Investing in Regenerative Agriculture and Food
Investing in Regenerative Agriculture and Food podcast features the pioneers in the regenerative food and agriculture space to learn more on how to put our money to work to regenerate soil, people, local communities and ecosystems while making an appropriate and fair return. Hosted by Koen van Seijen.
Investing in Regenerative Agriculture and Food
397 Andres Jara - How a chef-butcher-farmer turned legumes into a scalable, clean-label food that rewards farmers
How do you make legumes great again? This is not a political episode. It’s about something far more urgent: giving legumes the role they truly deserve in our food system. Together with Andres Jara, co-founder of Favamole, we explore what it really takes to build a regenerative food brand in the middle of today’s industrial food landscape.
What if a simple, delicious sauce could change crop rotations, farmer income, and your weekly lunch? With Andres we explore how a chef-turned-butcher-turned-farmer built Favamole: a fresh, clean-label legume spread that tastes great, pays growers fairly, and can scale without losing its soul.
How do you play the game while sharing shelf space with giant food companies, big retail, massive processors, and catering empires? And more importantly: how do you scale fast, influence as many hectares as possible, and not lose your regenerative soul along the way? We dive into regenerative business models, flavour as a lever for change, regenerative finance, scale, money, and impact, all while walking on the stunning, sunny, and very cold fields of Jeroen and Mellany Klompe.
We dive into the origin story—why a guacamole “alternative” wasn’t enough—and how redefining “mole” as its own category unlocked flavor, pricing, and brand freedom.
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In Investing in Regenerative Agriculture and Food podcast show we talk to the pioneers in the regenerative food and agriculture space to learn more on how to put our money to work to regenerate soil, people, local communities and ecosystems while making an appropriate and fair return. Hosted by Koen van Seijen.
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How to make legumes great again. Don't worry, this is not a political episode, but legumes simply deserve a bigger role. But how? How do you build a regenerative food round while being in the game and in the space with gigantic food companies, big retail, food processing industries, and catering giants? How do you not lose your regenerative principles while you try to scale as fast as possible to reach and touch and of course influence as many hackers as you possibly can? We talk regenerative business models, flavor, region finance, scale, money, and everything on the stunning, very cold but sunny fields of Yerun and Melanie Culture. This is the Investing in Regenerative Agriculture and Food Podcast, where we learn more on how to put money to work to regenerate soil, people, local communities, and ecosystems while making an appropriate and fair return. Welcome to another episode of Walking the Land. Special land in this case. It's always special land. It's always this is a first, definitely, because we're here with Andres Yara, who we had on a Walking the Land episode, which we also filmed on his land. But since then there have been some interesting developments which we're gonna unpack, and we're now not on his land, way bigger, 360 hectares, which we're not all gonna walk, don't worry. And it will be a 10-part, 10-part series. But we're on the land of Jurun Klompe and Melanie Klompe, obviously, of Klompa Agri, So Heroes Foundation. And for those of who have been here, for those who have been seen those episodes, listened to the episodes, and definitely familiar ground, common ground. And we're in the winter, it's a bit windy, but it's sunny, and it's quite fresh. So let's see how long we last. It's always also rained a lot, so we're with boots, and you're gonna hear that a bit. But we're walking through one of the biodiversity strips next to the water, and uh cover crops are growing. So we're gonna unpack that and we're gonna unpack why Andres we're not walking on your land one hectare or less, just west of Amsterdam, but while we are here. So welcome back on the show. Of course, I will link the other episodes below, but welcome uh to another walking a land on another land.
SPEAKER_00:Nice, thank you for uh having me here for inviting me again to this wonderful format. And then, yeah, it's uh interesting development since the last time we met.
SPEAKER_01:Absolutely, and then you were we talked a lot about pricing of vegetable packages, how you build your business as well, you were into sauces at the time, and now even more. Um, how because it's been a relatively new but relatively fast development, let's say, of what you're building now, FavaMola. And for sure some people think, oh yeah, I saw that on LinkedIn, and I saw that also there, and I've seen it. But what was the spark that led to you becoming a food entrepreneur next to you? And of course, you have your farming colleagues are farming, you're mostly out of that now because yeah, you can only do so many things in 24 hours. And what was the spark, or what was the steps that led to you saying, okay, actually, I want to have impact and I want to build something beyond uh the market garden that we're building?
SPEAKER_00:Well, for that it was we had been doing this for seven years, so then it's a cycle of seven, so it was just like the farm is running actually really well. We have people, members, and then I thought, is there something else that we can do? And then I have really in my head since nine years, and then we someone direct me to a subsidy from developing products, plant-based products based on legumes, and then I thought, okay, this could be the great opportunity to actually bring Favamole out of the box full of dust, and then put it out in the give it another chance because we tried nine years ago, four years ago, and then now again last year, and then last year the timing was right. I was ready, the market's ready, so that's that's when we took it. The reason why is also because we can really see way more impact and way more reachability and scalability with Favamole. With the farm, it's we have let's say one hectare. In eight years now, seven years, we have so we have seven hectares impact per year in total. In the first year of Favamole, we have reached uh 20 hectares. And this is 11 months.
SPEAKER_01:And not even a full year, yeah. Exactly.
SPEAKER_00:So the potential scalability, what we have, it's way bigger, and the potential of collaboration with more farms and regenerate more land is way bigger. So that's why should choose chose the to step a little bit aside from the daily operation of the Sasgrundebour and then jump full in on Fava Molle.
SPEAKER_01:And you said nine years ago, like we tried four years ago as well. The idea has been around for nine. Um, what is different now compared to four years ago? Why is it taking off? Or what's the different path or different elements or different pieces?
SPEAKER_00:Well, there are two main reasons. The first one is Andres. It's a different one. So at that time I was having different belief systems, different things that is small, it's humble, and this kind of thing, scalability, growing is not per se good. So this kind of thoughts they were like the ones that were not really allowing this to to flow the direction that is flowing right now. And also the the market. There was the boom of vegan products, plant-based alternative, and there's there was a lot of thinking in plant-based meal meat alternative, but not really product made entirely of legumes yet. So that was also a little bit of the thing that that plus when I was doing Yara, because I was still doing the my previous sauce company.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, you were already making some products, it wasn't completely only fresh vegetables and stuff from the farm, from the market farm.
SPEAKER_00:Exactly. So then over like with that, the concept what was to have ambient products.
SPEAKER_01:So we were in the aisle of out of the fridge, and then somehow we tried to put Famamole in that like shelf stable, exactly, and it just didn't work because why like flavor, or is that very is it like you kill some of the taste expert experts, or what was the reason?
SPEAKER_00:No, it was basically the legumes when you pasteurize them, they smell like farts. So it's not a nice smell when you open a page. This is gonna go in a reel, you already know that. Yeah, of course. So they're just like when you open the page.
SPEAKER_01:This is not good. Even the flavor. So it's actually interesting that the processing doesn't help in that sense, interestingly enough. Even though it's just pasteurizing, it's nothing, it's not that you add a lot of salt or sugar. Yeah, it blocks the experience, and so now it's fresh, now it's fresh, has to stay cool, yep, relatively cool. And you say you changed like growth and scalability, and I see some people I can hear almost people cringing, in the sense of now you're all for growth and scale at all costs, and you became a fool on more like what is it, Thomas Friedman capitalist, or what's the transition of Anders?
SPEAKER_00:No, it's just if if we want to make impact, then we need to be able to reach more people and grow more legumes in more land. And then with that, is if you just make it niche product, then it's a cute, nice project for or for yourself as a hobby or just for the wealthy ones.
SPEAKER_01:And then with this because with smallness, often not always comes a higher price because it's more artisanal, you do it in the kitchen or maybe a slightly larger professional kitchen, but definitely not in a factory. And so, yeah, costs are just higher.
SPEAKER_00:Exactly. And then one of the most important things for us at the moment at Famamolia is that we would like to regenerate more European soil by putting more legumes on it. So then this is, as we all know, the power of legumes to add nitrogen from the air, from the atmosphere to the soil.
SPEAKER_01:I had a fun discussion. Shout out to Meren or Marin of the Protein Project coming out of Moro, the School for Moral Ambition. And I think Favamola and Fiverr beans are one of their focus areas. And I was asking, pushing him, yeah, but can you do legumes badly in a sense? Oh, I see a hair. Oh, yeah. Vivers and a bird. And can you do them like even if you don't do them regenerative, organic, etc. Is there a way he said, yeah, but it's like it needs so much less stuff anyway, like regardless of your growing stuff, like if and it really helps the next year's crop so much, like you also reduce the next year after, like they are not magical, but they come pretty close to that. So we should, like Andrew Dimbleby likes to say, we should all fall in love with lentils and pulses and legumes in general. So you were focusing on that, but then let me play the devil's advocate a bit. We're here on one of the most regenerative farms, potentially in Europe. Does your fava bean or in Dutch feldbone like acquisition here help extra hectares or put more legumes in the ground compared to what would have been if you weren't here?
SPEAKER_00:That's a great question. I think by now, not yet.
SPEAKER_01:Okay, but that's additionality as impact investors love to make it like okay, not yet, but okay, where's the yet? Interesting.
SPEAKER_00:But then, yeah, we are already like speaking with some farmers, other farmers, and new partners. And that the interesting thing is that one of the big challenges of putting legumes in the crop rotation is that farmers they know we know that we need to put legumes in the soil to put all the nutrients and nitrogen, so on. The challenge is not to add the health benefits for the soil, but actually the financial benefit for the farmer. So if you put the legumes, who is going to buy your beans? Normally, so far, what we have been discussing and discovering is that the majority of the beans will end up in animal for animal feed.
SPEAKER_01:Which is wrong in so many ways, let's say. Let's let we have a whole series now on animal agriculture, and we're not gonna understand. Yeah, let's not let's not go to. I think most listeners, if not, I guide you to a whole series we're doing on animal integration and many episodes we've done. So basically, farmers know they need to do it, they want to do it. It's good for the soil, it's good for their rotation, but it's a loss-making or not an ideal part of their commercial rotation, let's say. Exactly.
SPEAKER_00:So, what are we doing with Favamole? So we go to them, we tell them that we will buy all the crops, like all the harvests from the amount of hectares that we want them to grow at a really competitive market price. So, in this sense, sometimes they get between 15 to 30 cents per kilo for animal feed. And uh 15, like one five, yeah, one five to three zero. And then we pay between 80 and 1 euro per kilo.
SPEAKER_01:And that's significantly more, and just a much better story. We're just with Yeroun, he got the five amola box, and he was, let's say, we say, as happy as a child. We had to take a picture and we had to like it's uh it's also I think very different if you grow something that ends up feeding humans, not that we shouldn't feed animals, but ends up feeding humans, it might be in a supermarket or in a like a catering company. Like, actually, people are because that's the other part. We all, most people at least, should eat more legumes for health benefits, more fiber, protein-wise. It's something we, at least in the Western world, unfortunately, many other cultures of course do, but we don't eat enough. And somehow we are not able to cook fava beans, or we're not able to, like, it's very interesting or lentils, and so you have to quote unquote sneak it in to make it palatable.
SPEAKER_00:And then in this way, what we're doing with Fava Mole is to just like sneak in legumes for some children, yeah. Exactly, in a high percentage, because at least there is 79% of legumes in Fava Mole.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, uh so what is Fava Mole for people that are now Googling or echo CIing what is the product at the moment or the products, because they're two.
SPEAKER_00:So Fava Mole is a product made from Fava Beans and Yellow Peace, that is basically a spread, but it's a mole. Which is a spread, right? Exactly. So and then we can actually break the word and make the explanation because we also, while building the company, and then it's actually really funny to mention it, we started as alternative to guacamole. And then we also saw that there is it's a great entry point, but also very limiting in the possibilities of growing the company. Yeah. So then while we go, we have been discovered that if you always compare yourself with something, you will never be anything. So then it's okay.
SPEAKER_01:It's gonna be another view, yeah, the same AI transcribing, take note. So it's it's a great because you really, if you go back in your communication as well, you see that sort of, of course, to in order to exist and you're only 11 months old, as a company, you enter some enter in this activist, we should eat less guacamola, we should eat less, let's say, avocados, let's just get it over with, from very questionable sources. And you don't have to look very far. There's some very interesting documentaries, photo exhibitions of scene, etc., on the horrors of avocado growth. Not only on the environmental side, of course, horrendous water and everything like that, but the social side is equally or worse. And they grow also in in Europe. You can get them through crowd farming. Uh actually, it started now, I think. I mean we're recording this in November 2025. So you could get your crowd farming avocados from Europe, regen organic, of course, but most what goes into what goes into guacamole, yeah. We can go around there, D H what goes into guacamole are very questionable quality avocados. And so you started as okay, we should eat less, or but we then let's replace it with something, with it's more nutrient-dense, more healthy, definitely more local, better for the farmer, etc. etc. But when did that switch came in your head? Okay, we cannot just push against guacamole and have fava mole, when it has to be a category on its own if we want to.
SPEAKER_00:Well, one of the first things that actually we started to realize is like the people comparison. This is like the first thing they say is like it's not as bright green as guacamole. The texture is not fluffy. So like you already saw patterns of if you compare yourself with something, you will never be that thing. So then while building and doing it, you also try to like you always in constant evolution. So it's like, how can we make this change that we own our narrative? And we're just not like the alternative to something. So then we have seen the different ways, okay. Then what is guacamole? Guacamole, and then we went to the epistemology of the word, and then it's okay, guacamole. What is guacamole? It comes from aguacatl, aguacate in Spanish, that is avocado, and then mole, that is sauce mash or yeah, sauce salsa. And then so guacamole is avocado sauce. So then like this, then you separate the word, and then we have been explaining to many people, and then they were just like, whoa, that makes so much sense. So then fava mole is fava sauce, fava deep. So then what we're doing is like we open a whole new category and we're becoming our own thing. So people know the most famous mole, that is wacamole, and now that is fava mole, that is the second most famous. That is the that is your favorite mole.
SPEAKER_01:Which opens a whole new space of other moles, basically. Exactly. For and other sauce, it has doesn't have to be as fluffy and as green and as bright green, and it doesn't have to taste exactly the same. Be good for you and be a relatively competitive price. Exactly. And then, of course, the story be good for you and be good for the planet, and farmers, and that seems to be the case. We can walk probably through. Did you not allow us to walk through? Yeah, otherwise we're gonna get an angry. There's a bit of the cover crop here. How deep is gonna be very especially. It's very interesting to see, yeah. So on this, not on this field specifically, but you so when did this idea came to you? It came with already before, now you thought, okay, now I'm ready to try again. Then how do you find in a country where you have been farming but it's relatively in a bubble, we can keep all commissioner? How do you find the farmer, the processor, the packaging, the channels? Like, how do you choose where to where do you even start? Because I think many people have an idea, oh, it would be great if there are more vegetable chips or something there, but like something, and then that just doesn't happen because it's just very difficult to start a food company.
SPEAKER_00:Well, the fun part of all of this is that it has been for me, it has been quite easy because I'm a farmer. So then one of the things that we're doing is there is no blueprint of the supply chain that we are tapping into or like we are building. Because the easier option is okay, you get you go to wholesaler, you buy the fava beans from Bo, some yeah, maybe organic if you try again. And then, of course, then you can make fava mole, but then you don't know where you're sourcing, you don't know how they're grown, you don't know the farmers, much about them. So then we felt okay, and this is already starting before even the company. Because one year ago we were already speaking with the farmers telling, okay, we would need this amount of legumes for the coming year, and then they were just like, Why are you coming now? It's because I know it now in winter you're doing your crop planning for 2025 at that time, 2024. So they're like, okay, yes.
SPEAKER_01:And then Yeah, because you need certain characteristics and you need certain things. Now you can show up in the summer of 25.
SPEAKER_00:Let's make some let's make give me give me 20 10 hectares or 15 hectares of legumes.
SPEAKER_01:Dude, if you want direct from farmer, you need to put in the work and the time. So you showed up already without having a company basically last year.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:Just scoping, okay. Can we secure, let's say, the the legumes we need. How easy was that?
SPEAKER_00:Quite actually, because with one of the examples that with Jerome, he has he put his crop rotation and his planning, and then he had enough couple of tons extra for us.
SPEAKER_01:Okay.
SPEAKER_00:But then it's also like one of the beautiful things, but also the most challenging thing, is because you don't know how fast it's going to go. So it could be that you don't have enough legumes by I don't know, June 2026. And then what do you do? So it's better to have a little bit more than not enough. And then, of course, that's the challenge because then if it doesn't pick up as fast as you hop, then you have a lot of legumes.
SPEAKER_01:Your cash flow is gonna be interesting.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, the advantage is that legumes they can stay for a long time. Yeah, uh if you really keep them well in dry storage and all the good conditions. Away from the mice and the rats. But then it's just like a great opportunity to work together because then you can really see that they can incorporate more hectares of legumes within the rotation. And that is something that all of them want.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, was that an easy sell to Yuru and Erwin, like that super advanced farmers that like you want more? Would they anyway do it and sell it as animal feed? Or did you was there an easy space for you to grow, like in case you sell a lot more and you make a lot more, like you can divert a bit from the animal feed side, or were they really hungry, let's say, to plant more?
SPEAKER_00:No, they were really open and keen to plant more. Then of course they're not they work in relatively big farms, so they're also not in the in in that position that they need desperately to sell to animal feed. But it's then if the case is that they that the year comes and then they have too much and then the new crop and the new harvest is coming, then that might be the situation. I'm not completely sure because we haven't discussed that, yeah, but that might be the situation. So with this, what we're actually aiming to do and doing is working with them and get everything. But of course, there is always challenges because you cannot control what happened. You still we're still working with nature. And then it can be that like this year was quite a dry year, so like some in some beds and some farms we have less than expected. So that's also a way we're also learning, and they're also learning with us.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, because it hasn't been, I think, here at least, uh a super commercial crop. So I don't know, I'm assuming like there might be still quite a bit of development possible in terms of best growing practices for the best quality, for the best, because if it anyway is a rotational crop that goes into animal feed, I'm imagining you don't put all your energy in terms of uh foliage spray or in terms of pest control in case like you're growing it because you want to and you have to for your land, but you're not focusing all your energy and learning energy on that. You focus it on the cash crop. So that might be in a few years that they have learned a lot on how to. I remember speaking with Regenerate with Alice, like on Camomila, Camonilla, uh the oil seed, yeah. Where they're running the biggest trial now because they need it for sustainable aviation fuel, whatever you think of that, but very interesting. We invested in the company. And so suddenly they're with all these farmers selecting seeds and really pushing on it because there's a proper buyer and there's a need, and there's these farmers are not just seeing it as oh, something I have to do or would like to do, but actually something I need to do, and I need to learn and figure out the best moment of planting, best maintenance, best like how many do I pass? Do I what do I do when it's super dry or super wet? So I don't know, fava and other legumes, how much like how much potential there still is, let's say, in these climates, of course.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, and then like we this year we had uh where we met one of the farmers I've been work as working the the latest with is with Howard.
SPEAKER_01:Which we haven't spoken to, yeah.
SPEAKER_00:And uh I think that's Yahoo, how you pronounce it, sorry if my pronunciation isn't the best. So he had fava beans in the and he planted in winter. So he has actually a cover crop for winter.
SPEAKER_01:Interesting. Yeah, I was gonna ask, like, when is the growing season normally?
SPEAKER_00:Or well the in in the with this mild winters that that we had, at least the one we had last year, that was it was possible to grow. And this year now it's a little bit colder. So I don't know how it's like uh we're also learning the but he planted in winter, and then what happened? And then he planted in winter, and then in so in March, so he had two hectares, and then he was just like looking for someone to buy those beans because there was no no one to buy them. Then the funny thing is like he put a post on LinkedIn, and then many people just tag Andres and Favamole, and then I just answered openly, publicly, yeah, we would be happy, we would be really happy to jump in and to see what we can do to buy all these uh these beans. So and then it was so funny because once you once I did that openly publicly, then MVO also jumped in. It's like, okay, we would like to to to be also in the conversation to see what we can do to help like this thing to happen and do move forward.
SPEAKER_01:Which is like a government agency on promoting sustainability, and I think one of the programs is on the protein transition, right? Exactly. And then the so the power of being open.
SPEAKER_00:Yes. So and then thing, but it also came with challenges because it's two hectares, more or less, it was approximately 10 tons of fava beans, but then they were attacked by lice, and then at that moment it's like, what do you do? It was like spring, so there are two options of you let it be, and then you hope that the plant really recovers, or you water and then you know they wilt, and then you also hope that the plants have a second chance. Yeah, so it's like what decision you take at that moment. So then it's also this at the end, these are the challenges of doing these kind of things, especially in the winter, and with crops that like we don't know how they we have very little knowledge because we are reintroducing them into the rotations. So then at the end it was they I think they harvest three tons or something, and we cleaned them with from Sunspelt, another farmer that we're working with.
SPEAKER_01:And so from 10 to 3 is quite a drop, huh? Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, but from 10 to from 2 to nobody buying them, yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01:It's from 10 to 0, it's even worse. Yeah. Yeah, it's almost like RD that many are doing, like figuring out okay, what decision to take, like what's the decision chart with this kind of weather, with this kind of weather predicted over the next weeks, okay, with this pest coming in, what do you do? And in some many cash crops we know to a certain extent, and maybe we even know the most regenerative answers, but in many other crops we have just no clue. Like what to because either the data isn't there or we don't know where it is. And and so because that was almost the start of the company, right? Yep. Like how, and then you needed to find some yellow peas and made the product, or what then was were next steps? You were you were going through the winter sourcing next year materials, then you stumbled upon some material for this year.
SPEAKER_00:Well, in that's also the thing. Like when I was doing Yara, I was a solopreneur. Well, I had some, I have I did it with with another colleague, but then it was mainly me. This year, for Favamoly, then I introduced and I welcome a good friend of mine that now is my co-founder, is Edwin Sander. So then I learned that if I was doing the RD and all the things that I even though I loved, you cannot really do you can if you're working mushroom. If you're working for the business, you cannot work in the business.
SPEAKER_01:I'm just seeing a whole merch line like of t-shirts and hoodies and hats. Okay, no, but it's a great point of again coming back to scale and delegate, and how do you of course you don't want overnight 100 people working for you, but there is a running a medium-sized business compared to a small one almost by yourself is a fundamentally different thing. It's not just 50 people together or 10 people together, like it's more than 10 individuals. There's a very interesting mechanism there that I think we often underestimate in space, like, yeah, it's more is beautiful, yeah. But economies of scale also help, and delegation and specialization, and is there are fundamental pieces of life, and so but then you didn't have resources, money, like how do you go about uh do you pre-sale? Like, how do you go about starting off something like that?
SPEAKER_00:Well, with that, we were also very lucky with this subsidy from organized by South Holland and a bank called Totkimchi, that it was also supported by the European Union. So they were giving money to companies to start a develop a new business model or products that include legumes. So we got this, and then we got 50,000 euros from them to start to kickstart the process, the project, and the concept. And it's it was so much helpful because then rent equipment, RD, pre-buy, buy the ingredients for the RD. Like one of the things of this money is like I couldn't pay myself, but that was fine. Yeah, because then I have the farm, I still eat my own vegetables. I had jara, I still bring in some income inside.
SPEAKER_01:So yeah, but at least you could pay for a lot of other costs because not do you want to go to Howard and say, Oh, we'd love to buy your beans, but first we need to sell. And first you would like to also make that as sustainable for everyone as possible. Yeah, and you need to do some RD. Like, how many versions did you make before you landed on? You're constantly iterating you did a new version already now, but it wasn't something like, oh, I had the recipe ready, no.
SPEAKER_00:Like, how much did you need to uh it's funny because we had our recipe, yeah, and then with Edwin, we just well actually he did an amazing job. And we scale up the recipe from four kilos to 800 kilos, which is not easy, I think.
SPEAKER_01:Nope. To keep it consistent, because there's one thing of doing that in your blender and in your semi-professional kitchen, there's a whole different thing. 800 kilos. Okay, just people imagine 800 kilos of production, your bag boxes now are half a kilo, more or less, a bit more, which is like 1600. Okay, yeah, that's an interesting okay. So, how did that go?
SPEAKER_00:Then it was quite funny because you might think that in order to increase a recipe, you use times the amount of times 800, yeah. And it's not, it's just then you see the amount of salt, and then you see something's wrong. So then it's of course you have to see you have to have some knowledge about it, and then also to be able to scale up the recipe.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, it's not cooking anymore, it's like food production.
SPEAKER_00:Exactly, exactly. And then we also had the challenges on the on reaching those volumes and those amounts because we could do in our hands the production of uh hundred to two hundred kilos, but beyond that, then it was not possible to do so. So then we also did this. It was a 10-month program with one session of once a month.
SPEAKER_01:It's a food pioneers in Flevoland, and then which I think Yossi is on the farm now, as part of that, right? Small worlds, I think so, yeah. Very small worlds, yeah. So then or organize that, sorry, yeah.
SPEAKER_00:So the thing is that I started the program with Jara. Ah, yeah, I remember. And then halfway the program I say, screw this, sorry, not sorry, but then I'm just I just see way more potential with Famole. And then what was their reaction?
SPEAKER_01:Because sometimes these things are very rigid, and sometimes they're like, Oh, yeah, of course, this makes sense.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, they were not happy at the very beginning, but then I made my case, I explained to them, and then they were like, Okay, it's actually made a lot of sense. The scalability, the impact, the now the like sticking boxes, regenerative agriculture, plant-based transition, incorporation of fiber in the diet, CO2, CSRD, etc. etc.
SPEAKER_01:All the acronyms we need to. And shout out to Alice, who connected us actually, and who I think was helped you with that as well, was partly part of that, right? Yes. Funny, she might listen to this at some point. We're now being observed. I'm just bringing you, and I'm gonna we're gonna we gotta open a quiz. Which animal is observing us? You would never ever guess this. There are four llamas basically. Three llamas and a small one. As long as they don't spit. We're gonna have some trucks because we're turning around, we weren't around a big field, so we're gonna have a bit of background noise, but we're gonna deal with it because we're in the land. And so that accelerator or incubator helped you figuring out okay, how do I process this at scale? How do I make this at scale?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, so then one of the organizers that really just encouraged me and just, yeah, this is a great idea. It makes so much sense. It was also like Fababins or in in Dutch, it's Felborn, and it's really crop that is connected to the Dutch heritage.
SPEAKER_01:So did you bring things like when you made that case to the organizer as well? Did you already have some trial batches just to make sure, look, I am also able to make this? Always taste, because you always bring it around.
SPEAKER_00:Yes, I always have it with me.
SPEAKER_01:King is taste. The proof of the pudding is in the eating, right?
SPEAKER_00:No, taste is kidding. I said it wrong, but anyway.
SPEAKER_01:And then the so I think the king in the Netherlands also likes to taste. You will get it to him. I'm pretty sure. In the next, I was gonna say year, but as you win prices left and right, get invited everywhere and everywhere. That would be funny.
SPEAKER_00:In a year, the king would have tasted, we would have tasted your uh so then at the end of this uh incubator, then we had the possibility to pitch to in front of uh 100 people, and then one of the judges actually really liked the project the product and the project. So he was just like, I can put you in contact with someone that can help you scale this. And then it was just like, sure, why not? Then the he put us in contact with two companies, and then one of them answered back right away, and then uh they were really interested in the idea, in the project, and then they see like a great potential, so they were just like, Yeah, come and uh we can talk about we can start talking about it. And then uh we did some samples with them, and then the scaling up process continues once we met them, because then they have, and then it's like one of the things that I also learned in the incubator program is not to be afraid to partner with a big company because a lot of entrepreneurs are afraid that they're going their idea is going to be stolen or like going to be taken away or something, which could happen, you have to be conscious, of course, but the chances you're gonna build your own factory and buy equipment, etc., are just very small.
SPEAKER_01:Exactly.
SPEAKER_00:So then we partner with one of the biggest guacamole producers in the world. Oh the devil!
SPEAKER_01:Oh no, this took us this took a plot turn that every expectation.
SPEAKER_00:But then it's because also he sees the market shifting. So then he also sees an opportunity for us, but also for himself, to really work with young entrepreneurs that are wanting to make impact. And the factory and everything is quite like the process is similar after the beans are cooked. You need the same equipment. So we were actually able to scale up the recipe and be able to produce willingly one ton per day if we want. Wow. Now we just need to sell. But we are there in scalability, we are there in sourcing the beans, we are there in the story, we are there with the impact. Like we are there in many different aspects.
SPEAKER_01:And so now, quote unquote, we just need to sell. Then what was your what is and what's your strategy or your steps there? Retail, direct-to-consumer, markets, like the food service industry. Or we start with and what's your thinking there? Because that's there's so many options and everybody has opinions.
SPEAKER_00:Of course. We started with the food service, and then we just we did this way because then the actually the marketing and communication is less. If you go retail, it's a lot of big investments from the very beginning.
SPEAKER_01:So then you have to reach less people, they buy more once you're on board.
SPEAKER_00:Exactly. More, less, less talks, more volume.
SPEAKER_01:Not easier, of course, because they're for sure pressure on prices. Yes, of course. How do you get your story in front of people when they don't actually see your packaging? Like the end consumer.
SPEAKER_00:Exactly.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:But then, like, this is one of the things thinking in how we think in the regenerative mindset. We are here to serve. How can we actually help everyone in the chain while helping ourselves to just also bring the change that we want to be? It's just basically that.
SPEAKER_01:I'm laughing because like I can almost hear the people that were like, oh my god, it became like the only like financially focused capitalist. And then they can hear their shoulders go, ha, okay. Luckily, there's a of course there's a region angle here. But it's interesting. Did you meet a lot of resistance to that mindset in your journey over the last year? Like partnering with a big company. Like, how does that then go when you're on this mindset of let's make everybody flourish?
SPEAKER_00:It's interesting also because one of the things that really people have this thing that when you grow or when you're successful, money corrupts you. So this there is this wrong idea of like money in as a very loud cooling machine for the potatoes that will be gone in a few seconds.
SPEAKER_01:Okay, let's go back.
SPEAKER_00:You said there's this idea that money that there is idea that like money corrupts you, but it's not really that. Like money is a tool.
SPEAKER_01:And it's also like the whole theme of this podcast, basically. You choose how to use it, it can be super extractive.
SPEAKER_00:If God really enables you to do the right thing, like at the end of the day, let's also be super frank. Everyone is in the business of making money. Like, you don't make a business just for charity. But then, of course, if you have the possibility to add all the things you're adding into the system, conversation, CSRD, health, and all this is just like a freaking change in the whole like business concept of creating something that actually can add more than what it actually takes, and that is what we are doing now in this in our small scale. Yeah, that we're moving towards and forward to make it that it has impact that is bring brings regenerative agricultural practices that brings health into people's diet, that and then it's also because everything is connected. Like we see the many people that see the food. Chain as links. We see them as a whole. If you put the amount of biodiversity that we have lost in from the fields in your gut, it's like it's aligned if you put the graphic. So then it's okay. Let's bring new things, let's add new crops, let's bring more diversity in the soil and also in our diet.
SPEAKER_01:Specifically, probably to people that don't do that normally. We're not the crazy foodies that anyway we're eating fava beans or anyway we're fermenting whatever, etc. But that's 5%, 10%, maybe. And most people are suffering from fiber shortage, from suffering from for sure, legumes in general, protein and exactly.
SPEAKER_00:This is one of the things that we really thought with mole is you can really add a good chunk of protein and fiber in your diet without changing your eating habits.
SPEAKER_01:Like two spoons or a few spoons on your bread and or whatever you use mole, sauce or cream, and you're done.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. Exactly. So then it's we are helping people if they want to make a change without really changing. Because one of the things that we see is like people don't like change. And even though it's the only constant variable in our life. So then it's like, okay, we offer you something, you do have to change, but you're changing without even really realizing that you change.
SPEAKER_01:Or even if you're in like a canteen, like a food service of your company or something, and you select left or right, or it's just been pre-selected, and you the only choice is okay, do I want to try this or not? And then, but it looks familiar, it smells relatively familiar, you can do the same things as you with other things. Taste is great. Yeah, what's there? It's really healthy for you. The price is not outrageous because that's probably also why this is partly possible, because you choose legumes for all the benefits, but also because they don't cost the star and the moon. If you have two like good avocados are expensive for good reasons. Yep. And legumes are this sort of silent master in the sense that they are super healthy, can grow relatively easy, of course, with more development, but also aren't like certain, let's say animal protein, if you grow them regeneratively, it's in some cases much more expensive. Like legumes are an e not an easy, but are uh a good part of your margin, and a nice part of your margin, let's say.
SPEAKER_00:Totally.
SPEAKER_01:Then the also going back into the So the creative gives you space to be that regenerative force in the value chain. You don't have to squeeze, you don't have to, it's not that you're already three times as expensive with guacamola, like how on earth are you gonna make people change? No, this is super possible.
SPEAKER_00:Exactly. And one of the things like that we're saying going back into the strategy, like we started with B2B, and then because big companies, big catering companies, it's just like you change the narrative depending on which whom you're talking. You're talking with big catering companies that they see more price taste, of course, but also impact on sustainability. You can have a really interesting conversation with them because all of them now are aiming to reduce or to reach their CSRD net zero goals and ESG.
SPEAKER_01:And then with just for the acronym people that didn't get that, ESG is environmental, social, and governance, mostly on public companies used. And CSRD, what is CSRD? It's the disclosure, carbon disclosure in Europe, right?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, it's like the sustainability, corporate sustainability goals.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, and so they have to report on that. Of course, they need if you touch food in any way, sourcing and ingredients, etc., are fundamental.
SPEAKER_00:So then, like with that, pharma model can really help you reach, because at the end of the day, it's by working together is that we can do this. So helping you reach your sustainability goals while also now understanding how it is that we're working within the system, keeping the price and your budgets, because you have specific numbers to really be careful on. So it's how can we work together understanding the pain points of the people that we're working with, but then also offering solutions to the challenges that they also have to tackle.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, because of course, if you're running like a big catering company or something, then you would love to include more things, you would love to push probably on the salad bars or whatever you're offering to to the offices you service. But there's so much only so much you can do because you have a fixed budget, which for sure you're being squeezed on that side as well. You have always the churches of staff. It's not that you have a Michelin kitchen with uh 50 people to do a 30 people office, let's say there's a constant squeeze or a constant challenge, and inflation has not been easy in food service, let's say. So, yeah, to meet them where there is space and room to maneuver, and they can do the right thing, quote unquote. It makes a lot of sense.
SPEAKER_00:And of course, now after the lockdowns and COVID and all these things, there's less people working in kitchens. So you have like also a lack of chefs. So they're also looking for products that are very convenient, and then this is just not for the canteens or for the food service, this is also for the people during retail. Yeah, like now, like we have the equipment, we have the like the scale, we have the partner, we have the farmers. So then, like 2026, we're doing the jump into retail because like people also now they're the consumers are asking the right questions, they are paying more attention to the label where they are really seeing and paying more attention to what they eat.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00:So then we also see as like a great opportunity to bring these kind of products into the market, and then just really to make it available for as many people as possible.
SPEAKER_01:And so do you have it? Seems like you're playing chess on many different boards. Has it been overwhelming at all this year?
SPEAKER_00:Sometimes, but then it's also has been really wonderful experience to really see what is noise and what is focus. And then of course how do you select? Yeah, exactly.
SPEAKER_01:How do you filter? See everybody thinking I want that.
SPEAKER_00:Exactly, and then everyone's want something, they want you to talk here, there, or something like this, and then that is just like very interesting. The fact that the fact that yeah, you cannot be every everywhere.
SPEAKER_01:No, you became a bit the impact darling as well, right? You're winning prices, like you're on stage left and right, but you yeah, you have to run a company as well. It helps because you wouldn't have been in touch with some of the processors, some of the things, some of the network. But where do you say what do you say yes to and when not?
SPEAKER_00:Well, now we are saying more no than yes, because at the beginning, when we started, we wanted to be everywhere because then by repetition, people remind remember you. Yeah, and then now, after 11 months of being really active on LinkedIn, on events, on first, on the farmer events, markets, tastings, then okay. Now we actually need to focus in the quote unquote put it like this, in the boring part of the job that is the most important part of the company. Yeah, exactly.
SPEAKER_01:So, how are sales going? What's the current state? We're talking November 2025. Of course, when you listen to this or when this is out, that might be different, but well, it's actually they're doing great.
SPEAKER_00:For we were talking also talking yesterday about this, and also now with Jerome, is that we started and we see that we're also building social capital. And then for that takes time. I'm not from here, I'm from Colombia, and then for that, even though I know a lot of people to just plug and play some things, it just takes time.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, who to call, who to yeah.
SPEAKER_00:But then so far we have done the triple the every quarter the sales.
SPEAKER_01:So and that's only three quarters, yeah. Yeah, that's quite a steep scaling curve. Of course, coming from very low, but if you do that ten quarters, it's a whole different story. Yes, exactly. Three, five, ten. It's a people underestimate exponential growth curve quite significantly. That's what is the Chinese saying or the Chinese story with the rice and the check or I don't know, checkers or chess uh board. Okay, you can look it up.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, yeah, I I heard about it before.
SPEAKER_01:It's very fast, like it's crazy how much exponential doubling. So it's also then that is great because you of course need it, because you need the cash flow and you need the validation, but it also puts quite a bit of pressure on a tiny company.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, of course, and like with that, the as you mentioned, the awards have really helped us. But it's not just oh look, these uh these guys are amazing, but it's also a confirmation of others seeing the potential of it, not just your friends and family or yourself, but actually professionals in the field that says, holy cow, yeah, this this project actually has the potential to reach this this growth. It can it it is already becoming something.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, because let's face it, 12 months ago, it was just an idea. Which is very interesting to ponder on. And so now what are your biggest challenges?
SPEAKER_00:I would say communication, but not it's because what we were speaking uh a couple of minutes ago, like it's just in a constant evolution. So be as like we started with with the alternative for guacamole, now we are owning our own narrative, but then for this you also need education and time. So then it's a way to communicate this, not going into a very boring technical, but in a more fun kind of communication style, and then it's also so that that is one.
SPEAKER_01:The other would be okay, challenges because it's not that you just you need to reach these sales managers in in companies, in like it's not just okay, I need to blast Instagram with a lot of ads because then people recognize the name, and when they're in the supermarket, they buy it. No, this is you need to read maybe when you go to retail, but you need to reach very specific people, a few of them in very specific places, which probably LinkedIn or but it needs to be very not targeted, but specific communication, and then they hopefully pick up the phone and reach out to you.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, okay. One of the challenges right now is I have I'm doing too many things because we're working with the LCA to see the impact of the product. Then we're also working on the communication, we're also in the funding round. So, and then we're also in the sales, marketing, and communication, and we are basically like okay, Edwin and myself, and then we have a team of people that is helping us. They're not full-time, but then yeah, it's starting to pile up.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, so then coming back to your point, what is noise and what's important? How do you keep focusing on that while the noise is increasing? And also what's important is increasing.
SPEAKER_00:Well, sometimes you have some fires that you need to extinguish during the same day. You reach an email and then you have this thing of okay, something happened with the production, it's like holy cow. Then everything stops, then that becomes the biggest priority. It becomes the biggest priority, and then but normally we just have uh now it's well sales.
SPEAKER_01:So yeah, I what's the bottleneck, what's holding you back?
SPEAKER_00:It's like one of the uh advantages or one of the things that I'm good at is let's put it like this, like bringing fish from the deep waters to the shallow waters. But now we focus on bringing the fish home, yeah. Closing, yes, and then of course everyone.
SPEAKER_01:Are you good at that? Are you good at that? Or are you learning?
SPEAKER_00:I'm learning. I'm not good, I'm not that good at it yet.
SPEAKER_01:Okay. Closing deals is a very different skill than fishing deep the fish from the deep sea to the shallow one, yeah.
SPEAKER_00:Because everybody's interested, but actually getting a signature on a piece of paper that makes sense for everyone is uh but then also what is very interesting about this whole process is that like startups as us as humans, we want everything yesterday. Yeah, and then it's like this just something that has started 11 months ago, and is look where we are. So then like things, it's like a tree. If you plant a tree, you cannot expect to have uh let's say an apple tree. You can expect to have apples in year one. If you're lucky in the year three, you will have some apples. Doesn't matter how much fertilizer, how much uh compost, mushroom extract, it doesn't matter how much you add. You just need time.
SPEAKER_01:Yes, and you need the cash flow to survive that basically.
SPEAKER_00:That's also one of the things. So then like you have to have the like investment to be able to let's say make it till the contracts until the sales starts to happen. Because they are happening, it's not that we're just sitting there waiting, oh yeah, people will come. No, we are moving every day towards that.
SPEAKER_01:But you're also producing every day, so there's of course the cost, yeah. It's a cash flow can kill a company very misaligned cash flow, very easy. Yeah, of course.
SPEAKER_00:Of course, it sales, yes. And then the as I mentioned to you, we're also looking for investment, and then yeah, we you will guys know more about it later.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, what's the most regenerative way of funding a company like this? It's an interesting question to ponder on.
SPEAKER_00:Because a lot of people have told us, okay, do a crowdfunding and then you do pre-sale. And they say, but then for example, to ship all of this pre-sale in winter is great. But if what if you do this in summer? Yeah. Our product is and then actually we we didn't speak much about the product actually. So it has to be refrigerated, and then we use as much as Dutch produce as possible. Whatever we cannot get in the Netherlands, we get in Europe. Why? Because if we're already not importing other things, why import, like for example, lemon juice? We get lemon juice from Italy, olive oil from Spain.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, why if you replace the avocados coming from Central South America, why do you would you then put lemons from Brazil or something? Doesn't make a lot of sense.
SPEAKER_00:So then also, so like we thought a lot about it, it's okay, let's produce as local as possible, let's distribute also as local as possible. Like our market is Europe initially. Well, the Netherlands and then Europe, of course. And then also we want a product that is a clean label because then one of the things is like you can have in a glass jar a product, and then you have to add stabilizers, additive in order to have a longer chef life. So we have gone for session or HPP, high pressure packaging that is actually gives us a longer chef life. Around 30 days, for sure, we can guarantee for the person of the company that buys it. Yeah, we have a little bit longer due to logistics, transport, etc. 30 days at least we can guarantee.
SPEAKER_01:Eat it within 30 days.
SPEAKER_00:And you have a completely clean product.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, because that's one of the issues with many, and for sure it bothers you as a chef and foodie. A lot of alternative spreads, or like if you look at the ingredient label, a lot of products in supermarkets in general, uh or in food service are let's say there's a list of things there that you can't pronounce, and as what is my component likes to say, if you cannot pronounce it, don't put it in your mouth. Exactly. And but they're there for reasons for shelf life, because that's the holy grail of any supermarket. So, how do you get around that and how do you are how you're innovative in that? Because more and more people, as you said, look at the label now.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, so that's why we went to to through this process of the high pressure packaging because it gives you it gives us a very long shelf life just by controlling the pH, the acidity, and then uh while keeping the product simple and without adding many like new things. So, for example, it's in a vacuum in a in a container and it has uh it's sealed vacuum, yeah, and then it's high pressure like HPP, and then what it does is like you basically compress all the bacteria without changing the organolectic properties of the product. So then once you open and you eat it, then you have the your feeling that you're eating really the fresh food that you actually eat.
SPEAKER_01:It's as if you would have made it in your kitchen with half a kilo instead of 800 or a ton a day. Yeah. Which is all we often food processing is bad. But this is food processing meant to get stuff from your field to your kitchen or your plate intact.
SPEAKER_00:That's the funny thing. When now that you said that food scaling is bad, I was also in that mindset before. And now, can we do something? Yes, what can we do? This, okay, then let's do it. And then, of course, nobody's saying that it's easy. No, no, no. But it's not impossible.
SPEAKER_01:No, and that's we had a conversation with Nicola on their Italian farm in Umbria, and you're gonna meet them soon, actually. And spoiler, no, I'm joking. And they have their own laboratory on their farm to make their jars and a few simple quote-unquote equipment that you would never have in your kitchen. They're slightly bigger than the version in your kitchen, but also a high-pressure or low pressure cooking device, and a few things that just make preservation possible and suddenly not only extend the shelf life, but you could argue, in some cases, even uh enhance the nutrients or make it more with pulses, might be different, but with vegetables, unless you eat them super fresh, they lose a lot very quickly. So, how do you get most of the nutrients or even more on your on your plate when you open the jar, you open the package, etc.? Similar conversation we had with Dan Barber, Chef Dan Barber, and now going into processed food, ooh, but having really good veggies from really good seeds, because of course he has a seed company, and saying if we can put them in tens, that normally are like very shitty food is in in cans usually. But if you do that well, he said if we actually process them well, my my hunch is that they even are as good or even better than fresh, which is horrible to say. It's a chef. He says, I'm a fine dining chef and white tablecloth, but they might even get it, might improve. Of course, we know that with fermentation. So I think we're gonna see a lot of interesting as these machines get smaller, hopefully, yep, get them into the hands of a few farmers or a few companies. It doesn't need to be a million square meter.
SPEAKER_00:facility or etc and it would be very interesting because smaller batches much more control focus on flavor nutrients is not something we uh let's say connect to the processed food industry no the whole line of thug is like how can we make it bigger better cheaper faster yeah self-stable at all costs whatever crap we have to put in and that's because we built a system like that i think there are many people in that system that really want flavor and want that but it's if the conditions are that if that's the rules of the game then yeah good luck hey this reminds me about like the book that you gave me with Anton you gave me this book of the search for the perfect pitch ah Franco Fubini yeah that's it's a really good book actually I have to say I don't know if you enjoyed it but I did enjoy it and it makes so much sense fruit in season is the best food like in in nutrition density in like price in flavor so it is how do you capture that sort of and not freeze it I mean that could be a way but yeah how do you capture that from the field and then if it's not possible to get it fresh how do you transport the nutrients to your plate and through time.
SPEAKER_01:Like then like minimal processing but there's still some processing yeah of course I think we also got allergic to that in some way of course everybody's like ultra processed food and people and the book with Chris Stolligan and there's a good scare around it now which is good. Look at your labels what's in it but lemon juice in stuff is not bad. Yeah there's a beautiful bird hanging over it stays still very well and then suddenly if she see something goes straight down and catches mice too small for a right that's a very long scanning very tiring scanning you need some proper food after that being hovering like midair is a and so challenges etc what are the greatest joys now 11 months in oh man hey like for the big difference like farmer versus food entrepreneur.
SPEAKER_00:Yes one of the things that okay that it is for me is very new is because I've been a chef butcher farmer all these other things in the food chain I've been now working a lot sitting and that's I was gonna say probably on from a physical point of view this is not good. Yeah it's like I've been the I've been sitting a lot I like to work standing and then now I also work out a lot and walk a lot and run and everything.
SPEAKER_01:So that's why we did the walking the land exactly get your one 1000 steps in.
SPEAKER_00:But then biggest joys is waking up every day and doing knowing that what I'm doing will be helpful for the generations that are coming. And then it's going to sound like maybe cheesy but I don't mind isn't just adding it to the merch department yeah which kind of ancestor do you want to be Roman I'm not gonna try to pronounce your name good the good ancestors right so then it's like what kind of love what kind of planet or system would I like to build to live for whoever's coming after that is what keeps me keep us going and then of course the amount of hectares that we are now aiming to put for the next growing season the of course the when they call us to do podcasts or to do interviews because they people want to tell our story and they say what this is amazing how can we help you like the milestones that we reach personally or as a company and just to enjoy those as a startup as an entrepreneur they always tell you that you have to hustle and then you reach something and then you don't even celebrate you just continue the next one and then there's another fire to put out take the time to just enjoy that for even an afternoon. Just go out have dinner go for a walk with your team there are so many other emails waiting on this how can I do that yeah then they can wait because this is one of the most important things where regeneration starts within if you want to be if you want to build a regenerative food system with burnout body then it's just not going to happen.
SPEAKER_01:So in that sense it's just you have to be like you have to embody and you have to be in regeneration to be able to build a regenerative food system and that is something that you don't do by thinking you do by being and so how do you apply that and working in like a com super commercial margin sense here sense there squeezing because not again because we built a system like that how do you keep yourself in the regen mindset we did a whole series on that actually with Emma Chow shout out to Emma. How do you keep yourself that don't allow yourself to be dragged down in margin squeezes and things like that like trying to squeeze your farmers or like how do you stay sane in in the food processing world?
SPEAKER_00:The first thing is to understand that with everyone you're working is your ally not your enemy and then is to just to have open conversation and to ask and to be also in the I what the word I'm looking for integrity with yourself. If you can have you're aiming to get 80% margin and then you like your product is super expensive you cannot sell it or you're squeezing the margin of someone then ask this question are you happy with less margin and then you can share that margin with someone normally a farmer. Yeah yeah so then it's asking the question to the farmer what do you need yeah to be happy and then also in in this of serving others is like also to ask the I can give you examples of some of some companies startups when they go and sell their product they're like you can really feel the energy of desperation of no I need to sell buy my product please it's good because of this and they tell you all these facts and then it's you can feel really this how to say like this like a little bit of rush desperation yeah and then one of the things that we have done is do some due diligence before you go into a conversation see the mission of them see if you is there is alignment if you see that as a company that their mission is to actually help people to eat more local healthy and affordable food then it's okay there is a line in this company. So you're going to go there okay with working together with us what we're going to do is we're going to help you on your mission of bringing more local food affordable to people and while you do that you're going to help us working with more farmers that are in the same philosophy of your values so then you're basically merging the circles and then expanding the whole vision and then for them starting to become like oh this is not a just a sale of a product it's just like an improvement of our good and you ever put are you ever being put in like the corner of the naive hippie cute oh you talk that is that especially in more traditional food processing or larger companies partnering with whatever is that ever a stamp or do people easily lean in to this kind of thinking and doing well it's actually that's a great question and then I'm going to ask I'm going to answer also with the hippie so you are not the people that is ready to work with you is the people that is going to appear in your life if of course that doesn't mean that you're going to be super softy and then you are in the game you are sending emails you're like you're going for it. But then there are going to be some companies that are easier than others. Yeah and then eventually it's just not the right moment to work with that company yet because they need more proof of concept they need a better price they need etc etc but then it's also fine eventually you will know that then you say to them or you say to yourself you know what I know oh wow blueberry you know that they will come back and you will work with them and they will work with you but has that happened like people coming back to even in the short cycle you've been in now they were dismissive or were yeah actually one it was like they gave us a feedback and then the it's funny because in my eyes it was just like okay we have been ghosted and they no they everyone is just so busy that is also like the thing don't take anything personal everything is everyone is so freaking busy doing everything doing their jobs doing their things not everyone is paying attention to you and that's also fine then you just you also need to let go of that and then once then we met on a meeting and I was just like hey I just wondering if you like you see my emails and then like oh holy cow yeah yeah no it's not and then I'm not here to actually tell you why you didn't answer I just wanted to know if you're okay in everything is fine and then I know that everyone is busy but then it was so nice just to see this person just saying like oh Rosa I will and get back to you and then it's like how how can I help you and all of these things and now it's coming back.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah yeah now it's interesting that don't take anything personal in fundraising definitely with the podcast I've chased some guests for a long time and I always say I don't take anything personal I would just keep stalking until they answer at some point and there will be a moment where timing is right where and then we'll record and when the moment is right we'll do that. And but yeah sometimes it took two years to get certain people on.
SPEAKER_00:Not because they didn't want to or because but yeah just scheduling teams around them keeping annoying podcasters like me away etc etc but don't take anything personal just keep going and at some point it does or doesn't work and that's okay there are always others there's always other things which is a yeah but it's difficult because you're selling quote unquote your baby you really want people of course to care about that and then people just don't answer because they have 500 email but emails in their email box which for anybody that sent an email to me recently probably is the case so yeah so then in in that sense it's just like very interesting to also it's never about the it's never about the outer world it's always about the inner and then in that sense it's like and then cover and cover again the hippie the outer is a reflection of the inner so if your inner is in peace then you will have actually the regenerative world right in front of you then if you're not then you can also feel it. That's been a journey for you right to keep that to bring that regen world inner yeah it's actually one of the things that I have learned the most in these past one and a half years. This is turning into a farmer philosophy episode yeah exactly but then it was just like very interesting because even though I worked in regenerative farming building a regenerative brand I was not willing regeneration in regeneration within myself and then the then I did all my process I worked on myself I did the things and now just okay you did your you did with your stuff now you go and it's going which of course doesn't mean there's correlation but we can say I think it's an interesting such an interesting piece hence we did the full and we could do another 10 episode with Emma if anybody wants to support that on the regen mindset.
SPEAKER_01:Like people say okay does it have to come first before regeneration or together and or first regeneration and then you roll into the mindset I don't really care. I think it's an essential piece to go long I don't think you can do this work more than I don't know a cycle of seven years or a few years or whatever your cycle is if you're not also in a regen mindset. And the interesting thing is of working with regeneration is that you're forced almost or actually by definition to ask those questions around a lot of things that you normally wouldn't ask. So I think it's a great it's a great Trojan horse to ask those questions. Not everyone is ready to face those questions or ask those questions at the beginning but I see that with farmers that's why we've done a number of farmer philosophy ones now we're turning them mostly in walking the land but they're always philosophical because I don't think first of all I think we can learn a lot from farmers that have been on this journey for a while because they get philosophical very quickly because they see life like around them emerging and they're facilitating that and they're not in control and that is scary and weird but also amazing and the farmers we know are also very interesting human beings and that's just and I think it's because they're in regeneration not because they were interesting in the gut and think it's a product they're also a product of the land in that sense. Yeah totally and and you are saying Favamol wouldn't exist in this way if I wouldn't have done the inner work yeah because as I mentioned before like I tried to do it two times and it didn't work.
SPEAKER_00:Three times is a charm. Exactly then then now and then like for the next year of course now it's also like the thinking about the structure thinking about like how to grow the company thinking how to scale the impact but also like how to keep it in the regenerative lens and view perspective so any tips is not the right word like any suggestions any for other food entrepreneurs starting ones or future food entrepreneurs there's a new cohort starting afresh spring next year.
SPEAKER_01:Anybody's listening that might want to sign up or is interested like what as now as a chef a professional butchered farmer region farmer turned and food entrepreneur region food entrepreneur what would be I can say wise words but any things you wished you knew or anything you want to give to if you're speaking to a group of entrepreneurs well yeah you're never ready so just start that's the first thing it's already so good because it's gonna be yeah if you wait for the perfect moment and the perfect business plan and the perfect whatever yeah restart. Don't lose all your savings in one shot though.
SPEAKER_00:Definitely and just be also aware that there is enough if you're looking for funding there is enough money in this world don't get just the first investment because you're in desperate need of money. Coming back to the other point there are others if they're not regeneraled exactly like there is a delicate line between going through commercial and in regenerative in between the lines and we're in the system in which we just went to the other side dance between the lines and why I say dance because if you walk it can be just a steady pace if you dance it's energetically and fun. Have fun is also very important it's also sometimes happen that you get really serious you want to be considered serious you're telling all these like people how to do it better and you have all these ideas but it's also we have this say in Spanish I would say in Spanish then I say in English so you attract more flies with honey than with ice it's such a good one I'm seeing like a whole merch right here it's like at least 10 quotes when if somebody does it just please do it with super post-consumer recycled or region cotton yes please and send a percentage to farmer finance for compost and things.
SPEAKER_01:Have fun yeah but you attract more flies and then just it rhymes in English that's it even rhymes in English.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah well I had to make a little bit of an adjustment zero with my Spanish and then also just be aware and this I learned not long time ago that be aware that sometimes 99% of the work doesn't work let's put it like this if you are if you have your river and you're building a trench towards your fields to get water 99% of the shovels to get the to build the trench is not bringing any water but that one last shovel lets the water flow so then you can do 99% of the job and don't get nothing back. And then you just need one last one that you don't know well in this case is very particular because you see the water.
SPEAKER_01:But if you don't see you just do so there's a piece on keep going but of course not endlessly but it could be that you put in an immense amount of work and you are so close like you're pushing up the stone up the hill but you don't know how big the hill is because you cannot see over the stone. Exactly because the stone is bigger than you. Yeah and at some point it starts rolling hopefully because there are also many things that at some point you just have to cut and say okay this doesn't work because you tried two times before and it doesn't didn't work. Yeah it's also the last one that I wanted to mention advice is okay sometimes you have to keep pulling for pushing forever.
SPEAKER_00:It's very important when to also say it's it's actually quite easy to start but it's very important also when to say basta no not more not anymore. And it's not there is this misconception of oh if you do that you're a quitter if you do that you're smart.
SPEAKER_01:You're preserving yourself for the next run.
SPEAKER_00:Exactly because whatever it is nobody nothing is failure because this is actually your learning lesson. For example when I did Jara I did so many mistakes but now how far mole is also going so fast because those mistakes I just remember this so then that that I had to do again that was a super easy sprint.
SPEAKER_01:So many entrepreneurs successful ones now have done multiple not failures but it's not that they stumbled upon their success overnight or and and doesn't mean you should keep going but there's a huge yeah how to document your lessons how to learn from them how to not do that again. Like now if you would set up like next to like we were talking about some successful food entrepreneurs in the car and if you recognize the patterns okay we need a product that's really good for farmers. There could be other ones in the future if we talk in a few years really good for farmers really good for the soil not a crazy price because then we make a product with a margin that's accessible great taste needs to fix something for for people as well either fiber or other things were missing there could be 10 or 20 like that that's not limited but definitely not one. And then you would have so much experience and I'm not saying it's easy none of that is easy and we might make a few mistakes you might fail once or twice but you probably won't make the same mistakes you made with Yara.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah it's and it's exactly also like going back to Faumole conversation like at the beginning there were people selling okay but do you have one product and then it's just okay you have Faumole and then can how can you really build a profitable successful business with one product and then no now with the conversation we had about opening to the mole.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:And then we also expand the category and the possibilities of our production. So range, sorry. So now it's just not Fava Mole, but it's just it's just about mole.
SPEAKER_01:And then mole skin. Oh no, that's books.
SPEAKER_00:And then you actually can do way many more things. You can even go to limited editions with, for example.
SPEAKER_01:That's a great experience here with an and Tomasu, which we featured a few times. They do have a very successful product. A lot of other products in the pipeline. Some limited editions every now and then they do a stumble, very good margin, so they can pay the farmer in this case you're doing really well. And of course it's a lot of risk like cash flow storing soy sauce for two years in a barrel is not the easiest thing for insurance nor your cash flow. But it's it works. Like there's space if if you would have said if you would have pitched that to someone we're going to make an expensive amazing flavor. Like you're once you taste it you can never go back to mediocre soy source in Europe and it's going to compete with the best Japanese. Like nobody would have invested in that. These four guys were like yeah we're going to do it. It took a few years and they had some space and money to do things but they and now it's ah that's a category we can do other things that where time is our friend and fermentation makes sense and blah blah but until they proved it with this nobody even considered it.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah so then the who knows in a couple of years. Yeah exactly and then there is so much to actually to still develop like there is I'd say we have to eat a lot more legumes so there's a lot of space to do that.
SPEAKER_01:Oh my God.
SPEAKER_00:Like then with with fermentation precise fermentation there's so many things that actually just like we can do now like with legumes and the products.
SPEAKER_01:And they really are like a great Trojan horse but also a great machine in for regeneration. Not to say the engineering mindset but like there's also it's just very difficult to do them wrong. That's the on the growing side but also in in recipes of course yeah but there's a big need in in Europe and we'll do an episode on that in the near future on a just protein transition. Which yes animals are part of that don't worry. But also we need to actually get a lot better at growing proteins here like legumes etc because in Europe because we're very dependent on other sources. And then we need to get a lot better at cooking them and eating them and including them everywhere.
SPEAKER_00:And uh in the meantime you can just eat more male no worry we've been eating it.
SPEAKER_01:Every time you bring it it's like disappears. It never gets to the 30 days I can tell you it's the girls love it and we like it. And but we also see yeah like even though how we eat legumes and chickpeas and easy soups etc compared to many others I mean the girls just snack chickpeas out of the organic out of the can and or not out of the can but straight and beans and big beans and small beans and colored ones and it's all funny and it's all nice because it's all a snackable size. Yeah. Not hard is making easy hummus or some kind of cream it's really not that complicated. But I also realized that because partly being with different food culture that's just very different. And I know here it's just not that like feldbone are such a fundamental piece but I would I think if we go house by house now nine out of ten wouldn't have an idea where to get them from even though they grow in this on this island basically next door like it's not a given so we need to do a lot of education on that side as well to make legumes much more to make legumes great again. Yes for the merch edition.
SPEAKER_00:But then it was also just like to really now it's one of the things that really I love the most is just like to be able now to be in this new chapter of from chef to butcher to farmer to now build in the Fava mole is like I'm doing something completely new at a new scale that I never experienced before. So of course there is a lot of uncertainty but then I'm so certain that it's this is working that like the uncertainty it doesn't stop me. And then it was it is also also doing things that I never done before thinking like marketing communications to reach a bigger audience things to do in social media to make these kind of reels and like right now we have like this with the phones we have a megaphone that actually we can reach people.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah that's what do you tell and you don't want to be against something like you said before that with the story and the narrative to get more people like on board or in into it and what's the most scary thing though oh the personally it's like for me too is to be in front of the camera.
SPEAKER_00:I don't know why.
SPEAKER_01:Last time we filmed it this time we didn't yeah partly on purpose partly because I thought the weather was going to be horrendous and actually turned out to be lovely. But like on camera on stage those things no no like like social media I could see you needed to be not to be pushed but it's a step to take you want to be face famous or but maybe it's needed.
SPEAKER_00:It's also you but maybe it's needed I'm not saying it is but then it's also what I have realized about myself here we're talking now we're just talking and it's just being really nice whatever comes in the mind the answer and everything once you put the like a cell phone in front of me to a reel or whatever then I go into like performance but it's an interesting point who made that George of Wild Farm because coming from TV career as soon as you put a camera on people most people they like go in perform mode or at least very conscious and the bigger the camera of course I try to find the smallest camera possible but everybody now knows that a phone is a camera and some people just go into dance mode and they love it which is probably also not a responsive one.
SPEAKER_01:Like a camera which why we resisted a lot of the filming always because it's quite a it's quite an intense thing like looking into or knowing that you're being filmed compared to knowing that you're being recorded. It's it is a different that's why I I love this format where we just walk and talk. And yes we have microphones but they've disappear or bland away and it's yeah it's true a camera is a very different we've done quite a bit now we did a video course which is like an almost full day into talking into the camera and it's a weird thing. Not sure if I like it. And then also I like being on stage I like chatting like with friends and like question and answers and it's different with an audience.
SPEAKER_00:Camera you just don't see the audience like it's yeah that me too I now got used to more being on stage and then being in front of talking in public that's no let's say challenge on that. And then also like for example how to say it hate comments of these kind of things is just this is funny. When you start saying something and then people start getting pissed that means that you're doing something true no reaction like shit reactions is better than no reaction. Yeah for sure but then like how do you you're not a golden coin so everyone will love you for sure. Yeah but then it's how do you did you ever take that personal or how did you no I'm also just saying of if don't take anything personally but then someone told me this once it's like why you have one bad comment where your attention grows where your attention goes that grows.
SPEAKER_01:Why you're focusing in that in one that is bad and you have 37 that are positive because our mind it's the same with investing in money where they did a lot of research like it feels I'm gonna say 10 times worse I don't remember it's I think Daniel Kahneman that did the if you lose 10 euros you're gonna or if you gain it or you find it on the floor on the street or something. Those two experiences the one losing it is you're gonna remember that way longer maybe three times probably nothing. And that's very interesting so you're gonna be like hanging on to that's why we're a lot of people are risk averse compared to because you lose like when you lose it it's just gonna linger along way longer than when you win the same amount which objectively of course we're not a homo psychonomicus because that should be the same. If it's the same amount of money it should be the same but it's not like our mind is very much connected to so one bad comment potentially is in the same piece of your brain like you're gonna hardly write about the flavor or that it doesn't make a difference or blah blah blah. We get comments sometimes that I interrupt too much and other things or I'm too talky. But it doesn't hurt but it's interesting it gets more to you than the positive one which is ridiculous. It comes back to you we were actually at this spot now when celebrating the wins like when somebody writes an amazing comment or amazing feedback please keep doing that because we don't we always celebrate them whenever they come but celebrate them and really spend time and stand still with the positive ones. And with that I think it's a good one to wrap up thank you so much for the work you do for join agreeing on another walking I can see the lamas far away but they're too far to spit and for sharing an exciting new chapter and we'll definitely keep checking in and see how it develops how many molas or other things are going to be around in the next years.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah well that's also something that I mentioned to forget that that now we have not just one flavor we have two and then we have also now three more flavors in the pipeline being developed. So kimchi right is the second one.
SPEAKER_01:Which I had but I hadn't tasted yet because it disappeared somewhere as it was eaten in the house I left with the kimchi still there and I came back without the kimchi oh then that's a good sign.
SPEAKER_00:It's a good sign yeah yeah then three others three other flavors I was going to mention.
SPEAKER_01:No it will be a scoop sometime. And then uh yeah no thank you for the invite also thank you Jerome for hosting us for hosting us yes thank you to the land for carrying us yes for not being even though it rained all night it the water maybe you can really see great the water absorption. Yeah water absorption because we look at the next field where it's very swampy it's very swampy we would have been in a different and thank you for the sun and not the freezing wind because it was snowing yesterday. Yeah to make it actually a very pleasant walk. Cool nice then we'll see each other again soon absolutely amazing you made it all the way to the end first of all thank you for listening as we walked as we found some llamas as we of course got some noise and I think the wind was okay it was quite sunny and of course we talked as legumes. So what I'm very interested in is how do we continue that push or pull like how do we make sure like in many other cultures legumes are just an intrinsic part of diets and we probably have to learn how to cook them again and a proper part of rotations and of course so there's there seems to be very little that can go wrong not can go wrong very little downsides or negative effects etc there's a very positive in intervention which of course doesn't mean it's easy so what we discuss of course a lot is how do you scale something within a system that really values monocultures really values extractive really values or incentivizes a winner takes all etc etc how do you keep your ground how do you make sure you stay true to your regenerative principles and so I think that shows a very nice struggle but it also shows a very interesting potential if we are able to do things like this and we're able to build brands healthy, good for you good for the planet and we're able to impact a lot of hackers then why not build more of those? And of course it should be affordable and of course it should be accessible we discuss all of that and but there's such a potential to do more with brands and with food brands because honestly many that we've seen let's say from the incumbents many that you see in the supermarkets and the average stores of course you have exceptions are highly processed not good for you not good for the planet and nor very cheap and so there's this huge open space to do more with that and I'm very curious and very much looking forward to covering that more times here on the podcast. So thank you for listening and see you at the next one. Thank you for listening all the way to the end. For show notes and links discussed check out our website investinginregenerativeagriculture.com slash posts. If you like this episode why not share it with a friend and get in touch with us on social media, our website or via the Spotify app and tell us what you liked most and give us a rating on Apple Podcast or Spotify or your podcast player that really really helps us. Thanks again and see you next time
