Damn Good Brands

Welcome to DAMN GOOD BRANDS. Today, we're diving into the world of real estate with Julie Newdow and Mark Landisman. With over 30 years of experience in the industry, Julie and Mark are ranked in the top 1% of America's real estate broker teams by the Wall Street Journal. In this episode, Julie and Mark share their insights on professional growth in the real estate industry and the impact of the recession on the market. They also discuss how trust is the key to maintaining client retention and share details about their success mindsets, emphasizing the importance of working hard to make the lives of others better. Their inspiring conversation left me feeling fired up and motivated. So, if you're in the tri-state area and looking for your dream home, we encourage you to contact the Newdow-Landisman team. With their vast experience and commitment to excellence, you'll be in good hands. Check out their website at www.compass.com/agents/newdow-landisman or simply Google "Newdow Landisman." Thanks for listening. ----- Produced by Simpler Media

Michelle Park is the Chief Marketing Officer for Territory Foods, a female-led fresh food platform that offers a new take on the food preparation and distribution industry with chef-prepared fresh food delivered locally. Territory offers personalized menus with a chef's touch and can cater to paleo, vegan, pescetarian, any diet you name, they can do it and do it deliciously. As a customer of Territory I can attest to the fact that their food is fantastic - I kinda enjoy cooking but can never get around to doing it, so Territory is a real game changer because it gives you chef-caliber delicious meals that follow your diet and are delivered right to your door. Michelle has a varied and fascinating job history that includes major positions across major CPG companies like Procter and Gamble, as well as leadership positions at multiple startups and venture capital firms. This was a great conversation about career trajectory as Michelle's did not follow a typical path by any means, but her experience across startups and major companies shaped her professional development to be extremely well-rounded and suited for leadership. Really enjoyed this conversation and hope you do too. Without further ado, here is Territory Foods CMO, Michelle Park. ----- Produced by Simpler Media

Jeremy Reid is the founder and CEO of PINCHme.com - the leading digital hub for CPG manufacturers to acquire new customers and increase sales through targeted and data-driven sampling. Since launching in 2012, PINCHme’s community has grown to over 8 million members with $35 billion in collective spending power on consumer products and has powered sampling campaigns for multiple Fortune 400 CPG companies, including Kraft, Proctor & Gamble, Unilever, Kellog's, Reckitt Benckiser and Nestle to name a few. The origin of PinchMe started with the observation that CPG sampling programs were inefficient and ineffective, a problem that Jeremy sought to fix by building an entire business around an innovative and data-centric sampling platform. In this interview, Jeremy gets into his overall entrepreneurial origin story and how he overcame multiple obstacles in launching his company only to turn it into a major success story on today's episode of Damn Good Brands. ----- Produced by Simpler Media

Joshua Ostrovsky is an entrepreneur, social media influencer, author, and plus-size model. Having started his career as an Instagram humor influencer under the name The Fat Jewish, Josh went on to be a co-founder of Swish Beverages, which launched White Girl Rosé in 2015 followed by the Babe family of sparkling canned wines. In 2019, Anheuser-Busch acquired Swish Beverages, marking the brewer's largest wine investment to date. In this wide-ranging conversation, Josh and I talked about his humble origins, entrepreneurship, the founding of Babe beverages, and his super exciting new venture. Guys, this episode is a treat, Josh is not only incredibly hilarious but surprisingly inspiring. That being said, I will issue a disclaimer that this is definitely more of an R-Rated - episode so if bad language or crude jokes offend you even a little bit, you might want to stop listening now because there's QUITE A BIT OF IT. You've been warned. Now without further ado, here is The Fat Jewish himself, Mr. Josh Ostrovsky.

We recently split up the prior episodes of Damn Good Brands into two different podcasts. If you may have noticed some of the previous episodes of the podcast are missing; but they're not. They've been transferred over to a brand new podcast called Frictionless Marketing. Frictionless Marketing will feature a series of corporate and creative conversations with CCOs, CMOs, and other executive marketing leaders to discuss today's best in class marketing campaigns and frictionless frameworks to help build your brand in an era where advertising is no longer the answer. Frictionless Marketing we'll feature behind the scenes stories and expert insights to help marketing decision-makers prepare for a future where the consumer rules. Damn Good Brands—this podcast—willl focus more on entrepreneurs, founders, upstarts, and edgier, more controversial brands and brand leaders. We hope you subscribe to both, but check out Frictionless Marketing for Fortune 500 brand leaders like CCOs, CMOs, and other comms and marketing leaders, while Damn Good Brands will be the place for edgier deep-dives into new companies and new brands.

Mike Cessario is the CEO and Founder of Liquid Death, an outrageous new canned water brand with quality mountain water engineered to murder your thirst! Liquid Death has made a name for itself as an extremely disruptive force of marketing, and the brand's outlandish marketing stunts are as refreshing as the water itself. To date, the brand has convinced 180,000 people to sell them their souls, has cursed its water with a real witch and performed a reverse exorcism with an accredited warlock that allegedly put demons into the water. Customers who purchased during this time period were entitled to a coupon for $1 off any exorcism (yes, this is all for real). Recently, to further raise awareness of plastic pollution in the oceans, Liquid Death released a series of plush marine animal stuffed toys called Cutie Polluties that were bloodied and choked with plastic garbage. Additionally, as you can imagine, this is a brand whose unholy approach to marketing inspires a lot of controversy and hate, which is why Liquid Death took their favorite angry online comments and turned them into lyrics for their own death metal album. Liquid Death also has a very compelling mission, which is to eradicate the over-use of plastic bottles. According to their website, the average aluminum can contains over 70% recycled material, whereby the average plastic bottle contains only 3%. Additionally, aluminum cans are infinitely recyclable, and of all the aluminum produced since 1888, over 75% of it is still in current use. Plastic, on the other hand, technically isn't even recyclable in the first place because it costs so much money to melt it down, sending most of it into landfills and into the ocean. The planet has been overrun by plastic pollution, and Liquid Death is here to do something about it, which is why 10% of profits from every can sold help kill plastic pollution. Prior to founding Liquid Death, Mike worked in marketing with companies like Vayner Media and worked on multiple viral promotions for Netflix on series like "House of Cards," "Stranger Things," and "Narcos." The entrepreneurial origin story behind Liquid Death is extremely inspirational and a real testament to how putting passion, fun, and personality into a brand can make it into a formidable gamechanger. We get into all of this on this very special episode of Damn Good Brands Origin Stories. Here are some key takeaways from this conversation with Mike Cessario. Throw the rules away. Ideas don't sell. Proof sells.

After a 30-year agency career that included notable stints with Edelman and WE Communications, Alan VanderMolen was named Chief Communications Officer at CPG giant SC Johnson last year. Alan oversees both internal and external communications at SC Johnson, reporting to CEO Fisk Johnson. In this wide-ranging conversation with Lippe Taylor CEO Paul Dyer, Alan delves into the importance of trust, keys to revolutionizing sustainability practice, the importance of internal comms, advice for...

Russell Dyer is the VP & Chief of Communications and Government Affairs at Mondelēz International. At Mondelēz, Russ is responsible for overseeing all external and internal communications as well as government affairs for Mondelēz International, a Fortune 150 and the global leader in snacking. Russ joined Mondelēz in 2015 as Vice President, Global Communications. In that role, he was responsible for all strategic communications plans, overseeing the worldwide external and internal...

June Lee Risser is Vice President and General Manager for the U.S. Galderma Consumer Care business. A strategic business leader with a passion for building great brands, June is responsible for leading the U.S. commercial organization for the Galderma portfolio of consumer-available brands, including Cetaphil® Gentle Skin Care products, celebrating 70 years of healthy skin in 2017 and Differin® Gel, first FDA-approved, prescription-strength retinoid acne treatment available over the counter...

Jen Sey is the global brand president at Levi Strauss & Co., where she is responsible for marketing, design, merchandising, and brand experience. Jen has been with Levi Strauss & Co. for more than 20 years, holding a variety of leadership positions within the Marketing, Strategy, and Ecommerce teams. In 2013, Jen became the global chief marketing officer for the Levi’s brand and in 2018 was appointed senior vice president and chief marketing officer, overseeing marketing for the company’s...

John Galloway is chief marketing and innovation officer for Godiva Chocolatier, the 95-year-old Belgian maker of premium chocolate. He joined the company in 2018 after nearly 30 years in marketing, including substantial stints at Pepsi and Hard Rock. John came to Godiva from a position as CEO of Beautiful Day, where he worked for three years to roll out the lifestyle brand startup. Before that he was with Hard Rock for eight years, handling advertising, public relations, loyalty, and social...

Jeremy Parker is the Co-founder and CEO of Swag.com, the eCommerce platform for purchasing promotional materials that people actually want to keep. When you think of the promotional products industry, you might think of cheaply made items you pickup conferences only to eventually throw away. Or, god forbid you've ever had to order promotional products yourself and are aware of the nightmare of dealing with shipping inquiries, quality issues, and all manner of inconvenience synonymous with that industry. Swag.com's mission is to take the pain out of ordering customized promotional material with a focus on high quality, frictionless ordering, and seamless distribution. Swag.com launched in 2016 and has since become the fastest-growing company in the promotional product space. Inc. magazine recently included the company on its list of fastest-growing companies in the country. Swag.com’s thousands of customers include corporate giants like Facebook, Google, Amazon, Netflix, Spotify, and TikTok. In this conversation, Jeremy discusses the founding of Swag.com, what he learned from pivotal mentors, and how he was able to observe and utilize Uber's inventory-free model to great success. Observe the Uber model of curation organization and obliterating friction. The foundation of SWAG.com was born out of the constant frustration most people have when ordering branded items for their companies or clients. Something as simple as branded t-shirts or water bottles can be a nightmarish process consisting of hours of research, waiting around for samples to arrive, comparing price quotes, etc. And even then, quality is never guaranteed. Instead of starting their own custom branding company from scratch, Swag.com yielded the Uber model of brokering, whereby they found and vetted a series of high-quality and trusted custom merchandise providers and created a network of them that they would dispatch orders to through their e-commerce platform. This allowed them to move fast and operate on a large scale, all with a very lean company structure. Pound the pavement. When he was just starting out with Swag.com, Jeremy landed an enormous client right out of the gate, Facebook. How did he get Facebook? It wasn't from months of cold calling and emailing and asking for a meeting; no, he showed up at their office. By inserting his own foot in the door, decision-makers met with him and ultimately signed on to be his client. This caused a social proof domino effect because once he announced that he had a titan like Facebook as a client, WeWork and Netflix jumped on board next and the snowball for Swag.com was very much set in motion. Clearly, showing up at someone's office without an appointment doesn't always work, and you're likely to be turned away but, if you do it enough times, who knows, you may be surprised at who will take an impromptu meeting with you and what it can lead to. Surround yourself with greatness. In his earlier years, Jeremy worked very closely with Jessie Itzler, serial entrepreneur, social media personality,self-development guru, and husband to Spanx founder Sara Blakely. Jeremy's time with Jessie was incredibly formidable for his work ethic, entrepreneurial sensibility, intelligence, and overall hustle. If that wasn't enough, Jeremy got to spend a great deal of time with David Goggins; ex-Navy SEAL, motivational speaker, and downright badass in every sense of the word. The combination of these two mentors imbued Jeremy with innate entrepreneurial intelligence and a...

Mike Cessario is the CEO and Founder of Liquid Death, an outrageous new canned water brand with quality mountain water engineered to murder your thirst! Liquid Death has made a name for itself as an extremely disruptive force of marketing, and the brand's outlandish marketing stunts are as refreshing as the water itself. To date, the brand has convinced 180,000 people to sell them their souls, has cursed its water with a real witch, and performed a reverse exorcism with an accredited...

Jordan Silbert is the founder and CEO of Q Mixers, the premium brand of cocktail mixers. The idea for the company came to him while he was drinking top-shelf gin mixed with low-quality tonic with friends and asked himself, “Shouldn’t my tonic be as good as my gin?” Next came years of experimenting before he devised the perfect blend of high-quality ingredients and ample carbonation that became the brand’s first product. Today the Brooklyn-based company has 11 products and is distributed by...

Ray Kerins is senior vice president of corporate affairs for Bayer US. Ray’s current position is the latest in a string of senior communications jobs in the pharmaceutical and life sciences industry. Before joining Bayer in 2013, Ray was with Pfizer, serving as chief global spokesperson and overseeing global internal and external communications as vice president of external affairs and worldwide communications. Before that, he was chief global spokesperson for Merck & Co. Ray has extensive...

Diane Gomez-Thinnes is Worldwide President at Mentor, one of the world’s biggest makers of breast implants for aesthetic and post-surgical breast reconstruction. Diane has been with the Johnson & Johnson company since 2016 and held the title of vice president for U.S. marketing and global strategic marketing before ascending to the role of president in 2019. Before Mentor, Diane was a marketing executive for medical device makers Ethicon and Cordis. She began her career as an engineer in...

Matt Furman serves as the Chief Communications and Public Affairs Officer at Best Buy, where he’s been since 2012. He’s responsible for communications--internal and external--as well as government affairs, CSR, and community relations. In addition, Matt manages event planning and Best Buy’s in-house production studio. Before joining the Minneapolis retailer, Matt held the Vice President of Corporate Affairs job at Mars Chocolate. Earlier gigs included communications leadership positions at...

Paul Cohen joined Visa as Senior Vice President and Chief Communications Officer in 2017, coming from a similar role at PayPal. At PayPal, he spent two years setting up the company’s first corporate communications function and overseeing communications about its separation from eBay. Before that, he’d been with Visa for more than a decade, serving in his last position as Senior Vice President of Corporate Communications and Marketing for North America. His time at Visa has been marked by,...

Jeffrey Kuhlman is Chief Communications and Marketing Officer at Bentley Motors, Inc. Jeff was serving as communications chief for the U.S. arm of the British luxury automobile brand when he added marketing responsibilities in 2016. He reports to the president of Bentley USA as well as the U.K.-based global communications director. Jeff is an auto industry comms veteran, having worked for several automobile brands during his career. In addition to Bentley, which he joined in 2015, he’s...

Chris Chiames is the Chief Communications Officer of Carnival Cruises. As CCO, Chris reports directly to Carnival Cruise Line’s President, Christine Duffy. He oversees the company’s internal and external communications, reputation and issues management, and executive communications. Before joining Carnival in 2018, he worked as a senior communications executive mostly for major travel industry organizations including, among others, Sabre Corporation and Orbitz Worldwide. He has a master’s...