#229 - The Rise of Ketone IQ: Creating a New Energy Category with Michael Brandt

The Startup CPG Podcast

Startup CPG

Startup, Food, Business, Beverage, Cpg, Entrepreneurship

4.9 • 642 Ratings

🗓️ 30 December 2025

⏱️ 51 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

In this episode of the Startup CPG Podcast, host Daniel Scharff sits down with Michael Brandt, founder and CEO of Ketone IQ, to explore one of the most ambitious category creation stories in modern CPG. Ketone IQ has raised significant capital, secured military research partnerships with the Department of Defense, landed major retail distribution including Target and Sprouts, and achieved mid-eight figures in revenue with a $110 million valuation—all while educating consumers on an entirely new-to-them ingredient.

Michael breaks down what ketones actually are in refreshingly simple terms: a form of energy your body naturally makes that your brain loves to use. When you're fasting, exercising hard, or following a ketogenic diet, your body produces more ketones—and that's when people report feeling sharp, focused, and energized. Ketone IQ bottles that feeling, making it accessible without the restrictive diets or intense workouts. Michael traces his journey from competitive marathon runner (5:57 mile pace) experimenting with biohacks and intermittent fasting to recognizing ketones as the common thread behind peak mental performance.

Throughout the episode, Michael shares the unglamorous realities of creating an entirely new category: early product development when ketones cost $30 per shot, convincing co-manufacturers to produce something they'd never made before, securing Department of Defense contracts to fund R&D, and building initial traction with special operators and elite athletes for whom cognitive performance is life or death. He discusses the strategic decision to start D2C-first to provide rich educational context that brick-and-mortar couldn't offer, how the brand's "nuclear furnace" of DTC business now fuels retail expansion, and why he wishes he'd started building his founder brand on social media earlier.

Whether you're creating a new category, scaling from D2C to retail, or building a brand that requires significant consumer education, this conversation offers honest lessons on stewarding new ingredients to market, maintaining IP moats while developing ecosystems, leveraging partnerships for education at scale, and why the "job's not finished" mentality keeps founders grinding even at eight-figure revenue.

Listen in as they discuss:

What ketones actually are: your body's natural energy source that your brain prefers
How ketones differ from caffeine: actual cellular energy vs. blocking sleep hormones
Michael's origin story: competitive marathon running and biohacking led to Ketone IQ
The keto diet connection: why low-carb eating produces ketones naturally
Creating a new category vs. entering existing ones: the Gatorade playbook for electrolytes
Early product development: when shots cost $30 and no suppliers existed
Securing Department of Defense contracts to fund R&D with special operators
Building traction with elite athletes, UFC fighters, and Ironman competitors first
The strategic decision to start D2C-first for educational context and rich consumer information
Why 90%+ of future volume will be retail, but D2C is the "nuclear furnace" driving awareness
Landing Target, Sprouts, and Vitamin Shoppe: the "as seen on Instagram" shelf strategy
NSF Certified for Sport: building trust and compliance when stewarding new ingredients to market
The QR code strategy: always-on demos with first shot free via Venmo/PayPal reimbursement
Preparing for competition: maintaining IP moats while developing category ecosystems
Why Michael wishes he'd started founder content creation earlier
The importance of personal brand before launching: building community pre-idea
Hiring smartly: bringing in Monster Energy leadership for convenience channel expansion
Reaching $110M valuation at mid-eight figures revenue
What it feels like to scale: running faster, but never easier—more zeros, same obsession

Episode Links:

Ketone IQ Website: https://www.ketone.com Instagram: @ketone Founder Instagram: @michaeldbrant

Michael Brandt - Founder & CEO, Ketone IQ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michaeldbrant/ Instagram: @michaeldbrant

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Show Links:

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Episode music by Super Fantastics

Transcript

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0:00.0	I'm a big runner, and so I think of a running analogy here, which is that as you get better at running, it doesn't ever actually get easier, you just get faster.
0:18.5	The track this morning doing 800s and 200s and it was terrible.
0:22.8	It was a world of pain, chewing on glass the whole time. And it was really hard to do 800s and 200s,
0:29.2	three, four, five years ago when I was getting into the sport. I'm just a lot faster at it now.
0:33.0	And so when I think about the business now, I'm as ambitious as ever and is working as hard as ever.
0:39.6	I don't feel like I've made it. I think that there's so much more room to build.
0:45.2	Welcome everyone to the startup CPG podcast. I am bringing you some very special energy today because
0:50.5	we are talking about a category that barely existed just a few years ago that is ready to drink ketones.
0:57.0	Ketone IQ has raised a ton of capital. They've secured military research partnerships and landed huge retail distribution.
1:04.0	They have hit mid eight figures in revenue already. They've achieved a $110 million valuation, all while having to educate consumers on a new to them ingredient. It's a super impressive story. I can't wait for you to hear all about it. And I promise we are going to start with a real basic eighth grader level intro into what are ketones because I needed that badly. All right, you're going to love it.
1:28.8	Here we go.
1:34.6	All right, Michael, my friend, it is so good to have you here.
1:37.7	So for somebody who has never heard of ketone IQ, how do you explain?
1:41.8	What is it?
1:42.6	Who is it for what is a ketone? Daniel, it's a great question. And thanks for having me on. Thanks everyone for listening. And that question really gets at the belly of the beast of what we're doing here, which is that we're creating a new category. That's not for everyone. It's not for the faint of heart. Let me also say there are a lot of ways to make great CPGs. There's a lot of way to create value in the world and you don't have to
2:04.5	create. of heart. Let me also say there are a lot of ways to make great CPGs. There's a lot of way to create
2:01.6	value in the world and you don't have to create a new category. I always think about Gatorade
2:07.0	created electrolytes back in the 1960s with the Florida Gators creating electrolytes as a new entrant
2:13.7	into the pantheon of CPG and nutrition. And now here we are all these years later. Electrolites is a tens of billions of dollars category. You don't have to do that. You can also have a celebrity-backed peanut butter company that exits for a couple hundred mill in like three years. And you're laughing all the way to the bank in your own way. There's a lot of ways to create value in the space. So I always like to be really
2:34.5	clear on what we are doing, which is very inventive. We are creating a new category. Ketones are an
2:39.5	inventive new category. My hypothesis is that it is going to be as large as electrolytes and
2:46.0	collagen and these other nutritional primitives. Now, to answer the question, like what the heck actually
	...

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