Episode Summary:

Join Harry Duran, host of Vertical Farming Podcast, as he welcomes to the show Matt Ryan, CEO of Soli Organic. Formerly known as Shenandoah Growers, a name inspired by their start in Virginia’s Shenandoah Valley, Soli Organic is a controlled environment agriculture company that grows exceptional organic produce, at an affordable price, nationwide. Today, Harry and Matt do a deep dive into Matt’s incredible business background, from working at Disney and Starbucks to eventually pursuing an exciting opportunity at Soli Organic. Matt talks about the high growth in the indoor agriculture sector, what Soli Organic is doing to differentiate themselves in this market and the importance of fulfilling the vision of a brand.  

Episodes Sponsor:

Freight Farms – https://www.freightfarms.com/ 

Global Vertical Farming Show – https://verticalfarmingshow.com/ 

Cultivatd – https://cultivatd.com/

What We Covered:

03:41 – Harry welcomes to the show Matt Ryan, who joins the show to discuss his experience as a business leader going through Covid-19, what he learned from his time at Disney and Starbucks and the journey that brought him to Soli Organic 

13:02 – Understanding markets and fulfilling the vision of a brand 

19:27 – Matt’s vertical farming origin story and his first 90 days as CEO 

29:49 – Matt explains how Soli Organic is differentiating themselves in the world of controlled agriculture 

35:03 – From Shenandoah Growers to Soli Organic 

42:32 – A tough question Matt has had to ask himself recently and how he thinks about expansion and growing Soli Organic  

47:22 – Mentors who have inspired Matt along his journey and something that Matt has changed his mind about recently 

50:36 – Harry thanks Matt for joining the show and let’s listeners know where they can learn more about Soli Organic and connect with Matt

Tweetable Quotes:

“There’s no such thing as a simple business I learned. And certainly that’s true at soli Organic as well. There’s complexity everywhere and understanding the nuances of business is really important. But, if you don’t understand what the consumer and the customer want, you’ll never get anywhere.” (12:27) (Matt) 

“I also knew, way back when, as soon as I started doing advertising that I felt like I understood markets. And I think that understanding markets is what business is all about.” (14:52) (Matt) 

“I’m starting to feel like I’m in that sweet spot where I have all of the perspective of somebody who’s joined from the outside who sees the opportunities, who sees the challenges, who knows the world from a different angle, plus real understanding of what the business is like and how it operates and how the technology and the science work and the people at the company and everything else.” (27:49) (Matt) 

“The problem with developing brands and marketing in a business like produce is you can’t have a brand if you don’t have consistency. And the way you get consistency is by having a standardized product. And the only way you can get a standardized product in agriculture is to grow stuff indoors.” (39:24) (Matt) 

Links Mentioned:

Matt’s LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/mattryancmo/ 

Soli Organic’s Website – https://www.soliorganic.com/ 

Sponsor Info:

Cultivatd Website – https://cultivatd.com/

Cultivatd Instagram – https://www.instagram.com/cultivatdco/

Cultivatd’s Twitter – https://twitter.com/cultivatd 

Cultivatd’s Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/cultivatd/

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Mentioned in this episode:

2025 Precision Ag Report by iGrowNews

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or click the link in the show notes. The biggest challenge right now, we're a

small company and we need to become a big company. And that

involves going out, raising money, and building

incredible indoor farms, building that national footprint, converting

our old school business that we've been in for many years into this new

school business that uses indoor farms and better product and

cheaper, frankly, all at once. That's an incredible journey, but there's a lot of work

to do to scale it. And that's what I spend a lot of my time

thinking about.

Welcome to the Vertical Farming Podcast, weekly conversations with

fascinating CEOs, founders, and agtech visionaries.

Join us every week as we dive deep into the world of vertical farming.

With your host, Harry Duran. Vertical Farming Podcast,

Season 4. Welcome back. If this is your first time listening, welcome new

listeners. If you're looking for a show where we interview fascinating

CEOs and founders of the leading vertical farming companies from around the world,

you're in the right place. I'm your host, Harry Duran, and really

excited to share this week's episode. But before

I do that, in case you missed last week, I spoke to Aja Atwood, She's

the co-founder and CEO at Trella Technologies. It's an organization that

provides technical innovative solutions to make indoor and urban farming a sustainable,

long-lasting industry. What was most fascinating was the

patented technologies that AJ and her team developed, including

automated plant training robotics. She also shares some of the

work they're doing with the John Charles Academy, and we speak a little bit about

the importance of fostering diversity in the workplace. Make sure you check that out.

This week, I have the pleasure of speaking to Matt Ryan. He's the CEO of

Soli Organic, formerly known as Shenandoah Growers. Soli

Organic grows exceptional organic produce at an affordable

price nationwide. And in this conversation, we dive into Matt's

incredible business background from working at Disney and Starbucks to eventually

pursuing the opportunity that presented itself at Soli. Matt talks

about the high growth in indoor ag and what Soli Organic is doing to

differentiate themselves in this market and the importance of fulfilling

the vision of a brand. Really inspiring conversation with

someone who's super knowledgeable. This episode is brought to you by Freight Farms. Freight

Farms manufactures and sells a leading vertical hydroponic container farm, the Greenery

S. Built inside a 40-foot shipping container, the Greenery S uses

innovative climate control technology paired with an IoT app called Farmhand

to enable anyone to grow fresh food anywhere in the world. Visit

freightfarms.com/verticalfarmingpodcast to learn

more. And one quick reminder, we do have sponsorship slots open

for a couple of episodes being produced this month

at a discounted rate if you're interested. And obviously season 5 is

opening up and we're having conversations with sponsors there already as well.

[email protected] if you're interested in learning more.

I do want to take a moment to read off some of the reviews that

have been coming in over the past couple of months. And I

will apologize ahead of time because it seems that there was a whole slew

of these that I missed. And so I want to

really thank folks that have written in reviews, and I

value each and every single one of them. And one of the things I say

at the end of each podcast is that I'm going to be reading these out

on future episodes, and I'm a little

lax there and have been. So I do want to get caught up. And so

if you'll grant me that time now, I want to get caught up

because I really value the feedback. And it means a lot. You know, it's a

labor of love that goes into getting these episodes out and doing the

interviews. And when people are getting value out of it and

they're sharing that with me, I'm truly honored. So back in March,

Original is smart. This was needed. Thanks, Harry, Duran. I never miss it.

Back in April, I love the show. When's the next episode? It's been 2

weeks. Obviously keeping me honest there. Thank you.

Quality work. A very interesting podcast. Quality interviews and

understandable also for people like me with limited background knowledge about vertical

farming. Thomas Oberlin, past guest, thank you Thomas, says, single

best source of vertical farm founder knowledge. Wow, thank

you. We chatted on LinkedIn

back in July, says, informative sessions to gain holistic understanding of the field.

Every new topic I would get interested in, I end up looking for a podcast

on it. I entered the words vertical farming on Apple Podcasts and this one showed

up first. The album art was so attractive, I opened the channel and read the

description. Gave the first 3 episodes a listen and quite liked the

conversations Harry was having with his guests. I'm looking to invest in this industry

and I believe this podcast might be the right platform to seek holistic understanding of

the industry of vertical farming. Thank you so much, Seha, some very kind

words. Excellent show, insightful. I was

shocked to see so few reviews. This is gold. Thank you, Harry, for an incredible

series about vertical farming. I've been thoroughly enjoying your work.

empowered me to launch my own. Carrie has done an amazing job at getting so

many variants of guests from different aspects of vertical farming. Since listening to this

back in March and leaving my job, I'm in the process of launching my own

urban farm in the UK using hydroponics. That's

awesome and inspiring. Fascinating topic,

insightful conversations. I've loved learning about the space and this podcast is very

informative. And lastly, Emily Seward. Thank you so much, Emily.

Fantastic podcast. I've really enjoyed these informative but

accessible conversations with leaders in the sector. The host seems to have a knack

For drawing out lots of interesting information in a very conversational and

easy-to-follow way. I would recommend this podcast to anyone interested in vertical

farming. Whew. I have to take a moment to

really let those sink in. Really, the only thing I can say is that I'm

just truly grateful for the listeners and for

taking the time to leave that feedback. So as you can hear,

I'll be reading these out on future episodes. ratethispodcast.com/vfp.

Been keeping you waiting long enough. Let's get into this conversation with Matt. So Matt

Ryan, CEO of Soli Organic, thank you for joining me on the Vertical Farming

Podcast. Thank you for having me. I appreciate it. Have you used this

tool before, SquadCast, for recording? First time. First time. Newbie.

What's been your experience in this world of online

recording with, with everyone forced to look to use Zoom? Your

experience having the

It's funny because I've always been a

little bit adept at technology, so that part doesn't scare me. But there are

techniques you have to learn through all of this. And

I'm not saying I'm perfect, but I've gotten better at the virtual thing.

Yeah. So I'd be remiss if I didn't ask, what was that

experience of going through the pandemic for you?

And obviously there's a lot of different ways you could— jumping off points, but just

maybe a quick synopsis of your takeaway now that we have a little bit of

room to look back. What were you experiencing as a

business leader through those 12 to 16

months? Well, I was very lucky in that I got to choose the

next chapter of my life during this period of time. I had

decided to make the move away from Starbucks literally at the beginning of the

pandemic. It was the day that the first case of COVID in

Seattle came out that I decided that it was time for me to look for

my next chapter. Did a wind-down across a year with

Starbucks and then spent some time looking for what the next

opportunity would look like. And I had time to

reflect and through the process realized that I

wanted to do something that was meaningful and impactful. I wanted to

lead. And the opportunity at Soly

Organic, then Shenandoah Growers, came up and I said, wow, I've been

following the opportunity. I've been following the sector. And I

started to learn about the company and said, this is the kind of place where

I could make a difference or I could help make a difference for the company.

And I had the great luxury of

Yeah, it's interesting. And I'm wondering if you heard from a lot of your colleagues

in the space about some of the challenges they faced. I was out of corporate

at that time as well. I've had my own business since 2015, so been

remote and so had familiarity with the tools. But I can only think about—

have this dynamic of having a workforce in person, and

then just like that, it's switched over within the span of a couple days, and

you're forced to adapt. Yeah, it's a big shift. Well, I was there at the

beginning, of course, at Starbucks. And it was a, you know, Starbucks was a company

that very much, I mean, it's an in-person company. The stores are in

person. The offices were in person. And it was culture shock to

have to go virtual. Now, the good news is a company like Starbucks had, you

know, from a customer point of view, built a lot of tool— put a lot

of tools in place, digital ordering and all that kind of stuff. Thank goodness for

Starbucks that was all there. But it was a transition. And I know

from my old colleagues at Disney as well, too, with so many of their businesses

being dependent upon in-person experiences, think theme parks or movie

theaters, just immense disruption to the business

and immense disruption to ways of work. So

quite a ride for anybody who was with those companies. I know that.

Yeah. So you did mention Disney, and I did want to talk a little bit

about that experience. Can you talk about— and there's

significant milestones obviously in your career with Disney, with Starbucks, and now with Soli,

but just so people get a little bit of the context, How did that opportunity

present itself to work at Disney? And what was your experience working there like?

Yeah, so I'd been prior to Disney many years in the advertising business of all

things. And I knew that that was not the best industry to be in in

the late '90s as everything digital was coming along and disrupting

television. And I got this wonderful opportunity to join

Disney because that industry, the entertainment industry, was in great

transition. Used to be an industry where

The distribution was incredibly constrained. There were, you know, 3 or

4 TV networks, a handful of cable networks and movie theaters. And

there was not the endless shelf of entertainment. And what the endless

shelf of entertainment that we now see in the digital world meant

was that no longer was the studio in charge. It was the

consumer that was in charge and things like brands

and knowing the customer and knowing what the customer wanted. started to matter.

And I think they hired me for that reason, because that's what I ultimately am,

is a consumerist. And I was there through a great period

of change when the Walt Disney Company went from being,

you know, a company that was in control of what people wanted

to having to be a company that listened to what people wanted. The customer was

king, the consumer was king. And that's very much been the

motif of my career. And I think it's going to happen again in the produce

business. Yeah, I'm interested to learn how

some of those analogies might fit. I read in one of the descriptions that

at Walt Disney, you were responsible, as you mentioned, for long-term strategic planning.

And then this other thing that caught my eye was that you oversaw the development

of the character franchises as well. And I'm wondering

what skill sets or mental models are in play

as you have to think of the challenges with those tasks. Well, going

back to that era, I mean, in many ways, Disney had grown up as

a conglomerate with different parts of the organization

acting autonomously. It was a very effective model for growth for a long time.

But the truth was, there were all sorts of shared bits of intellectual property across

the company. Everybody had Mickey Mouse in their hands. Everybody had the princesses in their

hands. And at a certain point in time, it became evident that

with the consumer able to cross every angle

and every different piece of Disney business, that they needed

to have sort of a centralized voice in the planning of those

customer franchises. Planning from a business point of view so that there was

a timing across the entire company in terms of how

things worked, but also a planning in terms of what the

storytelling was like, what the consumer proposition would be like. And,

you know, you didn't always want to step on top of everything. So

having a very, very clear plan for all the character franchises was part of

what I did at Disney. And it certainly worked out for that company. It's going

strong as we speak. It must put a smile on your face when you see

what they've been able to do with the Marvel franchise because that's essentially what you're

speaking about. Yeah, it's exactly— I was very involved. I was part of

the team that did the acquisition of Marvel back then. And I saw

the potential, and it's just Wonderful to see it all come to life. Even

if I've left the company at this point in time, I'm still quite a fan.

Do you have children? I do not have children. The whole world are my children,

actually. So I do have children. They're just not biological.

Well, I imagine any of the children in the family, nephews, nieces,

maybe, like, you sure get some brownie points, I would imagine,

when folks know you work at Disney and Marvel. Well, especially when I was able

to bring people into the theme parks. There was a real— I was the most

popular uncle in town. I can tell you that. So I'm

interested from a career standpoint, where are you and

what are you— what's in your mind as you are wrapping up at

Disney and then the opportunity to work with an organization like Starbucks

in a different industry, but related also when it comes to client

experience? Like, how do you think about that process and what made you make that

jump? Well, you know, I was not interested in

leaving Disney. It was my dream job on so many levels. A

very remarkable opportunity came along where I was essentially

invited to start the strategy department at Starbucks.

And as, you know, somebody who never thought that

they'd have the opportunity to do something like that at such a major brand, I

thought to myself, this is an opportunity I just can't pass up. And

it ripped my heart out to leave Disney, but on the other hand, I knew

I was going to another great company with a great brand. And from my

perspective, the industry was completely completely different going from media and entertainment to going to

coffee and retail. However, people, customers

are customers, and understanding customers and understanding how you

translate what customers want into operational

business practices, into communications and marketing and product,

I've— that's the thing that I can do. That's whatever, you

know, whatever was in my background that gave me that ability is I have that

ability. And, uh, the The skill sets

transferred, and I very much went from being a person who was

focused on the movies to being a purpose person who was focused on

coffee and breakfast items and what have you. And a lot of the

skill sets were very transferable. At the same time, I like the challenge

about learning a new industry. Not all industries are alike; the dynamics are very

different. And when I joined Starbucks, you know, I you know I

found myself thinking, oh, this must be a very simple business. Well,

there's no such thing as a simple business, I learned. And certainly that's true at

Solely Organic as well too. There's complexity everywhere and understanding

the nuances of the business is really, really important. But

if you don't understand what the consumer and what the customer want,

you'll never get anywhere. And it's that basic understanding of

needs and how you serve them that is the common thread

across all everything that I've done. Uh, 2 of the things that,

uh, 2 examples that come to mind, this idea of you being a

consumerist and this being sort of in your background and this is what

you've done. Is this something that, uh, either in college or coming

out of college or even prior to entering college is something that

was the way you thought or how you viewed the world? Or when you look

at products, like there's people that just have an appreciation for how things are made,

how things are done, and like the end user experience. And I'm wondering where that

comes from. I wish I could tell you there was a grand plan, and

I'm afraid there's not. I was a combination

of a science geek. I studied a lot of biochemistry, got accepted

into medical school. I was very much interested in the world of

science and good at math and all that kind of thing. At the same time,

I ended up taking my major in history and literature, combining

the left brain and the right brain. And I got out of college

not knowing what the heck to do with that because it was a strange mix

of biochemistry and literature that wasn't really a career pathway.

But what I did have is the ability to be both analytic and

quantitative and really smart about those kinds of things, as well as an

understanding of the softer side as well too. And

recognizing at the same time that those were not disconnected. They're, they're

things that are very, very integrated in those points of

connection between the softer side and the harder

business side really is what being a

consumer marketer is all about. And I found myself

able to do the analytics piece with ease, and that differentiated

me early days from a lot of people who got into marketing who thought that

marketing was just pretty pictures. And then, uh, from the,

the pretty pictures crowd— from the, the hard analytics crowd, I had the understanding of

all the softer side things and knew how quantify them. So as you

started to make that bridge across everything, it was a powerful combination of skills.

Nothing to do with biochemistry or literature, by the way. But it was what was

in my brain that worked out. So I'm very fortunate to have had the trajectory

I've had and opportunities that came my way. But I also knew

as soon as I started doing, way back when, advertising,

that I felt like I understood markets. And I think

understanding markets is what business is all about. I'd be remiss if I didn't

ask, as a history and literature major, if you have a book

recommendation for folks who— I know there's many to

choose from, a recent one. Lots and lots to choose from. I will tell

you that I wrote my undergraduate thesis on Virginia Woolf, and I'm still

a fan. Okay. We'll have a Virginia Woolf book in the

show notes. All righty. We'll pick one. I'm

curious, Matt, working at a place like Walt

Disney and at Starbucks. You can tie those to an

iconic leader and founder, right, of those organizations.

Obviously, Walt Disney, Howard Schultz. I'm wondering, as you think

about stepping into this role at Solly, what role

that plays in how folks— or how that trickles down into

the day-to-days, thinking of fulfilling a mission of someone who

had a big picture of what they wanted their company to look like. Well, you

know, there are lots of brands that have famous founders, and there are lots of

brands that don't. And I think it's much more

about the brand and the idea than it is about the individual involved.

I mean, sometimes they put their name on the door, as Walt Disney did

himself, and they loom larger than life. And that's

wonderful on one level. But at a certain point in time,

it almost doesn't matter. It's about the power of the idea.

And at this point in time, Disney is a really powerful

idea about, you know, entertainment that has values and

heart and, uh, you know, quality and lots of things that the rest of

Hollywood doesn't provide. And Starbucks is really about that sort of

special everyday experience and that customization that you can get for

$5 that you can't get anyplace else. And

yes, the founders were immensely responsible for that vision in the, in

the early days, but The companies transcend their

founders and they become their own thing and they become their own

ideas. And that's happened over and over again in the history of the world. It's

a sign of success, by the way. But you don't necessarily need a name brand

founder to get there. And you can come up with lists and lists of companies

that have done that. And I think ultimately, Soli might be one

of those players too. Yeah, we're looking forward to learning more.

Just a last question on Starbucks. Did your coffee habits Change

dramatically during your time there? I'm afraid that I'm one of those

people that drinks 10 cups of coffee a day now, and that hasn't let up.

And, uh, you know, some people can and some people can't. I can, and I

love it still. Yeah, I was just thinking about today, just

routines and rituals, you know, because I— we have a French press

and I have whole beans, so I— it's a ritual. I grind enough for my

cup, heat the water up, I've got my French press, I do my— I

got my stirring and, you know, I guess similar to Japanese ceremonies. It's

really interesting how over the span of a lifetime, how things like rituals

can help ground us as we start our day. Absolutely. And there's

something about that coffee experience that is absolutely

magical. And that was something that predated my joining Starbucks as well

too. And it probably motivated me because I was quite a fan and I

enjoyed my morning coffee from the get-go. I actually

learned an enormous amount, as you would, about coffee while I was at

Starbucks and how it's grown and the processes involved in,

you know, going from bean to cup. It's not as simple as you think,

and there's something wonderful about it. And I am a

fan of many different kinds of coffee. I don't like the big sugary gloppy

stuff so much, you know, but, you know, there are people who do. The

stuff that I tend to like tends to be the pure, great coffee, and I

have my favorite Yeah, they did an experiment. I grew up in New

York one time and there's Dunkin' Donuts and Starbucks. So for a week they took

regular Starbucks customers and they sent them to Dunkin' Donuts and then the

regular Dunkin' Donuts folks, they sent them to Starbucks for a week. So you can

imagine just like, you know, asking for a small and they're like, oh, do you

mean venti or grande? And how the strength of the coffee,

I thought it was fun to read that. Well, it's interesting because the profile of

the customers and the profile of the taste preferences of different kinds

of coffee drinkers are just enormous, enormous

differences between those brands. And, you know, we had, you know, I

have my biases having worked at Starbucks, but, you know, we knew

that once people started to, you know, acclimate to

Starbucks and what they considered to be stronger coffee taste, which really meant

oftentimes darker roast, once you go there, you can't go back. Yeah,

that's true. Okay. So getting closer to current

time, when did this idea of vertical farming,

controlled environment agriculture, when did it start to come on your radar? It actually

started coming on my radar about maybe a

year before I left Starbucks because I knew some people who got into the business

and I was curious about it because, you know, I, my grandfather

was a farmer way back when, before there was even commercialized farms. And I've always

been a bit of a gardener and paid attention to land. And,

you know, I, you know, spend a lot of time in wine country. And, you

know, I've always been somebody who cared about where things come from.

And I was curious because, you know, I could see the stresses on

agriculture living in California for so long. You can see the terrible problems with

drought, and you know that things need to get done differently in this era of

the big, you know, commercial farm that

has, you know, industrial pesticides and industrial fertilizer and

monoculture and all that kind of stuff. You knew it wasn't sustainable, but like,

how do you solve that problem? And, you know, I started to pay attention

over time to indoor farming, and my big question was, how can you

possibly make money at this game? Because in order for something to work, you have

to be able to make money at it at the same time too. And I

just sort of said, well, yeah, they're raising a lot of money right now in

this business, but I don't really know what the pathway forward is.

And, you know, when I finally did get an opportunity to take a really

hard look at Shenandoah Growers at the time, now Silly Organic,

I started to realize, hey, there is a way here. And it's really interesting

because if you can figure out how to make money at

indoor farming and deliver the better product with all the benefits, the ESG

benefits that go with it, wow, this is the future.

And that's when I started to get excited. But That's a more recent development. That's

across the last 7 or 8 months when I started considering the

opportunity at Soly that I came to

understand what that looked like. Tell the story of

that meeting. It may not be one meeting, it may be several, but those

initial meetings and discussions with the founders of

Shenandoah, now Soly, and how you're thinking about the

opportunity to work with the team, or what was it about the team in those

conversations that drew you to them specifically?

Well, it started with, you know, obviously there's a recruiting process, but, you know, board

members and their sort of broad view of

the world and how they looked at Soli within it. That was the

first step. And that was the thesis, if you will, the investment thesis.

And, you know, that started to make a lot of sense. And I said, well,

gee, if these incredible people, I mean, really, truly top-rate

investors see this opportunity. I need to take a harder look. And I

remember the first time that I made the trip to the Shenandoah Valley

back in, it was, you know, right around the end of May.

And I, a very humble place in many ways and

humble offices. I mean, it's not a fancy showplace by any stretch.

People come to our offices and they're like, oh my God, you actually work here?

And it shows you that we don't, we don't put our money into the offices.

We put our money into farms. Which is the right thing to do, by the

way. And, um, I thought, well, God, you know,

who are these people who work here? And I started to get to know them.

I got to know Tim Hayden, the original founder, as well as Phil

Karp, who's still with us, co-founder and president. And I started to

understand what was in their head, and I understood the bravery

that they, they did to essentially make

investments very, very early on in CEA

controlled environment agriculture long before it

became as fashionable as it is today. And that was a real advantage because

they were not in the limelight when they were doing it. They were scrapping every

dollar they could to put, you know, into the invest— on the investment

side to figure out how to do things better because they realized the

problems of field grown and the challenges associated with field grown. And they

also saw that there was a pathway towards

organic indoors Number one, and towards better costs, number

two. And those are really the two big theses that I could take a lot

of credit for, but it really belongs to the founder team who said, this is

how it could be done in the future. And it took years of

working through the technology and working through the systems to get the proof of

concept to a place where it's like, yes, this is scalable. This is

something that can work at a larger level. And it was

exciting when I talked to them. I remember sitting in It was a dinner

meeting in this restaurant and hearing about how they

came, you know, the— it's the origin story of the company and

how they had come to put this emphasis

on this new way of doing things and how they'd done it quietly as

well too, which is truly amazing. Unlike the rest of the world that had

been out there showboating, this is a company that hadn't been showboating.

This is a company that had been walking the walk before they started to talk

the talk. And to me, that's the kind of, that's the kind of company I

really admire. And I said to myself, I

want this job. And sure enough, I got it, probably because I wanted it

in part. And it was a, it was an amazing moment because

I understood what the opportunity looked like at that point in time. And then of

course, I could bring all the things that I understand from the world of marketing

and consumers and strategy and so on to bear. This is something that

That's exciting to hear. I'm

curious about your mindset at the time. So you were— this is your first

role as CEO, correct? That's right, yes. And, and so is it

just as you start having these responsibilities in these other companies— I

think you did allude to it a little bit earlier— but you felt like now

was the time when you were ready, given your career, that

to take on the responsibilities of running a company, right, on your own?

Yeah, I have had amazing front row seats and

gotten to know some of the, the most incredible

CEOs. I mean, obviously I worked directly for Howard Schultz at Starbucks.

There were great leaders at Disney, especially Bob

Iger. And I had all sorts of exposure

to the way that he led that company and was part of his

circle and could understand what he did and,

you know, how he took a company that was a little fragile

when he took over and brought it to the amazing place that he did,

along with a lot of other people. And, you know, he was humble and

leveraged people along the way. And I learned so much about

that. Also sitting on the board of— still do— on the board of Kaiser Permanente

with outstanding, outstanding leadership there.

So I know what good good looks like. And I said, you know, if I

can have an opportunity, maybe on a much smaller scale I might add, to

do that myself, I would love that opportunity.

And I would love that opportunity to lead and be

responsible. And, you know, one of the, I think,

misgivings about CEOs is that they are, you know, they're in

charge. Well, truthfully, you're working for everybody else. You're working for all

your stakeholders, all your investors, and importantly, you're working everybody who works

for you. Because, you know, literally their livelihoods

and their careers and, and everything about what they

do is in your hands. And one mistake, and it's a big problem for

somebody else, not just you. And that's not a

responsibility that's taken lightly. And I love having that responsibility. I,

you know, I was, when I was 12, I was 50. So I'm

gonna stay 50 for the rest of my life, by the way. Hope so.

How do you think about those, you know, first— I think about first

90 days, again, just from that corporate mindset. But, you know, when you step into

this role, you know, where does your focus, where does your attention

go? Like, what I always think about, like, a new president moving into the White

House, right? Like, there's a lot of stuff to get on board with, and

it's drinking from a fire hose. But what are those early days for you like?

Well, a lot of hard work goes without saying. That's, that's what you get paid

for. But beyond that, it's learning. And you try to keep your

mouth shut as much as you reasonably can during the first

time that you're working there, because you have a lot to learn. And the things

that come out of your mouth during the very beginning may not be the right

things. So then what ends up happening is you start to really

understand the business. And, you know, I, you know, I think at this point in

time, I'm there. And you also, at the same time, have this

wonderful opportunity as an outsider who's come into the business to

have outside perspective on it as well, too. So I'm starting to feel like I'm

in that sweet spot where I have all of the perspective of somebody who's joined

from the outside, who sees the opportunities, who sees the challenges, who knows the world

from a different angle, plus real understanding of what the

business is like and how it operates and how the technology and the

science work and the people at the company and everything else. So

that was a— there's an adjustment period. At the same time, you start to

learn all sorts of things that you weren't expecting to learn

and that you have to learn along the way. Things that, you know, as

the head strategist or the head marketer or the head CRM

person at different companies, you don't pay attention to. And there

are new disciplines that I've had having to learn. And that's great. I

enjoy learning. And it's part of what you always have to do no

matter what job you have in life. So just more of the same on that

level. What's a pleasant surprise that you weren't

aware of? Well, you know, the thing that you start to look

at is, okay, well, this is great science and makes a lot

of sense from a scientific perspective, but behind great

science is great scientists. And

the caliber of the thinking and the

critical skill sets that exist at SOLI,

the people who are literally making the

process of growing better and better by relentlessly focusing

on quality, relentlessly focusing on cost. I've

come to admire how they, how they get there and how they, how they

do their jobs and the sort of open-mindedness. And

what I've realized that, you know, coming from what's traditionally called a

creative business like Disney, that creative people and

scientists are very, very similar in temperament. They

just have a different sort of set of surface

skills. So they're all creative people. It's just how they

express and develop their creativity. Sometimes it's with science and

sometimes it's with, you know, the arts, but very, very similar.

So I'm curious, and this is some of the things and challenges I run into

when I start telling people that I host a podcast about vertical farming, and

I'm sure you've— it's grown exponentially, the number of people who've

asked you about the industry, what it is you do, and And what is

vertical farming? So maybe starting at that 20,000-foot

level, you know, when you explain the industry and what it is,

how do you explain that? Let's say, let's use the example of you explaining it

to your grandmother or your parents. But then one level below that

is how do you explain what Solee does as a

differentiator than what other companies in the space might be doing? Yeah, so starting

with the bigger picture of like what is indoor agriculture, agriculture is what is

controlled environment agriculture. Basically say there's, there's

been really one big revolution

in agriculture, and that took place in the 20th century with the

advent of, you know, commercial inorganic fertilizers. We

have the Haber-Bosch process basically takes nitrogen out of the air

with a lot of electricity and energy uses and creates this incredible thing

that's fed the planet. That alongside of pesticides,

monoculture, mechanization, all that kind of thing. That was a revolution in

agriculture. And that's gotten us to where we are today. And

now it's causing all these sustainability issues that we see out there. And there's a

new way that's going to come along where we can be much smarter

about the resources we apply and be more efficient and

technical to grow stuff

better and cheaper. than how traditional

agriculture does. And that's what this is really all about. And the

means to do it is in these protected environments where you

can actually control the inputs of plants.

So I said, great, that is an absolutely terrific way of explaining

what things are like. Well, how are you different from everybody else?

And the way I see it is that we really have spent a long time

as old-time growers as a company understanding that growing

plants is not just a simple scientific process. It's

incredibly complex, and there's so much to be learned from years and

years of agriculture, and especially going back to before the

era of, you know, inorganic fertilizers and pesticides

and everything else. How did things grow in the first place? And, you know,

at the end of the day, it's a matter of, you know, the light that

plants absorb, It's the microclimates around plants, the

airflow and the humidity. It especially is the soil that they

grow in and the fertilization process and the

nutrients that are provided and the irrigation and so on. And you start looking

at all those inputs and I say, well, you know what SOLi does that the

other companies don't always do is we look at all of it together and we're

not doing this as a great big science experiment. We're just trying to figure out

how to bring the best of nature indoors. And critically,

what we're focused on is organically. We don't

want to do anything that's not organic because organic is better. It's better

for you health-wise, and it also tastes better.

And everybody else in the indoor farming space, the vertical

farms, doesn't do what we're doing. We're organic,

and that is a result of the science and the special

sauce that only Sole has. That attracted me to the company because

we can actually do that. We can grow organically indoors

for about the same price that people are growing inorganic stuff

outdoors. And I said, wow, this is the

basis of an incredible, incredible customer

proposition because many, many poor people would

buy organic if it didn't cost so much. That's true. And

we are laser-focused on delivering. It's

almost like CEA is not the end in itself, it's the

means to an end. We want to grow organic

at the same price that inorganic is grown by

everybody else, and we don't care where it's grown. We want organic

grown at that same price, and the way we do it is through

CEA. That's what Soly is all about. Yeah, that's great. That's a

great encapsulation, and that'll be helpful especially that historical

context of where we've come from, because I think people don't

see the bigger picture and see how sometimes you need to go through

the stuff that gets us there fast. If you think about the railroad

magnates and all those stories of Carnegie, it was

necessary at the time. But to your point, as we evolve and prioritize

different aspects of that supply chain, I think it's important to

really have that 7 generations look, Look

forward, look back, you know, in terms of impact that we're having on this planet

as well? It's a breakthrough moment. And, you know, there's a lot that

we have to do to scale. I mean, that's the biggest challenge right now. We're

a small company and we need to become a big company. And

that involves going out and raising money and

building incredible indoor farms, building that national footprint,

converting our old school business that we've been in for many years

into this new school business that uses indoor farms and is

better product and cheaper, frankly, all at once. That's an

incredible journey, but there's a lot of work to do to scale it. And that's

what I spend a lot of my time thinking about. It's, it's probably

self-explanatory at this point, but the reason for the name change,

because it says it all, Solely Organic, obviously. And so how, I don't know,

were you involved in that as well? Were you on board when, when that decision

was made? Oh, you betcha. So I was very much

part of that. We have this amazing differentiation

around organic and the name wasn't saying anything about it. So

obviously the company needed to be called something organic. Shenandoah

is a mouthful. If you're out here in California, you don't know where

Shenandoah is. Doesn't mean a lot to a lot of people. And while it's

the heritage of the company, it's not something that

says future. the way that you want to say future, because our

company is about the new way of farming and we

wanted to get it across. Now, of course, there's a lovely play on Solely

with S-O-L-E-L-Y, Only Organic,

because we don't do anything that's not organic. But really, the idea is a

simple, memorable name that would stand out in the

marketplace. That's not going to sound like every other, you

know, place name. that dominates the entire business. Yeah,

that's true. Yeah, very well done. It's very catchy and it

says it, it's encapsulated in the name. So

well done on that name change. Thank you. I was looking

also as I was tying your experience and how it relates to what you're doing

now, I saw that at Starbucks you're responsible for a couple of

different areas. And I'm wondering as I read these out, which one of

these you think would be most relevant to think about in Soly? So

it was new product development, digital customer experience, innovation,

data analytics, and consumer insights? Yeah, there's— well, it's

interesting because there's a lot of my skill set from Starbucks that I'm

not yet able to apply it solely. So the whole digital piece, the

digital experience, we don't have a digital experience yet. And it'll be years

before we have one. And at that point in time, my digital skill sets will

probably be a little out of date. So I'm

afraid I'm not putting that part me to use. Now, the data analytics, on the

other hand, is just using information well. And of

course, we use it differently. Starbucks used data from a consumer point of

view especially. We're using data from a scientific point of view.

We have AI that basically helps us

understand all those inputs I talked about, the lighting and the

irrigation and the airflow and so on, to figure out what's optimal for the

plants. So understanding that piece of it and the data analytics on the

input side and the science side, great. That's useful. And I, you

know, certainly apply myself in that area. But I would

say that the most relevant things are new products as well as

consumer insights. And of course, those are tied together because if you don't

have great consumer insights, you will not develop the best new products.

So one of the things you can expect from us across the next couple of

years is a truly breakthrough lineup as we

expand our— as we expand further into leafy

greens. I'm not going to divulge everything we're doing right now on this

podcast, but I can tell you that we are focused on

the best possible crops that only

indoor agriculture and only our organic agriculture can

enable. And I'm excited about it because these are the kinds

of things that I as a consumer would want to buy. And I think that

part of winning at our game means winning at new products. Everybody

who's doing hydroponics is more or less doing the same things plant-wise right now.

I promise you, when we come out with stuff, we're going to take the world

by storm. I think what's going to be exciting to watch is not only

the innovation that's happening, but with someone that has your marketing

experience also, like the marriage of those two, And I

feel like we just got a taste of it with the rebrand. So it feels

like an industry that's ready or

ripe, pardon the pun, for a little bit of shakeup. So it's going to be

fun to watch. Well, the funny thing about— you look at all these

mega categories that technology companies have come along and disrupted.

I mean, take the obvious one, taxicabs. And then comes

along Uber that reinvents the taxicab experience with technology.

Produce has been one of those businesses that You know, globally,

I think it's a $1.4 trillion category across all

channels and everything else. It's enormous. But the problem with

developing brands and marketing in a business like that is

you can't have a brand unless you have consistency. I mean, that was also true

in the taxicab business. And the way you get consistency is by

having a standardized product. And the only way in that you can

get a standardized product in agriculture culture is to take the vagaries of nature

out and grow stuff indoors. So what an opportunity if you can grow things

indoors and have all that consistency and predictability

combined with the ability to design relevance and differentiation

into a product. That's the recipe for brand, and

it's happened over and over again in so many different businesses, is

when you can come online and start to develop product that's consistent.

Starbucks Remember, there used to be coffee shops all over the place, and they all

served coffee in the same cup back in New York City in the day. Thank

you for serving you in a little blue cup with Greek lettering on it and

so on. And you never knew what was inside the cup. It was all the

same anyhow. Starbucks comes along and says, no, this is a

different kind of coffee. It is relevant because it tastes

better and so on to your uplifted taste. But what Starbucks did

is they did it consistently. So, the Starbucks in Shanghai and the Starbucks in New

York and the Starbucks in Paris all gave you the same cup of coffee. That

has never happened in the produce business. Yeah, good point. And it's about to happen

right now because you will literally be growing plants

with the same recipe, regardless of whether or not they're grown in

California or Virginia or Minnesota.

They are going to be grown the same way. And you know that when you

see the Soly brand name on top of that box of lettuce,

It's going to be exactly that great quality lettuce

that you always have. Yeah, it's going to be exciting to watch. Yeah, I

think for folks that are new to Soli, maybe looking at in

terms of differentiation between other folks that are in that

space, are you more— and I know that you're not containers, so

you're not like a Freight Farms, but people think about Freight Farms, think about Plenty,

they think about Bowery and trying to figure out where

solely fits in that hierarchy? Yeah, I mean, in

many ways we are like a lot of the other people who grow indoors,

except for not, because we grow organically. And I think

that's a big difference. And, and that's the number one thing that we

wanted to do is to deliver all that quality that you

associate with organic. So great quality product,

by the way, fresh to market because it's grown nearby. And

importantly, we're going to focus on the best possible crops, the

crops that can happen because it's organic as well too. So we're going to have

real differentiation and real advantages. We're also

focused on not being the most expensive lettuce in the store or

the most expensive herb in the store. We want to be able to provide

that organic at the mass price point. And I think that

once people start to see organic at a mass price point,

With all the quality that sits beneath it and all the ESG story as

well too, all the environmental benefits and so on, will think, wow, this is a

great brand. Yeah, that's going to be definitely interesting and exciting.

What's a tough question you've had to ask yourself recently? Well,

one of the things that I think the entire industry could do a better job

at, and certainly it was one of those things that I discovered only after being

at the company, is all the information that's out there on the

environmental advantages of indoor farming

almost become like, it's what's the source, where's the real truth?

And I think there's real work to be done for the entire industry to

demonstrate and prove the advantages. We know they're there.

It's not a question of them not being there, but having that really

good data on why this is better. for the

environment is something that I think the entire industry ought to get

behind. And it was shocking that all the things you see

are not always backed up with the best fact set out there. And one of

the things I'm on a mission to do across the next year is to make

sure that we have that fact set. And by the way, there are things that

only Soly can do because the advantages of not having to use the

inorganic fertilizer, which I read is using

3% of the world's electricity to make right now.

That's greater than aviation. So the environmental impact

of fertilizer is something that's enormous. So getting that

story out there, also big differences, our way of growing versus

hydroponics. We're not spending a lot of energy pumping water around to the same

extent. So there are things that we have to do to tell our own story

there, but the industry in general has a big job to do

to tell the environmental impact story. much more

compellingly than it's done to date. Assuming as we start to open things

up and getting back to conferences that Soly will be making its

presence known as we get into that. Yeah, we've been

a little shy. We have not been the, you know, we've always

preferred to walk the walk before we talk the talk, but we're starting to run

right now. And people are going to notice us one way or the other. So

we're going to get out there. We are opening facilities, mega-scale

facilities this year. Okay. One in Northern Virginia, one in South

Carolina. And it's not a secret anymore what we're doing.

We are going to take our rightful place on the stage. How do

you think about expansion and what, and going back to data

analysis, right? Demographics. What's a little bit of that thought process as you

think about where it makes sense to expand to? Yeah. So, I mean,

the analytics we do basically have to do with serving population. And so serving

customers, you know, our retailers, as well as serving

the end consumers. And we have plans right now to

develop a national network of facilities. Now,

we have basically a line of sight to funding half of that done

already in the bag, and we're looking at figuring out how to fund the rest

of it. But, you know, we have a little bit of time to do that.

And by the time, you know, a couple years pass, we will have a

national footprint to serve all of our customers what they

need in both herbs and leafy greens. And then we have an

opportunity, which we're working on in R&D right now, to tackle and apply the

same kind of R&D work that we're doing right now for

leafy greens and for herbs to other crops as well too. And

that's just, you know, more opportunity down the road.

So what you can expect from us is that we will have a

nationwide network network of mega facilities to grow

with organic. You know, we can't just use somebody else's facility if

they happen to go belly up and want to sell us something. We have to

use soil-based facilities, and we are going to continue

to build them and develop them. We are looking for partners in that process right

now, but it's pretty exciting because it's something that we have a clear

line of sight to, and it's not going to take all that long to get

there. To that point, given the audience's Vernish in this

podcast. Is there an ask that you have for folks in the industry, for your

peers, for your colleagues, any potential partners? Yeah, I mean, I guess if I'm

speaking to investors, and I'm sure I am here to a certain extent,

understand the differences between the different players and companies in the space and

what different people bring to the table. You know, we are in a process right

now to figure out what's next for us from an investment point of view, and

we welcome the scrutiny. And we welcome the ability for people to

understand what it is we're doing and how we're different. I would also say

that this is a rising tide now for

everybody in the industry. And while we may be, you know, at the top of

the floating to the top of the tide, if you will, others are going to

benefit from it as well too, because it's a, it's an area that

deserves the attention it's getting. And, you know, I think there are going to be

some bumps in the road and not everybody's going to be successful right out of

the gate. Don't get discouraged by that. Look to the long term here

and see how this is going to revolutionize one

of the last big total addressable markets that has

not yet been addressed. Good point. Matt, I'm

curious, because of the successes you've had in your career and

leading up to this new position with Soly,

do you have any mentors or people that have inspired you along the way that

come to mind? I have a long list, and I like

mentors. I like Inspiration. And I

usually find myself learning from everybody.

And sometimes it's not even the mentors you learn from. And you can

learn from people who don't do things well as well too. And I'm not going

to name any names there. That's true. Yeah. But, you know, I'm— I— you try

to be a lifelong student and you absorb from those people who

are trying to teach you. And you also absorb from those people who are

not trying to teach you, but whom you can still learn from. And

it's one of the great joys in my life is to be able to look

at anything that's going on, and not necessarily just in my industry, or not

necessarily just in business, to say, how did so-and-so

tackle that? And what about that person makes them a great leader?

And I have been fortunate to have

front-row seats on so many different arenas over my

lifetime, and to be able to learn from some of the very best. But I've

also seen some things that I've learned from that maybe weren't

intended for me to learn from. And all that is good. It's

all good as long as you keep on moving forward. That's very well

put. One last question. What's something you've changed your mind

about recently? Well, I have been

one of those people who changes my mind on a lot of things, but I

don't change my mind when the fact set doesn't tend to change.

Okay. So I think that what ends up happening is as you learn

new things, and as you learn about, you

know, things that you thought were true that are no longer

true, you can revise your opinion on stuff. You can

revise what you decide to do because the

things are no longer the same. And there's a long list of little things like

that that have happened since I've joined SOLI. I mean, lots of things where,

okay, the fact base is now different from the fact base that I thought it

was earlier on. And you just learn to pivot along the way on everything

that you have to do. Occasionally, I suppose it's possible that you could make a

mistake that is based upon, you know, making the wrong

assessment or making the wrong logical decisions about something. And I,

that will happen to me at some point. But mostly it's about new information that

comes along and how do you pivot on that? And it could be everything from

information on, you know, growing costs to information on,

You know, what's going on in the facility, and you make a pivot

at that point in time. And certainly we do along the way. You have to

be flexible. Yeah, that's a good reminder for everyone who thinks there's only

like that rigidness of not being able to change an opinion they

previously had because maybe you're embarrassed that people would see that you changed

your thought process. But I think to your point, with a different set of facts

and new facts, I think you're able to make more well-informed decisions.

Which is better in the long run.

Sure.

Yeah. Yeah. Well,

Matt, the hour's flown by. I want to thank you for being

generous with your time and for sharing a little bit of your backstory as as

well, because I feel like that's inspirational. We have a lot of stories with

founders and CEOs, and I think anytime people can see what

other folks' journey has been, I think they can relate and

be inspired as well.

Yeah, wishing you all the best with Soli Organic. As we've alluded

to, it's going to be exciting to see some of the innovations that have yet

to come, but I think with someone that has your experience, again, at Disney and

Starbucks and how that gets incorporated into Soley. It'll be fun to watch.

And if it makes a point where some things, big things are happening,

you have an open invitation to come back for round 2 and fill us in

on what's been happening. I appreciate that. Thank you. And we'll get

folks connected to the website. So should we

just direct everyone to Soley Organic? SoleyOrganic.com. Yep.

Okay. Thanks again for your time, Matt. I really appreciate it. Thanks, Harry. Thanks again

to Cultivated for being a fantastic sponsor. If you're looking into a vertical

farm and don't know where to start or which technology would suit your needs, make

sure you reach out to them today. The best part about it is that their

service is free, and it's because they work on behalf of their partners. So

head on over to cultivated.com, just leave off the last E.

That's C-U-L-T-I-V-A-T-E-D.com. And thanks again to episode sponsor

Cultivated. This episode is brought to you by our sponsor Freight Farms, who manufactures and

sells the leading vertical hydroponic container farm, the Greenery S. Built

inside a 40-foot shipping container, the Greenery S uses innovative

climate control technology paired with an IoT app called Farmhand

to enable anyone to grow fresh food anywhere in the world. Visit

freightfarms.com/verticalfarmingpodcast to learn

more. Another reminder, if you're enjoying the show, please leave us a rating and a

review at ratethispodcast.com/vfp. We'll be sure to

read those out on future episodes. Until we meet again, here's to your health.

Thanks for listening. To read the full show notes for this episode, which

includes any links mentioned in the episode, as well as a full show

transcription, visit verticalfarmingpodcast.com.

There, you can sign up for our email list to be notified when new

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