Emerging Brands Podcast

The episode contains a handful of genuinely useful insights - particularly the food-service-first go-to-market logic, the COVID pivot to meal kits, and the discovery that sustainability messaging underperforms versus nutrient-density messaging with consumers. However, a large portion of the runtime is occupied by origin-story narrative, host enthusiasm, and vague inspirational statements that dilute the density significantly.

“we realized that what regenerative organic agriculture does is it creates food that is more nutrient dense. So we just finished a nutrient density study where food is 35% more nutrient dense than USDA benchmarks”

“we launched in January 2020 and we had three incredible clients. We had Sweet Green that signed up, we had Little Beat and we had be Good up in Boston. And um, Covid hit in March20. We had all this incredible inventory in the US but nowhere to be placed.”

The insight that regenerative organic brands should lead with 'what's in it for me' nutrient density over sustainability virtue-signaling is genuinely non-obvious and stems from real market feedback. The Gen Z-educating-parents dynamic is a mildly fresh angle, but the broader narrative follows a predictable founder-origin-story arc with no contrarian or first-principles arguments.

“we were leading a lot with the sustainability story because that is the heart of simply...But we realized that what regenerative organic agriculture does is it creates food that is more nutrient dense”

“the gen zers are being educating, um, their parents at home. Their parents are now taking more time and they usually have more time than the millennials to read more labels”

Sorella Harada is a genuine practitioner - she sourced ingredients at scale for Cava before co-founding SIMPLi, built 20 regenerative organic supply chains, and has navigated food service, retail, and D2C over six years. She is a real operator, not a thought-leader, though the company is still emerging and her domain is relatively niche.

“at that time I was working for Cava, which is a Mediterranean fast casual and the, the food and beverage team”

“we have 20 regenerative organic certified unique product supply chains in the market and that makes up 33 SKUs. We are the um, the company that has the biggest SKUs that are regenerative organic certified in the market”

The guest names specific launch clients, specific retail partners across channels, and cites a concrete nutrient-density figure (35% above USDA benchmarks) along with SKU and supply chain counts. These are meaningful data points, but there are no revenue figures, growth rates, velocity data, or study methodology details - so the specificity is real but thin.

“we just finished a nutrient density study where food is 35% more nutrient dense than USDA benchmarks. And that's because of how it's grown. It has more fiber, protein, it has, is a rich source of the essential eight minerals”

“We work with HB in Texas, Wegmans here in the Northeast. Um, we also sell on Amazon, which simply is doing really, really well, and Publix also.”

The host largely cheers the guest along rather than probing, asking no follow-up on the nutrient density study methodology, no questions about unit economics, retail velocity, or margin structure, and offering unsolicited compliments throughout. Questions are open and soft ('What were some of the things that you had to shift?') with no productive disagreement or challenge to any claim.

“Again, I'm obsessed. I really have enjoyed every moment of this conversation and I appreciate you sharing so transparently”

“I love how you are keeping the integrity of your products and standards again as you grow in scale.”