the high turns you can get from that part of the store. So what's it been like going and negotiating for that space? And also the big boys, the big CPG legacy companies don't love people coming on their turf and taking share away.

43:16
Daniel Scharff
You know, a lot of like Very aggressive salespeople trying to hold onto their bonuses there. What's that whole thing been like, trying to get that space? It's been really competitive how people reacted.

43:25
Kent Yoshimura
Yeah, I mean, we try to negotiate slotting fees into, like, ad fees. So being able to, like, hey, we'll spend this much instead of, like, the slotting fees to make sure we retain our space. But I'm trying to remember what the retailer was, but we got cash flane there, and were doing 11 units per week per store, which is pretty freaking healthy, even at checkout. And we still got kicked out after three months.

43:47
Daniel Scharff
Somebody paid them a lot of money for that space. Might have been a corporate initiative. They might have even had, like, a bonus on kicking you out, like, whoever that sales rep was that managed to buy that space off you.

43:59
Kent Yoshimura
Isn't that crazy? There's definitely some mafia undertones within the checkout space. But, you know, thankfully, with a lot of the other partners that we have, like the convenience stores and things like that, I feel like it's less aggressive because the cash register checkout lane is a lot wider, a lot bigger. But once you get into grocery, I feel like it's just like a vicious space. Which is funny because, like, that's not even where people really shop for gum, like, in general.

44:27
Daniel Scharff
Oh, interesting that you say that. Those are, like, my memories of buying gum are always being, like, with my parents, at least as a kid, because a lot of. I mean, maybe Neurogum isn't obviously as much of a kid product, but at least when I was buying, like, yeah, go with my babysitter or my mom or something at the grocery store and, like, go grab some gum.

44:43
Kent Yoshimura
You know, it is the perfect impulse section. I mean, do you know Julia Adams? She used to work at Mars Wrigley also.

44:49
Daniel Scharff
I don't know. I'm not sure, but they do have, like, 70,000 employees.

44:53
Kent Yoshimura
Yeah, that's fair. She's on the marketing side, but, you know, she's an advisor of ours, and one of the things that she was talking about is, like, the biggest change that Mars Wrigley did that increased their revenues was just making their gunpack bigger. So instead of like a five pack, they made like a 24 pack. And so it's all about, like, how much space. Can you really start taking up that impulse set and then pushing other people out to minimize their presence as much as possible?

45:17
Daniel Scharff
Yeah, that's what they say. If you can't beat em, buy their space, kick them out. Right. But you guys have a lot going in your favor. I also, I remember seeing a clip of Joe Rogan talking about Neurogum, right? Like, this must have been an ad that got served up to me. But it was like him sitting with Neurogun on his table during a podcast and talking about it. He's like, I don't know, I just have this and it gives me much more, like, energy or clarity or something. And I can do my job better. I can do better on my podcasts and stuff. How did that must have been a huge moment for you guys.

45:49
Kent Yoshimura
Yeah, I mean, funny enough, so Shark Tank happened, and then a few weeks later, Joe Rogan happened. So were just seeding a bunch of people product, and, you know, I think we seeded Joe rogan around like 2018 or something. We had no idea he was taking the product. And then out of nowhere, he started talking about it. And since that moment, he's probably mentioned us like 40 something times, just naturally, organically. And that's probably one of the most impactful things that's obviously ever happened to our business.

46:18
Daniel Scharff
That's amazing. Although it kind of makes me wonder how I can chew gum and podcast at the same time, because I feel like that would ever. I don't think anyone wants to hear me smacking around gum while I'm doing the audio here. My microphone, I think it's too good. But he obviously is quite a big audience, so I guess he knows how to make that work.

46:34
Kent Yoshimura
Yeah. It's funny though, because everything reaches a saturation point. And even with like the Joe Ro. I think he mentioned this last weekend, you know, and we didn't see a, like a pop or anything.

46:43
Daniel Scharff
Okay, well, what about, like, I know you work with a lot of other people out there in that community, and athletes and DJs, creators, all that. What's your strategy around all that?

46:52
Kent Yoshimura
So we have our brain pillars, and how do any of these people overlap with our brain pillars while also building an incremental audience against that? So similar to what I was saying earlier, how do you get that core audience and then be able to cross the chasm just a little bit for certain parts of that cohort to that maybe taking other energy products and guiding them into your funnel. So with Steve Aoki, for example, we know the NightLife scene, the DJ scene is a bunch of people that, you know, want to stay up all night. So how do we position ourselves with him on a performance basis? But as people start taking it, they transfer it into their lifestyle habits. With Yuki Tsunoda, from a credibility standpoint, there's only 20 F1 drivers in the world.

47:33
Kent Yoshimura
And that's like, one of the most intensive sports for focus. So how do we gather that audience, apply really, that positioning that he has to over give and then, you know, drive incremental revenue growth?

47:46
Daniel Scharff
It's funny because at. At supply side, I was visiting a booth of another company that does cognitive claims on stuff, and they had an F1 simulator and, like, a data point, like, based off F1 drivers. Their performance per lap increased by 0.3 seconds or something, which, I mean, would be substantial. Actually, if you're a driver, like, you take any clicks of a scene, you're a me.

48:07
Kent Yoshimura
It doesn't have an mia. Yeah.

48:08
Daniel Scharff
But I guess, yeah, people do associate that with just like, the highest levels of concentration and mental acuity.

48:13
Kent Yoshimura
Exactly. And, like, everything is just credibility game. And how do you leverage that credibility game and to whoever you're messaging to? Like, we don't expect them to be F1 drivers, you know, or we're not expecting to target drivers necessarily. But how do you back things into your brand messaging that you want to promote?

48:28
Daniel Scharff
You know, it's a funny thing. Like, I've thought about caffeine especially, and, like, why people take it and what is the thing that they're, like, hoping to feel more from? And even I used to ask people who were drinking a Red Bull, like, hey, why do you drink that? And they're like, you know, for oomph, like, energy. And then I would ask them, like, okay, what in there do you think gives you the energy? And actually, a lot of them didn't even really know it had caffeine in it. They're just like, I don't know, like, sugar. But, yeah, the reason why people take that sound is pretty interesting. And then also, like, how do you really verbalize the thing that they're trying to get to? And I feel like it's just this, like, mental clarity.

49:06
Daniel Scharff
Like, they want to be more like themselves and less groggy and just more capable of, like, how they usually are, you know, and just not feel bad at all. What do you think?

49:17
Kent Yoshimura
So what's funny is, like, we used to put 40 milligrams of caffeine more forward on our packaging. Especially, like, if you go to, like, a Casey's, we're like, people are definitely gonna be more conscious about the caffeine amount that's in our products. And it was just a hypothesis that we wanted to test. We realized that no one knows exactly how much caffeine that they're taking across any of the products they take, but they know exactly how it makes them feel. So exactly to your point, it's like, as long as we could be energy and focus forward and we have everything else backing that.

49:48
Kent Yoshimura
Like, whether it's like, the media activations similar to what Red Bull does, or the claims that we have from, like, the scientific studies that usually pushes 80% of people towards trying our product more so than, hey, this is, you know, it's a better deal than taking Jet Alert or nodos.

50:05
Daniel Scharff
It's so interesting. And by the way, there are some products out there that have a lot of caffeine in them that you really don't know about. Like, you know, those buy the AI infused drinks. Okay, so nobody sued me for this. I don't think on the front it says anything. I don't believe it says on the front anything about caffeine. It just says, like, super antioxidant infusion or something like that. Guess how much caffeine is in one of those bottles. What?

50:30
Kent Yoshimura
That has caffeine?

50:31
Daniel Scharff
Just guess.

50:32
Kent Yoshimura
Like 120 milligrams.

50:33
Daniel Scharff
Okay, it's 80, which. That's a full cup of coffee. But, like, that's a lot. My sister would buy those for her kids. I was like, what? Did you look at the back?

50:41
Kent Yoshimura
Well, do you remember the whole, like, a Panera bread lemonade scandal? Like, that was crazy.

50:47
Daniel Scharff
It's wild. It's a wild world out there. And it's like, oh, I feel, like, really good from this and this infusion. Like, there's. Yeah, that's caffeine. There's a lot.

50:55
Kent Yoshimura
Yeah, it's caffeine.

50:56
Daniel Scharff
It's a cup of coffee.

50:57
Kent Yoshimura
Yeah. Or even, like, Excedrin. You know, Excedrin has, like, 20 milligrams of caffeine per pill. Like, that's what's helping your migraine go away most of the time.

51:06
Daniel Scharff
Even just knowing that makes me feel like it'll work better. All right. Yes. Let's get some of that. Let's do it. Get this headache gone. Okay, so just as we're wrapping up here, Kent, I'm very excited for you in this journey. I think just because, like, you guys just seem like such good guys. Everyone go watch the Shark Tank and just see, like, how lovely Kent and Ryan are as people. Like, you just seem like some of the nicest people, honestly, in this industry, which, you know. So I don't know if you'll.

51:32
Daniel Scharff
I feel like you're going to answer this question just really humbly, but I just want to know what does it Feel like when you were that person pitching on Shark Tank, or even just in the early days before it was going that well to now, at the point where you're running a hundred million brand, what does that really feel like when you stop and think about it?

51:49
Kent Yoshimura
I mean, the hardest part is to stop and think about it, like, because it's funny, because a lot of the conversations I have with early team members are always around. It's like the culture has remained, but everyone feels like we've gotten, like, more professional now. Like, that's the word. They're like, wow, we're so professional now with everything that we do. And as I look back on Ryan and I's journey through all this, having an understanding for us that we don't know everything, you know, as startup founders and there's people that are way more experienced than us and kind of honest about that, I think has helped us more than anything. And not really taking that fake it till you make it route that a lot of people tell you to do. So I don't know. There's still so many things I don't know.

52:36
Kent Yoshimura
And I lean on so many of my teammates for that, have way more experience than me. And awesome. To not only, like, feel myself and the team leveling up, but really seeing, I guess, the company as a whole, like, adjusting to each other and leveling up in different ways. It's surreal. A lot of luck, obviously, as well.

52:55
Daniel Scharff
I like that answer a lot. It's a beautiful answer. And it wouldn't be the same for everybody. I think there are some people who should fake it till they make it. Like, if that might work for them. I feel like that very open, thoughtful, honest model works because that's who you are, and that, like, works really well for you. I just think it also ties back into this, like, really understand yourself and your strengths and how you, like, can leverage those. And that may be, like, I don't know, I'm like, a big energy, positive, hype kind of guy, and that's like, a thing that I really try to lean into and I feel like has really, like, helped me to grow the things that I've been trying to grow.

53:28
Daniel Scharff
Everyone has, like, their style and their strategy, and I feel like a lot of life is learning how to really lean into that and, you know, use it in a really authentic way. All right, I'm going to close us out here, Kent, but I really want to thank you for coming on the podcast. I have really enjoyed this discussion and learned a lot. And do you mind just as we close out here. What's a great way for everybody to support Neuro and follow along with you guys and your journey?

53:53
Kent Yoshimura
Yeah. Find us on Instagram and TikTok at Neurogum. N E U R O G U M and you see us in stores. Make sure you buy us so we can get our velocities up.

54:04
Daniel Scharff
That's right. All right, get them. Find them in that checkout space. It cost them some money, so make sure. Get in there. All right, cool. Thank you so much, Kent. I look forward to having you back in the future and we can hear more about this retail journey that you guys are now on as well. All right, thanks a lot. I hope everyone enjoyed.

54:22
Kent Yoshimura
Bye, everyone.

54:24
Daniel Scharff
All right, everybody. Thank you so much for listening to our podcast. If you loved it, I would so appreciate it if you could leave us a review. You could do it right now. If you're an Apple podcast, you can scroll to the bottom of our Startup CPG podcast page and click on write a review. Leave your company name in there. I will try to read it out. If you're in Spotify, you can click on about and then the star rating icon. If you are a service provider that would like to appear on the Startup CPG podcast, you can email [e-mail] lastly, if you found yourself grooving along to the music, it is my band, you can visit our website and listen to more. More. It is superfantastics. Com. Thank you everybody. See you next time.