11: Out Of Stock: On Pushing Through Pain in Business + Sport

This week’s episode dives immediately into the almost-TMI honest, rough water deep end about Picky Bars’ current inventory struggles. Lauren and Jesse talk candidly about the background of Picky’s production and growth cycle, and how a perfect storm of supplier, manufacturer, and brand change decisions conspired into a massive out-of-stock issue. As the company owners and without outside investment, making the call to either “ship and duck” or address the quality issues came with big implications on both personal finances and the integrity of the brand. But just like a bad race, it’s best to be honest about the real-life struggles of entrepreneurship, rather than pretending they didn’t happen, so they lay all the cards on the table, including some news about exciting updates just on the horizon.   Another batch of superb listener questions pivot the conversation to a variety of topics including: Learning to push through pain in racing “Sharenting” Defining and pursuing your own definition of success Creating & maintaining a brand voice “Practice makes perfect” might be cliche (it is, but it’s also true) and better suited for shooting free throws than getting in the hurt locker, but Lauren and Jesse have both developed a knack for embracing rather than running from the inevitable pain that comes with endurance sports. They share their tips on that before transitioning into a discussion about “sharenting” - the sharing of your kid on social media - and how much or little they consider it when posting about Jude and Zadie’s adorable(-ly awkward, sometimes) antics, pursuing your own definition of success in a vague space like sport, art, or music, and finally how they’ve managed to hold on to the core of the brand they started eight years ago while giving Picky Bars employees the reins to let it evolve and grow. Enjoy!