Wilma The Wonder Hen Podcast

EP 20 Grubbly Farms: The Heart & Science Behind The Brand

August 15, 2021 Melissa Season 2 Episode 1
Wilma The Wonder Hen Podcast
EP 20 Grubbly Farms: The Heart & Science Behind The Brand
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Show Notes Transcript

Today's guests are Patrick and Sean founders of Grubbly Farms.

Since 2015, family-founded Grubbly Farms has been pioneering the use of healthy and sustainable insect-based pet foods. The protein comes from black soldier fly grubs sustainably grown on leftover fruits, veggies and grains that would normally go to waste in a landfill. As Grubbly's earth-friendly, farm-fresh recipes give love to the planet, they also keep our fluffy ones happily nourished with foods they naturally love.
We discuss:
1. A little background story of the founders.
2. Why they started Grubbly Farms
3. The science behind their pet food line of products.
4. How they’re helping the environment by reducing food waste.
5. Tips for a healthy flock.
6. The future of Grubbly Farms.

You can follow Grubbly Farms on Instagram:
https://instagram.com/grubblyfarms?
utm_medium=copy_link

On the web:
https://grubblyfarms.com/


Grubbly Farms is running a special for first time customers until the end of August! 25% off your first order!
Wilma’s Affiliate  link https://bit.ly/3yIglyI

Support the show

“Where education fuels compassion.”

Mel 0:01

Welcome back. I'm Mel and you're listening to Wilmer the Wonder Hen podcast. Today's episode is a little mind blowing because I have on the show today I have Patrick and Sean of Rugeley farms. I know who isn't excited.

 

Mel 0:20

But I do want to ask a quick question. Before we start, I want to know how does it feel that millions of chickens absolutely are madly in love with you? I mean, how does that feel?

 

Sean 0:32

It's, it's amazing. You know, sometimes I still have to process it and we will randomly meet people that will know grumbly farms and it really puts a smile on my face when they bring it up without knowing that we're the founder. So it really is an incredible experience.

 

Unknown 0:49

Today's guests are Patrick and Sean of grumbly Farms. Since 2015. Family founded grumbly Farms has been pioneering the use of healthy and sustainable insect based pet foods. The protein comes from black soldier fly grubs that are sustainably grown on leftover fruits, veggies and grains that would normally go to waste in a land field. As grub leaves earth friendly farm fresh recipes, give love to the planet. They also keep our fluffy ones happily nourished, with foods they naturally love. You're going to get an insider's view of what gravelly farms actually started their company for and it wasn't for our pets. Okay, so I kind of want to break it down because there's two of you. I just want to hear in the beginning backstory of each of you like something personal, you know, did you grow up on a farm, you know, those types of things. And we then we'll dig into like the meat and potatoes. But this way, I think our listeners can kind of get to know you a little bit. So I'll start with Sean and see how that all started for you.

 

Unknown 2:06

Yeah, so my name is Sean Warner. I am born and raised in Georgia. And I guess I did not grow up on a farm I grew up just in the suburbs. However, I have always loved animals in nature my entire life. And I've had a variety of pets from your dogs to lizard snakes, even a scorpion for a while. However, I really didn't even think of chickens as pets for a number of years growing up. But I actually worked at a vet throughout all of high school and really considered going into veterinary sciences in college. However, I ended up going to Georgia Tech and graduating with a degree in construction management.

 

Unknown 2:48

Wow. Yeah, that's totally different from where you are today. Hmm, life just has a way of doing that, doesn't it?

 

Unknown 2:55

Very true. I never thought I would be in the insect or chicken industry to be honest with you. Yeah, that's kind of gross. It's just gross. I fall into love it. It really is fascinating.

 

Unknown 3:08

But yeah, that's true. That's very true. So Patrick, we'd like to hear a little bit about you.

 

Unknown 3:15

Oh, certainly. So, like Sean, I did not envision that I would be here. Um, so I unlike Tron, I always I've been into entrepreneurship. I started two tiny companies during college. One was a computer company and other one was a clothing company. I went to school for August. I initially started as an engineer but ended up switching my major to business and I'd always thought that I would start somewhat of a tech company when I was growing up my dad worked for Apple and Kodak so that's the world that I grew up in and never in a million years did I think that I'd be going towards insects and chickens and food on it especially because I for those who know me pretty well. I have a definitely fear of insects or guest bugs and Joe mostly like cockroaches, spiders, millipedes, centipedes, um, so only one of this is a named natural insect, right? So it was pretty weird and people were pretty confused when I was like, You know what, I want to start a I want to start a bug company Shawn. What I've come to love them. They're they're really are super, like, docile and like a gentle bug. I show my have a picture of a stand inside a gigantic fly breeder that we built that has like 10s of 1000s of flies all around us and they're landing on our eyes and face. glasses. And I'll say definitely was great immersion therapy for

 

Unknown 4:51

forgetting your fingers. I don't even know. I mean, can you imagine? I mean, what did your family think? I mean,

 

Unknown 4:59

they thought we were a little Crazy, I think they saw the passion. And you know, we obviously pitched the concept to them. And I think, you know, they understood building a more sustainable future and a more sustainable, like, contributing to up to a more sustainable agricultural system. But yeah, it was it was an interesting pitch to them for both of us to turn down job offers out of college and pursue this full time.

 

Unknown 5:23

Okay, but where did the idea for the black soldier fly grubs come from? I mean, instead of mealworms? Cuz that's completely different, right?

 

Unknown 5:32

Yes. So, you know, within the insect industry, it generally falls into soldier flies, mealworms, and crickets. But we really became fascinated with the black soldier fly. It was my last semester at college, I believe, Patrick, a similar timeframe for him. And we read an article about the insect industry and just became fascinated with the overarching concept. And just for a quick refresher there, basically these insects are bred in large scale commercial facilities, you collect their eggs from the flies, and then hatch them into neonates, which are actually the baby larva, you then collect food waste from different organizations and processing facilities haul it back to the insect facility, and then the grubs are raised off of the food waste, as they eat through the food waste, they can convert it into a fertilizer and then once mature, the grubs are processed into fats and proteins that can be used in a wide range of animal feed with the main goal of really replacing fish based proteins to help prevent the overfishing of our oceans. And, you know, we just became absolutely obsessed with that entire concept and said, that is the future of agriculture. You know, I don't care that we don't have a background in biology or chemistry, we want to be a part of it. And you know, that was just the initial concept that we just dove in headfirst.

 

Unknown 6:51

Wow, I would have never imagined that you know, someone, okay, you have to look at as a consumer, because, you know, we have the big flocks, you know, we love our birds, we, they have names, and a lot of our guests, previous guests, you know, they use them for chicken therapy, when we bring out the Grizzlies, you know, it warms our heart because it makes them so happy. And they love us so much. So we, you know, kind of brings into perspective when, you know, when I opened up my grumbly loved hub, which I love the name, you know, there's so much behind that. And, you know, the environment, the like you were talking about, you know, reserving the environment and preserving things, a different perspective. Do you have chickens? Now?

 

Unknown 7:35

We I guess neither of us do. I actually am considering it, we did actually have a probably flock for a while and one of our employees ended up adopting them after we moved out of a certain location. But that is on the top of the list that we do want to actually get chickens of our self. And I actually recently moved so I can now actually have chickens in the backyard.

 

Unknown 7:58

Oh, that's great. Can you give us a little idea of what types of products that grumbly Farms has? Yes. So grumbly Farms offers. Oh, wait, wait, oh, let's back up. I'm no good. I'm sorry. I got ahead of myself. I'm so excited. But can you just tell us how grumbly Farm started? Like, I know you went to the background a little bit, but how did it actually become what it is?

 

Unknown 8:23

Yeah, so grumbly Farm started with really the fascination of the insect industry. And Patrick and I initially actually thought about targeting human consumption. We actually did make a bug burger. And I'll be honest, it you know, I think a chef could have spiced it up a bit, and it might have tasted a little bit better. But that was actually the original origin of grumbly Farms. And ultimately, we decided to move forward with the pet industry. But when we first started, it was early 2015. And at the time, one of the largest bottlenecks of the actual insect industry was breeding the flies, they breed very well in natural sunlight. However, if you know an overcast day comes in or depending on the weather, if the sun's not out, it can hinder the breeding which can then affect the downstream manufacturing line. So what we focused on was actually breeding the flies in an indoor environment trying to replicate natural sunlight with artificial light. And we actually set up a breeding unit in our laundry room at Georgia Tech, and ordered some black soldier flies off of Amazon, hatch them into flies and started breeding from there.

 

Unknown 9:36

Did you and Patrick go to school together? Or you're just okay, y'all did go to school? Yeah, we

 

Unknown 9:41

did. Both of us went to Georgia Tech at the same time, and we lived together. I graduated just one semester before Shawn did so I had actually just started my first job out of college, when we kick this off and that that job only lasted about three or four months before I quit and dove in headfirst to work on drably full time. So how did y'all come up with the name gravelly farms. That's, that's all Patrick right. On. So we were just throwing names around, we wanted the name to be fun, friendly and approachable. We saw other insect companies that sounded like very scientific, it didn't sound like, like something that that the consumer would want to be a part of. Um, so we wanted to have something that would that felt like it was gonna be more consumer facing that felt it would be fun and approachable and really just soften the blow or soften the ick factor of talking about bugs as food. And so we came up with the name grumbly. We thought it was approachable. We thought it was good enough for the time being. And we were like, no biggie. We'll go back one day, but we can't spend like a year thinking about a name before we actually start working. Let's go ahead and start working grumbly is good enough for now. And slowly, as the company went on, we just love the name more and more and never went back to the drawing board. And I think that everyone's really happy with that the company is called crumbly recovery farms now.

 

Unknown 11:14

Yeah, I'll have to agree. I absolutely love grumbly, the name grumbly. Everything you described. That's what it is. That's how we feel as a consumer. And definitely the love tub. I don't know whose idea that was. But it was brilliant.

 

Unknown 11:28

Thank you that I that's Haley, who is the Director of Marketing. She is a marketing and branding genius. So as much as I would love to say that was mean, Shawn, I know Haley deserves all the credit for the vast majority of all the fun puns and names and terms that we have today.

 

Unknown 11:48

It's a very sweet, it's endearing. I think a lot of us trigger chicken mamas can relate to it. So yeah, she did a good job there. I'm so glad to hear that. Going back to you. I mean, can you tell us a little bit more about what that looks like? Like if I if I'm looking at my grub, please, what am I looking at?

 

Unknown 12:07

Yeah, so the grumblings are the whole dried larva. So that is basically the grub and it's matured state that is dried, intact. And that is different from the ingredients that actually go into the chicken feed. That is a protein meal that is very similar to other protein meals on the market. But that is basically a ground powder that has a higher protein percentage. And it really comes down to just the different benefits that they offer to the chickens where the whole dried larva has a number of health benefits. And generally speaking, they're about 40% protein, 40% fat and used either as you know, encourage foraging or a lot of our customers also use them to get the chickens either in or out of the coop while the actual insect meal can be incorporated, basically in a different inclusion rate, meaning the different percentage of the amount that goes into the actual chicken feed. And I guess I don't want to get too technical. But it really comes down to if you're able to more or less isolate the protein content and the fat content from the insect, then you can incorporate them into different products at different amounts. And it really is just catering toward the actual nutritional needs that the chicken have. So you really want to have a balanced diet for them, which is why we have the snack line and the feed line.

 

Unknown 13:35

Yeah, we appreciate that. That's kind of what my next question was, is the different types of products. I know that y'all have a new crumble that came out. My flock absolutely loves it. And they are not fans of the powdery crumble. And we didn't find any powder in the crumble at all. So it's a high quality product. Where is your facility located? Do y'all offer tours? Can people come look? Oh, thank

 

Unknown 14:04

you so much. So we don't, we don't offer tours. And we've actually in order to expand our impact and bring a grub based protein to the chickens of the US and hopefully the world at some point in time. We partnered with with additional bug farms. So while we started growing our own bugs on as we continue to grow, we realized that we were having a really great impact in in product development in educating and connecting with consumers on and we probe a little bit more with you overall like actual manufacturing or rearing of insects so we further partner with cars from around the world. In the US, Canada, Southeast Asia, Africa Europe, partner base with a the top tier top line farms that that meet all of our quality control standards, and then we source the ingredients from them. Then make whatever products so electron was talking about with the insect meal that goes into making the the chicken feed. So we have the pellets, the the pellet feed with seeds and whole grains. We also have the crumble, which is talked about which is brand new. In January, we launched the start to grow growing up, which we're really excited about all of these products, the layer feed, and the CIC, D were actually the first insect based proteins, our first chicken feed based on insect proteins on the market. So we're really happy to be kind of leaders in the industry and bringing this new, and not even new, but really like original protein for insects to the market. So people can start feeding their chickens a happy, healthy and balanced diet.

 

Unknown 15:46

So where are y'all actually located? I mean, like your I know, you talked about your different like seeking out farms to provide for grumbly grumbly Farms. Right, so where are you based? Are you based just in the US or do you have an operation in other countries

 

Unknown 16:03

Oh, we're just based in the us right now. Um, and we only are able to ship to to the lower 48 for the time being. However, our goal is to expand outside of the US probably starting with Canada first, we'd love to be able to supply customers and Alaska and Hawaii as well. They're they're a little bit further out and harder to get to but we'd love to be able to help their chickens out one day. And then from there, I believe that the EU would be another great market saw chickens aren't aren't as popular there but they still are a growing trend over there like there on the US

 

Unknown 16:40

I know a lot of our listeners are from South Africa and they comment all the time just begging someone to send them some grub

 

Unknown 16:50

I that would be amazing to be able to also get into the the South African markets. I've heard wonderful things about about the country and we know a few people who actually operate there. Um, so that would be another goal of ours to dissolve South Africa.

 

Unknown 17:09

And along the way, if there's anything you want to bring up that our listeners you think would be important or valuable to our listeners, then please please You know, comment or jump in or start a conversation and I know our listeners would love to hear are their things for the future are there things that we can look forward to from Grizzly farms, new products, anything like that

 

Unknown 17:35

we certainly do have a long list of new I can tell you guys something you're hiding something from us. Oh, and unfortunately it's good to see that woman I can't comment quite on on what we're going to be coming out with soon but it's gonna be really exciting in the best way to stay in the know is to sign up for our email list which you can do on our website at girlie farms calm, unfortunately not quite ready to share what we're working on but it is gonna be really exciting and we have a long list of great products we want to come out with

 

Unknown 18:08

and on top of that I do want to share that a lot of the products that we have been working on come directly from customer feedback just because you know we really want to make sure that we are offering the highest quality products to our customers and as an example the crumbles that recently launched that was largely due to customer feedback saying they wanted some additional variety on our feed line. So you know one request that we have to our customers is please continuously give us feedback because we are listening to you

 

Unknown 18:38

yeah, we as chicken keepers we deal with a lot of different companies and brands and things and I will say that grumbly farms and I know not just me but a lot of our listeners are very adamant about stating how good you are as customer services I don't know you know how connected you are with your customer service people but they definitely get big kudos from us chicken mamas for sure.

 

Unknown 19:02

But thank you i i that is near and dear to my heart. Um, it was only a year ago that I stopped answering customer questions on a daily basis or on a regular basis. It was split between me and Haley Haley certainly did a lot of the hard work. But she and I would tag team customer success and customer service until just about a year ago when we were able to hire our first like dedicated rep on and that's that's something that's really fundamental to our beliefs of how a company should operate on is making sure that the customers are taken care of that they feel heard, respected and helped when they need it to our goal is for every single person whether or not they've bought a product from us before on is to feel appreciated and special and that their major net whenever they they interact with with us

 

Unknown 20:00

When you were describing, you know how the business started, and it was, you know, a lot of scientific stuff that we all appreciate. commendable because you weren't looking to market something like you weren't trying to bring up just flash and, you know, designs and things like that. You were looking purely at nutrition.

 

Unknown 20:21

Yeah, nutrition sustainability. That's That's exactly right. And so it's actually kind of coincidental right about that time that Shawn and I started looking at insects as food and my parents on had chickens. And my dad was feeding them mealworms and goose Tell me about them. And so I should read it. I was like, Huh, it really is sort of, like Shawn do are we should we be going into mealworms and instead of filter fly grubs. And what he and I Shama discovered is that while people were feeding their chickens mealworms, there really, there really wasn't much going on in terms of like health for chickens coming from the worms. Yes, they have the protein content, but that's about it. Whereas black soldier fly grubs and grumblings, in particular, are packed with protein, they're packed with calcium, they're packed with amino acids that are all essential for egg production and feather production. So when, when we looked at, you know what problems could grow up solved in the real world, aside from just being a sustainable protein, chickens were just the perfect fit. And as we started to learn more and more about the backyard chicken market and interact and spend more time with my parents, chickens, we absolutely just fell in love with the people that we were meeting with the animals on, and we really wanted to provide something that had tangible benefits to to whatever customer or animal that we were offering, offering the protein to, and I can happily say that groceries definitely do make a big difference when it comes to stop stronger eggshells, or, or shiny or healthier feathers. We have reports for customers all over that grill these have really helped with molting. And have they've seen a very quick, a very large change in how fast and multi occurs on a growth based diet and typically feeding properties versus versus not.

 

Unknown 22:19

Yeah, you can do. I'm kind of bias okay. But when you open up the gravelly if you've had any experience with mealworms, which I know most of my listeners have, the difference of veal worms and Grog, Lee's is visually, we're not talking even nutrition part first, but just visually looking at them. It's completely different. You know, the the groceries are, you know, they're big and thick and juicy. And those little mealworms are like just tiny, little things. So yeah, I mean, just looking at them as obvious that there's definitely a huge difference. Do you think that there are things that you would have done different? Shawn, do you think that y'all would have done things differently? Do you think you're in on track for where you planned on being? Or is this something that has just blown your mind that you didn't even imagine this?

 

Unknown 23:14

Yeah, on track is a difficult statement, just because, you know, we've definitely had some ups and downs, some, you know, internal pivots. And, you know, it's been a long journey throughout the six years that we've been working on this company, but it's been an absolute pleasure. But, you know, there's definitely been, you know, lessons learned and mistakes from the get go. And, you know, even if, if you want to go back to when we were breeding the actual insects in our laundry room, I mean, that was just a huge learning curve for us. Because, you know, we had to just dive headfirst into the biology and chemistry of the insect industry. And really, you know, as you said, kind of educate ourselves about the actual properties of the insects and figuring out, you know, where we can cater toward or like, what market we can cater toward, that will actually have those tangible benefits. But you know, as far as some potential, I'd say, actually, one of the largest learning curves that what really went through was really as we continue to educate ourselves on chickens personalities, and that, you know, every chicken is different. And it's kind of a funny statement, but until you've really had pet chickens, you might not really think that and, you know, working around picky chickens has been an interesting thing that you know, every chicken, you know, they're visual eaters, and some chickens like certain elements and other chickens don't. And that's where it really comes down to listening to the customers trying to figure out you know, what other product lines we can offer, where if a customer has a picky chicken or chicken that is particular to one ingredient versus another, we want to be able to continue offering a wide line of products that covers the basis there. So, you know, it was it was definitely a learning curve as we continue to educate ourselves on the petrick market but it has been an absolute blast.

 

Unknown 25:03

Do you did you see a rise in sales or anything during COVID? I know a lot of people out of nowhere just decided they were going to buy a whole bunch of backyard chickens.

 

Unknown 25:15

Yeah COVID was pretty interesting for grumbly Farms on. So we we started off 2020 with actually a large push to go into retail. And those efforts kinda stopped dead in the water in March of last year. But what we did see is grumbly Farms is uniquely placed as one of the only chicken companies on that was online first. So we were there for a lot of people who were not able to go to stores anymore, who were not able to or didn't feel comfortable shopping in person. We were already there and set up to to provide feed and snacks for people's chickens. And then we also certainly did see an uptick in the number of people who had chickens on as people spent more time at home and wanted more fun and interesting things to do in and around the house. Chickens are make perfect sense on so we definitely saw a lot of people getting into the hobby, and making relationships with their chickens and with other chicken mamas

 

Unknown 26:23

community. There is a huge community of us. So you may have chicken daddies too. Do you have a funny story that you can share with us Patrick or Shawn whoever or each. We would love to hear it your your fans, your followers, your chicken mamas would love to hear it.

 

Unknown 26:39

Yeah, so I have one in mind several several years ago, I think was four years ago now maybe five on WeChat and I were invited to go on Shark Tank but we had to go through the application process where we you had to tell like a funny video and all that good stuff. And one one shot is a video of Shawn Nye inside one of the fly breeders with 10s of 1000s of flies flying around with which was a lot of fun but but the next one that was very interesting was I actually sat down in a bed of grubs. So I got into one of our grub growing containers and it Sean poured like 50 6070 pounds of rubs on top of me seen and it was a very weird experience to be covered and just these like crawling grubs it they're not slimy they weren't gross or achy or anything like that. It was just a very unique sensation to have all these like little things crawling all over you. Yeah, um so yeah, and then the the noise is actually very weird because you know, you don't think about it but particularly when there's not the the substrate that they're crawling through their their exoskeleton like you can hear the them like moving over each other. And so you hear that? It was like a little gold war, just like this pool of grubs that I was sitting in. Did y'all actually go on Shark Tank? Oh, we ended up not going on Shark Tank. But we are invited to to pitch and unfortunately we did not get we did not make the final cut. But I you know if we do have an opportunity to go on, I think it'd be a lot of fun.

 

Unknown 28:23

Do you have a video of what you could share with us? No. Yeah. somewhere? We'd have to find it. Yeah, I think we do have a video that we could probably share. You got something Shawn? I know you do.

 

Unknown 28:37

Um, I was just trying to think of, you know, one other thing that is potentially noteworthy is really just the the sustainable elements that kind of surround grumbly farms and the insect industry. And you know, that's something that we really pride ourself on just because, you know, we want this to not only be offering a healthy option to your pet, but really building a brighter and more green future for future pets of yours as well. And, you know, for every pound of grumblings that is grown and sold it helps divert 10 pounds of food waste from a landfill. And for those of you who are unfamiliar food waste actually decomposes into methane, which is about 20 times more harmful to the environment than co2. And it's kind of a sad statistic when you start looking at you know, the about 16 million tonnes of food waste that is landfilled every single year, and that's nearly 40% of the food that is actually produced in the United States. So, you know, while we're taking baby steps now we really see the potential the huge impact that this could have as grumbly continues to grow as the insect industry continues to grow. And we really want to highlight the benefit that you know we can pass that along to the customer that they themselves by making that simple decision to use probably farms food and feed. They are contributing to That brighter future that we're trying to build.

 

Unknown 30:02

I know our listeners will definitely appreciate that and we know that's important that just loves it makes us love you and you even more that you are caring about your environment and then you know allowing us chicken mamas to be part of that too and provide a delicious snack to our chickens course course. What is your best selling product?

 

Unknown 30:23

So Grizzlies girl these original or the USA Canada version is, is probably our number one seller. That's also the longest product that we've had around. And that's followed by the layer feed on live feed is the second most popular product that we have.

 

Unknown 30:41

All right, I want to ask you guys a couple of questions before I let you go. Because I am so grateful that you have spent the time with me and on our podcast. We absolutely love you. And I know all of our followers do. So I want to know, Sean, who has inspired you the most?

 

Unknown 30:59

Oh, that's a good question. Um, is it me? Patrick is high on the list. I will say I hope this doesn't come off as cliche but probably my father. And you know, it kind of goes back to the quick story about us initially talking about grumbly farms and the idea of pursuing this full time. You know, he he said, when you're young, that's when the time is to take a risk. And you know, if it does fail, it'll be a huge learning curve and or only benefit you into the future. So he really encouraged us along the way and nothing against my mother. She was right there as well. But, you know, it was the balancing act of you know, do I go to work do I work on grumbly part time and I think it was really just the the support of the family and friends behind us that allowed us to kind of dive into this headfirst and really see where it took us.

 

Unknown 31:53

I love that you mentioned your daddy though. That's sweet, though. Because daddy's don't always get the big hurrah. It's usually you know, moms and that, but yeah, okay, Patrick, you're up next.

 

Unknown 32:05

Oh, that's gonna be tough to be on. While I certainly do appreciate everything that my dad has done for both my parents that have done for me, I absolutely would not be here without them. Um, I actually do have to say Haley, our Director of Marketing on. He's one of the most incredible people I have ever had the pleasure of working with. Her passion day in and day out, is contagious. She is the hardest worker I've ever met. And she really loves, like, just in general, she has so much love in our hearts. If you really cares about our mission, she cares about our customers, she cares about our customers, chickens. I think that she probably cares potentially more than me and she is really incredible on and then one other person who, who I think has made a really big impact on on our life trauma in my life at ecoli farms is a person by the name of Alex is cold, who was one of our first mentors. Back in 2016, we went through a startup accelerator and he was the director of that program. And he was really one of the first people that took us seriously and took us under his wing. He was like, I see a real potential here you guys like are smart. You guys have a good mission. You just need some some additional coaching. And for for the six months that we were in the program, and for the years beyond, he has been an invaluable resource and has helped us tremendously. So I know you only

 

Unknown 33:49

decide between the two. I want to we want to hear all of it. I think that just to see the smile on your face. I know that meant so much to y'all. Y'all are y'all are pretty smart. I mean, we all this genius in one spot. So it kind of took me off guard there for

 

Unknown 34:06

your party kinda I can assure you that we are not that smart. And in fact, I something that Shawn and I like to say is our goal is to be the dumbest people. Because we hire such phenomenal and such smart people that it is and I think that our goal is coming out to be true that I think I'm I might be the dumbest people. I've probably farms. Everybody there is so bright and intelligence. And everyone's so passionate there.

 

Unknown 34:37

I think that is a pretty good answer. I think if you're the smartest person in the room, I mean, how are you going to learn anything? You know? Exactly. That's exactly what Molly said, you know, if always find you find a friend or someone that's smarter than you are and then that is how you learn and how you grow. Could you elaborate a little bit on how to keep our Chickens healthy, you know a few little tips that we could implement.

 

Unknown 35:04

So of course, you know, we have to highlight feeding your chickens a national unhealthy diet. And there's no better way to do that than a grow based food like grumbly layer feed. But a girly girl, these products are really foreign products I'm not now standing on something that's actually stuck out in my mind this year is a really good coupe construction and management. With the heat waves that have been going across the country, this has only become more important to make sure that your flock doesn't overheat. Inside the coop, you want to make sure that there's vents at the top for the hot air to escape, because obviously hot air rises, you want to make sure that your coop is well protected. Um, every chicken parent knows out there that knows that there's predators out there, most parents have have suffered from a predator entering the coop. So it's really important also to make sure that it's secure, top to bottom, left to right, forwards, backwards and inside out. The other thing is, and this all comes back to the coop construction and coop management, you want to build a so it's easy to clean, um, everyone's super busy. So if you have to, if you can clean your coop in 30 minutes versus two hours, that just won't hurt you to keep it clean more often, which will only further help help your chickens and then also jumping back to the heat making sure that they have fresh water and that is replenished often enough.

 

Unknown 36:33

Very good tips. Those are awesome tips. How about you? Shawn, you got any tips for us? Chicken lady?

 

Unknown 36:39

I think Patrick covered a lot of the main ones. I would say the only other thing there I mean, kind of just tying back into nutritional needs for chickens. You know, I think you had mentioned it previously. But you know, chickens naturally forage for insects. So it really is a natural diet source. And sometimes it's a little discouraging when you actually can, like see vegetarian chicken feed. And while I understand the concept there, you have to realize that chickens are omnivores, that a wild chicken will rarely eat, you know, soy and pick out the seed it would much rather go for that grub or grasshopper. So it really does just come down to understanding, you know, the natural diet of the chicken, what they naturally forage and naturally eat and you're really trying to mimic that in the feed that you provide them. And, you know, of course, that is our goal. So other than that, I think Patrick did a phenomenal job as far as the kind of baseline and I think coop construction. If you plan it out ahead of time, you'll be able to save yourself a lot of hours downstream. And I think when we first built our chicken coop it grumbly some some of that we didn't quite take into account. Yeah, I know, we'll definitely be making some improvements for that.

 

Unknown 37:53

Absolutely. We always suggest to make your cube at least four times bigger that you think you're going to need because chicken man what Shawn was talking about with, you know, providing a natural diet, you know, and foraging and finding those items that they would naturally be drawn to, you know, not all chickens like my chickens are free range chickens, we take the risk. They are locked up safely at night. But you know, they do fruit free range most of the day, but not everyone has that ability nor do they want to let their chickens free range. So providing a diet such as groggily that is mimicking nature is a big benefit to the chicken. So yeah, I like that you brought that up. I appreciate you. Absolutely no, thank you. Okay, and we are so grateful. And really we are honored because we do love Grizzlies. And now that we have spoken to you, I know that our listeners will get a more personal idea behind the brand.

 

Unknown 38:51

Thank you so much for having us on. It's been such a pleasure and such a treat for for you

 

Unknown 38:56

to have chocolate I can really appreciate you taking the time and glad that we were able to share you know the story of drably and continue to pass along smiles to the customers and you know, we're excited about the future of drably. So keep an eye out for some new product launches.

 

Unknown 39:12

We are excited to you. Patrick got us all excited with that smile over there. We know something's coming. So we're very excited. But we will talk to y'all next time. Bye Bye, y'all. Take care