#408 Brett & Harry: Building Noble Origins from the Ground Up

407- B/H
===

[00:00:00] We're back in studio. This is our first, I think it's our first episode since we moved out. Right. We're no longer roommates. We're just big life update. Yeah. Life update. Brett's getting married in a week or two weeks and Yep. We don't have that much going on right now. Yeah. Yeah. No, nothing. Nothing going on.

Life is super casual. Yeah. And then you're getting married a month and a half after. Yeah. Right. A month and a half. Yeah. August 16th. Yeah. We're, we're locked in. It's gonna be a hell of a summer. We're just. We're going for it. We're going big buddy. It's gonna be great. And yeah, I think like the, it's such a cool season of life, kind of seeing the fruit from the last three years.

Mm-hmm. All kind of just coming together. And a lot of the things that you and I have been going through just like this brotherhood, this fraternal bond of just like kind of going all in together on this journey. It's like stuff's starting to pay off. We're starting to see, yeah. You know, just like the right people show up systems and things starting to get put in place.

Yes. Yeah. So this like crazy [00:01:00] kind of journey that we've been on is, is uh, finally feels like we're kind of in a place where things are really like set to take off, which is amazing. Definitely, man, I think this will be a really cool time capsule episode two, just being number one, just being so close. To my wedding.

You know, we just moved out, like you said, end of an era was unbelievable. Couple years, like the biggest point of growing, I think in both of our lives by far. Gimme your take on the last three years. The last three years. Oh my gosh, if I could sum it up. It's just like the power, I would say it was just the power of, of going all in.

And I think we will dig into this more because we wanted this to be an episode focused a little bit more on just our journey building Noble, the last two years. Yeah. 'cause even though it's early June, we just hit the two year anniversary of founding the company, the product launch in April of 2023. And when I think about day one of me moving to Austin and joining you to really grow this thing out versus now.

Like, you know, spiritually, um, in regards to business, the things that we've learned. [00:02:00] It really, it really hit me hard when we were actually at your, um, like that engagement party that you and your fiance Joe Lee did. And just like all the people that you've impacted that mean a lot to you. A lot of our really close friends in the Austin community were there too.

I felt like that was a really good example of like just. Uh, just, uh, just some of the incredible seeds that you've sown too. Um, and I feel like that's how the show is evolving. It's like how are we sowing seeds in business, um, in regards to our relationship with the Lord as friends, um, as greater members of the community and of, of your country.

It's been a, it's been a really fun and challenging and blessed journey. Yeah. We'll get into it more too, 'cause I wanna talk about some of the like, personal, personal. Things that we've learned mm-hmm. Along the way. And then also like some setbacks too. But I feel like, um, yeah, there's a lot to chew on, a lot for us to talk about, but as you said, you know, this is, this is the No Noble episode.

Us talking about building Noble the last two years, I feel like we haven't really done a full kimono behind the kimono update of like what's going on [00:03:00] with Noble, what we're excited about. Um, and so I think it'd just be really fun to just dive in and kind of just. Talk about what's new, how we're thinking about building the brand, um, what the brand stands for.

Mm. And just talk about some of the details behind building a brand. As you know, two friends who quit their corporate jobs to come down to Austin to run an Ironman together. And then they started, we started running online. Mm-hmm. We started a podcast. We start Noble and then boom. Like, we're just in the world of entrepreneurship.

So, you know, time flies. It's been three years since we started this. Mm-hmm. Entire journey. Um, but I think it would be helpful, you know, the person listening to this, you know, whether you're. Um, an entrepreneur, a person of faith, somebody who's sitting in their corporate job, you know, has that itch to just go all in and do something cool.

Um, somebody who's in the trenches right now feeling like they need a little spark of hope, like hopefully this conversation is transparent and just kind of like gives people a little perspective on [00:04:00] what it takes to build a business. Definitely. Yeah. I think it's a, I think it's a cool perspective to share too, too, because like in a full transparency, we've said this a lot on the show.

Like we're, we're not out of the woods yet, but what I will say is we've confidently, you know, the brand right now as it stands today. It's like definitely in the best spot that it's ever been. Systems are humming, customers are growing. We're doing around a hundred KA month. I. Organically. We don't have a dollar being spent currently on paid acquisition channels right now.

And I think to your point, there is a lot of value because we get hit up all the time. Either friends or dms, just people that it's 2025, there's more opportunity than ever before. They want to get in the game. They don't really know where to get started. Like we thought this could be a cool. Behind the scenes curtain of like how we started the brand, the mistakes that we made, the things that we've learned, you know, for you, the listener, what should you be mindful of if you know you have this passion or this vision or this thing that you ultimately think that you could monetize, but maybe you just don't know where to where to get started?

Yeah. Or if you're just like, you know, [00:05:00] customer who like wants to know. Like, they like the brand. Mm-hmm. You like the brand, you're listening to this right now, and you're like, I just wanna know, like, what it's been like getting that product on the shelf and getting people, seeing it, getting people's reactions.

Some struggles. Yeah. So this will be a cool combo. Um, when we started the, the, the brand two years ago, launched in April of 2023. Mm-hmm. What, um, how would you have described our initial vision for Noble? That's a good question. Well, what I would say is that, you know, what helped us a lot was we were both infatuated with the nutritional landscape and just mistakes that we were being, being made, we were seeing being made at like the food system at a macro level.

And so we were just like the curious enthusiast that we're never, we never tried to play the expert. We were just sharing our learnings of just trying all these different iterations with different to forms of nutrition, fasting, you know, relationships that we [00:06:00] had built with local ranchers. And we, our thought process was, well, let's just, we love, we both loved doing this.

Let's write on Twitter and let's start a podcast where we interview experts and let's share those learnings with the world. Um, Twitter was our primary distribution channel for the podcast, which was a huge lever to grow the show. I think that's a, I think that's a big issue with podcasting in general is that like you might have the best episode ever, but a lot of people really struggle to hit those that like thousand download mark because distribution is so important.

So it's like if you're just doing the podcast itself and you don't have that lever behind the scenes to distribute it to the masses. It's really tough to grow, which could probably be a whole other separate episode. But my whole point in saying that is that noble to our, to, you know, we, we were fortunate and blessed that it was a media driven brand.

So we started just creating content because you and I were just dying to create something that was our own, share our learnings. And I think you and I always trusted like. Even though we don't really have a business plan or a monetization path outside of some sponsorships, our [00:07:00] audience should probably inform us of what we should be creating.

And I remember in 2022 into 2023, we were just getting asked all the time, you know, number one, where's a good ranch to buy my meat from? Which is still a question we get asked all the time, which is really interesting. Hopefully that question gets asked less in the future, and I think it will. And then the second was just this continued.

Um, questioning around, you know, Hey, what, what supplements do you guys like, what do you recommend? What protein powders are good? And at that point, I don't think either of us were really taking many supplements at that point. Um, I. And I think the, you know, you, you get a question enough times, you're like, all right, I think there's, there's this model there for us to go after.

Um, we both wanted a brand that was uniquely our own, that was outside of the podcast in the media space. And that was really like the impetus for starting Noble was like, let's create something that our customer base wants that's better than anything else in the marketplace. And let's [00:08:00] just. Accept the fact that we don't know what we don't know, and let's lean on each other's energy and just create something that's amazing that could ultimately nourish our customers.

I, I didn't have much more of a plan beyond it than that. Hmm. Yeah, it's interesting. I thinking back, like we were, I, I think one of the things that we picked up on early, and, and I think this is just. Just kind of like our nutritional philosophy in general. It's like simplicity wins out in the end. Mm-hmm.

And I think we both felt like there was a lot of co like complicated voices, like noise in the health and wellness space in general, specifically with nutrition. Just a lot of noise. A lot of this works that doesn't, don't eat this, don't eat that. And. That there's a lot of like just prescriptive narratives around there, around nutrition that aren't all that helpful for people.

Mm-hmm. So I think our general mission with Noble too is just to like, kind of simplify like what people need. Mm-hmm. Like what do you, what do people actually need when it comes to nutrition? And so I think our like part of the goal is like, can we just get like a simple protein [00:09:00] product out there that also has a great micronutrient profile with some organ meats in there, collagen colostrum.

Um, and like tap into the full nutritional profile of the cow. Yes. Which, you know, we spent the better part of a year just, you know, talking about our benefits with the carnivore diet, animal based diet, experimenting, you know, your mm-hmm. You know, healing through from auto autoimmune conditions like, you know, all the different.

You know, people that we had on the show were talking about ranching benefits of regenerative ag, and then we had all these contrarian doctors on it was like, how can we create a product that maybe isn't reaching these people? Exactly, but it's like, it's a way to kind of bridge between people who are pure in the way that they think about food.

They want simplicity, they want stuff that grows from the ground. They want stuff that comes from a farm that's fresh. Compared to like a person who maybe doesn't have access to that right now and is [00:10:00] eating more of a processed diet. Mm-hmm. Would you say that's fair? I think it's so fair. I, I know for myself, and I think he felt this too, I think I was definitely guilty of maybe being, I don't wanna say overly extremist, but I think a purist to some sense, just because.

I was so sick and then just went in the completely opposite direction. And I remember thinking to myself like, oh, I don't really need supplements. I don't need protein powders. And then I think as I've gotten older, there's like a lot more nuance to it. And I think that's what the Maha movement is seeing now, is that I.

We kind of social media, especially if you go on Twitter, we like shit on the bridge. It's either like all or nothing. Mm-hmm. And I think, I think what we've done with Noble is like just being comfortable owning, being that bridge product where it's like, yes, if you're getting 200 grams of protein a day from grass finished sources through your local farmer.

It's the best possible thing you can do. It's really hard for a lot of people. Um, you know, like we were talking about, our moms, our sisters, they're never gonna, they're never gonna eat organ meats [00:11:00] in raw form. Yeah. But if we can make a shake that's actually tastes like dessert and it's minimal ingredient, it doesn't have all these like fillers and additives and artificial flavoring.

Like why can't something simple that tastes delicious actually exists? And I feel like once we own that mindset, um, that was really big and just gave us a lot of energy and gusto to wanna go after Noble and build noble and put it in the hands of customers. Yeah, and I think it kind of speaks to what you're, what you're saying right now speaks to like our vision now and how it's evolved a bit where I think when we first launched the product, we just felt really good about.

One, starting something, a product, like literally having that bag in our hands for the first time and being able to just communicate our values from not only a nutritional standpoint, but just our beliefs and going after things and like pushing yourself and taking big risks and taking chances like I.

You know, communicating that a bit through the show and through the product, and hopefully more and more as we continue to, you know, push our, our messaging out through the brand. But, you know, I think [00:12:00] right now what, how we're thinking about Noble is like this brand, I think can represent like a nice bridge between people who are thinking about, Hey, I wanna be right about my nutritional intake.

Like. 95% of the time, and I'm willing to have some margin on some things like. You know, there's, there's plenty of people out there who are thriving. Um, just eating an animal-based diet and no processed foods. And I think, you know, protein powders considered a processed food. It has like, you know, our, our product is processed, so you're, you're maybe losing a bit of that nutritional value, but the trade-off is, it's more convenient.

It allows you to tap into some nutrients from the organ complex and other, um, things that we have in there that are harder to get. And I think the, the convenience factor there is huge. So I think for us it's like, how can we get this product in places where people are craving like this shift towards [00:13:00] higher quality nutrient dense foods, but also having some of that.

Simplicity and convenience. Mm-hmm. You know? Yes. The, the balance there. Definitely. Yeah. I think that that balance of simplicity and convenience that you talked about, that actually gave me a lot of internal confidence to wanna start noble with you, because in the beginning I think my brain was a little bit skewed because I had read Zero to One by Peter Thiel a few times in college, and I think it's great for tech and SaaS and there's so many amazing entrepreneurial principles.

But I remember reading that book being like, well, if I'm not gonna disrupt the entire category, I probably shouldn't even start that business. And I remember when we were starting Noble, I was just doing some research on the protein category. You know, $70 billion industry, there's so many competitors. You go to a retail store, it's just line with all these different types of products that I'm like, can we really, can we really fit in this niche?

Like, is it, is it too competitive? Are we just, you know? And then the more research we were doing, the more we were working with our manufacturer. And just [00:14:00] like digging into beef protein isolate, which is kind of like, I think we both think that it's, it's like the miracle of protein powders that no one ever talks about, just 'cause it's expensive, more expensive to make and it's been around for almost 30 years, but it's just so much more expensive than whe 'cause whe a, you know, byproduct of the cheese making process, that there are some incredible brands that are out there, but no one has really like bridged the gap to the masses.

And I think once we started working with a good manufacturer. Trying the Beef Protein us, like leveraging it, putting it into, into our daily routine, and then the opportunity to put in organs and collagen and colostrum and trying those first sample packs that our manufacturers sent us and them tasting delicious.

We were like, all right, we really have something here. But I think that's a big thing for aspiring founders to get in their head is like. I think a lot of, like this old adage around entrepreneurship, you need to throw out and you can carve out like a beautiful piece of your pie, even if the category is really saturated.

Hmm. I love it. [00:15:00] Um, all right. I've got a question here for you. What do you, what do you envision the future of noble looking like and what would making it mean to you? Hmm. That's a great question. I mean, when I tell you this year, like. The work that's been done since January, you and I mean it when we say it, it is a completely different company than January 1st of this year.

And that's really a testament to just pulling in the right people, people and putting together a kick ass team. You know, it, it all started with, uh, with us partnering with Josh White, who's currently the CEO of the business for Noble. He started off as a CMO. Um, helping us, uh, with our marketing agency and now we're, we're fully integrated with him, where we're working on the marketing agency together work, we're working on Noble together.

And, um, just having like a true operator that's so good at systems who like the way that we think about. Sales and marketing and relationships and [00:16:00] content creation. He thinks that same way about operations and systemization. Yeah. Seeing that at scale within a few months has been incredible and my, it's gonna reinforce what I'm about to say, where it's like, it's just allowed us to build up this incredible team of 10 people, people that are younger, that have like connected with us on, on X and social media in the past that reached out to us for entry level jobs.

Like we, we had our first big. Team call last week and you and I were texting behind the scenes just being like, almost like emotionally overwhelmed, just seeing how much everything has grown. So when I think about the future, I just think about sowing seeds with the young talent that we have, just watching them step up into these incredible roles.

You know, affiliates, wholesale account management, um, organic social media, content creation, just watching it give them more responsibility and grow and flourish. And just cultivating, you know, hundreds of people that have that similar mindset because we know we're out there. I think that's a gift that you have is like seeing that spark, recognizing it, finding them the right, the right [00:17:00] hole to fit into within the business and just ideally like watching their lives financially change.

And then from a company level. I think we've really gone from, you know, hey, let's build out this like sexy little protein powder company, grow it to this revenue, sell it within two years. Where now we're both like, dude, why can't we just own the entire beef protein category and just do this thing at scale and just try and transform the lives of hundreds of thousands of people that are out there.

Yeah. I feel like, I think I texted this and I, I love what you said about just the team. I feel like that's been, that's been the biggest shift across the board for us is just as soon as. You start bringing on like that one right person at a time. Like that's when all of, like, everything starts to change.

And we've seen that in different iterations across all the different things that we've done. Whether it's the podcast or, um, it's noble or it's the agency. It's like there's, there's been these iterations of having like. The right person to show up at the right time. Mm-hmm. And make a huge impact. Like, [00:18:00] you know, Nolan and Carlisle have been perfect examples of that.

Chad, and then now Josh, just like the team that we have there has just, you know, they're, I, I feel like it's, we were texting about the types of people that we need, and it's just like. To me, people who are just hungry, willing to like bulldoze a brick wall mm-hmm. In order to get things done and are willing to just plug into different cross-functional things.

Maybe not an expert in one thing, but they're just highly competent at. Wearing multiple hats and just switching context, switching between things like, I think beginning stage founders can all agree that like specialists are great, but at the beginning you need like incredible culture. People who just understand what you're going for, share the same values and are hungry to just kind of do whatever it takes to make it work.

Yes. Um, and I think like, yeah, it's been special to see what the standard that Josh has set across the board. Mm-hmm. Just in terms of like systems operations, it's. Been night and day, and I think you and [00:19:00] I have been able to, uh, we haven't even started to sniff what it, what it's gonna look like when we are fully operating within our strengths.

Yes. And within our full capacity. So I think it's, it's just exciting times. I feel like there's balance, there is balance. Feel like really catapult the brand. Yeah. Yeah. There's, uh, the, it's tough if you're listening to this and you're gonna do something on your own, but, you know, doing this for two years.

And having people, working with people that have not worked out and now working with the team that we're the most confident in. I think that's something Harry and I have learned a lot about each other is like we share some strengths, we have some different weaknesses, but the one common weakness that we have is that we just don't have that operational framework in regards to the way that we think.

And when I think about an operator, I just think about someone that. Is like incredibly system oriented, just know how, knows how to put those puzzle pieces together. And I think a lot of times founders, their energy is more inconsistent. It's very high [00:20:00] or low. And I think I, when I think about an operator, I think about like this consistent energy all day long.

I met this dude who runs Sean Sheik, who runs this huge marketing agency in New York, and he was speaking very complimentary of his COO. And he was saying that he's always just at like the same energy level and just operates and executes every single day. Hmm. And I feel that with Josh really strongly.

And um, I just couldn't encourage you enough, like if you're a product focused founder, which we see a lot, you have so much passion for making it, maybe you're great at selling as quickly as you could just find someone. Maybe they're fractional, maybe they're full-time, that has that complimentary skillset to you that loves inventory and putting systems together.

You're gonna scale your business so much faster because they're gonna be really good at the stuff that you hate that, and because you hate it, you push it off and then these things become bigger issues and they form cracks in your business. And that's something that you and I, I think saw really early on.

Yeah, definitely. Yeah. It's been cool seeing too, just 'cause he also, he pairs a specialist skillset with. [00:21:00] The ability to have deep interpersonal skills that I think is pretty rare. Mm-hmm. And why you and I were so excited that he was excited about what we were doing at Noble. 'cause like he has the ability to deeply resonate and motivate mm-hmm.

And organize and inspire the team to do great work. And also he can wear the hat of just like going deep on like a paid ads, you know, meta account. Definitely. And you're like, all right, this guy's. This guy's just such a good marketer, and it's super impressive and yeah, I, I think anyone who's listening to this and is like either, you know, just starting a business or thinking about starting a business, the, the key is people at the end of the day.

Mm-hmm. And you could, you could probably own a, a product business. Business online. Amazon business online and not have to have many people to interact with. But if you actually wanna build a company that has impact and meaning behind it, you need great people to can [00:22:00] one, like help. Build the brand and their different functions within the brand, but also just build the culture of, you know, all right.

Like people around Austin know you and I like a fair amount of, we know a fair amount of people. Just we've been here for three years. We know a lot of people in the health and wellness space. They know of us through Noble and like having some of the people that we have on our team representing Noble is such a honor.

Mm-hmm. Like thinking about like Angie and, and Nolan and Carlisle walking around Austin. And working for work, working for Noble is such an honor. It really is. Yeah. When you think about, um, if you were to put yourself back in the shoes like two years ago when we first launched the brand, like think about the first month when the product went live or maybe even like pre-launch, are there any like learnings that come to mind for you that you think would be helpful to share?

Yeah, I think, um, I think like. The, in the beginning, it's very easy to think that you're not qualified for certain things [00:23:00] as a founder, like you and I both have like more traditional corporate routes as our background, so I think there was some like unlearning that. Mm-hmm. We, we both had to do go through and I think that there was a a little bit of like, Ooh, I don't necessarily know how to do that.

Like. You know, let me focus on the things that I know how to do and I'm good at. And as a founder with a, a lean team, like you just, you literally can't afford to do that. Mm-hmm. So I think for me it's like kinda just like put the, pull the governor off if you're just getting into startup world entrepreneurship for the first time, and like, really just try to get your hands as dirty as possible.

I feel like there's yeah. Plenty of moments where I can look back and, um, wish I had just gone deeper on like one certain thing. Mm-hmm. Or. Push it a little bit harder in one, in one particular area, but let kind of that more of just, uh, you know, inner dialogue around like, oh, I don't necessarily know how to do that.

Like, streaming away from it. Yeah. Um, I think too, you know, more on like the business standpoint, I [00:24:00] think being slow to raise money is a good thing. Mm-hmm. I think like figuring out that you have product market fit and figuring out that you have a legitimate product that people want in the market is.

Very important. I think we timed it well. We raised a little bit of money early on, but I think we could have waited a little bit longer and seen material growth within the business before we went out and raised. So I think anyone who's out there, it's like try to really establish product, product market fit before going out and raising money.

Definitely. I couldn't agree more with what you just said. Yeah, I think that, I remember we picked a good manufacturer to start with. Because that, that manufacturer came highly recommended. I wish that when we started, I wish that I had personally, both of us spoke to like five to 10 manufacturers just to get familiar and understand the industry and understand pricing.

And I wish we picked like our top three and actually went out and visited them in person. [00:25:00] I remember you talking about that too. I think there's just something about seeing the facility and shaking their hands. And also just like getting more of a comparison around like, does this price make sense or does it not make sense?

I think that would've been big. Yeah, that's like one of the first things I recommend to people that wanna start a physical product is like, Hey, here are the three manufacturers I recommend. I'll throw you into a group chat with them and just get pricing and see what it looks like. And that also starts to make it more real.

Mm. Because I remember a year before we launched Noble. We were ideating on this carnivore coffee creamer that never came to fruition. So the physical product thing was always, was always there in our minds. Yeah. And we were doing some work on it and I remember getting some quotes from manufacturers and I was like, I wish I just picked up the phone and talked to those people.

It obviously all worked out the way that it was supposed to. Yeah. Um. And I think you're spot on where we felt like we needed to raise capital because, because of what we're selling in the minimum require the minimum amount of bags that these manufacturers force you to run. We were like, well, we don't really have that liquidity to support it on our own.[00:26:00]

Um, versus like now there's thing, there's financing options like settle where they'll literally front the bill for you. You pay them off over the course of 120 days and smarter, smaller chunks with a little bit of interest on top. There's just ways to get more creative. And I don't think we re, I don't think we regret what we do at all, but I have a lot of admiration for these, particularly like based Twitter brands that just like start bootstrapping it.

They start really small. Maybe they're even hand making their product or they're doing a minimum PO run with their manufacturer. Then they're just like doing every aspect of it themselves. They're shipping the product, they're making the product, they're answering the customer service tickets, they're building the Shopify website.

I think there's just something about getting your fingerprints on all aspects of the business, like you said, where it allows you to learn so much and then when you want to bring in agencies or make key hires, you really know what's good and what's bad, versus like if you've never done it, it's really easy to get fooled by a lot of like the wolves and sheep's clothing that just wanna charge you.

Six KA month to run your email, [00:27:00] but they don't really know what they're doing. Yeah. And I think for us too, what's important to remind ourselves of is that, like from the beginning we were, we were agreeing, you know, we, we had a third partner who was involved with the backend operations of the business.

Like we were definitely thinking more so like we're gonna be externally facing within the business, more so like relationships, community, things of that nature. Yeah. Um, so I think it's important, even just for you and me, just to remind ourselves of that, like. You know, there's a world where from the beginning we were like, all right, like we're gonna own a hundred percent of the backend ops and we're doing that.

But I think having the show and having some other stuff going on with the agency too, we were like, there's no way we could possibly do this. We'd have to like shut down other stuff to probably stop doing the show if we wanted to focus fully. On Noble. So we, we just, we, we needed to kind of like lay our chips in different areas.

And I think what's cool now is we're kind of seeing, you know, the potential for some of this stuff to start working together more and more as we, you know, [00:28:00] keep moving things forward. Definitely. Which is really cool. Definitely. Yeah. Um, is there anything from the early days that you remember where it was like, this is gonna work?

Do you have any kinda moments that just, 'cause I think like, coming from the corporate background, you're just always kind of like. You're always kinda like, this isn't gonna work. This not, you're not saying that to yourself, but I think there's, there is a little bit of that existent existential fear where you're like, it's working and like things are happening and you have like a legitimate business and it's getting more and more legitimized every day.

And uh, I'm just curious for like the people who might be listening who haven't gone all in. Like, was there that mo that moment for you where I was like, all right, this is gonna, this is gonna work out or seem seemingly looks like it's gonna work out? Yeah. I remember having this weird feeling where I was like, what if no one buys this thing off Shopify?

And why I say that is I would like, I, I remember following like Van Man back in the early days and some of these other brands like Culty Bra and they would post like Shopify screenshots of their monthly revenue. And I was like, this is, this must be [00:29:00] such a cool feeling of having a business that you own and then being able to go into your Shopify account and just see.

The product that you've welded into existence, like customers that are buying this thing literally while you're asleep. And I remember when we lo, the day that we launched it, I'd written a Twitter thread just announcing Noble. And then between that and us pumping it to our friends and family, we did about 14 K in sales the first two days.

And that confidence of like, wow, like we have an organic, there's something here. Yeah. Like we just, we just pumped out 14 k worth of product, however many bags that was, that just gave so much confidence. Like, people want this, they wanna buy it. Um, now what, what could this really look like if we lean in?

Um, that was a, that was a huge catalyst for me. And it also kind of reinforces what you said before. If I was to look at a brand like say a version of Noble Launch in 2025 and they did something similar, maybe a little bit bigger, maybe a little bit smaller, I'd be like, dude, you have organic product market fit right there.

[00:30:00] Like customers wanna buy what you wanna sell without any help. And I see people that just get almost conned into thinking that they need to work with these agencies. And dump all this money into paid ads without any understanding of the p and l and how this ads, even though you're juicing revenue, how this is actually affecting the bottom line and your ability to place more pos and keep the product in stock and on the shelves.

I mean, that was literally what happened to us, where we. We're told that we should work with a media, media buying agency. The revenue was being juiced. It wasn't integrated into the p and l and our profitability. Um, and had we not pulled the reins back on that, we would've been in a really tough spot with cash flow.

And I just think more brands need to ride it organically. And like right now, the last four months we've been all organic and we're having the best months that we've ever had with the business. It's been a really good learning lesson. Well, I think the good thing about the good thing about tough times with the economy, 'cause the economy has been rocky and I feel like just from like a.

The standpoint of just like consumers, consumers aren't spending as much, um, money is less [00:31:00] available from like a investor standpoint. Economies tightening up. I think what the good thing about that is in general is like you really do have to just like be ruthlessly focused on your, on your p and l, on your expenses, how you're spending your money in cash out.

And I think it. At the end it has, there's been a shift in companies and startups where investors used to focus so much on just like the. You know, top line revenue, just what, how big could this company get? And now it seems like investors are more focused on profitability, which I think it's like that ultimately should be the metric in a world that isn't a complete circus.

Mm-hmm. Profitability is a company that is actually able to able to sustain itself. And it's not just pumping Yeah. Dollars into the. Ether of paid ads. Yes. So yeah, we got lost in the sauce of these like crazy high series A raises where the founders from day one are building the company with the intention to sell it within a really short [00:32:00] timeframe.

So they take all this money, they wanna drive top line revenue. There's like zero impetus being put on to like. Like p and l bandwidth and managing burn and profitability. And it's like, it's almost like we've gotten so lost in the sauce that it's like, don't you think that if you were a PE or an acquiring company, wouldn't you wanna buy a business that's so bulletproof they don't even need to sell because it's cranking.

And that probably gives you a lot more leverage as a founder too, dude. Totally. All right. What, um, what skills, habits or beliefs more on a personal level do you feel like you've evolved into and, and really developed since we've started Noble? Hmm. I probably spent four hours talking this question along.

Dude, this is, uh, there's literally, along with everything, I think all the above. Oh my gosh. I think outside of building your relationship with God, I don't think there's a single other thing that you could do. Like obviously outside of building relationship with God, being a father, being a husband, that will teach you more about yourself than actually starting something from scratch and trying to will it into [00:33:00] existence.

Um, I think the biggest and the most challenging thing has been. Understanding that winning is a very unpolished like messy experience. Like you're like just the amount of mistakes and uncertainty and you become like this professional problem solver and stuff. Big things arise almost every single day in the mood swings of having like the biggest winds of your career.

And then the next day everything feels like it's. Going to zero. It's, it's like the mental and spiritual management of that, that roller coaster. That's been the biggest thing. And I definitely haven't cracked the code, but I think I've gotten better at embracing that and the confidence of like, just the shift of like, I don't wanna just, you know, I don't want us to just build a good company like I want, I wanna play to win.

Yeah. Like that confidence of like how does that, if you're an [00:34:00] operator that's playing to win, how do you show up every single day? Yeah. What are the things that you do? What do you not do? What do you stop doing? What do you cut out, dude, and I think it's remarkable. One of the things that I've learned, just one of the biggest blessings of our life, I think we'll look back and just be like, you know, we want started down this entrepreneurial path and then we're, we like found the Lord in the process, which is incredible.

I think looking at those two things like. The inner growth that I think you and I both have felt has been such a challenging process, but such a rewarding process and I feel like every time I take personally, take a step in the right direction in terms of becoming that highest version of myself, it is like.

Almost one for one. Mm-hmm. A benefit of like what's happening in the business and how I'm showing up day to day. And it kind of sounds dumb to say, 'cause it's like no, no doubt. Like if you're becoming better, like your business is gonna, you know, hopefully grow as well. Mm-hmm. But I feel like just in the early stages, like it's [00:35:00] very evident, you know, like your energy is the brand when it's just like you and a handful of other people.

Mm-hmm. So if you're showing up with more energy and you're able to solve bigger problems and you're able to, you know, show up with the right. Toolkit of interpersonal skills and also problem solving skills, like, I mean, that's like so invaluable. Mm-hmm. I feel like the best thing that, I don't know, I, I feel like the best advice I'd give a, a person in their early twenties is to just like.

Literally pull the rib cord, go all in on an idea, and just like be ready to like, take the bumps and bruises. Mm-hmm. The, I remember us having a conversation once about like us struggling financially, like personally, and we're like, dang, like, we're kind of just like, like I had gone through my savings at that point.

You, you were watching it melt and we're just like, all right, like this is getting real. And I think we were both like hanging our hats on the fact that we had. Seen our character improve in this process, that we were [00:36:00] becoming resilient. We were becoming problem solvers, we were becoming leaders in arenas that we really hadn't been tested in before.

Like, that is like the whole point. Yeah. It's the whole point in doing something like this. Yes. Yeah. It's a, it's a mindset shift because most people that. Would want to transition to this path. They're assumingly working a corporate job, so your workday is like eight to five, eight to six. The infrastructure is built around you, where you're working a singular role so that like all you're doing is worried about that role for those eight hours or whatever the period is.

And then you can just like completely clock out and you get this incredible paycheck every two weeks. And um, you know, it allows you to save and invest in traditional savings vehicles and your 401k and things like that. And you kinda have to throw all that outta the window to will this thing into existence and take a seemingly riskier path where it's like, we're gonna pay for, we're gonna throw everything we own into this thing for this like long term.[00:37:00]

Incredible outcome or liquidity event, but it's, it's incredibly hard and like I wish I did a better job in the beginning when I would go back home and see friends or people that were on the traditional path and buying houses and seemingly further along than me financially. Like I just wish that I did less comparison or put less shame on myself and just like was really proud of the.

The work that we were doing and just accepted the fact that you're fundamentally playing a different game. So you have to make different decisions with your money in the way that you do that. Yeah, yeah. We're, we're riding a, a totally different rollercoaster. Yeah. Yeah. Um, where do you think, just in terms of like where Noble's at right now, where do you think the, is there like one area of the business where you wish that, or are hoping to see like mo more growth, um, where you, where are you looking to see like something big happen within Noble?

I am excited. I, I would say the biggest thing with the brand right now is that [00:38:00] there's not a huge, like top line funnel that's driving a bunch of new customers to the business outside of the pod. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I'm excited to see like, what is that like, just to test and see what that funnel ultimately looks like.

Mm. You know, maybe, maybe it'll be. And like the, the brand is doing great. The monthly revenue is great, but I'm excited to see like, all right, if we're at a hundred k organically. Is it gonna be paid ads where it's like we pour gasoline on that fire where we have this great organic moat and that takes us to 500 k plus a month.

Is it partnering with someone like an Andrew Huberman or a Dr. Gabrielle Lyon and doing their own version of Noble with them and then that's the ticket? Mm-hmm. I'm really excited to figure out what that big funnel of new customers looks like, and I, I, I think we both feel like it's coming within the next 90 days, and so I'm excited to just test that out and do a bunch of outreach and find the one lever that really hits and.

And just ride it and just see what the brand can ultimately become through that. Yeah. I feel like it really [00:39:00] reminds me when we started the podcast where I, I feel like we're in a position of thinking singularly focused around. Mm-hmm. Like our, our singular focus is now being gravitated fully towards like, what's that needle in the haystack event that will allow noble to scale to the moon?

And I think I'm, I, I feel that similar comparison to when we were launching the podcast because. The podcast can grow like infinitely because the internet and the RSS feed just basically sustains itself. It doesn't require a bunch of systems behind the scene. And for us, like I feel like the biggest bottleneck for the growth of Noble so far has just been having the right systems in place, the right people in place, and now we have that.

So it's super exciting to think like, all right, like. There's a needle in the haystack out there that could just make this thing Yes. Go. You know, full inferno. Yeah. Which is awesome. And what will that look like? And like, after having recorded 400 episodes of the pod, like we have so many people, not just like rooting for us from like a friend standpoint, from [00:40:00] people who have been on the show or people who are listening to the show, but also, you know, people who are.

Potentially able to, you know, promote the product and help get it in front of new people. So I think that's also really exciting. Just like the relationships that we have with people who are, you know, able to help support the brand grow is, has been really cool to see. That's a whole other lesson, bro's, like finding your com, your, your product champions and a lot of these friends and family, you know, you're like, do I, should they buy it on their own?

Should I give it to 'em? You know, you kind of feel like you wanna hoard the inventory because every bag that you could sell is, is more dollars to the business. And that's something that we've learned too, is like. You know, whether it was like Vital Proteins or Red Bull, these guys that did it the best, you hear all the time that they were super generous with giving out free products.

So it's like instead of spending money to market on Meta, you're spending the money upfront to give free product to potential champions in the marketplace. And dude, I've had so many friends that have nothing to do with health and wellness that have [00:41:00] gotten like five to 10 of their buddies on it. And it just snowballs.

And like these things that you think are so unscalable, you look back a couple years later and you're like, dude, that's like so many of our subscribers are people that were extensions of our personal network and they worked really hard to champion us because they believe in us. Totally. Yeah. What are your, or Yeah, I, uh, thinking of like just Sun Life in general?

Mm-hmm. Our relationship with Sun Life has been. So wildly cool to watch Evolve, like from launching the Holy Cow smoothie, which for anyone who doesn't know, sun Life Organics is this incredible smoothie shop. They're located, launched outta California. We had their founder CLE Rafti on the podcast a little while back, but launched outta California.

They have a spot here in Austin and for us to launch that holy cow smoothie and today like getting so many of like just people tagging like Noble after getting, you know. The holy cow. And you know, knowing that Noble is fueling so many people who are going to Sun Life mm-hmm. [00:42:00] Is just super cool. And then I think that collaboration has unlocked something for me where I'm like the, these relationships that you build with when you're building a business.

They like, you just don't know where they're gonna end up. You don't know how much jet fuel can actually be for the business. Yeah. And I would say that that relationship with Sun Life has sustained us through periods of like, you know, and, and pushed us where it's like, all right, we have this great relationship.

We need to get like the, the most out of it, and it's amazing distribution for us. So, uh, it's just for me, I think it's really cool to just see people post about it and, you know, I, I like that relationship with Sun Life has been. Incredible. Yeah. It's been so cool just seeing that pop up. It's been one of the biggest, yeah.

I don't even know if we would be around still without Sun Life and just like. The support that they've shown us. And it's also a good example. It's like the Mark Andreessen quote, where, where, when you know what you want, the world has, world has its ways of like opening itself up to you. Mm-hmm. Which I think is really true.

I remember we met, we'd heard a lot about Khalil. We met him at this [00:43:00] event, at this location in town called Arena Hall. He was there for whatever reason, everyone's kind of just given like the classic like corporate intros talking about what they were doing professionally. And I remember him just boldly off the cuff telling his whole addiction story and the Sun Life story and just being like, we need to meet this guy.

Ended up getting his cell phone number, texted him five times to come on the show. Never responded, even though he complains to me all the time about not answering my phone. He's a tough guy to get ahold of. Um, and I remember thinking, I'm like, well, I've been in, we go to Sun Life all the time. They have colostrum, uh, behind the counter.

They put it in their smoothies. Maybe he'd be interested in Noble. There's colo. We put colostrum in our stuff. I have no idea. Sent him the website, called back immediately, um, ends up writing a check. A couple weeks after that. We give him advisory shares on top. We get into Sun Life and the rest is history.

Um, so that's just, it's, it's so hard when you're sitting on the sidelines and thinking about getting into the game. But like I'm telling you that once you just get in the game, like you can literally just [00:44:00] like. Push, push your will into these things and just materialize things outta thin air just based on your beliefs.

And like people will take a chance on a young, hungry, scrappy founder with a great product and like walk around with that intentionality and that energy and that confidence that you've built something great that the world needs to try. Mm. That was a banger, but they've been huge. Dude. Yeah. It's like we, you and I went to the, their Soho location, it was their loca location, number 25, and the line was literally wrapped around the block as a cult.

It's like air one on steroids only. And I'm like, this is like we, we are there preferred protein powder vendor to like where all the, all these amazing people are going. And we just willed that thing outta thin air when we were 28 and had no idea what we were doing. Well I remember. I remember when we were walking, walking through the So Soho house launch, it was crazy.

Very crowded in there. Uh, the line was out. The dude, it was literally like a club. It was like [00:45:00] a club. It was insane. And then Andrew Huberman is there. I did not realize how, I don't mean this in a disparaging way. I did not realize how much of a celebrity that dude is. Yeah. Literally people coming up to him left and right, just like wanting to chat, wanted to take pictures.

He was like, Frank Sinatra. He was, he was like seeing Frank Sinatra walk into a building. Dude. Dude, it was Aura. I've never, I, I hate to sound like this. I'm like, yeah, this is, I'm like, if his aura. 'cause you and I met a lot of people that we've admired and looked up to on social media. Yeah. I don't mean to sound like a dick, but I would say like nine outta 10 of those people don't match up in person.

He was one of the first guys in a while where I'm like, this guy is the man. Yeah. He really is. And then. Yeah, his ability to just like, have conversation with people for four hours straight. Like he just, he probably spoke to a thousand, I don't know, a thousand people maybe. Yeah. And he was just having convos with 'em.

It was pretty incredible. But then we're walking past, you know, we're about to leave and we, we need to get a picture with one of the bags of Noble and I go to grab one of the bags of Noble off the shelf and [00:46:00] this girl goes, that's the best protein powder ever. And I was like. That's cool. That's really cool.

So why do you think that? And like, I kind of just like played dumb for like half a second and was like, oh, no way. Like what do you think about it? And she was like, oh, it's so great. Like tastes great, has all these, has organs in it, has colostrum, has collagen. I was like, oh, no way. Well this is actually mine and Brett's company.

And like, it's so cool to hear you say such nice things about our product. Mm-hmm. And like just that moment and like seeing it in stores and seeing people actually like. Having a relationship with a product that you as a founder don't even realize is necessarily happening is really cool. Yeah, I think that's been a sneaky, big thing that we've never really talked about.

It's like going incognito into Sun Life in some of these other locations that you're into and just like getting a smoothie or whatever and just. Kind of standing around to your product and just watching people come up to and interact with it, not knowing that you're the founder and just seeing like, off the record, not knowing that you're there.

Like what do they actually think about it? What do they think about the package? What are they saying about the ingredients? What are they saying about protein powder in general? It's kind of a [00:47:00] cool, again, unscalable thing to get some really good unsolicited feedback about your brand. Yeah, a hundred percent.

A hundred percent. Um, all right. What is, what's one lesson you've learned? From Building Noble that no book or podcast could have taught you something. You only understand from the lived experience. You wanna start that one Huff. It's a hundred percent people related. It's, I mean, it's the, it's the interpersonal side of things where I think this ties back to kind of how we started everything, which is that when you're starting a business, you need to realize that you're running a marathon, you're running a race that I.

Might have a, it, it, it will have a finish line and there's different finish lines throughout that race that you're gonna have to mentally check off. But for the most part, you need to realize that you're gonna go through some very challenging moments where you start to doubt yourself and you start to, you know.

[00:48:00] You realize that you, you have to go to places that you've never been before. And I think so much of building business just comes down to the interplay between people and how you communicate, how you handle different emotions, how you handle, like developing and investing into people. Mm-hmm. How you, um, yeah, how like, how you're able to support each other through a very challenging period.

'cause there's not just a business being built, there's lives, you know, existing outside of the business. That I think for us. Like there's a level of intensity to the way that we've stacked our deck where we have this podcast together, we have this product together. We were living together for a long time.

There was basically, there was so much stacked into one hand that, I mean, I wouldn't change it for anything, but I feel like we learned how to just be adaptive, evolve into different situations and continue to grow. But also, yeah, just like make tough decisions and run with it. Um. You know, there, there's a million [00:49:00] textbooks that you could read, and I feel like I, I definitely used to fall on the camp of like, just information overload.

Listen to every single podcast. And this is like, you know, I'm sure there's people on the other side of this podcast who listen to a bunch of podcasts, get a lot of information, and that season of life is so great when you're on the other side just trying to like, think through like, what do I wanna do? I don't know.

And wrestling with some of that. But at the end of the day, like you're. You're gonna constantly be just evolving and iterating through real world situations mm-hmm. That give you more information than you ever could read a book or listen to a podcast. Yes. So I think, you know, it kind of goes back to my initial thoughts around just get your hands dirty and get in the game.

Mm-hmm. You gotta, like, just try to do as much as you can, um, when you're first starting out and you don't know what you don't know. Yes. And that's honestly kind of a good thing. Yeah. Yeah. Having a little bit of a. Naivete into the market will actually serve you really well because if people knew how hard it actually is behind the scenes, very few people would start.

But it's [00:50:00] like starting is where that starting allows all the magic to eventually unfold however long down that road it ultimately is for you. Yeah. I would say for me, dude, I haven't spending a lot of time the last month I keep thinking about this Jerry Seinfeld quote. The hard way is always the right way.

Mm. And that that guy is actually a sage dude. He's got a bunch of unbelievable quotes, and it's like the guy that created the most tele, the, the most successful television show of all time, probably has some wisdom to impart. I remember hit hitting this, this season of Nobles like 2023 into 2024. I felt like every week there were just so many difficult decisions and hard conversations that needed to happen.

And like people to say no to, um, hiring, like firing decisions. And in my gut with a lot of those things, I would know very early on that something wasn't sitting right and I would actually know what the right decision was. And then my fear of not wanting to let that person down or the situation blow up would overcome [00:51:00] myself making the right decision and you making the right decision.

And it's one of those things where it's, they're tough conversations and they're tough decisions for a reason. But I wish that I just like ran at those things a little bit harder when I initially felt that. And I still struggle with it now, but, um, I'm getting better at it. And I think that's what's, that's the most important thing.

And again, it's like you can't, you can read about negotiation and tough conversations like you said in a book, but like, you still have to sit down and have it and it's still gonna suck. Yeah. I think negotiations is probably, 'cause everything in business is a negotiation. Yeah. I mean, even you and I like having discussions about just.

Like it's, it doesn't necessarily, I don't think you or I would sit here and be like, it feels like a negotiation. Yeah. But sometimes when we're just talking about decisions to be made, like Yeah. There's, there's things that we're like Yeah. Working through. And I feel like that's one thing that you can't really fake the realness of business decisions.

Like Yeah. It, you're not gonna go to business school and take a negotiations class and be prepared to go mm-hmm. Have like live bullets [00:52:00] thrown at you. That's really only gonna happen by getting out there and just doing it. Yeah. Um. How would you say, like if someone's listening to this and being like, I love what these guys are all about, you know, I won like am a customer and love the product, or I'm listening to this for the first time, love the podcast, and I'm just hearing about Noble, how would you just say like, Hey, if you guys are interested in learning more about Noble, like how can they help us out?

What could they do? What's something that, like someone who's listening to this to the end can do to help noble out? Oh man. I would say and be a part of the journey of noble origins. There's so many things, man, dude, so much. I would say number one, if you are listening to this and you have someone in your life that you know is on the cusp of starting something, or you think maybe there's like a couple nuggets in this podcast, that would be helpful, dude, I would just just copy and paste and send it to them with like a little thoughtful text message.

I think that would be huge. There are so many nudges I've gotten [00:53:00] from certain people or certain bits of content that. Completely changed my life. And I always, that's one way that I try and keep in touch with someone, is if I'm listening or consuming something that makes me think of someone. That's a great, just like, thoughtful way to do that.

So I would say that that's number one. Um, I would say for Noble, in particular, word of mouth helps us so much. So if you have friends that you wanna help get in the game and drink Noble, if you could share our website with them, with, uh. You know, special discount code. That would be awesome. We can link to that code in the show notes.

BRE 25. Bre 25, our, our Instagram account. Um, noble Protein, but also like, you know, the two of us. We, I would say for me, Instagram is where I'm the most active right now. Meet Mafia, Bre, I don't know. Are you more active on Instagram or Twitter? I'm, yeah. I'm definitely more active on Instagram these days.

Yeah. Meet Mafia Harry. Yeah, meet Mafia. Harry just DM us. DM us. Let us know any feedback you have about the product, things that you wish could be better. If you're someone that's looking for the next role too, like our, our team is gonna. [00:54:00] Expand, I think tremendously the next year. Like we're always creating roles for people and you know, just trying to keep a fresh pipeline of amazing talent.

Like if you're someone that's really interested in the health and wellness space and maybe you've never worked at a CPG brand before, like that's the majority of the people that we've ended up hiring, like, like you were saying, if you're that sponge and you have that spark, a lot of this stuff could be learned and taught and we're always on the hunt for that.

But yeah, DM us or if you're, you know, you're starting a brand and you have any questions. You know, what manufacturers should you talk to? Do we know a ton, you know, three PL and shipping services, Shopify developers, website developers, um, bad creators, designers like we've, we have a Rolodex just being in the space for the last couple years, and we'd love to just be able to collaborate and just share any of those resources.

Yeah. If you're a brand founder right now, sitting here going, these guys have recorded 400 episodes of people that I want to get in touch with, like, literally just hit us up. Yeah. We'll, we're so happy to make introductions. Um, all right. So recapping. How people can help us out. Number one, cut. Paste the pod, send it this [00:55:00] podcast episode to somebody who maybe you thought of during this conversation that they might benefit from listening to this combo.

Yeah. Two, get someone in the game with, uh, being a noble customer. Send them the website link. Send them the Brett 25 discount code to get 25% off three. What was the third one? DM us. DM us. Any questions? Any questions, any thoughts that you might have about what we're doing with Noble? We would love to hear from you guys.

Yes. Like there's truly nothing better than interacting with people who are listening to the show. Yes. Because you guys are along for the ride. You guys are truly a part of this journey with us and it's just, it's fun to hear from you guys. It's a, feels like a little bit of a one way street sometimes.

And, um, just interacting with. People who are listening is incredible, so we'd love to hear from you. I love it, man. This is my last podcast as a single man. Any, any parting wisdom outside of, uh, you know, we've talked a lot about business advice, but as a single [00:56:00] man, what are you, what are you thinking right now?

Heading home to New Jersey? That's it. I'm thinking about a lot.

I, uh, you literally buckled in full seatbelt, fastened just, yeah. Life is about to just take off. I have this autistic OCD brain where I can just overly fixate on all the things that I need to do, and the thought that's helped me the most is just imagining. My fiance Dana's face and the way she's gonna look up at the altar, and I've just been, the next two weeks I'm actually going back to New Jersey, which is where I'm getting married.

Just to like physically be there for her and her parents and my parents, but also to like, just get some time to soak it up with her, my family. And I really wanna make a lot of time to just like, literally meditate and feel myself up at the altar and just try and have the the best, most supernatural day of my life.

Dude, it's gonna be special, especially after us, just this last three years, having gotten as close mm-hmm. As we [00:57:00] have together and just seeing you make the biggest step in your life. Like, you know, bringing Dan into your life. You two, two, flesh becoming one, and you guys just, you know, being a, a partnership, a lifelong partnership together and just having her down here is gonna be.

It's so incredible. Definitely, man, you guys are putting the reps, so it's gonna be great as your, as your friend and as your business partner. Just having her down here to support you is gonna be so incredible. Yeah, man, I, I wouldn't be doing any of the things that I'm doing without her, but this will be a cool time capsule to look back and reflect on.

And then your next buddy, I'm right behind you. Let's go. Appreciate you, bro. Right, brother, my guy. Great episode. Love everyone. Talk to you guys soon. Bang.