The journey of launching a better-for-you snack in the food and beverage industry is both exciting and full of challenges. Tom Seymour, co-founder of Moka Energy, has taken his years of experience in sustainable packaging solutions and business development to bring an innovative coffee-based energy bar to market.
In a recent episode of Spilled Salt with Maureen Ballatori, Tom shared insights that new entrepreneurs—especially those in the CPG startup strategies space—can learn from. Whether starting a food brand or growing your network in the industry, his advice will help entrepreneurs navigate the challenges of launching a better-for-you snack in today’s market.
From Flipping Candy to Making Energy Bars
Tom’s journey into entrepreneurship began with a willingness to work and a savvy eye for a sale. As a child, he created a candy supply chain for the neighborhood kids that began with odd jobs in his community to fund his enterprise.
These days, he’s a business development specialist at Bison Bag and a mentor and volunteer to other business owners during the day. In his free hours, he co-founded a venture in the CPG space.
His company, Moka Energy, is pioneering the first coffee-based energy bar made with whole coffee beans. Unlike other caffeinated snacks, which often contain artificial flavors or small amounts of coffee, Moka Energy bars use coffee as the main ingredient—delivering a natural energy boost with a luxurious texture similar to chocolate.
Tom’s story highlights essential elements of success: identify a gap in the market and create a product that truly stands out. With more consumers looking for functional, better-for-you snacks, the demand for natural energy sources continues to grow.
The Smart Way to Scale a CPG Startup
Many early-stage food brands make the mistake of trying to get into big retailers too soon. Tom advises against this, emphasizing the importance of going deep before going wide. Instead of trying to get into hundreds of stores immediately, Moka Energy will start with independent retailers and direct-to-consumer (DTC) sales.
This strategy helps brands:
- Build a loyal customer base before expanding
- Ensure strong sales performance before approaching major retailers
- Gather real-world feedback to improve the product
For new food entrepreneurs, this is a vital lesson: a great product isn’t enough—you need a clear distribution strategy to grow successfully.
The Power of Relationships in the Food & Beverage Industry
One of Tom’s biggest strengths is his ability to network and build meaningful relationships–he’s a superconnector. He believes in helping others first, without expecting anything in return. This mindset has led to strong industry connections, making it easier for Moka Energy to secure partnerships and navigate the competitive world of better-for-you snacks.
When launching a food brand, relationships are huge. Tom believes networking isn’t just about making sales—it’s about creating long-term partnerships that will support your growth. Whether it’s finding the right supplier, distributor, or mentor, investing time in relationships can make all the difference.
Advice for Aspiring CPG Entrepreneurs
If you’re thinking about launching a food or beverage product, here are a few key takeaways from Tom’s journey:
- Find a unique angle – Moka Energy stands out by using coffee beans in an entirely new way. What makes your product different?
- Think beyond the product – From sustainable packaging solutions to customer education, success in CPG requires more than just a great recipe.
- Scale strategically – Start with independent retailers and DTC sales before approaching national retailers.
- Build a strong network – The food and beverage industry thrives on relationships. Be helpful, connect with others, and opportunities will come.
- Stay committed – Entrepreneurship is tough, especially in CPG startup strategies, but passion and persistence will get you through.
Tom’s journey in the food and beverage industry demonstrates the power of strategic growth, industry expertise, and meaningful connections. His experience in CPG startup strategies, sustainable packaging solutions, and launching a better-for-you snack offers valuable insights into the realities of building a successful brand.
Through Moka Energy, Tom Seymour’s success combines innovation with a deep understanding of supply chains, consumer needs, and product development. His full conversation on Spilled Salt explores these topics in depth, shedding light on the challenges and opportunities within the industry.
Moka Energy is launching with a limited-edition coffee bean sale to raise funds for its first large production run. You can support their journey by subscribing to their newsletter and purchasing ethically sourced, premium dark roast coffee at eatmoka.com.
Transcript
This transcript has been edited from its original form to support readability.
Maureen Ballatori: I’m Maureen Ballatori and this is Spilled Salt, a podcast on the thrills and spills from the food, beverage and agriculture industry.
Today’s guest is Tom Seymour. Tom is sort of a packaging guy, but really he’s a super-connector in the food, beverage and agriculture industry.
Tom is a business development specialist at Bison Bag, which is a flexible packaging producer in upstate New York, but he’s also the co-founder of the newly minted Moka Energy, a groundbreaking brand transforming coffee beans into edible energy bars.
I’m going to refrain from sharing Tom’s many nonprofit charges because honestly, we would be here all day if I tried to do that. Let’s just say that Tom is a guy who gives “giving back” a whole new meaning.
With Tom’s expertise in packaging and supply chain innovation, he has driven the brand’s mission to deliver sustainable, portable energy solutions that is a better-for-you option, but feels like a decadent treat.
Tom is passionate about sustainability and efficiency and combines in his industry experience and entrepreneurial vision, which you’ll hear from the discussion today started when he was a small child, but he’s combining that industry expertise and entrepreneurial vision to redefine better-for-you snacks. Enjoy the conversation.
Maureen: Hey, Tom, how are you?
Tom Seymour: Hey Maureen, how you doing today?
Maureen: Very good. So glad to have you back again, just for everyone out there. and I did this interview two weeks ago, right before Tom went to Expo West. And I didn’t have my audio configured the right way. So we’re having this conversation a second time.
So in case I reference last time you said that’s what I’m referring to. So thanks again for joining me again today. I appreciate it.
Tom: I always, always will take an opportunity to spend time with you. So I was pleasantly surprised when you said we had to have the conversation again, because I love spending time with you. I love talking with you. So, yes.
Maureen: Awesome. Thanks, Tom. That means a lot. So, always love to start in the beginning. Take us back to what a young Tom Seymour was interested in and kind of the start of the trajectory of your career.
Tom: I’ve been a hustler my whole life. I started at a very young age. So I can remember going over to my neighbor Marion’s house and picking up crab apples for a penny a piece. And then taking those pennies to Wilson Farms, a corner store, because I had a brother, I was allowed to walk.
My sister hated this because we were allowed to go to the corner store at a much younger age because we were two, we were two boys together and she was a single girl, so we would go up there and I would buy candy with my pennies.
And I’d fill up my red wagon and I would go through my neighborhood and like a skippy truck, I’d ring a bell and I would, I would flip the candy to kids, at a markup.
I want to say I was maybe like nine or 10 years old, something like that. And so that’s kinda when people ask me like, where did it all begin? That’s where I track it back to. It’s that drive to be an entrepreneur.
And then, yes, I’ve been working my entire life, was fortunate enough to start working on a farm at 13 years old, and then have never taken a break.
I turned 46 in January, and I’ve never taken a break from work. Yes, I’ve always found different ways. Like I’ve always had a lot of side hustles. You know, I was that kid in college that always had money because I was working at Applebee’s full time and side hustling.
So yes, I’ve just always enjoyed the creativity aspect, but also the rush of finding success and making money.
Maureen: So I think that I’m glad that you mentioned the idea of you’ve never taken a break from work. I haven’t either. I got my first official job, I think when I was 14 or 15, you had to go get your working papers and, you know, jump through all those hoops and you could only work like 3.75 hours a day or something like that.
I remember my first job vividly and that summer, the summer after when I could work more, was like, give it, give it to me. It was never enough. And I have also always worked.
And so I was thinking recently about how much the landscape of employment and people’s careers has changed since COVID.
I know that there’s so many talented people out there that are not working full time, sometimes not by their choice, right? Because the landscape of work has changed so much that sometimes people are let go from roles.
And other times where people are your age and my age, they’re in their late thirties, forties, you know, usually I’m finding that it’s around that age where they’re like, I need a break. And they’re stepping back from full-time work. Now for you, the absolute opposite is true.
Tell everybody a little bit about what you’re doing now.
Tom: So like you, that first job, no working papers. My dad brought me down to the farm at the end of the street and had me bail hay for a summer. $2.15 an hour.
They were the longest, hottest, hardest days I’ve ever worked. And it very much started me with a very respectful thinking of every part of our supply chain and how critical it is.
It doesn’t matter if you’re bailing hay or you’re the executive at the company that’s using the product that’s being grown on the farm, everybody’s job is equally important. Without each individual, the system collapses.
But yes, you’re 100 % right. I’m a bit of an overachiever. I love to work. I often tell people, like if I was a dog in a dog show, I’d be the working dog. Or if another animal reference, like I would be a horse, a horse that pulled like a working horse.
I love to work. get a lot of enjoyment. not just working, in my profession, but working in volunteering at my church, working at the gym. Like I get a lot of satisfaction out of, using my time and talents 110%. Right?
I don’t want to look back with regret ever. I want to know that I gave it everything I had every single day. so it is a little bit of a different mindset. I guess, yes.
So my day job, I’m full-time employed at Bison Bag. I’ve been working in flexible packaging and co-packing, food manufacturing for the past 16 years. And Bison Bag is my home today. I’ve been there coming up on four years.
We make outstanding flexible packaging, pouches, roll stock. I came from the hospitality industry. I spent 16 years in hospitality. I was a head waiter at the Woodcliff for a number of years.
So I really brushed up my HQ and my EQ, while, while spending time, really in a sales role, as head waiter at the Horizons restaurant. And yes, in addition to Bison, I volunteer my time to a lot of different organizations. I’ve lost count at this point. I think it’s like eight organizations and, up until December of last year, I was actively providing leadership to five of those organizations. So yes, very active in giving back and volunteering and helping other people.
I like to tell people that I haven’t gotten to where I’m at on my own. There have been a lot of people that have held the door for me. And so I feel very much responsible to make sure that I’m doing the same for others.
So yes, I spend a lot of time trying to balance that work life. I have a family, I have kids. I have got to say that my wife and kids do sacrifice a ton for me to be able to chase my dream. But when I’m here, I try to be very involved in the moment. But it is an area of my life that I sacrifice to give to others in hopes that it helps somebody out.
Maureen: I think it’s an important observation, especially honestly for a man to recognize the work-life balance. I mean, I can’t tell you how many times I’m out there and people are asking me, how do you travel so much? Don’t you have small kids?
It’s like, yes. And my husband is the primary parent. It works for us. It’s important to recognize the balance required in all of those things. And I think that your awareness of that and also the message that you’re sending to your family, especially to your kids, that giving back is a critical part of life, I think is also a great message.
And so with all of that, you’ve now launched Moka Energy as well. So I’m going to ask you two questions about that to start.
One is to tell everybody what that is.
And second is, tell everyone about, for you, what that conversation looked like with your full-time employer to launch a side hustle publicly, right? Because you need to be able to wear both hats.
Tom: Moka Energy is a better-for-you confectionery product made from coffee beans. It plays in that permissible indulgence space.
We’ve done a lot of work formulating the product to be very functional. So it’s the first whole bean coffee bar in the market that I know of.
Others have used either very small amounts of coffee as a flavoring play, but nobody has made a main ingredient out of the coffee bean and transformed it in a way like we have into a delicious bar.
It has the sensory experience of eating a milk chocolate, but it’s made from coffee beans. So it’s naturally caffeinated, it’s gluten-free and vegan, only 170 calories per bar, five grams of sugar, low glycemic. There’s some prebiotics in there. It’s rich in antioxidants and polyphenols and yes it’s a great three grams of plant-based protein so the product is a bar made from coffee.
Maureen: I want to stay there for one second as the last time we had this conversation, I said, now tell everyone about your chocolate bar and you said coffee bar. But you just said that it has some taste profile, texture similar to a chocolate bar.
So talk about the difference, like what’s in the ingredient deck? You mentioned permissible indulgence in the better-for-you space.
What’s the use case? Like, when are people typically consuming something like this?
Tom: Yes, so I guess to answer the part of correcting people, there’s an educational component that I have out in front of me to help people understand.
Because when you see it, it looks like a Hershey’s bar. And when you put it in your mouth, we’ve designed it to have the sensory experience of a luxurious chocolate bar. Because what we found is that caffeinated foods are growing. Plant-based foods are growing, better-for-you candy is growing.
B, but the delivery systems can be pretty subpar. So there’s a lot of other products on the market that deliver a caffeinated dose in a food product.
When we started working on this, we really got thinking about, how do we deliver it in a way that, when you consume it, you go like, wow, I really would, I would do that again.
Because a lot of the competition it’s like, yes, you have it once and you’re like, man, that wasn’t a great experience.
And so it was all about experience for me, right? That goes back to my head waiter days at the Woodcliff was all about creating experience and food is no different. So it’s creating experience that makes you want to have it, that gives you that enjoyable bit because food has to be enjoyable.
And then on top of it, how do we use science to formulate and make the product as clean and healthy and beneficial to the body as possible? Because I’ve been on a wellness journey for a lot of years. Some people recognize me with a little bit of a rounder face.
I’ve been as much as 170 pounds heavier than where I’m at now. And so the gym and eating healthy and eating clean has been something that I’ve been very, very invested in.
I didn’t want to launch out into the market with a product that goes against those principles. The key difference in being a coffee bar versus a chocolate bar is yes, it has the delivery system of a chocolate bar.
But in order to be considered chocolate, it would have to have cocoa beans or cocoa nibs or chocolate liqueur and in this case it is using the fat matrix is cocoa butter. It’s deodorized natural non-GMO (genetically modified organism) cocoa butter, so cocoa butter and sugar.
Technically, it can be called a white chocolate, but it would be really hard for me to call it a white chocolate because it is as dark of a chocolate color as you can get because coffee is like the second or third highest percentage ingredient.
And so it looks like dark chocolate. So it’d be very strange to call it a white chocolate. So there’s no cocoa or cocoa nibs or chocolate liqueur or anything like that in the formula. It’s coffee beans and cocoa butter. And that’s what gives it it’s like amazing mouthfeel and sensory experience is the blend of those two amazing ingredients.
And by the way, I hate to use the word superfood. So you know, people listening to this, can you remind me later that terminology for me can be a little bit cringy. But coffee and cocoa butter are both amazing ingredients. They have tons of antioxidants and lots of other [benefits] if you go on and research coffee and cocoa butter as ingredients.
There are a ton of beneficial attributes that those ingredients have from a wellness standpoint. I’m not claiming that this bar is going to regrow my hair or make any type of health claim other than the ingredients we’re using are clean and they’re healthy and you don’t have to feel guilty about putting this food in your body.
Maureen: I think it’s all the better too that it’s not heavy in cocoa because talk about supply chain issues, that’s been incredibly challenging for a number of companies right now with cocoa production globally. So anyway, that’s a conversation for another day.
Tom: And at the same time, you get your caffeine fix.
Maureen: Answer for me what your conversation looked like with your colleagues at Bison Bag to say, hey, I’m going to be launching this side hustle. What did that conversation look like?
Tom: Yes, sure. I’ll do that. And then I’ll also go back to the use case because I never gave you the use case, which actually, maybe I’ll answer the use case first.
So use case, anybody that’s looking for kind of a pick me up, it’s 90 milligrams of caffeine per bar. So one cup of coffee is equivalent to one bar. So I consume it to start the day, right? It can be a replacement for coffee when you’re on the go as a convenience.
You might see I have a little prop in the background there of a spilled cup of coffee. You don’t have to worry about spilling Moka. So you can bring it with you anywhere you go.
If you’re doing things that are active, let’s say I’m out canoeing with my son, I love coffee. And if I drink a 32 ounce coffee before I go out canoeing, we’re going to be pulling that canoe over quite a bit.
Maureen: I even think about traveling, too. I love coffee as well. And I typically like to have a cup of coffee, grab a cup of coffee before I get on a plane, but I don’t want to have a hot cup of coffee on the plane, right? As I’m trying to, there’s nowhere to set it down. I’m juggling all my belongings, trying to get them squared away, right? Whereas if I could just pull this out of my bag, then it would be significantly more convenient.
Tom: Yes. And it’s a 12 piece break bar. So you don’t have to consume all 90 milligrams in one shot. We are going to eventually launch out some bites. And we’re also working on chips and wafers for inclusions and enrobing more like a B2B (business to business) play.
But yes, you can break it up into pieces and not consume it all at once. It’s great for on the go. It’s great for kind of a midday pick me up. I like it after dinner when I’m looking for a dessert or sweet treat, something that is not going to crash my diet.
Now, some people are sensitive to caffeine. I can drink a cup of coffee and go to bed.
Maureen: My husband can, too. I’m sensitive. I can’t really, I used to drink it all day, all day long. And now if I have a cup after, if I have any caffeine after like 2 p.m. it, I cannot sleep. But yes, my husband will have an espresso after dinner.
Tom: I see kind of any time a day as really a use case, just depending on what you’re using it for.
But the goal, again, is that it’s an enjoyable treat that doesn’t crash your diet and gives you that energy. And because of the sustenance and the ingredients in the bar, it gives you a nice, long, sustainable energy. It’s not like a jittery kind of crashing, which I do get sometimes from too much coffee.
But to go back to your question about talking through a side hustle with Bison Bag.
So Scott, my boss, is an amazing guy. He’s our age. I feel like when you have someone that is in the same spot in life that you’re in, it’s a lot easier for them to understand who you are and what you’re doing.
And Scott and I just simply went out to lunch and we talked about it. I explained to him that I had an opportunity with a couple of my friends to get involved with a company. That we wanted to launch out and utilize this amazing roadmap and network that I’ve built over the past 30 years to go out and do something on our own.
And as a commission sales rep, it very much falls back to the idea that as long as your numbers are coming in, which is important for both parties, right? The numbers need to come in to justify with Bison that I’m doing my job and I’m getting my work done, which by the way, thankfully, I’ve been blessed that they always come in and I’ve been coming in over, which is awesome.
So as long as numbers come in, Scott’s very flexible and says, Hey, your time is your time. If you can make your numbers, if you can make your numbers in 30 hours and you want to put 20 hours towards Moka like that, that just your numbers need to come in.
And by the way, the numbers need to come in for me too, cause I’m a commission sales rep. I know Moka right now is not paying the bills.
I got a mortgage that I got to cover. And so I need to make sure of that, so I’m working a lot of extra hours. I’m working nights and weekends. You know, I’m working around the clock. I might be working 60, 70 hours a week most weeks, but like I said, I enjoy it.
It’s if you’re passionate about something and you enjoy it, it doesn’t ever, it doesn’t ever feel like work. That includes when I do a Bison Bag. Like I absolutely love being able to get on as a subject matter expert and help people out and fix supply chains and find a solution.
The solution is not always a Bison Bag. It’s not always one of our amazing pouches. Like a lot of times it’s just working through like other issues that people are having a supply chain and then using and applying the network that I’ve built to say, Hey, if you’re having trouble with an ingredient or you’re having trouble with equipment or you need some food safety advice, you can turn to these different people or organizations.
And so, yes, that’s what makes it so enjoyable is it’s like I’m not “selling”. I’m selling a solution that can come in a Bison Bag. And if you’re having challenges, we can help you out as a partner and hopefully there’s some opportunity for packaging.
Maureen: I think that the food and beverage and especially agriculture as well, but all three of those sectors are so focused on helpfulness in a way that you don’t see in other industries.
And so like what you’re referring to with your subject matter expertise and that you mentioned, you know, you’re happy to help somebody and point them in the right direction, even if Bison Bag is not the solution.
I do the same thing at Agency 29, too. Somebody just called me yesterday to consult on their beverage packaging, because they have worked with a number of other agencies and they’re having trouble getting to the final result that they’re looking for.
And it’s funny because we got passed over for the original packaging design for that work, but then he reached back out and said, hey, we’re having some trouble. Would you mind taking a look at this? Of course I would, right?
And so I just think that you mentioned you’re blessed that your numbers come in, it is that, I believe, it is that mindset of helpfulness as like regardless of what’s in it for you that helps that continue to come your way because when you’re helping somebody.
Even if you’re not the solution, now you’ve made a friend at the corrugated company because you sent someone that direction who’s going to think of you as well, right? It all comes back around.
We haven’t specifically said this here today in this discussion, but Tom is a super networker, like a super connector. He knows everyone. And so tell me about why you chose to launch Moka Energy with two other co-founders and what about those partnerships, those two individuals made you want to launch the company with them in particular.
Tom: Yes, sure. So I do want to acknowledge that like our industry, I just came back from Expo and our industry, our community is amazing. And like the layer of also on the founder side, like the founder community is so amazing and rich in talent and people and compassion. And anyways, it is just a really wonderful space to exist in.
Maureen: Totally agree. It’s also hard as hell, especially for CPGs (consumer packaged goods), right? The margins are slim, especially depending on what you’re selling and what you can price it for.
It has to be produced and you have to buy all of the ingredients for it. And I mean, there’s cha-ching, cha-ching, cha-ching at each one of those steps to get the product on the shelf, let alone sell it and sell a lot of it. And so, there’s a lot of failure that happens in the CPG space.
And so I think that there is a huge willingness for people to want to have each other’s backs, to help them avoid pitfalls that they may have learned a lesson the hard way or from their own expertise. So I couldn’t agree more.
Tom: Yes, yes. And to add to that a couple kinda cliche things that I often reference. You do good things and good things will come to you.
And Bison Bag’s motto is, your success is our success. So I often tell people I help because I don’t need more customers. I need more successful customers. So how can I insert myself into your business to make your business more successful so that you need more packaging? Right.
I very much align with that thinking and just, yes, helping and doing good with the right intentions at heart.
I’ll get into the founder thing, the partner thing in a minute here, but it also goes back to talking about the just cause behind Moka Energy.
So, at the end of the day, I want to make everybody involved a lot of money. That’s every founder’s dream and goal.
But if your only goal is to put money in your investors pockets and line your own pockets, you fall short, right? Like I’ve chased money my whole life and the more I get, it doesn’t improve the quality of life, equally.
So, for me, there has to be a just cause behind what we’re doing. And we have a couple of opportunities to live that out.
So one is through sourcing our ingredients ethically, especially the coffee beans and partnering with farmers across the globe to pay way more than market value for the product that they’re selling and really lean into that partnership with farmers and highlight the work that they do because I feel like oftentimes we take for granted, especially in this country. In other countries that I’ve been to, they seem to be a little bit more connected with where their food comes from.
But with the convenience that we have in this country, it seems like we are disconnected with the people that are busting their backs every day to get that food to the manufacturers or into the grocery store.
Maureen: I think that’s especially true in CPG. I think it’s less true, that there is more of a connectedness between consumers and the source of their food when we’re talking about proteins, like center plate proteins, and we’re talking about produce, you know, that sort of stuff where there’s less processing.
I think that there’s more of an awareness of dairy as well. But yes, in terms of CPG, I think that there is less of a concern or awareness of where it came from.
But I do think that that’s been on the uptrend of improving over the last number of years, especially since COVID when people experienced that shelves can be empty because of supply chain issues as a result of something that can happen. So I do think it’s changing in a good direction, but I think you’re right.
Tom: Yes, or you take a look at our friend Mike with the egg farm. It takes a bird flu fruit and prices to rise. Because of that people understand and realize how hard that job is and how much effort goes into getting those eggs to market at a reasonable cost.
So anyways, and even involved in the industry, I take for granted all the time.
But the other piece to the just cause for Moka is working to try to use the success to bless other people. I’m working through the Center for Hope in Rochester, in Greece, New York, to set up a benevolence fund so that people in need have access.
There’s a lot of great charities out there. There’s lots of ways to get access to things that you need. But there’s also a lot of red tape and, you know, running a charity has administrative costs.
So my thinking is like finding a way to be able to take a percentage of the profit and hopefully someday if I’m fortunate enough to see a nice big exit, taking a bulk of that money from my share and giving it over to try to go out and really tangibly touch people’s lives, people in our community immediately that need it.
And so I’m really excited to continue to grow and explore that aspect of the business because there are a lot of people out there that need it for a lot of different reasons.
And I just hope that I can be a light and someone that can help to make their life a little bit better. So that’s the just cause piece.
And I know you asked about the founder piece and you… I’m sorry, I’m sorry.
Maureen: Love it. Yes, you screwed up my transcript, Tom. The questions and the answers are so separated, but no, I love the flow of it and you always bring us back around. So yes, tell me about the founders, the other co-founders.
Tom: Yes, so I jump around a lot. Yes, so thinking through, you’re right, I do, I’m fortunate that I have a lot of people that say very nice things about me being a super connector.
I just had a guy last night in a meeting tell me that I can walk into any room and make friends quickly, which I just assume everybody can, but apparently that’s like, that’s a super power.
Maureen: It is, that is very unique, yes.
Tom: And so because of that, I’ve met a lot of people and become friends with lots of different people. And so then I get that title of super connector. And I’ve been doing this a long time.
I’ve got to say, my dad got me into this industry and he was very much like me. And he knew where to go for everything. And so when I mentored under him, because I got to mentor under him for the first five years of my career, he kind of put that into me.
That’s always been part of my professional life is knowing everybody and who to go to the rolodex for. Having that network was a big reason, obviously that I got started, but then realizing that, again,I’m only where I am because other people and I can’t do this by myself.
And so I had the opportunity to partner with my two other co-founders. They both have their own set of talents. Both have their own networks. They both have superpowers that they bring to the company.
And so it was just a very strategic kind of, hey, let’s put together a really great team of people to be able to make sure that this opportunity, that this company is as successful as possible. Because the reality is, in entrepreneur land, there’s a lot of failure.
Maureen: Again, especially in CPG.
Tom: Yes, yes. So I’m trying to build a safety net, putting all the right people around the project. And I’ve told people that I have an unfair advantage, a little bit of a hack or a cheat sheet or a roadmap because I’ve been doing this so long and I know so many people and I’ve mentored over a thousand brands and I’ve seen the good, the bad and the ugly. And so I can apply all those learnings and I can apply that network to my own business.
Hopefully instead of being, I don’t know what the stats are. Is it two in 10 entrepreneurs who make it? I’m hoping that maybe I raise that percentage to like, maybe it’s a 70 or 80% chance that I make it rather than a 20% chance that I make it.
Maureen: I would argue it’s not a cheat code for you, right? It’s leveraging the experience of your career to the next thing that you’re working on, right? So it’s not cheating.
It’d be cheating if you were stealing. It’s just, leveraging your expertise and what you’ve spent your career doing to help others.
So talk about your scaling plans a little bit. You’ve spoken about an exit. So the plan is to exit down the line, but what will you do in terms of how you will accomplish your first production run? What are you going to do with that first production run? Who’s your first distribution outlet? know, talk about what the steps are a little bit.
Tom: Right now we’re in the process. In April, you’re going to see some hype around Moka Energy selling the same coffee beans that make our amazing bar. We’re going to do a promotional sale of whole premium dark roast, ethically sourced coffee beans.
It’s going to be available through our e-commerce. And our hope is that we’ll get lots of support. The idea is that many people have said they want to come along for the journey. They want to invest. They want to help out, but not everyone has the means to do it.
So my thinking is if people are willing to go and spend $20 on a bag of coffee and multiply that by everyone I know that consumes coffee, that could be a really great opportunity for us to generate some early revenue.
And also bring people along for the journey. You know, when you make that purchase, you’ll put in your email address. You’ll get our mailing list. And when the bars are ready, you’ll be emailed, you’ll get our quarterly newsletter.
So I see it as an opportunity to engage our community. You know, we’re working to try to get the bars launched for a June timeframe. We’re looking at going e-commerce to start.
And then some small regional [businesses], my yoga studio, my wife’s hair salon, hopefully my friends over at Red Bird Market, you know, places like that. I live in Greece, so Dell’s Market, so smaller regional spots.
Maureen: Independent retailers, yep.
Tom: Yes, independent retailers. And then we do have our site set with some pretty big retailers that, you know, through my network and through my years of working in the industry, I have some opportunity to get involved with some of those bigger retailers.
So we are working through like, you know, looking at, you know, shelf resets and category review and trying to figure out when is the right time to get that product in.
We’re hoping to launch out into a couple major retailers, again, focusing on selling deeper and not wider. So I don’t want to be one of those brands that out of the gate, we’re in a thousand stores. Maybe in 10 stores or 13 stores in the Northeast.
And then really drive focus on building that community, building that following, and then drive those people from small and e-commerce. Once it goes into those big retailers and drives them from e-commerce into the big retailers to be able to pick up the product.
Maureen: That is one of the common mistakes that early stage CPGs make that gets them too far ahead of themselves is that they’re not going deep before they go wide. And so I love that you just mentioned that.
And just to explain what that means to anybody who’s not familiar with that concept, it’s when Tom is saying he really wants to drive velocity in those independent retailers that he’s going to start in and make sure that he’s got D2C (direct to consumer) traction where people are buying it regularly from the website and they’re reordering, right?
Where you’ve got that repeat purchase and use that time to monitor to make sure that you’ve got the appropriate velocity and interest in consumer demand to be able to warrant national retailers and more stores because a common misconception is, I got on the shelves of Whole Foods. My job is done.
Whereas no, no, no, that’s where your job just begins. You need to drive the consumer into that retailer to drive the velocity.
And so it’s so complex, so many different aspects of scaling CPG in particular. And so you’re doing it all, no surprise, right? Based on your experience, you’re doing it the right way.
I love that initial launch campaign and that it’s coffee beans to help drive the initial cost of your production run for the coffee bar. And then you’re going to focus on independent retailers before you start thinking about national and then kind of continuing to grow and scale from there.
That’s the way to do it. And so for any early stage CPGs who are listening to this and taking notes, that is the way to do it.
Tom: Yes, and going to give a pro tip here. Remember that having a great product, that’s par for the course, right?
So I always hear brands are focused so much on how great the product is. That’s a given, right? If you don’t have a great product, if you don’t have a great product, you’re not stepping on the court, right?
So the key thing is figuring out, think about your retailers as businesses, what are you going to do? What is your product? What is your brand?
What is Moka Energy going to do for Whole Foods to drive more consumers into their store, spend more money, not just shift the spend from, okay, we’re buying a competitor’s product to Moka Energy’s product, but what are you going to do?
Largely that’s spending the time upfront to grow that following. That discussion is very different with a retailer.
When it’s like, hey, we already have a hundred thousand people on our mailing list that are buying our product and we can direct them into your store. And we understand these are the metrics that we have to be able to drive. This is the velocity. This is the extra dollars that’ll be spent. These are the unique shoppers that we’re going to be bringing into your store.
If you talk to a retailer from that perspective, that is much more likely to close than like, Hey, we have a great product. That’s better-for-you that has all these attributes, it’s like, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.
Instead it flips the script and it’s like, hey, how would you not want us, right? Like we’re going to, this is what we’re going to do for you. Instead of going and asking and putting your hands out and saying, hey, I need some, first you have got to give.
Once you give, you’re then in the posture to receive. And so you give them the business case.
Maureen: And we think you should take a chance on us. It’s no, they don’t want to take a chance.
Tom: How you’re going to help their business do better. And then you receive that purchase order and you receive that shelf space.
Maureen: You’re creating a win-win in that scenario. And it’s not dissimilar to what we’ve been talking about this whole episode with the mindset of collaboration and working together and just doing the right thing, right?
Because the other thing about when you do land on a lined retailer that’s going to bring you in on shelf, you also have to understand that customers who are going to buy directly from the retailer are likely then going to stop buying directly from you.
So you have to in your accounting and your projections on what the future of the company looks like, you have to make sure that you’re accounting literally for all of those various changes across the scaling plan.
So it’s just, it’s all the more reason why having that network is so critical. And again, not a cheat code, but a huge benefit for you and the future success of Moka.
Tom: Yes, thank you. It’s all about investing in partnerships and relationships. It’s no different than your personal life, right?
I always tell people that if you’re not spending time with your wife, if you’re not spending time with your friends, if you’re, you won’t have a wife, you won’t have friends.
And it’s the same thing in business. If you’re not spending time with your partners, your retailers, like everybody across the supply chain, your vendors, if those relationships and partnerships aren’t firm, then you’re not building a foundation for success.
And so, yes, I’m fortunate that I’ve built a lot of that foundation up over the years, and now I’m just kind of leveraging that foundation. But for others that might be earlier on in the journey, that is so important.
Don’t ever minimize the importance of putting in the effort to the relationships and partnerships, because that is what the industry is built on.
Maureen: Totally agree. Well said.
So last question for you, and then I’ll let you go for a second time. Tell us about how we can support you and support Moka. I would highly recommend following Tom on LinkedIn, Tom Seymour, but also just recap for us.
What’s the planned product launch? When is that coffee bean launch happening again so people can keep their eyes peeled?
Tom: Yes, so we’re going to have coffee beans coming available in April. You’ll be able to buy them at eatmoka.com. If you’d like to support us, I know $20 is a lot of money for a bag of beans, but it’s more about supporting us than it is about buying the coffee. It is great coffee and you’ll enjoy it, but certainly we appreciate anybody that goes and joins along for the journey at eatmoka.com.
If you go there, you’ll put in your email address, you’ll get on our newsletter so we can keep in contact with you, get you a quarterly update, as well as give you the information as to when those will launch there on our e-commerce site.
And yes, follow me and follow Moka. I would love it if everybody listening to this went on and followed and liked and shared on LinkedIn or across any social media platform, Moka Energy because that certainly helps us out a ton. So please like and follow and share.
Maureen: Awesome, great. Thanks for the story, Tom. Thanks for taking the time for the discussion. I appreciate it.
Tom: Yes, it was great spending time with you again.
Maureen: Thank you.
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