Alison Roman's Plan to Conquer the Tomato Sauce Market

Summary

Odd Lots Podcast Summary

Episode: Alison Roman's Plan to Conquer the Tomato Sauce Market

Date: February 23, 2026
Hosts: Joe Weisenthal & Tracy Alloway
Guest: Alison Roman

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Episode Overview

This episode takes a dive into the complexities and dynamics of launching a consumer packaged goods (CPG) business, specifically through the lens of Alison Roman and her entry into the tomato sauce market. Roman, a celebrated food writer and media personality, shares her entrepreneurial journey, exploring what it takes to scale a beloved homemade recipe into a competitive grocery store brand. The conversation traverses topics from supply chain minutiae, recipe development at scale, and the financial logistics of CPG, to the cultural moment of food celebrity brands and the "Lindy" nature of staple products like tomato sauce.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The “Lindy” Consumer Staple Market (02:10–03:22)

• Tech stocks may be volatile, but consumer staples like pasta sauce are enduring.

• "Food is Lindy" — meaning its longevity in culture forecasts its continued relevance.

• Food brands face challenges with pricing, branding, and crowded shelves.

  “Food is essential, but it's also constantly changing... I'm always very curious about how consumer brands actually make pricing decisions, branding decisions, especially because it also feels like an area that's very crowded.”
  —Tracy Alloway (02:50)

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2. Genesis of Roman's Tomato Sauce Business (04:41–07:16)

• Roman’s transition from culinary media to developing a product line was driven by a personal need for high-quality pre-made sauces as her life became busier.

• Initial production took place at her grocery store, First Bloom; demand quickly exceeded capacity.

• She was approached to scale manufacturing, which led her into the complexities of outsourcing and product consistency.

  “As the person whose pantry is lined with... ingredients rather than things... it's funny that I then got into the tomato sauce business.”
  —Alison Roman (05:24)

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3. Standing Out in a Crowded Market (07:16–09:21)

• Most “top” sauces are marinara-style, male-branded, chef-focused; Roman’s goal is to break that mold.

• Offers distinct flavors: classic garlic, spicy fennel, and caramelized shallot anchovy.

• She emphasizes originality: “Does this already exist? And if not, then I want to make it.” (08:48)

  “I want to do something totally different. Even if it's tomato sauce, I don't think they're all created equal.”
  —Alison Roman (08:48)

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4. Scaling a Recipe & Production (09:25–12:17; 13:38–17:00)

• Scaling recipes is not simple math—ingredients behave differently at larger volumes.

• Challenges included caramelizing shallots at scale for consistency.

• Chose a small co-packer in Brooklyn for hands-on oversight.

• At scale, even small ingredients and tweaks require retesting.

  “You can't just send a recipe in and hope for the best. Like, you really have to be tweaking and adjusting.”
  —Alison Roman (11:49)

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5. Sourcing Ingredients and Production Model (17:00–19:22)

• Uses canned tomatoes for year-round consistency, with limited runs of fresh tomato sauces seasonally.

• Dream of using "ugly" or surplus produce is currently cost-prohibitive.

• Highlights the reality that a high-quality, small-batch product would be unaffordable for most consumers.

  “That business model led down a very, very expensive path and I think is achievable at massive scale, but we're just not there yet.”
  —Alison Roman (18:31)

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6. Financials & Risk in Scaling Up (20:28–24:09)

• Discusses the pressure from outside investment—scaling too quickly can erode product authenticity.

• Advocates hiring only when necessary and seeking values-aligned investors.

• Her goal: sustainable growth over hype-driven expansion.

  “It seems like...what you're fed...is like, oh, this brand has $3 million out the gate...That doesn't mean that brand's going to succeed.”
  —Alison Roman (21:21)

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7. The Role of Celebrity & Cult Audience (25:13–26:02)

• Leverages trust and reputation built from years in food media.

• Recognizes she has a cult following eager to support her projects.

  “You cannot buy that trust and you cannot force it to happen over a short period of time.”
  —Alison Roman (26:02)

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8. Distribution & The Shelf Space Dilemma (27:08–29:52)

• The biggest challenge isn't making the product, but getting shelf space and handling inventory logistics.

• Direct-to-consumer (D2C) is the current sales channel; retail would require major investment and proof of supply capability.

• Navigates influx of advisor offers, mostly from women, as she considers scaling up.

  “Right now, I'm...in the thick of these conversations...It's very chicken or the egg...”
  —Alison Roman (27:30)

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9. Operational Challenges: Packaging, Shipping, and D2C Limits (50:09–53:56)

• Shipping glass jars is expensive and logistically complex, making D2C math difficult.

• Packaging must be highly protective, increasing costs.

• D2C is mainly to build initial traction before moving to brick-and-mortar retail.

• Quickly sold out upon launch, limiting ability to undertake major marketing pushes.

  “Jars are heavy. Jars of sauce are even heavier. So your shipping will always be the thing that gets you.”
  —Alison Roman (50:55)

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10. The Future: Media Crossover, Brand Building, and Small Business Realities (34:09–37:07)

• Roman’s media presence gives her a marketing advantage—no need for massive ad spends.

• Contrasts her food-from-passion origin with DTC business models launched by former consultants and MBAs.

• The market is mostly “mom-and-pop farmer’s market” or “$5 million launch at Target”—there’s not much middle.

  “How do you consider what is a middle class small business? Because it feels like it's only extreme farmer's market...or $5M debut at Target.”
  —Alison Roman (36:55)

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11. Food Media, AI, and The Culture of the Recipe (37:07–41:52)

• Discusses the trend of food bloggers writing long preambles for ad revenue and context.

• Roman defends long-form writing as a means to inspire and educate, but also acknowledges need for brevity.

• New tech allows users to bypass narrative (e.g., apps that auto-extract recipes); AI begins to factor in discovery.

  “I do respect that, though. And interestingly enough, it's one of my favorite things to do when I'm writing actual cookbooks. Because you're limited to the page versus the internet. You could write forever...you have to ask yourself, who cares?”
  —Alison Roman (39:29)

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12. Aesthetics vs. Authentic Cooking in Modern Food Culture (47:20–49:23)

• Social media culture has shifted recipe development toward visual appeal over taste.

• Roman intentionally developed “ugly but delicious” recipes as a counter to this trend.

  “We're not developing recipes, we're designing them...people lead with aesthetics and what they think will 'perform well' versus thinking about a soulful, authentically created recipe.”
  —Alison Roman (49:23)

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13. Reflections on Small Business Lessons (Closing) (53:08–54:25)

• Roman is at capacity but has yet to unlock full marketing or distribution potential.

• The journey is ongoing, and she considers this phase a “diary entry of following a small business.”

  “I really am at the very, very start, and I think it would be really fun to come back if and when things change.”
  —Alison Roman (54:13)

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Memorable Quotes

• “There wasn't a tomato sauce like mine...I also noticed that all the tomato sauces were sort of like chef focused and male dominated energy. I want to do something totally different.” (08:48, Roman)

• “You can't just send a recipe in and hope for the best. Like, you really have to be tweaking and adjusting.” (11:49, Roman)

• “Jars are heavy. Jars of sauce are even heavier. So your shipping will always be the thing that gets you.” (50:55, Roman)

• “What I'm really craving is an adult in the room … what’s the order of operations, who’s going to do that?” (30:27, Roman)

• “I am not a business person. I am a tomato sauce person. I make tomato sauce and I make really good tomato sauce.” (21:38, Roman)

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• Consumer Staples & Food Brand Landscape – 02:10–04:07
• Why Tomato Sauce? – 05:14–07:16
• Standing Out Among Giants – 07:16–09:21
• Scaling Up and Recipe Consistency – 09:25–12:17
• Ingredient Sourcing – 17:00–19:22
• Small-Batch Economics – 18:31–20:28
• Funding and Growth Dilemmas – 20:28–24:09
• Distribution, Shelf Space & Scaling Chicken/Egg – 27:08–29:52
• The Realities of D2C vs. Retail – 50:09–53:56
• Reflections on Food, Media, and Branding – 34:09–37:07, 47:20–49:23

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Episode Takeaways

• Alison Roman’s CPG journey spotlights the immense challenges in food entrepreneurship, from recipe fidelity at scale to the fundamental hurdles of distribution and the constant financing conundrum.
• Authenticity and trust—qualities earned from years in the food world—may grant certain advantages but do not eliminate daunting supply chain and operational challenges.
• For consumer staples like tomato sauce, operating in the crowded middle (not hyper-local, not mega-corporate) is both possible and uniquely difficult.
• Distribution and scaling remain the twin peaks every food entrepreneur must summit, often with no clear order of operations.
• Roman’s story is a case study in the value of brand credibility over hype or VC-driven speed, with the long-term health of both the product and the business always in mind.

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Listeners are left with a rare, candid portrait of the complexity of launching a food brand in today’s market—and an invitation to follow as Roman’s business evolves in real time.

Transcript

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[Joe Weisenthal]

Hello and welcome to another episode of the Odd Lots Podcast. I'm Joe Weisenthal.

[Tracy Alloway]

And I'm Tracy Alloway.

[Joe Weisenthal]

So Tracy, we're recording this on February 4th, and a lot of tech stocks have been getting clobbered lately. But you know what's doing really well?

[Allison Roman]

What?

[Joe Weisenthal]

Companies that make consumer staples. All of like the core staples that you'd see in your pantry, et cetera, like your Pepsi Colas and all this stu companies that might make like jarred sauces and stuff. People are returning to sort of the old style basics that people buy in the stock market.

[Tracy Alloway]

Who would have thought that food is

[Joe Weisenthal]

lengthy, amazing food persists? No, but it's serious. You know, it's like the only place to hide right now in the market. Like I look at my screen and everything is bright red. And the only thing that people feel comfortable betting on right now seems to basically be food. The stuff that people pasta sauce and the stuff that people have eaten for all time and probably will be eating for as long as they're pretty people on earth.

[Tracy Alloway]

Right? And this always. So I find this business really interesting because, you know, I joke that food is Lindy in many ways, but, you know, like, food is right, food is essential, but it's also constantly changing, it feels like. And so I'm always very curious about how consumer brands actually make pricing decisions, branding decisions, especially because it also feels like an area that's very crowded. You know, you walk into the supermarket and there's like 20 different brands of, I don't know, flower or something.

[Joe Weisenthal]

No, totally. You know, one of the things, you know, we've done various CPG episodes over the years. Remember we did some episodes about like Celsius energy drink and stuff. And one of the themes that we sort of maybe I hadn't appreciated prior is like that competition for shelf space, the distribution aspect, getting on the shelf, getting a spot in the truck that delivers the beverages to the grocery store or to the bodega or whatever. Like so much of the game is, yes, the brand, yes, the product, and then just the sort of logistical aspects of it. And I think like that sort of. We don't talk about it enough. But as a theme, I love, like learning about this space, how the CPG business works, especially regards to pricing and so forth. It's so illuminatory about how the whole economy works. Is that a word? Illuminating.

[Tracy Alloway]

Illuminating.

[Allison Roman]

Very good.

[Tracy Alloway]

Well, we do have the perfect guest.

[Joe Weisenthal]

I'm very excited to say we do have the perfect guest today. Someone who is in the tomato sauce business but really known for so much more. One of the, I would say, most famous people in the food world these days. We are going to be speaking with Allison Roman. She's a cook and the author. She has a grocery store called First Bloom that I missed when they had a pop up Manhattan location, I missed it. Hopefully that'll get reopened at some point and tomato sauce business called a Very good tomato sauce. So, Allison, thank you so much for coming on odd lots.

[Allison Roman]

Oh, thank you for having me. This is a pleasure.

[Tracy Alloway]

Joe, can I ask you a question before we start, which is I know you love fresh tomatoes.

[Joe Weisenthal]

Yeah.

[Tracy Alloway]

Do you also love tomato sauce?

[Joe Weisenthal]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Allison Roman]

Okay.

[Joe Weisenthal]

You want to establish some baseball?

[Tracy Alloway]

That's right. That's right.

[Allison Roman]

There is room for both.

[Joe Weisenthal]

I'm glad we. I'm glad we got this in. All right, where to begin? So you are this genuine celebrity of the food world. People are addicted and they Love your recipes. I just at home two nights ago, my wife made your. I think it was like a broccoli cheddar soup that you have a recipe for. It was fantastic. That is. It's a deep cut.

[Allison Roman]

Old school.

[Joe Weisenthal]

I've had your famous chickpea stew that went viral. I've had multiple recipes go viral. But how did you decide to get into why? Why, Why a tomato sauce?

[Allison Roman]

I think I. Well, I got my start working in professional kitchens and I worked in editorial and then I sort of went off on my own writing books and doing miscellaneous things. And my whole career as sort of a recipe writer, cookbook author has been teaching you how to cook and being like, why would you buy anything when you can make it yourself? You know, as the person who. Their pantry is lined with, like, ingredients rather than, you know, things. So it's funny that I then got into the tomato sauce business because I've written recipes for tomato sauce and I'm very proud of mine and I think it's delicious and easy to make and anyone can do it. And then the older I got and I married a man who does not cook, I had a baby. The baby does not cook yet either. Unfortunately. I needed to eat more. I needed someone to cook for me. And it just became sort of this question I had of like, why am I so allergic to the tomato sauces on the market? Why am I not embracing of the things that are currently available? And I realize it's because I'm, well, a very picky, B, probably very snobby, C. I just was sort of, you know, like, I do want to make it myself. I do want the sort of control here. So I made it myself. And when I had opened the grocery store first bloom, I decided to start including it as like a line of things that we would keep in the freezer. Chicken broth, beans, tomato sauce, things that we would make in the store to sell to people at the market. And very soon the demand exceeded supply. And I, you know, for all the things that I do, I did not want to be full time making tomato sauce. There was just, I didn't have the equipment, I didn't have the time. And so I was approached by somebody who is in the tomato sauce making business and she was like, why don't you just outsource it and have somebody make your recipe? And I was like, well, how is that going to work? You know, like, how won't people know the difference? And how could it possibly scale? And through a lot of trial and error, I figured out we can scale it.

[Tracy Alloway]

Definitely want to ask about scaling up, but before we do, were you daunted at all by doing tomato sauce specifically? Because this seems to be an area where there is a lot of competition, especially between can think of two, like, big players, which would be Rouse and Carbone. What are those?

[Joe Weisenthal]

And then all the cheap stuff. But I guess those aren't really the competitors.

[Tracy Alloway]

Yeah, I bought the Carbone things once, which probably maybe says something about it. But anyway, how do you differentiate your product from, you know, those names with very, very strong branding and customer recognition.

[Allison Roman]

Yeah, I think it's an interesting thing because sometimes, often people start a business saying what doesn't exist. There's a hole in the market. I'm gonna fill it. And obviously tomato sauce. There are many brands constantly fighting for sale prices and shelf space, but there wasn't a tomato sauce like mine. And there wasn't. I find that most tomato sauces on the market, especially the popular ones, Rao's Carbone, et cetera, are more marinara in style. They are, you know, more uniform in texture. They are sweeter. They tend to have oregano. There's just like a specific vibe that they're going for. And I think to me, sort of modeled after the like old school Progresso, which is what my mom bought growing up. And that's what I ate. And I think that that was sort of the gold standard and people kind of went down that path. And it's interesting because we talk about Carbone as like the, you know, top two. They are not very old.

[Tracy Alloway]

Yeah.

[Allison Roman]

And so we in our consciousness are like, oh, that's the top two. Well, they've only been the top two for as long as they've been around, which somebody can fact check, but I believe it's only a few years.

[Tracy Alloway]

Yeah, I think that's right. Yeah.

[Allison Roman]

So it's not like this legacy brand that I'm competing with. It's just another company with name recognition, a lot of financial backing and strong branding. And I also noticed that all the tomato sauces were sort of like chef focused and male dominated energy. It was sort of like a chef, a guy, a bro, a person's name that was a guy. And I don't know, I just was sort of like, I want to do something totally different. Even if it's tomato sauce, I don't think they're all created equal. And so with everything I do, I genuinely try to ask myself, does this already exist? And if not, then I want to make it.

[Joe Weisenthal]

I have some thoughts about Chef Bro energy But I'm going to save them for after the podcast.

[Allison Roman]

I can't wait.

[Joe Weisenthal]

No, I'm going to save them for after the episode. I want to talk about the entire from your conception in your mind to the end consumer, the whole supply chain. So I want to like, really break it down and understand it. But let's start with, like, how do you scale up a recipe? Because quality control, you have some recipe that you make in your kitchen and you really like it, et cetera, then making it in large batches is a totally different game. And then you're not there to supervise it all the time. Talk to us a little bit about that process, how, just how that even works, such that a recipe that you make at home can be done by someone else at a different facility in volume and it's still the same recipe.

[Allison Roman]

Yeah, I think that you have to consider, you know, there's a lot of knowledge that goes into it of like, your knowledge of cooking and how ingredients, you know, they're not a one for one. You can't just multiply it by 10 and be like, this is going to be the same thing. Also, the equipment is different. How they're doing. Things are different. We have three flavors. We have a garlic, which is sort of your classic, a spicy fennel, which is spicy and has fennel as advertised. And then a caramelized shallot anchovy, which is modeled after the shallot pasta, which is. Which went viral during the pandemic.

[Tracy Alloway]

I think we all at one point probably made it.

[Allison Roman]

If I have no fans, the shallot pasta will still have a million like it is. It is more famous than I am for sure. And that was the trickiest one to nail because the caramelizing of the shallots, the addition of anchovy, I ended up having to go back three times after we had jarred the first batch and adjust the recipe, which I didn't have to do with the others. But because shallots, when you caramelize it at large scale, they tend to get soft and jammy and very sweet, which increases the sweetness perception of the final product. We ended up switching to a different method of cooking the shallots. I ended up reducing the amount entirely, cooking them further like it. The whole thing had to change as soon as we started getting to the batch size. And each co packer is different. So I think, you know, an issue we can. We'll get there. But if you talk about scaling, it's each co packer is going to handle things differently. And right now we're with a pretty small co packer, which I like because I can visit them in from my apartment. They're in Industry City, Brooklyn. And I go there and I can taste the batches. I can say, okay, we multiplied the chili flake in this recipe and now it's way too spicy. So we're actually going to cut it by half, which is it seems to stand to reason that that would be not nearly as spicy, but because of the way the ingredients behave, it is, you know, so stuff like that where you're sort of in the lab, as it were, tweaking as it goes. And I think that the more I explore the CPG world, that is the biggest challenge of you can't just send a recipe in and hope for the best. Like, you really have to be tweaking and adjusting. SC.

[David Gura]

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[Allison Roman]

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[Tracy Alloway]

How big is the tomato sauce making operation right now? Like in people, it's two people. Two people.

[Allison Roman]

Yeah. So it's like relatively small. Yes. They have big, massive kettles. And I think that also when you think of, like, why tomato sauce? Like, I just, I kind of knew that getting there would maybe be the path of least resistance in that I'm not inventing something from scratch. We're not, you know, requiring equipment that nobody has. Like these are kettles that you can make Many different things in. And so co packers are a bit easier to find. These particular co packers specialize in tomato sauce. And most that I've encountered do. And that's like what they do. And so they are, you know, well informed.

[Joe Weisenthal]

I'm sorry, I might ask just a lot of like really remedial questions about this. So let's go deep. The kitchen, the two person kitchen where they're making it, that is a separate facility than the co packer or is it the same entity?

[Allison Roman]

It's the same entity. Okay, so we have, we have the, the place, the warehouse where the tomato sauce gets made. They get the jars in, they sterilize the jars, they make the sauce, they batch the sauce, they put them in the boxes. The boxes then get shipped to a third party logistics warehouse, which is actually not far from where the tomato sauce is made. So we cut down on shipping a bit and that is where the tomato sauce comes from when you order it online. Because right now we are, we do have it in store up in the upstate grocery store. But for a few reasons which we can also get into, we are just D2C.

[Joe Weisenthal]

Got it.

[Allison Roman]

Yeah.

[Joe Weisenthal]

And then again, maybe very obvious question when it comes to, you know, maybe at some point you grow and there'll be 10 people, et cetera, in the food industry. Are there chefs whose job is more or less to specialize in cooking at scale, that basically it's like, okay, someone has an idea for a tomato sauce, like you, you know, you're not, you can't be there every day. Other people who like, have professionalized the art of scaling up a recipe in

[Allison Roman]

volume, I mean, I've never heard of that job specifically, but I mean, the guy who makes the tomato sauce for us, like that is his primary. I mean, he was a chef, you know, did a lot of catering, private chefing, et cetera. And then I think to understand how to make things at scale, you do have. It's a lot of trial and error. You have to like understand it from a different perspective. But even working in restaurants, I experienced this because you take recipes built for a home cook, especially, say baking, you're going to make biscuits for a restaurant. You take a recipe that you like from somebody's cookbook. What, I don't know. And you're like, okay, well now I have to make these biscuits for. I have to make 200 of them a day. I'm not making 16.

[Joe Weisenthal]

Yeah.

[Allison Roman]

And you cannot just multiply that recipe ever. And so I had a bit of experience in, in the baking world. Working at scale, because you're never making 16 of something in a pastry kitchen, you're making 250. So you kind of understand. And also conversely, working at the Bon Appetit test kitchen. When I first started working there, we were doing a lot more chef driven recipes. And when you work in a professional kitchen, you're making sauce, you're making 16 quarts of sauce, you're not making two cups of sauce. So it was sort of reverse engineering that, understanding that it's the same thing. The ingredients ebb and flow, even if you're decreasing. So it's just kind of having that knowledge ahead of time. But I think that's how those people find themselves as a co packer. And as we look into other products to make, it's like, okay, well, these guys specialize in baked goods, these guys specialize in granola. These guys, you know, and they're. That's what they do. So they, they know.

[Tracy Alloway]

How did you go about finding suppliers? Because, you know, I imagine you have some connections with your grocery store to, you know, farmers maybe. But if you're doing it at scale or a larger scale than previously, how do you actually find someone who's gonna provide you with a steady supply of tomatoes or a steady supply of shallots and anchovies? I guess.

[Allison Roman]

Yeah, we use canned tomatoes. In the summer. We will do limited edition quantities of things like, you know, bruised tomatoes, sungold tomatoes, like more in season fresh stuff. But because tomatoes are so seasonal, and I also believe the best tomato sauce does come from canned tomatoes, that part isn't an issue. But it really is. I had worked with this woman, Isabel, who had more experience in cpg, and we sort of figured it out together with my chief of staff, Narni. And it was kind of the three of us looking at numbers and saying, like, who's located where? What is the shipping gonna cost? What tomatoes are they using? What tomatoes can they get? What is their capacity? Like, how, how quickly can we grow here? And so all of those things come into factor because honestly, the type of shallots you're using at that scale, it doesn't really matter. I think it would be my dream to always use the highest quality ingredients. I'd love to use like old, ugly shallots that nobody wants and the bad tomatoes and like make something beautiful from waste. And that's my aspiration. And that business model led down a very, very expensive path and I think is achievable at massive scale, but we're just not there yet.

[Tracy Alloway]

Wait, say more about that.

[Allison Roman]

Basically, that is sort of the issue with CPG in general. And if you want to make a small mom and pop, like locally sourced, like, beautifully made, responsibly pay your workers excellent wages. And it's going to be like a $38 jar of tomato sauce. And it's going to be a very limited market of people that are willing to pay for that. And, you know, I look at my local grocery store and I. The first thing I do is I go to the tomato sauce aisle. I'm just like, gotta know what's going on over there. But you see Rao's and Carbone on the same eye level and additional merchandising behind you. And they are both on sale for $8.99. And that's a 32 ounce jar. Our jars are 16 ounces and, you know, 12.99 or $12 retail.

[Tracy Alloway]

Joe, I'm going to betray my elder millennial status, but I'm thinking of that Friends episode where Monica starts making jam and selling it, and then she realizes that, like, in order to break even, it has to be $17 per jar, which was a lot back then.

[Joe Weisenthal]

That was a lot back then.

[Allison Roman]

Well, guess who else made jam?

[Joe Weisenthal]

And tell us about your jam making.

[Allison Roman]

Exactly. I mean, that was a million years ago when I first moved to New York, and I was working at Milk Bar at the time and used their commissary kitchen to sort of decide I was gonna make jam and sell it at the Williamsburg Smorgasborg when it first launched. And same 2010's lore. Oh, yeah, baby. And, you know, handwriting each label, like getting beautiful weck jars which cost $4 a piece. Like, the economics were so poor, I didn't care. I wanted to do it anyway. And as long as we could make more money to buy more jars and then make more jam, obviously that was not sustainable. It didn't last for very long, maybe a year and a half. But same concept where, okay. In order to get this actually done and to actually turn a profit, you're like, okay, well, that's why people go for the jugular immediately and seek out investment and say, we need to be in Target to launch.

[Joe Weisenthal]

So we've sort of talked a little bit about, you know, just scaling up the recipe. Let's talk about business skill.

[Allison Roman]

Yeah.

[Joe Weisenthal]

One of my favorite books I've read is the autobiography of the Nike founder Phil Knight.

[Tracy Alloway]

Shoe Dog.

[Joe Weisenthal]

Shoe Dog. And he talks a lot about, know, they started small with sneakers, and then there was, you know, this sort of jump where it's like he had the opportunity to get a lot bigger banks didn't really want to give him loans because it seemed dicey. It wasn't like a VC style business. But he clearly needed capital to sort of take it to the next level, like bigger factories, et cetera. Talk to us a little bit about like financial scaling and the risks that involve of like, okay, one day you don't want it to just be two people in a kitchen. You want it to be 20 people or 200 people in the kitchen. Well, that requires a lot of upfront costs and new warehouses. Maybe talk to us about how you're thinking about that or what you've seen on the landscape in terms of your options.

[Allison Roman]

Yeah, I mean it seems like the, what you're fed in terms of like the media coverage of brands and you're like, oh, this brand has $3 million out the gate and this brand has six. That doesn't mean that brand's going to succeed. That doesn't mean that that brand is

[Joe Weisenthal]

in the hole because they have to pay that back. Yes, multiple interest before the founder sees a penny of it.

[Allison Roman]

Exactly. And it also means that there's a lot of pressure to increase SKUs and marketing. And it's to me a very overwhelming landscape that is not rooted in authenticity or something being good. And that to me is always going to be the most important thing that I do. I also want to do it intelligently and make sure that it's not like a financial crazy firestorm. But I think that right now, literally today after this, I'm going to a few meetings, but I am right in the thick of it of figuring out that the answer to that question of like, who do I hire? How do I hire them? At what level? Who's going to actually help me? Who? Basically my desire is to hire somebody. Two people, three people who are excellent at what they do. I am not a business person. I am a tomato sauce person. I make tomato sauce and I make really good tomato sauce. I don't know how to do these other things. And what I do know is that I'm not trying to scale up at such an intense rate that it sacrifices the quality or the integrity or puts me in a position to grow the business faster than I want to. And you know, I think it's interesting because a lot of times people start businesses, especially in the food CPG world where the immediate thought is before they've even made the product, how do I sell it? Like, how do I, what's my exit? Okay, in six years we could, you Know, it's like, what happened to just making a great product that people are really into? And I think I have the luxury of having 42 other jobs. And so, you know, I'm a writer, I do video, I make cookbooks. And I think that knowing that this isn't my primary, you know, the one thing that I'm betting on, but I do think that there's a sort of credibility that's been lost in developing products and I think that people are going to start to want that and I think that they're going to be like, well, why would I buy this person's tomato sauce? Like, because I'm seeing it everywhere, or this one because I trust it, that it comes from a good place.

[Tracy Alloway]

What kind of lenders or investors do you actually talk to for this sort of thing? Is it like vc?

[Allison Roman]

I don't yet, but that would ostensibly be it. I think that for me personally, I've self funded every project I've ever done and I've kind of taken this to its maximum in that I'm, I'm not that in the red. And it will, I will be whole probably by the end of the year, which is great. It's more that I want to be sure if I'm going to ask for money. It's. I want to ask for money from people that understand me and are not expecting me to be someone else or model my business after those other ones that they see as being successful. And I say that today, ask me next year and I might be in a different position. But I think it's sort of, you know, a friends and family round style or one main investor who sort of sees me, sees the goal and is like, I want to be the lead and I want to be sort of the primary.

[Tracy Alloway]

Do you have to bring like actual jars of the sauce when you meet with investors? I know you haven't done it yet, but I'm really curious, if you have a food company, is that a requirement or are people just looking at the numbers and the branding and the distribution network?

[Allison Roman]

I don't think it could hurt. I think that if you are a lesser known quantity, that's probably a must. I would, I mean, I, I'd want you to know what I'm selling you and why you should invest in it. It's giving shark tank. But I think for me I've been very fortunate that I've already sort of been approached by people that are like, I like what you do, I like everything that you do, everything you do works. And like, I Have no reason to believe this would be any different. Even though I do know, given the saturation of the market and how crowded it is, it is sort of a, Ooh, why would you enter into what was effectively the most crowded, you know, market? But again, I see my contribution as being unique.

[Joe Weisenthal]

This might be sort of a sensitive question. You know, there is a. I think you have cult status within certain. Among some people. We seem to be in an age where people with a certain level of cult status, they have these fans who, like, really just, like, they want to buy something from you. They're excited to give that the opportunity to do business with you.

[Allison Roman]

Yes.

[Joe Weisenthal]

Taylor Swift's fans want her to make five different color vinyl versions of each album because they're really excited about that

[Allison Roman]

and they'll buy each one.

[Joe Weisenthal]

Yeah. And Donald Trump's fans really, like, want him to, like, you know, make a vodka brand and whatever, because they're excited about buying Trump vodka. I know. Do you feel that, like, do you feel that you have, like, a baseball that is enthusiastic about the prospect of essentially supporting you and, like, being part of your, you know, growing your world?

[Allison Roman]

Yeah. I think that I am very fortunate to have been in this industry for as long as I have, and I think that with that comes a reputation and trust. And you cannot buy that trust and you cannot force it to happen over a short period of time. And I think that it is familiarity, but it above all, people are like, I know this works, or I know when she recommends something, it is good. And so it stands to reason, if I'm going to make. If I'm going to put my name behind something and, like, put my own money behind. Starting a company like this isn't a money grab. You know, it's not the most lucrative thing I do. It's a definite loss leader. But it's sort of. For now, anyway. But I think that there is a. Hopefully, I would imagine people would think, if she's going to do this, I know it's going to be good. And I get a lot of feedback on the sauce. People saying, I've never bought sauce in my life, but I am curious. Or it's people that were like me 10 years ago, cooking from, dining in, cooking from, you know, nothing fancy. Well, eight years ago. But, you know, and thought to themselves, well, I'll never make. I'll never buy tomato sauce because I make my own. And now their lives have changed and their perspectives are different and they're like, you know what? I might buy tomato sauce.

[Tracy Alloway]

How are you thinking about distribution. Because as Joe mentioned in the intro, one thing we've learned from conversations with different food and drinks and snack companies is like, you kind of live and die by the shelf space that you get.

[Allison Roman]

Oh, yeah, High level, baby.

[Tracy Alloway]

Okay. And then also, like, which comes first? Is it a distribution agreement or the actual scaling of the operation?

[Allison Roman]

This is exactly where I'm at right now. I'm like in the thick of these conversations of trying to figure that out, because do I find a new co packer that can meet the needs of potentially being in Whole Foods? Well, then without a Whole Foods contract, I'm sitting on potentially hundreds of thousands of dollars of product. And where does that product go then? I'm paying for storage for that product. So how do you move that without having that in place? You also, I would imagine Whole Foods is not going to give you something unless they know for certain that you can produce it. And I'm assuming they want some proof of concept. But right now I'm. I'm. It's very chicken or the egg, and I'm sort of like, okay, what has to happen first? Is it the. The person who's going to get me that relationship with Whole Foods? Is it the co packer that I know can fulfill and execute at the level that I want? And, you know, these questions are being asked and answered very quickly. And, you know, next, if we had done this meeting next week, I probably would have a better answer for you.

[Joe Weisenthal]

Can you come back in two weeks? We just do a quick follow up.

[Allison Roman]

Well, it's so funny. I'm sure anyone listening to this that does know a lot about CPG is like, this woman has no idea what she's talking about. But I believe that's part of my charm in that I kind of jump into everything that I do, like, really curious and excited. And I actually think that there's a lot of benefit to not knowing because I think getting hung up on how things are done and what is the norm kind of limits you.

[Joe Weisenthal]

Are you just, like, surrounded right now by like, food industry execs that are promising they can take your business to the next level. Maybe they did a stint at Whole Foods or something like that. And like, hire me. We can.

[Allison Roman]

There's a few.

[Joe Weisenthal]

There must be a lot.

[Allison Roman]

There's a few. There's. Yes, the inbox is very busy right now. And I will say primarily women, which is really encouraging. And yeah, I think there's always somebody that's like, I can help you. And then some people that are like, I want skin in the game. Some people are like, I wanna help you find the money so that I can have skin in the game in the future. And I think that these companies become so hot and then often plateau or crash or people don't care anymore. Protein's no longer a thing. Nobody wants to drink this type of thing. But to me, I am such a legacy brand person and I believe so firmly in well made products that are built to last, that never go out of style. And to me this is, and I'd rather be successful over a really long term than like a flash in the pan or like hot right now and then next year nobody cares. And then I'm.

[Tracy Alloway]

Yeah, Tomato sauce is definitely Lindy, I think.

[Joe Weisenthal]

Yeah.

[Allison Roman]

Do you know Lindy? I don't know. Oh, I've heard it now four times. No, I sort of joke.

[Joe Weisenthal]

Yeah, just means, it means it's lasted a long time and therefore one can infer that it will last a long time.

[Allison Roman]

Okay. I love it. I'm going to adopt that word in my pitches.

[Tracy Alloway]

It's, it's a good word to use. What's been the most challenging aspect of building this business? Because, you know, you're talking about a bunch of different things all at once. There's the financing, there's distribution, there's logistics, there's actually making the product, branding, all of that.

[Allison Roman]

I will say I sort of did everything that was easiest first, which was developing the recipe, figuring out the label, like the creative fun stuff that I feel qualified to weigh in on and execute. And now we're at the hard part where it's like, okay, we've made the sauce, we've sold it, people love it. Okay. That feels like the hard part for a lot of people. For me, that was the easy part. And now, you know, I was saying to someone the other day, like, what I'm really craving is an adult in the room and I need a boss in this venture. You know what I mean? Like, I'm so, okay, I have the sauce, it looks great, it tastes great, people want it. How do what, what now? And I need somebody who knows what they're doing to come into the room and say, here, the, here's the order of operations, here's how much that's going to cost. Here's who's going to do that. Like, when you're starting a business like this, there's nobody to tell you. And so you do sort of feel a little vulnerable to people that are like, I can help you.

[Joe Weisenthal]

Yeah.

[Allison Roman]

And so it becomes sort of this personality vetting and, and who's, who do we vibe with? Who do you think understands you that it doesn't just see dollar signs and it's again built on trust and like who's going to like really be in this with you to best advise what's best for you, the business owner and also the product and not just sort of treat you like a mouthpiece for a thing that can make them money. Carol

[Carol Massar]

I'm Carol Massar.

[David Gura]

And I'm Tim Stanwak inviting you to join us for the Bloomberg businessweek Daily Podcast.

[Carol Massar]

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[David Gura]

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[Carol Massar]

That's right, Tim. We're all over global business, finance, tech news, all as it is happening in real time and we've got complete coverage of the US Market.

[Tracy Alloway]

Close.

[Carol Massar]

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[David Gura]

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[Carol Massar]

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[David Gura]

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[Carol Massar]

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[Joe Weisenthal]

You mentioned like you have the luxury of you're not betting your life on this brand, you have your thriving media empire, etc. And so you're in the position to self fund and so forth. It occurs to me like, you know, again, journalism is in such a difficult time but like, you know, thinking back 10 years ago, like all these consumer brands trying to build out a media side. And you're like, oh, we're going to hire the editor in chief of Gillette, you know, because we want to like build a whole series of blogs that are implicitly about razors and stuff.

[Allison Roman]

Yeah. Which people can't wait to read. Yeah.

[Joe Weisenthal]

This is like, right. Because they think this is going to be the best marketing is we'll just buy the media brand itself. It must be really nice to not like you already have that part solved implicitly. It seems so much easier to start with this media thing that everybody loves or that lots of people love and then like add on to these various products that can be sold on top of that.

[Allison Roman]

Yeah. And I would obviously never call myself a celebrity, but I think that's the appeal of the celebrity brand and why that is so appealing to people when they're like a, you know, a pop star that launches a makeup brand and an actor who launches lingerie. It's like, like it's a built in excitement. It's a built in buy in, you know. And so I think for me, again, I take that very seriously, that responsibility very seriously. But it is great to know that most of it seems like what the money goes towards in addition to hiring is marketing. Because if you're just like a person that's like, no one knows who you are, you don't have any food background, but you're like, I'm gonna start a insert blank here. You know, company that is food. Well, yeah. If you come from the tech world, if you come from the business world, you're already a leg up on me in a lot of ways. But I'm a leg up on you in a lot of ways. But one, money unfortunately trumps all. So I feel like always sort of at a disadvantage without that as my thing in the back pocket. Because a lot of brands that begin, they begin from a guy in a vest and, you know, and I don't have that.

[Joe Weisenthal]

Have you seen, like, I think there are some memes about it or like jokes where it's like, it'll parody some guys, you know, working at McKinsey. And I realized I had to quit my job and dedicate my life to making the ultimate tortilla chip. Have you seen this? There's like all these jokes and you see these on the labels. Like we were working nine to five jobs in New York City and then we're like, why can't we just make sun dried tomatoes?

[Allison Roman]

Exactly. Like, why isn't there a cream cheese for me? And you're like, Yeah, I mean, if you have a dream, you know, and I think that that is very inspiring when you can have a job that makes you so much money and then you're like, wait, this is soulless. And actually, I just want to, like, make granola. Sure, that's great. I. I think that for me, I've always sort of been the inverse where I've dedicated my life to cooking and food and, like, the whole act of it and knowing that those things, like, no one gets into the restaurant business to make money. I started working in restaurants when I was 19, making 750 an hour. And I never once thought, how will I make more money? I just thought, wow, this is great. I'm so happy. I love cooking. And so to end up here and be like, okay, I can, like, put a small amount towards this. But we've sort of reached the end of that road of the money that I was willing to bet on it. And it was sort of like, I thought pretty low stakes. I was like, I believe in the product. I know it's gonna sell. And it did, and it was great. And so now it's time to consider what's next. And how do you consider what is a middle class small business? Because it stands, it feels like it's only extreme Farmer's market. Mom and pop. Nobody knows who you are except if you live in the town or $5 million debut at Target.

[Tracy Alloway]

I have a slightly random question, but since we were talking food media, I think this has actually come up on the podcast before, but like a long, long time ago. Why do I have to read 3,000 words of people's life story or like explaining what an onion is before I get to the recipe online.

[Allison Roman]

Well, originally, the reason that I think that where those complaints originated from is blog culture, which predates sort of recipe database like Bon appetit, New York Times, cooking, et cetera. Because basically, in order for those bloggers to get ad revenue, the person had to scroll a certain amount. They couldn't just go to the page and click because they wouldn't see the ad, so the ad revenue couldn't support them. That is, I think, like 90s sort of reasoning. For me as a person who writes those things, it's because I think people care or it makes you a better cook and it provides context and richness to the story of the recipe. That also said, I often separate the text from the recipe. So I write in such a way that often, like for my newsletter, for example, there's many, many words about something. It could be A sweater or my baby or a tomato sauce. And then you jump to the recipe, which has like, maybe six sentences about, like, why you need to do what I'm asking you to do so you don't skip it and mess up the recipe and then the recipe, but you can always jump to it. So that also said, I always felt very defensive of that complaint because I'm a writer, and I. Part of what I do is writing. And I also think that's a huge part of my success because people are, like, emotionally invested in what I'm asking you to do and also selling you something. I'm like, okay, you might not want to make lentil soup, but I'm gonna write something that is so compelling that you're gonna be like, oh, my God, I have to make this lentil soup. And that is part of my job. And so I do respect that, though. And interestingly enough, it's one of my favorite things to do when I'm writing actual cookbooks. Because you're limited to the page versus the Internet. You could write forever. Most people don't have good editors or editors at all. I don't know an editor. And one thing that I learned while working in magazines is you have to ask yourself, who cares? And so if I find myself blabbing on about something, I think about that person being like, why do I care about this? And I have to justify it. And oftentimes I edit stuff out all the time where I'm like, that's boring or stupid or only I think that's funny, or that's too niche or it doesn't need to be here. I'm very cognizant of the fact that if something is too long, people's eyes glaze over. They don't care. They are gonna lose interest. So you really fight for every word. That's especially true in a cookbook because you have to keep it to a certain length, otherwise it doesn't get printed. And, you know, there's a lot that goes into that for me anyway. And I think each person that writes recipes or whatever in the food world will have a different answer. That's mine.

[Tracy Alloway]

Joe. Technology has actually solved this problem for me because there's. There's a really great app called Paprika, and you just, like, paste in the URL of a recipe.

[Joe Weisenthal]

You're killing people's. Killing people's.

[Allison Roman]

I know, but you. You know that that is, like, the utility user and, like, that. I'd rather you do that than, like, just go on AI to, like, Be like, what, you know, recipe with that.

[Tracy Alloway]

Ooh. I didn't even think about AI did I? Just know.

[Joe Weisenthal]

Now you just put the.

[Allison Roman]

I know. Damn it.

[Joe Weisenthal]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Tracy Alloway]

Really?

[Allison Roman]

How often do you cook?

[Tracy Alloway]

I cook, like, all the time on the weekends. I don't cook in New York. Cause I have a tiny New York kitchen. I have a big kitchen in Connecticut where I can do, like, whatever I want.

[David Gura]

Yeah.

[Allison Roman]

Do you find yourself reading cookbooks for pleasure ever?

[Tracy Alloway]

Yeah, sometimes. I have an expansive collection and I just ordered. What's that food book? It's like how to Eat a Wolf or something. Have you ever heard of that?

[Allison Roman]

No.

[Tracy Alloway]

Apparently it was written in World War II. And it's all about, like, I guess, how to eat frugally when there's, like, not so much support when we're at war. I'm looking forward to the rations.

[Joe Weisenthal]

How to Cook a Wolf by MFK Food. How to Cook a Wolf.

[Allison Roman]

Yes. Yeah, of course. Sorry. I thought it was more contemporary. Okay. So, like, I do.

[Tracy Alloway]

I do read some food stuff, but it's when I'm actually cooking, having to scroll is really difficult. Cause like, your hands are covered in, like, flour or sauce or whatever, and I just find it distracting.

[Allison Roman]

You'll be pleased to know that on my website, there's a tab at the beginning that says jump to rest recipe. And you can always just click on it and skip all the text.

[Tracy Alloway]

I should have said I have your book, by the way. The fancy one. Nothing fancy.

[Allison Roman]

Yeah.

[Joe Weisenthal]

Speaking of AI and cooking, et cetera, you know, like, all media is. Perhaps even you, but like, all media is very anxious about the presence of AI for various reasons. And people are worried how they're going to navigate it. Like traditional food media, like, obviously you have a niche, you have a name. People really like reading your stuff. Like, what's the broader landscape look like these days? Or what's interesting in the broadcast.

[Allison Roman]

I think the broader landscape. And we're noticing this in TV and also in newsletter culture, both in fashion, food, cultural criticism, politics. We're sort of going back to what we ran from. So it's like the streamers are bundling and you can watch all the things. Oh, wait, that's cable. Right. And then so now the newsletter people are sort of gaining employees and learning how to bundle their situation and saying, well, I've deflected and now we're starting a cooperative. I'm like, well, that's a magazine. And so it's so fascinating to me. And I think any of us that are old enough to have seen you know, lived through the various cycles of media and everything is returning to itself. And, you know, I'm sure they'll disband again and it'll become more about the individual. And now it's, you know, coming back to magazines.

[Joe Weisenthal]

So, you know, the move into tomato sauce maybe is like a little bit of a difference between your old self or maybe you would have looked down on that when you think, okay, tomato sauce, like another very hot button thing in the news. There was a big viral New York Times article a couple of days ago about people spending crazy amounts of money on doordash. And the people love to sneer at

[Tracy Alloway]

people who buy crazy though, because some people just love.

[Joe Weisenthal]

No, like there were like some, like

[Allison Roman]

someone was spending $700 on a. In a week for him and his husband, I believe. Right?

[Tracy Alloway]

Yeah. That's a lot.

[Joe Weisenthal]

Yeah. Wait, how much did you say?

[Allison Roman]

I think it was seven.

[Joe Weisenthal]

Yeah, yeah, they were. It was, it was. Yeah, it was a couple. And like they spent.

[Tracy Alloway]

Wait, what were they buying? Do you remember? Like, what were they getting?

[Allison Roman]

All I know is that if my husband and I order from our favorite Szechuan restaurant, which is down the street, embarrassingly enough, sometimes we do pick up, but if we're getting it delivered, that can be upwards of 100 plus dollars.

[Tracy Alloway]

It is expensive.

[Allison Roman]

And so let's say you're ordering from a more expensive place and you're doing it seven nights a week. Yeah, $700 plus. It really. I could see how you get there.

[Joe Weisenthal]

The thing that I think also set people off was the guy in the photo had these really nice copper pans and pots and stuff like that. Why did you. Thousands of dollars to deck out your kitchen. But apparently he was. But would you ever, you know, 10 years from now there's ever going to be an Alison Roman, like ghost kitchen where you're.

[Allison Roman]

No, that I've been. I've been approached so many times for that.

[Joe Weisenthal]

And I have to say more about that. What's the pitch when they bring it to you?

[Allison Roman]

The pitch is people want high quality chef made food. You have a name. People would go crazy to have Alison Roman's shallot pasta made by Alison. But I'm not actually making that for you.

[Joe Weisenthal]

You're not the tomato sauce either.

[Allison Roman]

But that I'm not claiming to.

[Joe Weisenthal]

Okay, okay, fair enough.

[Allison Roman]

And I think that there is, to me that, that devalues what I actually do. And having tomato sauce and then making something with that tomato sauce feels very different to me. I also understand meeting people where they're At. And if they're not going to make tomato sauce from scratch, at least they're cooking something at home. Even if it's opening a jar and adding something to it and blah, blah, blah. That, to me, is not a far cry. But the ghost kitchen, the delivery, the D, it's to me very impersonal. It freaks me out. I don't care for it. I think it's like a weird licensing of your name in a way that feels really inauthentic to me.

[Joe Weisenthal]

Have you seen that thing? Wonder.

[Allison Roman]

Yes.

[Joe Weisenthal]

I find it really weird.

[Allison Roman]

There's one near me.

[Joe Weisenthal]

I find it very creepy.

[Tracy Alloway]

Wait, what is it?

[Joe Weisenthal]

So it's like. It's a sort of. I think it's. I don't totally know the business, but I think it's basically trying to roll up the doordash and the restaurant at the same time so that they have this big facility that can make 30 different kinds of cuisines. And they have their own app and they have their own delivery drivers. So basically just like, vertically integrate the whole supply chain. But they have this space on. Not Houston, the one that starts with D down on the Lower east side.

[Allison Roman]

Delancey.

[Joe Weisenthal]

Delancey. Thank you. And on the outside, it says, like, a new kind of food hall. And I was like, oh, I like food halls. So, like, I walked in and there's just these kiosks, screens, and on the screens there's like a Mexican option, an Italian and a Chinese one, a Japanese.

[Allison Roman]

It's like you're at the airport.

[Joe Weisenthal]

Yeah, it's like you're at the airport. And then. So there's a theory. 30 kinds of restaurants.

[Tracy Alloway]

So now you guys are really selling it to me.

[Joe Weisenthal]

I know. No, I find it.

[Allison Roman]

So that is literally my personal hell. And I. I think also where they get you is they tell you a small business owner who's like a chef who has a restaurant, my rent's going up. I can't afford $20,000 in rent because. Blah, blah, blah. Doordash. Okay, so they come in and say, we can give you the space, but no one can really eat in your restaurant. So you're basically cutting out the entire reason for a restaurant to exist. And there are so many restaurants whose business is like 85% delivery. And you walk in and they're empty, but they're able to stay alive because of delivery. So if you take away that rent and the need to staff and da, da, da. That's pretty appealing to a small business owner. And I think it's very predatory. I think it's very sort of like, we can help you stay alive. And it's like, well, at what cost? Because you're then sort of, you know, I don't know. And some of these businesses never start as a brick and mortar. They are only an idea. Or they do take big name chefs and say, we can do like a fried chicken concept with your name on it. And when you look on Doordash or Wonder or whatever, it looks like a real restaurant.

[Joe Weisenthal]

Yeah.

[Allison Roman]

So you look like you think you're ordering from a neighborhood restaurant. Right. But it's not a neighborhood restaurant.

[Tracy Alloway]

I've done that before. And then I like walked past where they were actually making the food and I was like, wait a second, I've ordered from there. Speaking of hell. So one of the things that has changed in food media over the years is, I think, the emphasis on aesthetics.

[Allison Roman]

Right.

[Tracy Alloway]

So I think everyone probably does this. I certainly am guilty. But if I make something that I'm proud of, I take a photo of it, post it on social media.

[Joe Weisenthal]

Otherwise you didn't cook it.

[Tracy Alloway]

Otherwise I didn't cook it. There's no proof. How do you think about that particular aspect when you're coming up with recipes or, you know, deciding what to do with your food empire?

[Allison Roman]

Yeah, it's funny, I just wrote an article about this for the newly relaunched Gourmet magazine, which I don't know if you guys heard about that or what they're doing, but the Conde Nast trademark for Gourmet, the old magazine, had lapsed.

[Joe Weisenthal]

That's crazy.

[Allison Roman]

They let it lapse. And so this group of people, one of whom is a friend of mine, took it over and relaunched it as basically a website and newsletter. So very interesting thing that they're doing. Has a very different tone of voice, very different vibe. It's sort of like pirates that took over a ship. And you're like, oh, this is not the same Gourmet. But I think in a very fun and smart way. But I was thinking a lot about this recently because it feels like most people now, especially on the Internet, are making food to look good. They're reverse engineering of, like, what's gonna look beautiful and what's gonna look great. And back to. I worked at BuzzFeed Food for approximately eight months, 15 years ago or 10 years ago. How long ago? I don't know. It was too long ago anyway. But it was sort of like I would watch them in the way that they considered what recipes to run and what they would make videos out of. And it was always like, well, what has cheese and what has cream and what has this? And it was always reverse engineered from a visual perspective. And I think that we're still sort of in that, even if it's a lady in her kitchen or a guy in his kitchen with like a forward facing iPhone. And so as a reaction to this, I developed this recipe for pork cooked in milk, which is a very old Italian recipe. It's ugly as hell. It is just sinful. It is beige and clumpy with milk curds and soft looking and it's really disgusting. But wow. Does it taste good? It's like truly incredible.

[Tracy Alloway]

Some of the best tasting things are just like a bowl of slop or they look like it.

[Allison Roman]

Yeah. And I think it was sort of, you know, what about this food? Like, are we gonna make this food on the Internet anymore? Because I had considered what could I develop for this magazine that I wouldn't develop for myself? And I told my friend, I was like, well, I would never put this on my own, really, because it's too ugly. But also, I understand that part of encouraging someone to eat something is it has to look good and it also has to sound good. So the writing has to be there and the photo has to be there and everything works in conjunction. But it was just an interesting exercise. And, and I think that I said something to the effect of like, we're not developing recipes, we're designing them. And I think that a lot of people lead with aesthetics and what they think will, quote, perform well versus thinking about something like a soulful, authentically created recipe.

[Joe Weisenthal]

Can we just return a little bit to the tomato sauce? But I'm curious. You know, another reason we like to talk about this topic is because you get a snapshot into the consumer and pricing and all the, et cetera. When did you conceive of this? Like, when, when did this idea that

[Allison Roman]

you were going to launch a tomato sauce in 2023.

[Joe Weisenthal]

So, like, okay, so two and a half or three years later, when you look at costs of jars, the glass jars, when you look at ingredients or rent, like, how is the math working out relative to what it looked like in 2023 and how volatile is it still in terms of, of being able to get a good price on the raw ingredients or the good price on jars, a good price on shipping and stuff like that?

[Allison Roman]

Yeah, that hasn't fluctuated too much. Again, that's really a scale question. So the reason why D2C doesn't quite work for a business model in this way with something like tomato sauce Is because jars are heavy. Jars of sauce are even heavier. So your shipping will always be the thing that gets you. And so there are, you know, we looked into, you know, we had a, a co packer or a 3pl in California and we're like, okay, so we're going to ship the sauce from Brooklyn to la and then it's going to go out to the rest of the country. We're like, no, that's going to add $1.50 per jar or whatever. So you look at every consideration. Okay, this might be slightly more expensive here, but we're saving here. So that's actually the better choice. But again, it's scale, so we could be. Jars could fluctuate within a few cents. The packing materials was something that we really considered because jars cannot explode on their way to you. The better the packaging, the more expensive the packaging. And so we. Someone told me it was like, they're like, it feels like a old school election box. We're like, how am I going to break into this box? She's like, but all the jars arrived intact and that was really important to us. So we spent a little bit more money on the packaging.

[Tracy Alloway]

Wait, how do you actually evaluate the jars? Are you like tossing them around?

[Allison Roman]

You ship them, you send it to your parents, you send it to yourself.

[Tracy Alloway]

Here's a bunch of empty jars. Enjoy.

[Allison Roman]

No, you put the sauce in. Yeah, there's a lot of like a few trial and error situations and some of them are aesthetic choices of like, oh, I don't like the way this is. Or how does it feel to open it? Is it complicated? Is it annoying? Is there too much material? Does it feel wasteful? All of those things were deeply, deeply considered. And then to say nothing of like, do you put a card in there? Do you put a note? Does it come with a ribbon? Like the aesthetic choices, which also add cost. And so, you know, of course that's why the obvious choice is to be sold in the store, because you're not dealing with any of that. And I think a lot of, to me, respectable D2C brands evolve into retail only. But at first, doing the D2C model to like get people into it, to get people hooked, to get people, like excited about a product, sort of. Then you can show those bigger retailers, like, look at all the people who already love this product who are going to buy it in your store.

[Joe Weisenthal]

So are you like maxed out capacity wise right now? Are you like busting at the seams in terms of how much you can move in a given Week or month with tomato sauce. Yeah.

[Allison Roman]

Yes.

[Joe Weisenthal]

That's great.

[Allison Roman]

Very much so. And it's good. And I think that, to me, the biggest drawback there is that we launched in September. And also the reason it took so long is because I had a baby. I was, like, about to. We were gonna launch it and push it, and then I became too close to the due date, which is good. Cause I went into labor a month early, but I can't imagine having done that at the same time. So thank God I put a pause on it. I was like. And we also redesigned the labels. Like, it was a good reset. It was almost like a false start. But anyway, we launched in September, and I had these beautiful photos taken, and, like, I had all these ideas for campaign and marketing, and we sold out immediately. And I was like, okay, well, maybe I'll do it the next week once we're back in stock. We kept selling out at such a clip that I couldn't really ever talk about it. So I feel like, in a way, we haven't, like, fully even launched with its full potential.

[Joe Weisenthal]

That's great. That's fantastic. Alison Roman, can you come back in six months or a year and, like, after you've had all of these conversations that we could do a part two on what you've learned when you're.

[Tracy Alloway]

When you get the Whole Foods contract. I'd be super interested what those discussions are, actually.

[Joe Weisenthal]

Yeah, we want to hear about. We want to hear about the negative. What the other half of the mountain looks.

[Allison Roman]

This is a perfect diary entry of following a small business. I really am at the very, very start, and I think it would be really fun to come back if and when things change. And this has been great. I love talking about this stuff.

[Joe Weisenthal]

Amazing.

[Allison Roman]

What a pleasure.

[Joe Weisenthal]

Well, thank you so much for coming on. That was great.

[Allison Roman]

Thank you,

[Joe Weisenthal]

Tracy. That was a lot of fun. I don't know. You've probably noticed this too. We've probably talked about it. You know, if you look at the business section of the Apple Podcasts, like, BET Top podcast list, it's, like, dominated by, like, starting a business. Podcast entrepreneurs.

[Tracy Alloway]

And maybe we should pivot into.

[Joe Weisenthal]

I love these conversations. Maybe we should pivot into, you know, Diary of an Entrepreneur type episodes. They're really fun. You learn a lot.

[Tracy Alloway]

You know what I want to do?

[Joe Weisenthal]

Yeah.

[Tracy Alloway]

The Odd Lots cooking show.

[Joe Weisenthal]

What should.

[Tracy Alloway]

Let's do a cooking video.

[Joe Weisenthal]

Yeah, that would be great.

[Tracy Alloway]

We'll get a recipe from Allison and we'll cook it live on.

[Joe Weisenthal]

And Bart from Buttersworths and all the And Zeno's pizza guys. Yeah, we could get all of them. Yeah. This is actually our book idea because we've never settled on a book that you and I have wanted to write together, but we could just do a food one where in each recipe, someone learns something about the supply chain for that business.

[Tracy Alloway]

That is a great idea.

[Joe Weisenthal]

If you're listening. If you're out there in publishing and you hear this, hit us up.

[Tracy Alloway]

That's right. No, that was a fascinating conversation. One thing I hadn't really considered that much is the difficulty of deciding when to scale before you have that big distribution contract. Because, as Alison said, it does feel like a chicken and egg problem because you have to pitch to the grocery store or whatever that you can actually produce this stuff at scale, and then you have to decide whether you want to invest at scale in order to be able to make the pitch.

[Joe Weisenthal]

No, scale seems just sort of brutal in every respect. Right. If you raise VC money, then you have a lot of money to pay back before you ever see a dime of profit yourself. Same, obviously, for lending, and that's probably particularly hard for this. And then just, you know, you have to get into a new facility. That chicken egg problem, I'll say it definitely. It clearly doesn't hurt to have to be a celebrity. I know she sort of was hesitant about the word, but obviously a food celebrity. And the other thing, it didn't come up in the conversation, but something that I thought about right after it's come up a little bit on our show is she doesn't have to pay the Facebook tax. Right. Most companies that are in cpg, a big chunk of their money immediately goes to Instagram. Ads, marketing, whatever.

[Tracy Alloway]

Yeah.

[Joe Weisenthal]

And when you own a distribution list, you have a popular newsletter, et cetera, that you could sell out a run without having to spend like crazy. That's a huge.

[Tracy Alloway]

Well, as she said, like, she hasn't even really been advertising it that much.

[Joe Weisenthal]

Yeah, I know. That's huge. That's a huge Lego.

[Tracy Alloway]

And she sold out.

[Allison Roman]

Yeah, it's crazy.

[Tracy Alloway]

All right, shall we leave it there?

[Joe Weisenthal]

Let's leave it there.

[Tracy Alloway]

This has been another episode of the Odd Lots podcast. I'm Tracy Alloway. You can follow me at tracyallaway.

[Joe Weisenthal]

And I'm Joe Weisenthal. You can follow me at the Stalwart, Follow our guest, Allison Roman on Instagram @alisoneroman. Follow our producers, kermanrodriguezermanarmondashobennett@dashbot and Kale Brooks at Kalebrooks. And for more Odd Lots content, go to bloomberg.com oddlots we're the Daily newsletter and all of our episodes and you can chat about all these topics 24. 7 in our Discord, Discord, GG, Oddlauds

[Tracy Alloway]

and if you enjoy odd thoughts. If you want us to post recipes and do cooking shows and write a cooking book, then please leave us a positive review on your favorite podcast platform. And remember, if you are a Bloomberg subscriber, you can listen to all of our episodes absolutely ad free. All you need to do is find the Bloomberg Channel on Apple Podcasts and follow the instructions there. Thanks for listening.

[Joe Weisenthal]

Sam.

[David Gura]

This is Tom Keene inviting you to join us for the Bloomberg Surveillance Podcast. It's about making you smarter every business day.

[Tracy Alloway]

I'm Paul Sweeney.

[David Gura]

We bring you complete coverage of the US Market. Open. We cover stocks, bonds, commodities, even crypto. All the information you need to excel.

[Carol Massar]

And I'm Alexis Christophers. Bloomberg Surveillance also brings you the analysis behind the headlines. We do that through conversations with the

[Allison Roman]

smartest names in economics, finance, investment and international relations.

[David Gura]

We do all this live each and every weekday, then bring you the best analysis in our daily podcast. Search for Bloomberg Surveillance on Apple, Spotify, YouTube or anywhere else you listen. On the east coast, listen at lunch and on the west coast, listen as soon as you wake up.

[Allison Roman]

That's the Bloomberg Surveillance Podcast with Tom Keene, Paul Sweeney and me, Alexis Christophorus.

[Carol Massar]

Subscribe today wherever you get your podcasts.

[David Gura]

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[Joe Weisenthal]

a little, and even a little.

[David Gura]

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