The Massive Idaho Expansion

Audible subscribers can listen to all episodes of businessus wars ad free right now. Join Audible today by downloading the Audible app It's january two thousand five, and in his office in Johnstown, New York, Hami Ulukaya is tdying his desk He grabs a pile of unsorted papers and starts tossing unwanted items into the nearby garbage can Ulukaya is thirty two years old and a Kurdish immigrant who grew up in Turkey milking sheep on his family's farm. He moved to the United States eleven years ago and now runs a small business making feta cheese. But the feta business isn't what Ulukaya imagined it would be. It barely turns a profit and selling a cheese that people toss on salads without a second thought doesn't exactly set his soul on fire He flings a coffee stained pizza menu into the garbage can and glances down at the next item It's a postcard from a real estate firm advertising a fully equipped yogurt factory Uulukaya drops it straight in the trash bin with the rest of the junk mail and his used tea leaves. But as he continues cleaning up, the postcard lingers in his mind Back home near the Kurdish Mountains, his family made yogurt, Greek styled yogurt tart, creamy and custard thick. the kind of yogurt that's good for you. Nothing like the thin, sweet glops sold in US supermarkets Ulukaya looks over again at the garbage can. Maybe he could no. no, no, that's ridiculous He resumes toddying his desk. But soon, his eyes drift back to that garbage can It's as if the postcards calling him Before he knows what he's doing, he's on his knees fishing through the trash pulls out the now grimy postcard and reads the words again. fully equipped yogurt factory for sale. He stares at it for a few seconds Ben calls the number on the card Hi, I got your postcard, the one about the yogurt plant in New Berlin. I'd like to see it. Mhm Yes, that time tomorrow is perfect. See you then Ilukaaya hangs up and looks at the postcard again at the image of the factory that could give him a new purpose Introducing America to the delights of Greek yogurt There's just one problem with the factory. I can't afford to buy it This message comes from Bettermment. Dan Egan, VP of behavioral fininance and invvesting, explains how Bettermment takes the time consuming work out of smart investing I grew up learning about finance and investing myself and realizing that I needed to reinvest dividends and rebalance my portfolio, and if there was an opportunity to tax loss over time And then I realized that I was doing all of these things that were pretty straightforward to implement. I just needed to spend my time doing them Betterment automates the same good practices so that I know I'm doing portfolio management and goal based planning in a way that makes sense and is responsible without me having to spend hours of my life doing it Learn more at betteretterment. comot Investing involves risk, performance not guaranteed. Bettermment does not offer tax advice. TLH may not be suitable for all customers. Learn more at betterment. com slash tHash terms Being a serious business owner takes hard work, patience, and a drive to keep moving forward. So it's important to find a serious business card that goes the extra mile. With the VentureX businessus card from Capital One, you earn unlimited double miles on every purchase, and with big purchasing power, you can spend more and earn more. This is your sign to take your business to the next level The Capital One Venture X business card. What's in your wallet? Terms supplly, see capital onene. com for details Welcomeom Audible Originals. I'm David Brown and this is Business Wars When Handi Uluk Kaaya pulled that realtor's postcard out of the trash few could imagine where that might land him That postcard would lead him to found Chobani, the Greek yogurt empire that grabbed a massive twenty percent of America's multib billion dollar yogurt market and turned the industry upside down. But disrupting the market is only half the battle. The real test is what comes next When your competitors wake up, when growth hits a wall, and when staying ahead, means going beyond the confines of your original brand But that's all to come for Ulu Kaya. Right now, it's two thousand five, and he's facing a problem that could snuff Chobani out before it even gets started. getting hold of the factory that his creamy dreams will be built on can't afford to buy it And no one thinks he should This is episode one Nothing But good It's january two thousand five, and Hamdi Ulukaaya is driving through the leafy back roads of upstate New York He's just visited the former craft yogurt factory in New Berlin And he hasn't been able to sit still since He really really wants this factory He foolds over, grabs his phone and calls the one person he trusts for business advice. His attorney, Mario Papa Hi, Hamdi, what's up Ulu Kaya can barely contain himself. His words tumble out in a rush Factory, New Berlin, craft, Yogurt seven hundred thousand dollars. Whoa, slow down. Breathe, Hdi. Come on, breathe Ka catches his breath and lays it all out His visit to the factory, how Kraft wants to offload it, that it's fully equipped on sale at a bargain price, and he wants to buy it Papa's not sold. Hondi, you don't have seven hundred thousand dollars. In fact, you owe me money, if you remember. And Kraft is one of the largest food companies in the world. If they can't make it work, what makes you think you can Uu Kaya does indeed owe his attorney money As for craft, well, it's decided yogurt isn't a core business It feels it lacks a competitive advantage over market leaders Dannon and Yoke Play. so it's getting out But what doesn't make sense to craft does make sense to Ulu Kaya He tells Papa, He can make it work because he's going to make Greek styled yogurt. He will give America yogurt that's healthy and free of preservatives If people are willing to eat the watery goop currently sold in stores They won't know what hits them once they try his family's recipe from turkey Papa isn't convinced Greek style yogurt is niche, expensive, imported and rarely seen outside specialty stores This is a pipe dream Hdi. Your cheese business is barely turning a profit and you haven't paid me in six months Uu Kaya's shoulders sag He mumbles a defeated. Okaykay And hangs up, the wind fully knocked out of his sails But the yogurt factory won't leave his head Uu Kai is still thinking about it a few weeks later, when two salesmen from Key Bank dropped by his office The Key Bank is a regional bank looking to drum up new business They came expecting to talk to Ulu Kaa about his Veta cheese company But Ulu Kaaya can't help himself inststead of talking cheese He tells them about the factory he can't afford. and his dream of turning Greek yogurt into an everyday grocery item The salesmanen offer a solution Key Bank is partnered with the Small Business Administration, a federal agency that helps small businesses with funding, finance and mentoring With Ky Bank' help, Hamdi writes his first ever business plan and forms a new company, Arophharma Inc. He pieces together the money he needs from the smallall Business administration, to banks and a grant from the local county. And in the summer of two thousand five, he buys the factory and hires a small team four former craft employees and a Turkish yogurt master named Mustapa Dohan On august seventeenth, two thousand five, Lu Kaya gets the keys to the factory. The whole place reeks of milk that's been sitting in the hot sun for too long. There's so much to do, he doesn't even know where to start. So he and his new colleagues take it one step at a time Starting by cleaning and painting the walls as they work Hulu Kaya tells his team how he ended up here. He came to the US in the mid nineties. He didn't intend to come to America, but he definitely needed to leave Turkey Uluk Kaya is Kurdish, an ethnic minority that in the nineties was the center of an often violent conflict between a Turkish government that sought to erase Kurdish identity and a Kurdish separatist movement wanting independence Ulu Kaya started a newspaper, calling out human rights abuses against Kurds. That landed him a night in jail and was a clear signal that he needed to leave He thought about going to France or Germany But then someone said America was the place to go Kaya shakes his head and smiles as he remembers his response The U. S, the home of capitalism and imperialism No way He looks around his new factory now at his new colleagues, rollers in hand painting the walls. He giggles to himself almost like a kid. Now he's the capitalist. In truth, Ulukaya didn't know a thing about America other than what he'd seen in movies. So he asked the guy who suggested it, What do you actually know about the place It turned out the man had studied in the US and knew someone who could get Ulukaya into an English language school Just like that This new life began He arrived in New York City with a visa and three thousand dollars and started learning English One day, he was given a writing assignment and he wrote about making cheese It turns out his teacher owned a farm upstate. And she and her family wanted help learning how to make cheese. M Ka didn't even know upstate New York existed. Eulu Kaaya spent the next year and a half working on the farm teaching them to make cheese while they taught him English. Then his father visited and complained about how bad the feta cheese in America was So Ulu Kaya started a business importing feta from Turkey which eventually turned into a business making it But it's been tough Hease cried A lot. Fetta Cheese is a low margin product and since it's mainly consumed as part of a salad It's hard to get people excited about the quality of it But Ulu Kaya is certain Greek yogurt will be different The US. yogurt market is worth two point nine billion dollars a year Greek yogurt probably accounts for less than half a percent of that The Greek brand Fae is importing its products, but sales are low The name is hard to pronounce for many people and the price is high To Ulukaya, that spells untapped opportunity In fact He sure that Americans will love Greek yogurt If they try it With his factory now painted and cleaned, Uu Kaya's focus shifts to the recipe He knows he only has one shot at this. Money's too tight for his company to survive a failure H Greek yogurt has to be perfect He wants it to be as good as the yogurt his mother used to make back in Turkey, the best yogurt he's ever tasted But making a great Greek yogurt at scale is no small feat His yogurt will contain live bacterial cultures, which means it's not a static product What might taste perfect initially can taste terrible a few weeks later Hulukayya and his yogurt master, Doan Want their product to hold its taste for six weeks And it takes them a year of testing cultures to find The right one During that time, Ulu Kaya interviews shoppers and learns that many of them are mixing fruit into plain non fat Greek yogurt themselves They want non fat, but they also want fruit And the only non fat Greek yogurt on sale is plain. So he decides he will give people what they want. non fat yogurt pre mixed with fruit. He's also making yogurt that's much thicker than ordinary yogurt by straining out the hy, the water that's left behind after the milk has been fermented with friendly bacteria If it takes one cup of milk to make a cup of ordinary yogurt, it takes three or more to create the Greek style version If you or I were to make yogurt like this at home, we would need to strain it through a piece of cheesecloth over several hours to remove the hy. But that method won't work for Uukaya because he needs to do this at scale. And for that, he needs a piece of specialized equipment that the factory he bought doesn't have The machine is called a separator, and it looks like an industrial washer dryer had a baby with an unmanned spacebroke. It's about the size of a car engine and it spins at high speed to separate the milk solids from the whay But separators are pricey. A brand new one can cost around one million dollars. And Ulu Kaya just doesn't have that kind of money. After buying the factory, he only has around one hundred fifty thousand dollars remaining from his initial funding. So he goes online and looks for something secondhand Finally, he finds one in Madison, Wisconsin He flies to Chicago and drives two hundred miles to see it. And when he gets there, well, he's disappointed. The separator's covered in rust. It's been stored outdoors for who knows how long But on the plus side, it's only fifty thousand dollars, and one of his employees is a maintenance technician, so he should be able to fix it. Actually, he'll have to. On the journey back from Wisconsin, Ulu Kaya passes the time thinking about what to name his yogurt He wants something that reminds him of his homeland As he drives down the interstate through rural, Wisconsin, he remembers the Turkish word for shepherd Chobban He adds an eye at the end for a dash of panash and lands on So Banni Uu Kaya Now has his factory, his separator. and his product name. Next up packaging He doesn't have much of a marketing budget, so the packaging has to do the heavy lifting. He knows what happens to unknown products with little ad spend behind them. They get banished to the bottom corner of the supermarket aisle, the least desirable spot in the store. so his packaging needs to do the hard sell by catching shoppers' attention. Traditional yogurt cups are tall and narrow Chobani goes the other way, a squatter, fatter cup that mimics the serving bowls used for yogurt in turkey He also selects bright white plastic together. The shape and the plastic makes the cups look distinct from the competition The label breaks with tradition too Most yogurt brands print their graphics directly onto the cups, but that process leads to dull colors and lower quality graphics. Tobani opts for printing the graphics onto plastic sleeves that slide over the cups. It's more expensive, but the result is bolder, sharper and harder to miss Finally, Ulukaya is ready He's got his factory, his recipe, his separator, and Distinctive packaging But He's also running out of time. It's taken eighteen months to reach this point, and he hasn't sold a single cup. He's burning through his money fast And to make this business profitable, he needs to be selling twenty thousand cases of yogurt every week Everything comes down to one question. anyone A buy it There are people you're told to trust, lawyers, teachers, especially doctors. But what happens when you put your life in someone's hands and they betray you? The hit podcast doctor Death is back. and this season is unlike any other. doctor Death, the cowboy, is the story of a charming neurosurgeon who rode into western towns selling a persona of confidence and care He wore cowboy boots in the operating room and became sought after by patients He promised to heal them Instead, he left a trail of broken bodies This season is about a doctor who was never truly held accountable for the patients whose lives he ruined A story of greed, betrayal, and a fight for justice that will leave you questioning who to trust Listen to Dr. Death, the cowboy, wherever you get your podcast or binge the entire series right now, only with Audible I'm Leon Nefo best known as the co creator of Slowburn and Fiasco I had of course heard of On fans, but always with a distant and quiet skepticism A silent judgment, you might say. Who is actually using this platform? U I am Hi, I'm Oly Fans creator and comedian, Gracie Kanan. I work from home now I'm on Oly Fans and In case you guys don't know what O fans is, ask your husband. My journalistic curiosity got the best of me when I found out that my own sister had started an On Fans acc I'm not a sister, just to clarify. It turns out a lot of what I thought I knew about On fans was wrong. I felt like I wasted three point five years for something that wasn't real And what happens when connection comes with a price tag? Listen to Only Fantasy wherever you get your podcasts, or binge all episodes of Only Fantasy ad free right now, only on Audible. Start your Audible subscription in the Audible app or on Apple podcasts It's two AM on an october night in two thousand seven. Uluk Kaya and his team have just finished handpacking their first supermarket order. three hundred cases of plain vanilla, peach, strawberry, and blueberry Chobani yogurt Together, this order is worth four thousand six hundred dollars cases packed, Ulu Kaya drives more than two hundred miles to deliver them himself to a kosher grocery in the affluent village of Great Nck on the north shore of Long Island Ulukaya has been picky when it comes to finding stores to stock Chubani. He has one salesman, Kyle O'Brien and he's been given strict instructions. If a grocer offers to put Giobanni in the organic section instead of the regular dairy fridges, O'Brien should walk away Uulu Kaaya wants Tobani to be a mainstream product. He's not thinking small stores He's thinking national chains. But first He needs proof that Chobani sells Su Kaaya spends the next week on Edge, desperate for news about Chibubani's sales Every day seems to drag Finally, the grocery store in Long Island calls. Uu Kaya can't contain himself. He can barely get the usual pleasantries out. Tell me how did it sell? Okay, well, we've sold out and we won another three hundred cases. Sure, sure. But who who is buying it? The same people or different people? What does it matter? Well, if different people are buying it, it means they like the packaging If it's the same people, it means they like the product and will keep buying it. Well, then I've got good news. The same people are buying it and they're telling their friends about it too. It's a promising start. But three hundred cases a week from one store on Long Island isn't enough to keep the lights on and recoup the cost of launching Chwani Ulu Kaaya needs to sell twenty thousand cases a week. And to reach that goal, he needs the big stores Sulu Kaya and his salesman O'Brien sit down to plan their next steps Udu Kaya doesn't want to limit themselves to specialty stores He doesn't believe that quality yogurt should be an elite product. He's determined to get Chiobani into big chains like Costco and Shopwright, which has more than two hundred grocery stores across the Northeast and mid Atlantic states But these stores charge slot fees, meaning Chiubani will have to pay to be put on the shelves Kka asks O'Brien how much a chain like shopwright might charge in slot fees O'Brien estimates that the supermarket will charge Around twenty thousand dollars per flavor of Tubani Ulu Kaya thinks that's insane He's determined to find a way around this One week later, Ulukayya and O'Brien are sitting across the table from Shopwright's buyer at the supermarket's New Jersey headquarters They watch as the buyer scoops another large spoonful of chobani into his mouth Oh This is great No. H out I like the packaging too, and the price, one dollar twenty nine cents. That's smart. tells people this is special without pricing them out like most artisan brands Uulu Kaaya smiled So you'll stock, Cho Bonnie U We'd be happy to. in every store. Our slot fee is two hundred thousand dollars O'Brien shoots Uukaya and I told you so, look Ulu Kayya turns to the buyer Sounds great. The only problem is we don't have that kind of money Byer shrugs his shoulders as if to say, How's this my problem The room goes quiet What if what if we pay you in yogurt Pay us in yogurt? Yes, you don't pay us anything until you've sold enough to earn out the slot fee. And what happens if your yogurt doesn't sell We buy it back. Hey, I thought you said you didn't have any money. If you got no money and your yogurt doesn't sell, how am I going recover the slot fees you owe us Ulu Kaya thinks for a moment, then smiles. then you can have our factory. Wow All right, then, if that's what you're willing to stake to get on our shelves You got a deal. We'll stock Chobani. Ulukaya grins as they shake hands. But he's just bet his entire business on this deal So this yogurt had better be popular In two thousand nine, Subani arrives in Shopwright with little marketing spend Instead of a splashy ad campaign, they are relying on Chiobani's distinct cup to do the work for them. But what a cup it is, that bright attractive label. The unusual shape, the combo of non fat and fruit, something no one else is offering. a price that signals quality without whispering Elite Shoppers, pick it up out of curiosity They buy it, taste it, and come back for more. The chains reorder Shoppers tell their friends about the new, super thick yogurt they tried Word spreads Soon, other large grocery chains start stocking Gobani as well, like stop in shop and Whole Foods Then one day and ordered lands for twenty five thousand cases Ulukayya stares at it in shock He wonders if someone added an extra zero by mistake and checks with his sales director It's not a typo Yulu Kaya asks if it's a monthly order The sales director smiles. No They want twenty five thousand cases a week Sobani needed to sell twenty thousand cases a week to break even Now It's smashing that target. with a single customer And the momentum's just getting started And it got there with a promotional plan entirely built around better packag No wait a min When things seem to be going this well, it's tempting to think you've solved the marketing problem But what's really happening here is alignment, product, price, and presentation all reinforcing each other. See, the packaging didn't win on its own It amplified everything else that was already right from the recipe. Right down to the price point But Ulukaya isn't relying entirely on his yogurt cup design, he wants to build a connection with his customers, whichich is getting a lot easier to do. And Chobani's timing, that couldn't be better. In twenty ten, social media is going super nova. Suddenly any company can find and talk directly to the people who are buying its products Jo Bonnie dives in using Facebook and Twitter to connect with customers It responds to posts and reacts to customer stories. Muluk Ka even starts stenciling his favorite customer quotes on the walls of his factory quotes like life is good when Chiobani is in the fridge. And Chiobani, your yogurt warms my soul You know, direct connection with the customers used to be rare nowadays It's expected On works if it feels real, right Listen back to our series on Dominoes versus Pizza Hud. Domino' was getting trashed until it went on social media and said, We hear you. Tell us what we need to do Well, they listened and they made changes. and for the first time Dominoes became the world's number one in their segment Done right relationship with your customers becomes an asset that competitors can't easily copy evenven if they had the Kahonas to try Chobani's customer outreach isn't entirely online though, it also builds a yogurt bar on wheels, which turns up at festivals and food markets to hand out free samples. They call it the Chowmobile The chmobile helps Chiovanni tap into a consumer demographic that Yogurt has long struggled to reach Men because drivers keep running into the same response some men think yogurt is women's food. Drivers soon learn that when they hype up Greek style yogurt's high protein content, that attitude changes Suddenly, men are more interested The drivers hand out cups to women and watch as their husbands, boyfriends, and brothers Reach over for taste. To amplify the protein message, Chobani has also started working with nutritionists, encouraging them to recommend it to their clients Around this time, the brand adopts the tagline Nothing but By then Chobani is already the biggest Greek yogurt brand on the market And it's finally making enough money to go big on advertising In two thousand nine, the company spent around two hundred thousand dollars on advertising But Uu Kaa's ambition is running well ahead of that He wants to push sales as far as they can go So, by twenty ten, he inflates the ad budget to thirteen million dollars A sixty two times increase on the year before But as orders from stores flood in Chobani's factory in New Berlin is getting maxed out It's running twenty four hours a day, seven days a week to try and meet demand Every spare corner is now used for storage Even the bathrooms have been repurposed into a temporary office Ka He's running on fumes. He's working non stop, sleeping in the office, living off delivery pizza and taking Tylenol just to get through the days. His staff are right there with him, working overtime weekends and holidays, including Thanksgiving and Christmas It's relentless But they're all in they can see how transformative Joe Banni has been for their community As two thousand nine begins, Ulu Kaya makes his sales projections for the year Keep predicts that to keep pace with demand, he needs to double production to four hundred thousand cases per week But if he increases production this much, Shubani will be big enough to threaten the two largest yogurt brands in America, Yoay and Danin And Uu Kaya knows what that means. He likens it to kicking two large sleeping dogs. His business is at a crossroads Stay small and he's safe, but he'll never fulfill the promise of what Chobani could be bigger, and those giants wake up. They'll pile into the Greek yogurt market with all the money, distribution and shelf space he doesn't have If he wants to grow and stay competitive, he has to be ready to fight these giants And so, Ulu Kaya bets the house. He's not going to double production. Instead, he's going to increase it five fo to one million cases a week. He thinks this is the only way to take on Dan and your play But it's also a do or die strategy. becausecause if American appetites for Greek yogurt don't grow as fast as his factory's output, if demand doesn't rise to meet a million cases a week, Ciovani won't just stall. It'll crash and burn Whether you're exploring your current fascinations or discovering new ones, Audible has all the stories that'll introduce you to your most fascinating self. Tap into a whole new world of heated conversations with a Sucy Romantasy series. Become your friend group's sci fi expert on the latest blockbuster book to sccreen adaptation Or find unexpected reveals through the exclusive episodes of a viral true crime podcast. However you choose to listen, Audible keeps you fascinated, so you can be just as fascinating. All in one easy app, with plans now starting at eight do ninety nine cents, you'll get access to over one million audioobooks and podcasts, including trending bestsellers Hotest new releases and exclusive podcasts you won't find anywhere else. Sign up now to become a member and get any audio book every month plus exclusive podcasts. Plans now start at eightll ninety nine cents. Be fascinated, be fascinating. twenty eleven, and Chobanni is on fire America's gone crazy for Greek yogurt Five years earlier, it was a tiny fraction of the US yogurt market Now, Greek yogurt accounts for a quarter of the market. And it's growing fast The richer taste, the thick texture, the protein levels and the health halo around it have all created a massive swell of demand, and Shobani is surfing that wave like a pro. These sales are on track to exceed a half a billion dollars a year Chobani has come from nowhere. become the second largest seller of yogurt in the U.S Behind only your play Chobani was already working flat out Now the company iss going into overdrive Its factory in New Berlin is almost unrecognizable There's still the smell of soured milk, but the air is warm and moist now. The smell of a food plant in full swing The company's yogurt master, Mustafa Doohan, eats more than four pounds of yogurt a day while roaming the plant, tasting yogurt at various stages of production In the vast packaging room, Trebani's brightly colored sleeves are wrapped around filled cups at a rate of fifteen thousand an hour The fruit storage room is packed with enormous steel barrels of pureed blueberries and peaches, and every day, seventy tankers roll up to the factory to deliver the milk it needs By now, those big sleeping dogs of the yogurt business have woken up and they are also going Greek Y play introduces Y play Greek Danon starts selling Greek yogurt under the name Oicos. Even an ice cream brand Ben and Jerrys jumps on the bandwagon, launching a line of frozen Greek yogurt that it claims will rock your Acropolis Faye, Chobani's rival from Greece, is also doing well It began exporting yogurt to the US in nineteen ninety eight, but now the company is producing its stateside too Since then, Faller's sales have grown sixty six percent But neither it nor the traditional yogurt giants can match Gobani's turbo charged growth And a big part of what's fueling it is the relationship Tobani has built with the people who love its yogurt In twenty eleven, Chiobani turns its fans into pitch peopleople for its Real Love stories TV ad campaign The company even coins a name for its super fans Sho Bonnie Ys Butulu Kaya isn't just looking to grow sales and profits. He wants Chobanni to grow communities too It's july twenty eleven, and in New Berlin, New York, Hulu Kaya takes his cap off to wipe the sweat from his brow The Northeast is experiencing a major heat wave, and he's standing on a brand new baseball diamond in the Soon to open Chobani Champions field As he kicks up the dry dust, he takes a moment to look around. This. his w excites him Yeah, he wants to make money and sure he enjoys being a CEO. But he doesn't believe in working just to maximize shareholder returns He thinks of the anti heroes in Hollywood movies, you know, the ones who do the right thing, but unconventionally In fact, that's how he sees himself He's not just a CEO In fact, he's an anti CEO. And he sees this littleittle League baseball diamond as the proof. The local youth baseball and softball association asked if Tobani could help fix it up They needed new dugouts and a refurbished diamond, which together would cost fifteen thousand dollars Instead, Ulu Kaya decided Shobani would give them three hundred thousand dollars for a brand new field, a concession stand, dugouts, and an announcer' booth At six PM, after a full day of children running around and practicing Bulu Ka officially opens the field by cutting a sky blue colored ribbon The celebrations go on until dark and the evening is capped off with fireworks. as he watches them explode into the night sky Yuluk Kaya realizes this is the proudest moment of his life. Not growing Chobani into a yogurt giant, not introducing millions of people to Greek yogurt, not his spiraling net worth