CHOMPS - From $6,500 to America’s Fastest-Growing Snack Brand
The Story of a Brand
Ramon Vela
5 • 145 Ratings
🗓️ 29 January 2025
⏱️ 56 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
In this episode, Rose Hamilton, Founder of Compass Rose Ventures, sits down with Pete Maldonado and Rashid Ali, Co-founders and Co-CEOs of CHOMPS, the fastest-growing food brand in the U.S.
From humble beginnings to over $500 million in retail sales, Pete and Rashid have built a brand redefining the snacking industry with high-quality, healthy, and delicious meat snacks.
What I love about this conversation is how Pete and Rashid dive into the lessons they’ve learned, the mistakes they’ve made, and the strategies that have fueled their success. Whether you’re a founder, a business leader, or someone passionate about entrepreneurship, this episode is packed with valuable insights and actionable takeaways.
Key Moments in This Episode:
* Building from Scratch: How Pete and Rashid leveraged their complementary skills and a deep understanding of their customers to build a loyal community around CHOMPS.
* Focus on Brand Awareness: Why keeping brand awareness ahead of distribution has been their key to scaling successfully while maintaining customer loyalty.
* Lessons in Resilience: How bootstrapping through challenges—like raising $1 million in a weekend to fund a Trader Joe’s order—helped them grow sustainably.
* Innovation with Simplicity: The power of focusing on a core product lineup while introducing customer-driven innovations like pantry packs to meet evolving needs.
* The CHOMPian Culture: How Pete and Rashid maintain their original values and foster a strong company culture, even as their team and operations scale rapidly.
Join us in listening to this insightful episode where Pete and Rashid share the secrets behind CHOMPS’ incredible growth and their mission to create a better-for-you brand that resonates with consumers. Let’s dive into their journey and learn how to build a purpose-driven and wildly successful business. Enjoy the show!
For more on CHOMPS, visit: https://chomps.com/
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Today’s Sponsors:
Compass Rose Ventures - Advisor for CPG Brands: https://compassroseventures.com/contact/
Compass Rose Ventures can help your CPG brand increase customer lifetime value, expand into the US market, create an omnipresent omnichannel footprint, optimize customer journeys, build brand communities, and more. Visit the link above to learn more.
Augmentum Media - Influencer Marketing for Consumer Brands: https://www.augmentum-media.com/story
What secret do fast-growing Health and Wellness brands like Xtendlife, Nourished, and Hunter & Gather share? They all outsource their influencer marketing to the experts at Augmentum. Augmentum is offering "The Story of a Brand Show" listeners a 30-minute consulting session AND a personalized influencer strategy plan built by their experts for you to implement either with them or in-house. Visit the link above to learn more.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hello, friends, and welcome back to another inspiring episode of the story of a brand. |
| 0:05.0 | I'm Rose Hamilton, your host and the founder of Compass Rose Ventures. |
| 0:09.0 | You know, I'm always excited to share stories of innovation and resilience, but today's episode is truly something special. |
| 0:16.0 | Joining me are Pete Maldonado and Rashid Ali, the dynamic duo behind Choms, the fastest growing food brand in the U.S. |
| 0:24.6 | They've built a brand loved by households everywhere, from Whole Foods to Trader Joe's, |
| 0:29.5 | with a commitment to high-quality, clean label snacks that are flying off the shelves. |
| 0:33.7 | But the real magic lies in how they transformed a $6,500 investment into over $500 million |
| 0:41.3 | in retail sales last year. |
| 0:43.6 | I promise you don't want to miss this conversation. |
| 0:46.6 | Here's a little sneak peek of what you'll hear. |
| 0:49.4 | The Power of Community. |
| 0:51.0 | Pete and Rashid share how they built Choms by staying laser focused on their |
| 0:55.2 | niche and nurturing authentic relationships with their customers. Scaling without compromise. |
| 1:01.8 | From 100% inspection processes to strategic partnerships, learn how Choms has maintained quality |
| 1:08.0 | and culture while scaling to unprecedented heights. |
| 1:13.9 | And finally, consumer-centric innovation. |
| 1:19.2 | Discover how listening to their customers and staying data obsessed led to game-changing insights that propelled their growth. |
| 1:20.9 | So grab your favorite snack, maybe a chomp stick, and join us for this incredible journey |
| 1:26.0 | of entrepreneurship, grit, and purpose-driven growth. |
| 1:29.3 | Let's dive in. |
| 1:40.4 | This is Rose Hamilton, your host for The Story of a Brand Show. |
| 1:44.3 | For over two decades, I've served as a hands-on executive in growing consumer companies, |
... |
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