Vita Coco: Michael Kirban

How I Built This with Guy Raz

Guy Raz | Wondery

Business

4.8 • 31.1K Ratings

🗓️ 3 August 2020

⏱️ 72 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

So—no joke: two guys really do walk into a bar. While sharing a few drinks on a winter night in New York City, best friends Michael Kirban and Ira Liran met two young women from Brazil. That chance encounter eventually led to a business idea: to sell Brazilian coconut water in the US, as an alternative to Gatorade. In 2004, Michael and Ira launched Vita Coco, only to discover that another startup—Zico—was selling a nearly identical product. The two companies went to war, using the time-honored tools of corporate sabotage, but eventually Vita Coco emerged as the top selling coconut-water in the U.S. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Transcript

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1:09.0	I would go in on my roller blades, because I could hit 50 stores in a day on my roller blades, whereas if I was walking it would be a lot less.
1:20.0	Yeah. One of the early stores I went into, I found the store manager.
1:24.0	First, he's laughing at me because I'm on roller blades, and I'm a sales guy without a polo shirt and a briefcase.
1:30.0	And he takes a sip, and he said, this is never going to work. It's tastes like sock water.
1:38.0	Brahmin VR is how I built this. A show about innovators, entrepreneurs, idealists, and the stories behind the movements they built.
1:53.0	I'm Guy Ross, and on the show today, how Michael Kerbin shipped thousands of cases of coconut water to New York,
2:02.0	fought off a bram that looked just like his, and built Vita Coco, the top-selling coconut water in the country.
2:16.0	You remember that kid in high school who was weirdly interested in business, who had almost no interest in going to college or starting a traditional career,
2:27.0	but was determined to start something on their own? You might have snickered about them or even rolled your eyes, or maybe that kid was you.
2:37.0	Well, that kid was also Michael Kerbin. Michael had the benefit of watching his dad pursue a bunch of different business ideas, including ideas that failed.
	...

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