Thirty Minute Mentors Podcast Transcript: Interview with Hint Water Founder and CEO Kara Goldin

I recently interviewed Kara Goldin on my podcast, Thirty Minute Mentors. Here is a transcript of our interview:

Adam: Our guest today has risen from executive assistant corporate executive, to now founder and CEO of one of the hottest companies in her vertical. Kara Goldin is the founder and CEO of hint water. The unofficial water of Silicon Valley stocked in the fringes of Google, Facebook, Uber, and many others and the drink of choice of health conscious Celebrities including Victoria Beckham, Blake Lively and John Legend; John Legend is actually an investor. Kara, thank you for joining us.

Kara: Thank you for having me.

Adam: You have a fascinating story. And I would love for you to share with listeners, perhaps if you could start with the very beginnings of your career. Can you talk about your first job right out of college? You graduated from Arizona State? What was your journey like from start to starting headwater?

Kara: Yeah, so I moved to New York with a mindset of getting a job. I was a journalism major and went to the Walter Cronkite School of Communications and really had this focus that I was you know, going to go and be a journalist and I was a minor in finance. And so I thought, I'm gonna go, there's no better place for me to be with the combination of that major and minor to go and work for Fortune Magazine. And so I went out to New York and decided that I was going to, you know, make that happen. And as I started, you know, really networking my way into the HR department at time, which owned Fortune Magazine at the at the time, I realized that I just didn't really have experience- the experience that they were looking for to actually go and get a job as a writer at Fortune and so I had this mindset like I'll go do anything just to get myself in the building and I ended up getting a job in circulation. I decided, you know, I'll take a job at an entry level position as long as it's in the building and eventually I'll get to Fortune and I never did get to Fortune but I ended up having a great time there and also just an amazing experience and today, especially with our e-commerce initiative, and how we've grown that I mean, it's over 40% of our overall business, which is really unique for a beverage CPG company like ours. I look back on my time, sort of learning about how consumers shop. Why do they shop from you? How do you build a brand and all those kind of key initiatives that I learned back then and thought, I would have never learned that, you know, being a writer for Fortune magazine? And so I'm super thankful for that first opportunity for sure.

Adam: So can you talk a little bit about how you were able to climb the corporate ladder? You had a lot of success in your career before becoming an entrepreneur and, you know, a question that's often asked of me is, early on in your career, how do you really differentiate yourself from the other people around you? Everyone's trying to move up within an organization and there's only one CEO there are only a few people who make it into the C suite. How were you able to advance and what advice do you have for others who are early on in their career or perhaps somewhere in middle management and are trying to figure out how to take that next step professionally?

Kara: You know, it's funny, I think back on some of the first couple of weeks that I was at time I was you know, working really hard and you know, learning lots of new stuff and fine was back then and, you know, maybe even to some extent today known as a place where they would actually recruit on campus that many Ivy League schools and you know, Arizona State is not an Ivy League school. I grew up in Arizona. I was a gymnast and loved my experience at at ASU but really had you know, no idea that there was anything kind of, you know, challenging about sort of where I went to school until I actually worked at Time so I was you know, working with a lot of these, you know, kids that again, had, you know, gone to, you know, these super fancy schools and they would ask me, like, you know, “Hey, where did your dad go?” Or, “Where did, like, how did you get your job at Time?” And I was like, you know, what does my dad have to do with this conversation? Like, I really didn't get it. And then I started more and more realizing like, oh, okay, I get it. They're like, “How did you get here?” And you know, it's funny, I felt like, you know, the key thing that sort of differentiated me from a lot of these other, you know, kids that sort of had the right education was the fact that I, you know, not only worked hard and you know, really wanted to be successful, but I was also super curious. I went in, you know, sort of saying why I got this job, like, you know, they were like, “Wait, you came from Arizona and you just walked into the HR department and said, ‘Hey, is there any jobs?” and I'm like, “Yeah,” you know, and they're like, “That's crazy! They came and recruited on our on campus, and here you are, you've got the same job as I do,” right? And how did that happen? And, you know, so many of these kids that I worked with were, you know, they were so caught up in sort of their own kind of label and kind of where they came from. And I basically thought, like, I get it now, you know, I come from a different education; a different place altogether, but I'm, like, you know, I'm loving what I'm doing. And I'm really thankful for sort of being here and so, I think after a while, I was able to- like people sort of forgot that I didn't have, you know, the same education because I just kind of fit in and get my job and, you know, after a while, it really, you know, didn't much matter. And I think, as time went on, I ended up taking on more and more responsibilities at Time and was working actually on a group called airline circulation after about a year where I ended up managing all of the airline circulation business for all the magazines under Time at the time, which was for sale. Sports Illustrated and People and Fortune and lots of other magazines there. And so you know what that did was actually give me access to a bunch of publishers, I learned so many important lessons there. And then I ultimately ended up leaving Time to go on to another great company, CNN, and kind of doing the same thing there as well. And then, and I think, you know, every place that I've been along the way it was sort of the same, the same journey where like I went in and dug in and sort of did more than anyone thought I was supposed to be doing. I think it's just being your authentic self as well. And I just was never afraid to sort of just say it as it is.

Adam: I mean, I heard a lot there. Being your authentic self being resourceful, taking initiative, not being afraid of being different, not being afraid of not having the pedigree that you think others might find important. There were so many valuable lessons baked into your answer. And thank you, Kara. Now that you run your own company, and a highly successful company at that, what do you look for in people that you hire? And what are some things that you think other organizations might overvalue in new hires?

Kara: I think the great thing about building a company from the ground up is that you can create your own culture. A consistent thread of curious people. You know, kindness is such a big deal around this company. It doesn't matter what level you are, you have to, you know- I think you have to be able to be kind at all different levels and not sort of- titles are so much less important than if you have to sit here and run around and say, I'm a VP and that is the reason why you should you know, respect me, then I'm always, you know, like, that would never jive in our company. Like I think at all levels people you'd lead with kindness and curiosity and helpfulness. And just because you've got your job done, it doesn't mean that you're finished. I think people are constantly running around trying to figure out, “how else can be helpful” And then also, I would say that, you know, there's this urge to learn amongst people too. I mean, we really encourage people in our company that just because you're in the supply chain, doesn't mean that you're stuck in the supply chain forever. We have a lot of people who have crossed over into different departments. So, you know, we have people, for example, in finance, who have been, you know, kind of curious about the e-commerce side of the business and so we always encourage people to, you know, go grab lunch with those people, and we'll even pay for you to go out to lunch with them and start to really understand like, what do you guys do? And, I mean, we have a lot of people who have crossed over into different departments because they had skills but I think that at every single level, if you aren't learning- that's where I see people getting bored of their job including me; like, I want to bring people in to this company that I'm learning from.

Adam: Can you talk about the early days of Hint Water really starting with the idea behind Hint Water? How did you come up with the idea, how did you turn the idea into a business, and then how did you transform the business into what it is today?

Kara: So after CNN, I moved out to the The West Coast and I ended up getting a role with a little startup that was a deep jobs idea that was a spin out of Apple that was doing CD ROMs shopping. And shortly after coming into that, that job one of our investors was this company called AOL and AOL acquired us soon after investing in us and suddenly I found myself running this area channel called shopping and e-commerce which back in, you know, totally dating myself the back in, you know, the mid-90s, nobody was doing it. Nobody ever thought that people would actually shop online. And so seven years later, I'm, you know, running this business is now a billion dollars in revenue for AOL. I have 200 people working for me, I'm traveling all over the place. The United pilots all know me by name. And I'm like, I need to get off the train. Like I felt like I was in a place where I was teaching a lot of people versus actually learning and again, just kind of bored. And I started having my four children at that point. And I thought, you know what I'm going to take a few years off, I'm going to redo a house in San Francisco and just take some time to kind of figure out what I ultimately wanted to do. And I remember being off for a few weeks thinking, okay, I'm not going to be able to be totally off and I’ve got these young kids that I want to be around, but I also want to keep my brain kind of focused on learning and doing other stuff around business. And while I was doing that, I just didn't feel that great. Like I remember thinking, you know, my energy levels were way lower. I had developed this terrible adult acne that I never even had as a teenager. And then I had also, you know, gained weight consistently with each of my pregnancies that I couldn't take off and again, I had been an athlete growing up. I was a gymnast. I knew how to train and work out, lose weight and stay in shape, and I just could not get the weight off. And it was something that I never really talked to a lot of people about. But I, you know, sort of looked at it as I just wanted to better myself and, you know, ultimately feel better. And so, after seeing a bunch of different doctors trying to, you know, figure out what was wrong with me, they, you know, said as you age, your hormones change, your metabolism changes, all these different things  and finally, I found that there were a handful of doctors that were willing to give me drugs to lose weight to, you know, clean up my skin, all of these things. And I'm like, I don't know if I want to, like, take these things, like, long term, like- is it really that bad? But yet, I felt like I wasn't as healthy as I really like. There must be something up. And so I started looking at everything that I was eating, thinking it's got to be in the refrigerator and in my kitchen somewhere, and that, you know, the reason why it's, you know, feeling this way and causing these problems and nothing was really sticking out at me. I started to keep a log and, and really realizing that I didn't think it was the food I was running every day I was, you know, again, nothing was happening. So finally, one day I looked down at my diet soda, Diet Coke in particular, I was drinking it every day, since I was probably 12 or 13 years old thinking, like, there was nothing wrong because it was diet and so I was reading the ingredients and you know, there were over 30 ingredients and it was, again, diet. Like, I didn't really think that it was the issue, but I felt like I'm game for trying anything at this point, because it's not the food and what else could it be? And so I decided to just throw it away and no more Diet Coke. And I thought, I'm going to try it this way for two weeks and see what happens. So the next week it was really interesting. Like I expected headaches but I didn't expect my stomach to be like a mess. Like, I felt like I had the worst case of the flu that I had ever had over the next week; like I was going through this detox and I didn't even realize what was going on and I felt even more horrible than I had felt for years. And finally, after about 10 days, I sort of like woke up and I'm like, okay, I'm finally feeling a bit better. Finally, after two and a half weeks, I hopped on scale, and I had lost 24 pounds in two and a half weeks, which was just crazy. Like, I was like, wait, what, like, is the scale broken, what's going on? My skin had cleared up, I no longer had acne, my energy levels were up and then I was like, wait, why is this happening? And I actually went back to one of the doctors I had seen that I really trusted and he said, “Which of the medicines were you taking?” I said, “No, I didn't start to take any of the medicines. I was really just trying to do it through the food at first and then I, you know, decided to get rid of the Diet Coke.” And he was like, “It can't be the Diet Coke. Like, that can't be it,” and I said, “I know but that's the only change that I've really made.” And then I, you know, really started to be bothered by the fact that, like, why did I believe that I was confident at this point that it was the Diet Coke? And I thought so many people, including myself- and again this was 15 years ago. I was way ahead of my time. But I believed that diet had, you know, that there was a lot of research behind diet and then it was actually like better for me. And six months kind of went by. I lost all the weight that I had been trying to lose. I lost 55 pounds in six months, which again is like, it's a lot, right? I was a totally different person at this point. And then, you know, I really realized that I had kind of been gifted this reality and it was in front of me, which was that I was never a water drinker, I grew up in Arizona, so I should have been drinking a lot of water. And I just wasn't because I didn't like the taste of it. And what I had been doing over the last few months was slicing up fruit and throwing it in water, and, you know, any kind of fruit that was like sitting on my counter. And the problem that I was running into, which was, I would have, like, a picture and I would, you know, fill it up with water and sometimes put some ice cubes in it. And then I slice up the fruit and throw it in water, and then I stick it in the refrigerator. But it would be sort of nasty looking after a day, it would actually taste okay for like a couple of days. But then after a couple of days, it just, I don't know, there was some oddness to, you know, the taste of it. And I thought, if somebody could actually figure out how to bottle this, versus like, a Diet Coke or some of the other drinks in the market, that it would really help people like me who were just aspiring to be water drinkers, that it might just work. I just went to my local Whole Foods in San Francisco and, you know, started talking to the guy. And you know, who's stocking the shelves? And I said, “Hey, is there a water that just has fruit in it, but doesn't have, you know, any type of sweetener or preservative in it?” And he pointed me to a product called Vitamin Water, which I'm sure you know. And, you know, at that time, Vitamin Water had more sugar in it than a can of Coke. And so I was educating this guy stocking shelves at Whole Foods about like, you know, what I had discovered along the way, and he was like, “That's so crazy. Like, I've gained all this weight because I drink a ton of vitamin water. And, you know, like, You're, you're really educating me, like, you know?” I said, “Gosh, I should just go do this drink because no one's doing it.”

Adam: So Kara, what I'm going to do with our remaining time is ask you some rapid fire questions. What are your best tips on work life balance, balancing being a mom and being a CEO and entrepreneur?

Kara: Love what you do because it will be passed down to your children and if they see that you're having a good time doing it, and you share your curiosity, and sort of the things that you're solving along the way, then they'll be excited for you. And you'll be able to sort of do both.

Adam: What's it like working with your husband?

Kara: It’s a very different skill set. So it doesn't work for everybody. But I think for us it's a lot of fun because we actually get to see each other, which is, you know, I think the biggest challenge that I tell people, you know, along the way, and in marriage, which we're going on 25 years together in March of next year, is that, you know, people have two different lives. We have a lot of the same goals, which is the company and our family and so in many ways our life is simpler, but I think that if you don't have different skill sets, I'm not sure that it ultimately can work.

Adam: Are there certain rules that you have to put in place that help manage a relationship that you would advise whether it's another husband and wife combination or other family members working together, even friends working together in a business?

Kara: You know, I think it's a skill set too. I mean, we've hired people into the company who are friends of ours. We've had our, you know, teenage kids come back and work with us during the summer. And again, I think it's, it's to figure out what the needs are, and figure out if that person has the skills to be able to do that and the curiosity, I think, to be able to jump in and learn.

Adam: You have a very successful social media following. How did you build that and what advice do you have for others who are interested in building their own social media?

Kara: My favorite one is Twitter, which is very unusual, I think, especially for a lot of CEOs. I don't see a ton of CEOs on there and so for me, I think it's just, it's about a place where I feel like I can have a lot more conversation with people and, you know, kind of share some thoughts that I have along the way, whether it's on leadership or inspiration or just overall, you know, information on things that I'm super passionate about. But I think it's really just figuring out what the platform is and what it needs. Because you can't just say, you know, I'm going to go do social media and basically do the same thing for Instagram, as well as Twitter. Very, very different.

Adam: What about in terms of growing your following? How have you been able to enjoy such great growth?

Kara: So I think that the key to getting organic growth, again, is really understanding the platform and being your authentic self and figuring out exactly what people know; what they want to hear, but sort of what they maybe in some ways don't expect to hear. Like, I didn’t think of that. And I think it's also like leading. Again, going back to kind of leading with kindness. You know, if you're a Negative Nelly, right, and you're sitting there, like on Twitter, for example, I don't think you're really going to get a lot of people want to hear that all day long.

Adam: How did you get John Legend and other celebrity investors to buy into your company, both as investors and as consumers?

Kara: So John was a consumer first and found us at Starbucks years ago. And, you know, I think, you know, going back to my curiosity statement, he was really curious because he really had a hard time drinking water too, and obviously, to do what he does every single day and singing and work at sort of the capacity that he works at he needs to stay in shape. And so he was really excited about what he had discovered. And so he called the customer service line on the back of the bottle, and at that time, 10 years ago, it was actually me who answered the phone and so it was, you know, he was like “I can't believe the founder is actually like picking up the phone,” and I said, “Well, she went to lunch,” I said, “So it's just me.” And, you know, over time- I mean, it’s been a great relationship. I mean, people always ask me like, how do you get John to have blackberry Hints on the piano bench. And I'm always like, you know, John does whatever he wants to do. He's an investor in the company, but he loves the product. And so I think it really speaks to, you know, he's not an endorsement deal; he's an investor in the company and he invested because he not only like the product but he also loved the mission, to help people actually get healthier, and, you know, live the best life that they could live, but also to help other companies recognize that you can actually do good and have a profitable company. And, you know, I think if you talk to John today, that's what he would say about the company as well.

Adam: What's the biggest failure of your career and how did you bounce back from it?

Kara: I would say that the biggest failure would be, you know, two things: not trusting myself, that I could actually go out and just get something done, and hiring people with experience to, you know, whether that's people in the beverage industry, to just go do it versus actually believing in myself that I could go do it. If I just went and figured it out; networked and asked the right questions. I think also, you know, something that I've learned- and this is really something that I pass on to entrepreneurs as well as employees here- is that you always have to keep your options open and keep diversifying; to never rely on one customer or never rely on you know, one code packer for your product or never rely, you know, just on Facebook in order to actually, you know, control your destiny, right? Like, I think it's just the faster- like, as soon as you accomplish something, try and figure out how do you horizontally, you know get more of those kind of people or more of those kind of companies and relationships so that you are not wedded to one company or or service to control your own destiny.

Adam: How did you become the unofficial water of Silicon Valley? And what are your best sales tips for people who either have a product that they want to try to get into a brand name company or brand name retailer? What advice do you have for listeners who are trying to figure out “How can my product, that isn't quite at the level of Kara's enjoy this level of success?”

Kara: So Google actually was the first company in The Valley that we got into, and I was actually interviewing for a job there. They were trying to recruit me when I came up with this crazy idea of Hint and it really happened by accident that they were hiring chefs and they didn't have any drinks. And I said, “Oh, I can solve that problem for you. You guys can buy some of my water,” sort of tongue in cheek. And that's kind of how it happened. And it’s stuck since then. And then people would leave Google and go to Facebook, and you know all the rest of it. And so that's how that came to be. But I think it really if you're chasing the same playbook that everybody is playing off of, then I think it's a lot harder to get success and so I always encourage people, no matter what industry they're in, to really look outside of the box a little bit and figure out, you know, maybe you do that by looking at other industries to try and figure out like how they're doing it. And really figure out if the way that they're doing business or their applications or whatever could be applied to what you're doing to really differentiate. I mean, I talked about our e-commerce. I mean, 40% of our businesses are e-commerce. That's not what, that's not what Coca Cola or Pepsi or anybody else does. And so we've got a very different business model and look for different opportunities to grow more than anything. I think that's what I've learned.

Adam: Any final tips for our listeners on how to become more successful entrepreneurs; more successful in their careers or just more successful in their lives as human beings?

Kara: I think it really just goes back to like, figuring out what you enjoy doing, whether it's in life or whether it's, you know, in war or whatever, like and, and try and figure out if you can, like put stakes in the ground around that and really become, you know, good at what you're doing because I think if you, you know, enjoy something- I'm confident that somebody will be successful if you really enjoy it because you'll just work that much better at it and be that much more curious and happy with it and and so I think if you can find your uniqueness and your you that's really differentiated from other people and I think that applies to companies as well for founders that are starting it, how are you different, what is your passion what is what is you know, how do you how are you going to differentiate yourself versus others like that is so key and and that will ultimately make you a better individual.

Adam: Where can listeners find you and follow you?

Kara: So on social media @karagoldin, it's all one word k-a-r-a-g-o-l-d-i-n, on Twitter in particular. And also, if you're interested in trying Hint and you haven't found it in a lot of different stores, but maybe want it you can find it at Target as well as Sam's Club and soon Walmart, as well as Whole Foods and online at drinkhint.com and Amazon too.

Adam: Kara, thank you for joining us. Thank you for all your great advice.

Kara: I really appreciate it. Thanks so much.