 All right, welcome to the podcast on today's show. We're talking to Lauren from Snoods. For people who don't know, what is Snoods? What's your company do? Snoods is Chef created globally inspired noodle chips. Noodle chips. Yeah, noodle chips. Very much chip forward, noodle inspired. Each flavor is a different bowl of noodles, different noodle shape and sauce via the seasoning. And just inspired by the bowls of comfort that a lot of people would eat growing up, because there's really like a bowl of noodles in every culture if you think about it. That's true. Yeah, that's facts. Okay, how did you arrive at this product, right? So give me the background of like, what are you doing? How's life going? And then you're like, I think this could be a thing and the market doesn't see it yet. Yeah, I mean, I guess so, some background on myself. I've worked almost every facet of the hospitality industry. I did PR, marketing, worked in restaurants, savory, pastry. I worked for a celebrity chef. Which one, which one? Gail Simmons. Oh, cool, cool. Yeah, it's lovely. So I got to see a lot of, you know, in the kitchen and then also the media side. I worked for a meal kit. Saw the procurement side of that. Worked as a food editor. And then I found myself on a Netflix cooking competition called Snack versus Chef. Yes, for you who haven't seen it, Snacks versus Chefs. Yeah, yeah, yeah. On Netflix. On Netflix. Very bingeable. Yeah, I mean, I was tasked to make an original snack and kind of was just distraught because what snack is not already out there? And honestly for me, when I'm stressed out, I just want to eat a bowl of pasta, bowl of noodles all the time. And so it kind of just clicked. Well, why can't I just make that? That's a healthy stress, yeah, that's good. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You don't go to drugs, you go to pop. I know myself very well, yeah. Okay. Yeah, I mean, it's also, a lot of my background is also an Italian cuisine, but then I also bring in a lot of these Asian flavors a lot of the time. I love ramen too. So I wanted to create this snack that kind of highlighted both a lot of sustainable pieces, like upcycled ingredients, but a lot of these different cultures that I've come to know both cooking but then also as a food editor writing about. So I felt like noodles is like one of the most approachable things. It's very exciting and it's a really accessible way to bring those things into the world. Sure. Did you have the product prior to the show? No. Okay. Give us a window into being on the show and the innovation that you had to go through the rounds of innovation. Give us a window to that. Yeah, so I mean, we were tasked to make shelf-stabled snacks and I'm not a food scientist. At the time, I wouldn't have even categorized myself as a private chef or anything like that. Now I am, but it was very much learning through each episode. We learned to make seasonings from scratch, not just, you know, dehydrating fruit and vegetables, but really like cooking all the flavors down, taking the fats and creating this really developed seasoning. And that's also, I mean, some of the inspiration in this is because flavors have gotten so big and bold since the pandemic. People are traveling through their taste buds. And I mean, I love it because I think that it's expanding people's palates and opening people's minds to, again, different cultures and flavors. So that was also like a big aspect of it. I would say in the finale, the snack that I created is not the snack today, but taking a lot of those components as I learned throughout the show and also, you know, sticking to myself, I think that's one thing that I learned working for Gail. You know, you see everyone on Top Chef doing the most. And in the finale, the other contestant actually made two snacks and the producers asked me if I wanted to make two snacks. And I was like, I've seen this play out. I know. I'm gonna stick to my guys. Stick the way you know. Yeah, that's fascinating. Yeah. And so I made Amatriciana sauce for my snack and it went over really well with the judges. It was something that I didn't know that I, this sounds according, I didn't know that I had in me. Between the ideas, but then also the capability to make this. And then after the show came out, so many people connected with it that, that's kind of like, well, we have to do this. Yeah, it's like they believed in you and it made you believe in you. Yeah. So the show, is it popular? Has it changed your life? You will have a lot of people watch. Obviously Netflix is massive. Yeah. What has changed since you won? Yeah, I mean, everything. I make snacks now. That's not something I ever would have thought that I would be doing. Totally. I very much knew CBG was a monster from working in editorial. I know what founders go through. So taking that leap was something that I never thought I would be able to do. So I mean, the show gave me the confidence that I never had. Honestly, even the producers were like, girl, you have imposter syndrome. Yeah. You know what you're doing. You need to, you know, believe in yourself. I'm sort of picking up on that now. I'm like, she's still, you're almost there, I think, but I can, it's almost like. It's a humility too, though, and a modesty, which is really nice, I think. Thank you. And it probably stems from being in hospitality for so long, where you sort of, you know how hard it is. And so you know the ins and outs. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think, I mean, if I'm being honest, a lot of my career, and I, again, I realized this after the show, is I was told no a lot. Every time I was told no, I was always so surprised because I was just like, why can't I do this? Like when I left restaurants to work for Gail, I had a chef that was like, oh, like what are you gonna do? Become a Food Network star? And was just hating on me for no reason. And the same thing, I'm through like fundraising and even making the snack. So many people were like, ah, no, that's too, that's too out there, that's too different, how are you going to do this? And I think it was all of that, that just kept lighting the fire in me. And if anything, it's just to prove the people wrong, that no, I'm gonna do it despite. Yeah, I'll give you a short story for me. I got into real estate development maybe like five, six years ago. And for a while, I was like, what am I doing here? Like I didn't come from a real estate background, right? I don't know anything about commercial real estate in Los Angeles. I don't know anybody. I don't know the politics involved. And I was like working on, I think my second deal at the time. And every night I go to bed, this like I was in a room with this guy that would just tell me how terrible I was and like basically it was imposter syndrome in real time. It was like, you don't deserve to be here, you're an idiot, who do you think you are, all this stuff. And that probably went on for like three months. And then at some point I was, I would just like shut it off. Like I would just use the ego to kind of go, all right, I'm gonna beat this thing up basically. And then I realized that wasn't working. And then I was like, I'm just gonna talk to it. And so I ended up talking to it. And it was almost like in the conversation, all via in the dream, it was a function of me realizing there's no value to feeling like that and the world doesn't improve and the lives of those around me doesn't improve either. And so it's sort of like selfish to be in that space. And once I realized that, it was amazing. It was like, I made peace with it. But it took me a while, it was kinda a while. I think it's almost, I came to the point where I was like, am I just like feeling sorry for myself or like what is the like the root of this feeling? And I think, yeah, a lot of it was just owning who I am. And I hear this from a lot of people, the brand voice and the brand in general is loud and exciting and fun and nostalgic. And a lot of people are like, it's a lot of your personality, which is, I mean, that's a great compliment. But it also made me be like, well, maybe I am great, like let's just lean into this. Yeah, I think I've just come to own who I am more so through this. That's a founder story in a nutshell, to be honest. It's like you really discover who you are and you continue to do that. Why the name snooze? What does it mean? This is also a really funny story. I had no idea what to call this. And to be honest, it was truly a placeholder initially. I think I was thinking about Sandlot and I love that scene about s'mores and wanting s'more of this, s'more of that. And so I wanted something that was just really playful, again, nostalgic. And it can mean so many different things. Like snooze doesn't just stand for snack noodles. It can stand for send nudes. It can stand for salad nudes. A lot of people like, especially the spicy miso ramen on their salad. So I mean, I think the brand is kind of like, choose your own adventure and it's the same with... Send nudes, that's hilarious snooze, okay. But yeah, it's the same with the name. And it just really stuck. A lot of people really resonated and loved it. How do people consume it? And so give people a window, they buy it. What do they do with it? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So it's very much chip-forward, like I said. Noodle-inspired, they are potato and rice flour-based. I really wanted to lean into potato chips. It's over a quarter of the industry. And I think in the end, it's the flavor profile that a lot of people want when they're snacking. And then the rice flour really helps with that kind of airy texture as well. Like I said, each flavor is a different sauce via the seasoning. So I mean, you just pop the bag open and consume a little bit, consume the whole bag, share with friends, keep it to yourself. However you snack. When it came to the retailers, what were like their biggest questions? Or did they know exactly what it was? Or like where did we put you in the store? What was that process like? I mean, we've had a huge learning curve for both buyers and consumers. A lot of people will think either it's ready to eat noodles or it is freeze-dried noodles or dried noodles that we season. And so I think that has been a huge- So they think it's like dry pasta. Right, right, right. Which actually a lot of people, and the reason is too, and this is great for us, but also difficult because a lot of people grew up eating the dried pasta. And I mean, I've heard people eating the instant ramen on the corner store with the seasoning and just eating it dry. Never really Italian pasta, but you know, I mean, I'm not judging. So I think that was part of it. And so trying to hone in on how do we, not only the packaging itself, but the messaging, how do we better convey what this snack is. And again, the snacking occasions for buyers, they're wondering where do we put it in the store. We kind of an idea of who our competitors are. But again, it's kind of this first to market snack where there's no clear competitor that we can kind of put ourself up against. So I think for doing the research on our end, what is kind of, I mean, the closest in this category and where we're at kind of this more, I think we're prices more of like a luxury good at the moment. And so some of our competitors might not be obvious either. Yeah, how much is it? How much is the bag of this? The MSRP is $6.99. And I will say, so we made some updates, which I'm very excited about. We are moving our chips into a roll stock, which is the chip bag that you'll see lays in or any of your classic chips in. And I think that will really help too with the mindset of just relaying it to the snacks. Originally we put it in this standup pouch because I kind of looked at other brands like you see those pretzel flats. And for them, a huge strategy to separate from the kind of chaos of the chip aisle was putting it in this different bag and also putting it in more so the deli section. Because for me, I think this is really a good high-brow, low-brow snack. So you can eat it watching Netflix or you can kind of class up your truck. Watching your show, maybe. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Binge, binge my show, binge any Netflix show. So wait, where is it in the grocery store? Where do they land? Where do they end up? It's a mix. And so we are really early on retail. So just as much as the buyers are kind of figuring out per like, it's very different in each store too. Obviously your consumers are different with each store. So we're learning and I think also with that, we're learning with the buyers as well. We're very early on in our retail footprint. It's quickly growing, which I'm really excited about. But yeah, just trying to look at the data but then also connect with our consumers. I think this next year is a lot about brand recognition but also being boots on the ground with the consumers and getting more of that feedback. Yeah, when it comes to funding, how did you first go about starting this company funding-wise? Yeah, I mean, so I will say the Netflix show definitely helped because I announced that I was going to do this idea right when the show came out and I did a Kickstarter. That's smart. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Did you do that on purpose? Yes, very much so. So you had enough heads up on the show coming out. It wasn't like tomorrow. Yeah, got it, okay. Yeah, I mean, it would have been ideal if we had the packaged product ready to go when the show came out for sure but nothing is ever easy in this industry. So that's okay. It's very hard as a startup, especially CPG founder. I'm sure you know this, finding funding. I mean, economy is in a rough place but also CPG can be very dicey and so I think a lot of investors want you to be later on the game. They want to see some numbers but they also want to see what is the traction? What is also your plan? And so I'm partially self-funded but also I did a Kickstarter which really helped I think get the awareness out there kind of show these sales numbers, show the sales traction in a different way and still build on that hype as I figured out how to make this which it's, I mean, it's still a growing process for sure. Yeah, how much have you raised on the Kickstarter? I raised a little over 30,000. Will you continue to raise this year? Absolutely. Yeah, always. I mean, you never stop raising, yeah. Yeah, it was funny. I was talking to some founders yesterday actually at this event and they were explaining to me how there's this bit of a CPG investor fatigue at the current time and I was asking them like, oh, why is that? Like I'm an investor, so I'm like, why? I didn't feel that way. And I was like, they're like, well, they just realized they can make more money in like a bond based on interest rates at the moment. I was like, that's interesting, you know, it's interesting. I was like, if you're an investor though, I don't, generally I don't think investors are interested in bonds. Like usually when you invest in a company, you have a belief that that product should exist in the world. It's like a vote. It's like you're voting on what you think the future should look like. A bond doesn't do any of that. Yeah. And you like the founder, I think it's a good story. And I was like, but maybe it's because of like all the emergency board meetings that happened to like a year and a half ago in the CPG world. Like I was a part of those. I was like, maybe that. And I was like, I don't, I don't know. I was like, maybe it's just, anyway, my advice to the founder I was speaking to was more of just have more conviction. Right. Yeah. I'm like just- I think that's what it is. Yeah, yeah. At least that's what I was picking up on. Yeah. I was like, this sounds like you believe, you as founder believe the world doesn't want you when you're saying it's- I'm sure I still have that in my mind too as well. I think maybe it's the two humble, but I have a close friend that's also helping me with, she works for VC and is helping me with this fundraising side because I do not come from the finance side. So it's also this other world that I have quickly had to learn. What are you learning? Like what are things that you didn't know or things that maybe you knew, but you know, they're being enhanced at the current. Like what are you learning? Yeah, I mean, I think there's a lot of jargon around fundraising that I've never had to encounter before. I've never had a company that I've had to grow solo. So I think learning what is the best fundraising structure for me at this point. Like a convertible note or like- Yeah, exactly, exactly. Even knowing am I pre-seed? Am I series A? Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then figuring out that the budget, especially now it's kind of early on, you create this, I would say loose kind of budget that you have an idea of, but especially early on, as you're going into manufacturing, there's going to be all of these things that happen. And two things that I would say, a lot of them I expected and we prepared for, but there's in trying to figure out how best to make this product things that we've had to navigate that you wouldn't foresee, I guess. And I think, yeah, just knowing how to talk to investors. And feeling the confidence in terms of, I'm saying I'm raising $500,000 for the end of this year. What does that mean? And being able to talk confidently to an investor of, this is how I'm going to spend it, this is the relationship I'm looking for, especially building out an advisory board, which I'm doing at the moment as well. What does that look like? How big, knowing how to give out equity is so much. Yeah, I mean, I like that you're touching on it. It's not easy. When I first got into real estate development, there's enough books out there to teach you the language. I think every world has their esoteric language, and then once you learn it, then it makes it simple. But I think in startup land, for some reason, it really isn't an easy one-stop shop. I'm sure there's a website or something, but even that is like, do I believe it? Is that right? Has it changed? I mean, I think it's always changing. It's always changing, that's the other part. It's changing based on the person too. I think that every talk that you go into is going to be different from the next one, and you have to know that, understand that, be flexible, especially you don't want all of them to be the same either, because you're choosing the individual for certain reasons. Totally, yeah. So yeah, I mean, I listen to a lot of podcasts. That helps a lot too. Yeah, are you at the seed stage then right now? Yes, yeah. Okay, that's the stage we like to invest in personally. When it comes to like, how many skews do you have? How many different flavors do you guys have for the product? There's three in front of us here. Spicy, Miso, Ramen. So our three launching flavors, and this is one of the things that I kind of learned early on is I think three is the magic number in launching a brand. I've always known as a food stylist too that three is the kind of the golden number. You want an odd number for things you put on a plate and things that you put out into the world. So our three launching flavors are Rigatoni, Basil, Pomodoro. Which I'm gonna try right now. Amazing. I would say that is the new fan favorite. It was actually the Spicy Miso Ramen up until this week. And then we have our Kava Topi Carbonara. Some ASMR, well that's good. Yeah, there's also, I mean, I wanted a crunchy snack too. The crunch category is something that I think is lacking. We have... That's delicious. Thank you. You know, that's what we go for. I wanted to make a delicious snack, so I'm glad that we hit that note. Yeah, I wanted to get the crunchy... That's fucked up. That's really good. That's really fucked up. I can't wait to take that sound bite. Whoa. Yeah, I... I'm just having a moment here. You can keep talking. It tastes like a meal, but it's not. But you feel like it's a meal. So it feels like, I'm gonna try to describe it, a bit of a loss, but it tastes like the most amazing tomato sauce, right? A jammed pack, like, concentrated with... Oh, like, just the most delicate touch of basil somehow. Right? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. And then, like, a puff, but a noodle, but a puff. And there's, like, a delicate dance happening. That's legendary. Nice work. Holy shit. I mean, I would say this is... And I'm not a snack guy, by the way. Like, I hate snacks. Fair enough, okay. But these I'm gonna buy. These I'm gonna... I'm gonna... That's amazing. I mean, this is, like, the 1,000 iteration. It's been a journey. So my mind just went nuts. So I was thinking, okay, cool, like, red wine. All of a sudden I want red wine. I want, like, a nice Barolo with this. Oh, yeah, yeah. And I'm at dinner. I'm at dinner, too, do we want to, yeah. That's good. Thank you, yay, yay. Wow. Okay. It's in terms of, I think... I can see why you want it in a bag. I can see why you want it in a bag, though. Yeah, yeah. Cause you don't know what you're opening. Yeah. Exactly, exactly. And maybe today the buyer behavior, or I guess maybe the buyer today is educated on seeing this bag and it's like, you mentioned pretzels or, like, chocolate-covered pretzels or more of a snack chocolate. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I don't know, I mean, you would know better than me. I think the stand-up pouch, honestly, makes it this more, like I said, luxury good, like, more FruFru snack than I want it to be. I want it to be approachable. And so, yeah, getting into that snacky, like, casual, fun vibe, we gotta go in the chip bag. Is it healthy? I hate to ask this question. No, no, no, you're good. So I would say it's right in the middle. Making this snack, I never wanted to make a healthy snack, honestly, because I think that I kind of experienced this growing up, but there's a lot of this health jargon out there that can not only skew people's actual, the, your actual understanding of what does that mean? Cause there's a lot of wow words out there, but it's also, I don't want to, yeah, I just didn't want to make a healthy snack. I just wanted to make a good snack. And, but at the same time, sustainability is a huge thing for me. I really wanted to make an upcycled snack, and these are partially upcycled, but as a startup, upcycling is very, very hard. And so upcycling, for everyone that doesn't know, is using food that would otherwise be thrown out and repurposing it, reusing it. So we would take potatoes and make a flour from that and then use that to make our chips. So we are partially upcycled now, and then as we grow, hoping to like really increase that. I don't know how you did this. This is like amazing. You nailed it. Here you go, Nick, try this again. They taste like a meal. Like you made the meal a little chip. How did the fuck did you do that? Well, I mean. You're obviously talented. That's start, let's start with that. Let's acknowledge that. That's incredible. Thank you. I think the bread and butter is the seasoning for sure. It's that flavor. This, maybe this is the future of food. It's like, instead of going out to dinner and ordering the dish, you can just give people like, oh, you want basil pasta. It's like space food. It's like space food. Here's your bite. It's like a bunch of bites. I mean, I think. You got like 30 dishes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, let me tell you, I'm so excited for the flavors that we could do after this. I mean, like I said, there's a world of noodles out there. So very much. Yeah, I mean, I think. That's so good. Andrea from Snack Shop, she always says that it's like the snackification of everything. Yeah, okay. Not saying that I ever want to replace like, sustenance, like an actual meal with a snack, but it is very much that, you know, you just, you crave a bowl of pasta or you crave a bowl of ramen on the go. And I do want it to be satiating. I don't mean to be eating all of these. No, no, please do, no, no, please do. That's what they're here for. All right, so this one's the kava top. How do you pronounce that? Kava topi. Carbonara. Yeah, yeah. It's funny because I heard too early on you don't want to make a flavor that people can't pronounce. And I know that kava topi is a hard word for people. But I want to, you know, I want to open people's minds to more things than just like macaroni and spaghetti. I don't know how you did this. It's like, it's incredible. This is incredible. Thank you. I mean, it's been a journey. So like I said, it's really exciting to just see people's reaction now. No wonder you won the competition. That's so good. Here you go, Nick. All right, my favorite is the, for sure. The Tony? Tony, Basil, Pomodoro. That just felt like heaven. And I would say the other two are tied. They're just different, but really amazing. Yeah, I mean, the spicy miso is definitely, you gotta love some spiciness. It pats a punch, for sure. They're both so different. I feel like you can like open a restaurant and serve the, like it just feels like that. I don't know how to describe that. Maybe that's the hard part for the consumer. I think that the bread and butter for us is the seasoning. It's the flavor. And I wanted to make, I didn't want just a tomato powder with dehydrated basil in it. I wanted to taste like it was cooking on the stove for hours and really concentrate those flavors. Cause again, it's, I want to, I think you nailed it. Yeah, I want to extend that kind of pallet opening, if you will. Yeah, it's not a rice puff that someone threw seasoning on. That's not what this is. This is far more sophisticated, okay? I've never had this reaction, by the way, on the podcast. This is like unbelievable. I don't believe it. I'm like in shock right now. Nick will tell you. Usually if someone has three skews, I'll try one. And I'm like, that's great. And I want to do all three. What's next for the company this year? Where do you want to take it? Yeah, so we have some really exciting retail locations opening up. We have a lot of some national partners at Fairway, Shoprite, Gourmet Garage are a couple of those in the Northeast area. And so we're setting up a lot of our distribution right now. And so once that happens, I really want to just focus on our partners right now, focus on our consumers. We have a lot of brand awareness, obviously, as I mentioned, brand recognition to do, getting our margins right, getting our velocity right, looking at the data. It's a lot of the things that we've been trying to make the product right for so long. And so now we need to do everything else to make sure that we get the numbers where we need them to be. I see that. I mean, look, I think you've nailed it on the product. I think that's the hardest part of any CPG company. And now it's a function of like doing the demos, getting it out there. I don't know why my brain, probably because of my age or whatever, I just go like, this is perfect with wine. Like that's how I view it. Like I see myself serving it up. There's wine out. Oh, let's snack it. Do they want to snack? I told you, hype around low-brow. Yeah, yeah, yeah. For all occasions, yeah. Put it in a bowl. The ramen, it's just like you want an ice-cold beer with your bowl of ramen. It goes really well with beer. Yeah, it's almost like a beer and chips, wine and food. Yeah, exactly. Or non-alcoholic, you know, choose your own adventure. Okay, so more skews, different bags. Yeah, I mean, I'm excited for some Pad Thai action. We did actually... Can you walk me how you, like how do you do this? Let's unpack this. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So in my head, I'm like, all right, Pad Thai, I'm out. Cool, I like it. And then you go, let me make a chip of this. Yeah. Okay, so that nailed it. And then what's the next step? How do you do that? What do you... Part of it is, so what do I want it to look like? I think... Okay, yeah, it's got to look a certain way. It's I growing up, I loved bugles because it was just like this fun shape that you could play with. And I think that adults are wanting to eat. They're very nostalgic these days. And so I wanted to lean in to kind of, I mean, you want to also appeal to kids. And so figuring out what is the shape of this flavor? How are we going to do it? And not saying that all of them will be this potato chip. Our ramen will come out as a lentil chip moving forward. I wanted to lean more into this kind of wonton chip. A lot of people really resonated with that. So I think figuring out what is the base of it. And then with each shape and also each kind of formulation, you're getting a different texture. So then honing in on that and then honing in on, what are the flavor points of that? What do we want people to go away with? I didn't mention this, but all of our flavors are now... Well, they're all gluten-free, but all of our flavors are now vegan. So also then figuring out, how do we make it vegan? Because I think that is also... So they're all gluten-free? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I just wanted to appeal to, I mean, this is not what any investor really wants to hear, but I wanted to appeal to every demographic. I wanted to appeal to every palette. We're honed in on who our target market is. But I mean... Who is your target market today? Yeah, I would say it's probably your Gen Z millennials. We're really targeting kind of your metro areas because like you said, it's a very satiating snack. So a lot of people that are on the go, it's a snack that's hard to place. So I want someone at least currently that is more adventurous in how they snack and more adventurous in their flavors, more willing to pick up something that's new, different. So looking in the food service channel, college campuses, airports, metro people on the go. We're opening up a sports bar and I'm like, this is perfect. Yes, exactly. So finding partners like that as well, breweries. We have breweries. We have those too. I'm very much looking to place it in people's lives and take the thinking out of it. So I think an airline partner. Obviously you need to get the margins right for that as well. But it's something that it gives people a chance to try it without having to overcommit in a way. It's clear. Obviously you want a competition so you're obviously very talented but this is like fucking bananas. It's, I mean, again, it's been a journey. Yeah, no, clearly, but you landed it. Landed the plane. When it comes to marketing, what are your initiatives you got? Obviously you can tell your own story from the Netflix stuff and so that's a huge or it can be like a big boost. What kind of partnerships are you looking to do? What's the social media? What is the digital presence? Yeah, so I mean, I'm a solo founder so I'm really doing everything at the moment and so investors, yeah, that would be great to have more money to obviously do more of the things but what I've come to find is a lot of brands now that are successful are very transparent. So I mean, a lot of our social is me on the camera talking, which is very funny. I was on a show but I wouldn't say that I'm someone that just jumps right in front of the camera so putting myself out there. I mean, as the product's changing as well, letting consumers in on that journey, I think that is a huge part of our brand. Something that's fun as well is we have our noodle characters. Each flavor has its own kind of noodle mascot and a really exciting part of this actually is a chef that I used to work with. His wife illustrated all of our drawings so it's also this personal bit that comes into it. So exploring again this kind of like nostalgic playfulness of it, finding the right brands that lean into that as well. But yeah, I mean, I think for us we wanna do a lot of events because I think it's another way for us this year to get in front of eyes of people that maybe we don't have stores in their location yet or they wouldn't pick up the snack otherwise so it's an easy chance for them to try it. And again, doing demos, the key areas for us are kind of promos, activations, placement. How was Expo West for you? So I walked this year as a brand. I mean, again, I'm early on so maybe don't have the means for a booth but I think there's so many opportunities for brands that don't have those means to just walk. There's a lot of brands that need help as well so you can very much help for one day, help for a couple hours and get a badge and be able to still experience everything that everyone else is being a part of. Also meeting other founders and I think it's kind of this moment where you can realize you're not the only one. Everyone else is going through the same thing and it's a bit of therapy and there's also a lot of sampling events outside of Expo as well. So there's so many opportunities and again, we made all of these changes to our formulation recently and so it was really exciting to put it out there and see everyone's reaction and it was very much this reaction of just you've got it, you've got it. And so yeah, I'm so excited to leave this week and be like, let's go. It's funny you mentioned therapy. This podcast is a bit of therapy for me, which is fun because it's like, oh, nice. We get to vent about the things we're dealing with and obviously give some promo. Well, look, thanks for coming on the podcast. Are you doing anything on the Amazon side, e-commerce side, working people buy your product? Yeah, so right now it's available D2C online at our site. Foxtrot is a big part. snoots.com, what's the website? Yeah, yeah, yeah, eatsnoots.com. Eatsnoots on Instagram, come and find us. Send snoots, eatsnoots, yeah. Yeah, send snoots to your friends, send snoots to you, whatever you want. We're in Foxtrot, like I said, Fairway, Shopbrite, Gormick, Raj. We're launching the end of April and we have a really big retail partner coming up that I don't think I'm allowed to announce yet. We'll be in June. So we're slowly expanding, but I think by the end of this year you'll see us kind of everywhere. Lauren, congratulations. Thank you so much. This was such a treat chatting with you. Thanks for coming on. Thank you. Thank you for tuning in. 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