"Nothing In This World Can Take the Place of Persistence"

I'd just seen the Ray Kroc movie, The Founder, and recently rewatched The Social Network, so burned into my brain was this idea that the berry effect needed to be consistent, convenient and enjoyable enough to change behavior. The only thing standing in our way was a phone call to our farmer.

I was betting everything that even though we had never met in person, he’d see we weren’t going to waste his time. In three years, we proved we weren’t the type to talk without action. He had a strict no-visit policy but I knew the mutual respect we’d built was worth something. So I picked up the phone to pitch uniting our manufacturing with his grow operation to create a product the world had never seen—what Juliano and I started calling Nature’s Wild Berry.

Like Slicetruck, the original dream was running a food truck on the westside. Natural sounded like a red flag, so that was out. Nature still worked. For the experience? Juliano said, “WILD!”—which rolled off the tongue better than Crazy. If we added 'Side', it could become Nature’s Wild Side, like a walk on the wild side.

But the food truck idea didn’t last. The more I learned, the less I liked. We needed to simplify and think bigger. If we focused just on the berry, we could supply food trucks across the country—or restaurants and grocery stores too. We dropped 'Side' and added 'Berry'. Nature’s Wild Berry. 100% Nature. 100% Wild. Definitely a berry—but not your average wildberry.

The call didn’t take long. “Let’s get that freeze-dryer shipped down here and we can finally meet and work something out,” he said. I wanted to feel relieved longer but there wasn’t time. We had SOPs to film, logistics to plan and tickets to book. That week, our freeze-dryer was on a truck and we were on a plane to Miami. After months of R&D and no inventory to sell, we had no idea what the future held—but we were finally in business, almost.

Last week I shared how pomegranate juice got me thinking about juices I’d written off as too bitter or tart. If it worked on POM, could it work on R.W Knudson’s beet juice? It’s known to help with stamina, digestion and skincare. But to me, the real question was—could I actually crave it?

I popped a frozen berry, let the pulp coat my tongue for 30seconds and took a sip. It worked. Again. I still couldn’t believe how the berry flipped the flavor. I even diluted the juice to hit the perfect sweetness. I couldn’t stop drinking until the glass was gone. “No way I could’ve done that without the berry,” I thought.

Next week I'll share what happened when I really pushed the healthy envelope and tried something I'd never had the courage to try, until the berry, that is.

And as always, your hidden 48 hr 20% off alphanumeric code is hiding in plain sight. Look closely at the text—did you spot a word that’s formatted oddly? Enter it exactly as shown!

-Hank