What founders say
Where the money really came from, and the marketing founders paid for that returned nothing.
“I had a hundred and ten videos made for us on TikTok and we converted two units.”
The most expensive lesson in the episode, and he did not stop at the number — creator fit, audience fit, video quality and checkout friction are all candidates, and he says so rather than blaming the platform.
“less than like two percent of our overall budget… I'd spend more money on buying events for sure. I'd go to two or three buying events a year.”
Revenue went from under $100k to roughly $1M on that spend. Sales and marketing together still only reach eight to ten percent, and the single biggest line was a trade show booth.
“Most of our marketing dollars in retail is sampling… we sold fifty three units at our last sample at a grocery store.”
Sampling is the one spend he defends, because it converts at the exact place his product already wins — in front of a shopper at the shelf.
“we've made a conscious decision to do eighty twenty retail D to C. And that means effort as well as our sales.”
Splitting effort, not just budget, is the harder discipline. He is explicit that this ratio is specific to where their momentum already is and should not be copied blindly.
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