April Lemay's journey from a successful 17-year tenure as a partner at Deloitte to a maple sugar farmer in the remote expanse of Vermont serves as an inspiring narrative of transformation and resilience. In this podcast, I engage April in a comprehensive discussion about the remarkable transition she undertook, which was sparked by a simple dinner conversation that ignited her passion for honoring her family's legacy through the creation of April's Maple. As we delve into her experiences, she elucidates how the foundational skills acquired during her corporate career have been instrumental in establishing her flourishing business amidst the challenges of agrarian life. Notably, April emphasizes the significance of carrying forward the lessons learned in her previous career, particularly the importance of strategic decision-making and the judicious use of the word "no" in fostering sustainable growth. Throughout our conversation, April's insights into the grit required for entrepreneurship illuminate the path for those contemplating their own ventures in the face of uncertainty and change. . The conversation delves into the remarkable transition of April Lemay, who transitioned from a successful 17-year career as a partner at Deloitte to becoming a maple sugar farmer in the tranquil and remote Northeast Kingdom of Vermont. The discussion begins with an overview of April's journey, highlighting the pivotal moment when a casual dinner conversation with her family sparked the idea of transforming inherited land into a thriving maple syrup business. This episode encapsulates the essence of entrepreneurial spirit, emphasizing how the skills April honed during her tenure at Deloitte became instrumental in her new venture. April's Maple is depicted not merely as a business but as a manifestation of her familial legacy and a tribute to her grandparents. The episode further explores the operational intricacies of running a maple syrup farm, including the challenges associated with modern-day farming and the unpredictable influence of climate on production. April elaborates on the meticulous process of tapping maple trees, focusing on the delicate balance of extracting sap while ensuring the trees' health. The narrative also touches on the technological advancements in sugaring that have allowed April to optimize her operations, such as vacuum systems that enhance sap collection. Through her experience, listeners gain insights into the complexities of agricultural entrepreneurship, underscoring the importance of resilience and adaptability in the face of environmental challenges. As the conversation progresses, April shares her philosophy regarding business growth, emphasizing the importance of knowing one's limits and maintaining quality over quantity. Her decision to decline new customers during peak seasons illustrates a strategic approach to ensuring customer satisfaction—a vital lesson for any entrepreneur. Ultimately, this episode serves as an inspiring testament to the transformative power of following one’s passion while leveraging past experiences to navigate new challenges. April’s story resonates with anyone contemplating a significant career change, highlighting the significance of grit, family support, and the continuous pursuit of personal fulfillment in business.

Takeaways:

• April LeMay transitioned from a successful career at Deloitte to becoming a maple syrup farmer, showcasing her resilience and adaptability.
• The conversation emphasizes that every entrepreneur must recognize and leverage their existing skills from previous experiences to build their new ventures.
• April highlights the importance of knowing your limits, as she chooses to decline new customers during busy seasons to maintain quality service.
• The discussion reveals that asking for help is essential; April sought guidance from an experienced sugar maker to establish her sugaring operation effectively.
• April's journey demonstrates that not every opportunity is beneficial; sometimes saying no is crucial for sustainable growth.
• The podcast underscores the significance of family support in entrepreneurship, illustrating how it can foster grit and perseverance in challenging times.

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Hello. Please meet Today's guest, April LeMay.

I do have ups and downs and that's why averages exist, right? Every year cannot be great because then greatness changes. But I have been fortunate to not have too many lower years in a row.

What does it take to walk away from a 17 year career as a Deloitte partner, running your own advisory practice, flying all over the world, and become a maple sugar farmer in the most remote corner of Vermont? My guest today, April LeMay, did exactly that.

On 800 acres of family land with 14,000 trees and hundreds of miles of tubing, she built April's maple out of a single dinner table conversation into a thriving business in a place so far northeast, they call it the Kingdom. But here's what makes her story matter to you. April didn't leave her old career behind. She carried every lesson with her.

Over the next 40 minutes, you'll hear how a partner's playbook becomes a founder's toolkit, why saying no can be your smartest growth move, and where real grit actually comes from. This one's sweet. Let's get into it. Hello, April, and welcome to the podcast.

Well, hello, Jothi, and thank you for inviting me. It's my pleasure to be here.

Well, one thing that people like to know is some context setting. They love to know where the guest is from and where do they live now.

Absolutely. I am from a little known town in the northernmost part of Vermont called Canaan. Canaan, Vermont.

I am fortunate enough to be located directly on the Canadian and New Hampshire borders while still living in Vermont, so.

So it might not be a place people are familiar with and I suppose we like it that way because as much as I love seeing my customers, I am in a very sparsely populated.

Area and the area right around you, I mean, that sort of chunk of the state is called the Northeast Kingdom. Why is it called that?

That's interesting and I certainly should know the answer to that question.

I like to think of it because we are so remotely situated that it is like crossing into the Kingdom when you finally are able to make your way this far northeast in Vermont.

It's beautiful up there, that's for sure, but it is hard to get to. You think of Vermont as a really small state, but, you know, I'm in Boston, so it's not that far to, you know, touch Vermont.

And then it's a heck of a long way still to get all the way up to the northern border.

When I first started with this idea of April's maple, I was living and working in Boston, and I was commuting up to Vermont, which was. I've traveled through my other job all over the world, and Vermont remained my home. It's how I knew I should come back.

Because no matter where my home was, my home was always Canaan, Vermont. And there's this point, Jothy, when you're driving up Route 93 and you cross it through about the. The halfway point of New Hampshire.

You're almost at the point where you're at the top of the road and all of a sudden the mountains surround you.

And for anyone who has, you know, lived in the city and lived that busy life and that hectic pace, you know that there's this point where you'd cross and you would just stop and breathe and just take in your surroundings around you and appreciate the quiet that was on its way, because you could. You could see you were headed right into it. So I know that drive well. I did it for a long time.

Well, that's a good segue into telling us a little bit about before you created your company now, which is called April's Maple. You were this successful consultant. You had a career in consulting.

You.

You alluded to it. You worked in Boston, you traveled a lot. Consultants have a. A tough life, in my opinion. How. How often they're on planes.

But tell us who you worked for and, And. And what that was like.

I was fortunate enough to work for 17 years for Deloitte, so I started there right out of college, and I loved my time there. I started as a consultant. So a lot of drive and ambition, but not much knowledge on, you know, the working world.

I did come from a very small town, and I moved right into. Actually, I lived in New York. I lived in Manhattan first, so I was able to stay with Deloitte through 17 years of amazing learning.

I have never worked with such smart, dedicated, fun people. Just a wonderful way to start your career and learn so much. And I would say that everything I did, I ended my career at Deloitte after 17 years.

But I was a partner at that point that ran an advisory consulting practice. And everything I did in that practice, I actually apply today running my much smaller company, April's Maple.

That's. I was, I was just gonna ask you how much of what you learned there you were able to utilize at April's Maple. And that's great to hear.

Well, as a partner, you know, we were selling services. The difference is now I'm selling something a little bit more tangible, tactile. Right? I. You can touch and smell and taste maple syrup. So.

But I was effectively selling solutions. So I view very much today, today's work as that as well. I'm selling something that I believe in. I'm running the financial side. I'm doing marketing.

I have employees that I maintain and look out for. I have to learn and sell business to new customers. I have to manage customers.

These are all things that I was able to do at Deloitte and learn how to do through years of trainings. You know, Deloitte was wonderful with. With helping to advance and retain not only women, but people that were professionally motivated.

So just to take those lessons and apply them in my hometown is. Is been a really fun part of the experience. And I don't believe I consider April's maple to be successful.

I don't believe I would have the success I have now without those giant steps of learning that I was able to accumulate through Deloitte.

Help us get to the point, right at the moment that you had completed 17 years at Deloitte, you're a partner, you're running your own practice, and then suddenly you're a maple sugar farmer. How the heck did that happen?

It was an accident. No. So my. I had purchased a house in. Right outside of Boston, about an hour north. Well, depending on the commute time, about an hour north of Boston.

And my. My mom and dad were down, and they were helping me do some renovations on the house.

And there are 800 acres of family land up here that my mom and her five sisters had inherited from her parents. So they've been in the family for four generations, and they were thinking about selling that land.

And at the same time, I had been a partner for a few years.

I was very much enjoying the people I worked with and what I was doing, but I was getting a little tired of the travel, so I had decided I would invest some capital into a project. And I was looking at projects, not. Not with the intent to leave Deloitte, but just something for the other side of your brain.

And I was looking for projects, and my mom mentioned that they were thinking about selling the land that I am now on. And we were brainstorming over dinner one night, what could. What would somebody do? And, you know, something. We were.

We were thinking about something that would honor my grandparents and. And their legacy, that they continued to grow, you know, in honoring the land and also valuing family.

And my mom said, in that spirit, boy, I believe there are enough sugar maples on that land. I wonder if someone would buy it and make maple syrup and that's how it started.

It was a simple conversation and I thought they were between her careers at the time. And very quickly I said, I really like maple syrup, maybe I could buy it.

So my first vision for April's maple, before thinking it through thoroughly was that I would hire my parents, they would make maple syrup for me and we would sell maple syrup. It was that simple, Jothi. I mean, buy the land, make syrup and sell it. So, and I guess that's how some ideas start, right?

They don't have to be complicated, they can be straightforward.

It sounds like the transaction must have been a little complicated if. Five sisters, is that what you said?

Yes. Yeah, five sisters they have, there are six girls.

And so my first step before really committing to the idea was to have a family meeting with the five sisters. So I asked them to join me at my parents house.

And that was an interesting time for me because I would have been in my mid-30s and I left here, Canaan when I was 18 to go to college and hadn't, of course I'd been back, but hadn't had been back as an adult or you know, for holidays and family events for sure.

But to call my mom's sisters together to sit around a table and have a business meeting was interesting for me and very different, a different sort of reaction interaction that you normally have with family at that point. And I, I put the idea out and I had a lot of positive feedback immediately that they were interested in this.

And I can remember at one point one sister mentioned, maybe we should all do this together. And I said, while that could be a good idea, I don't, didn't like the idea of mixing my family with my business.

And you could say Jothi, but your parents work for you. True, they do work for me, but financially this is my responsibility. The obligations are mine, so they don't have to deal with the management side.

Hypothetically, they're here. And there's nobody better to have you working by your side than your family because we have very similar goals and alignments.

Um, but you know, I said that I don't really want to mix family and business in that way. I didn't want to be partners with someone I already been in a partnership which had been wonderful.

But it's also from a red tape perspective, easier to garner my own opinion and approval than and no one else's. Sometimes I do fight with myself. Jyothi. I'm not saying that, but in the end I always win.

Yeah, but did you try to make them like be Shareholders?

No, I. Again, when I first started with this idea, I didn't also want it to be that big. I am very. You know, I had already dealt with accountability as a.

You know, at the partnership. I was a partner of partners, but there were many partners above me as well.

And it was always good to get other people's opinions and perspectives, but it did make things move a little bit more slowly, and maybe it would change the vision of what you wanted. So it just seems simpler to. And, you know, generationally. You know, I'm younger, too. Right.

And so I have very different motivations in a way, so it's not something I pursued. I just thought it would be cleaner and better for the family to do that.

And obviously, they've participated in the growth and building of April's maple. And that's part of my success, is having such a wonderful family. But they haven't had to been here through the nitty gritty or the cash flow issues.

See, those are the problems that when things are going great, it's easy, but things aren't always going great. You don't always have the cash flow you need. You don't know. Things happen. Covid happens. Right. It was just more straightforward.

So you. You just did a straight transaction. You bought it from the five sisters?

Yep. Well, yes, and my mom. So all six of them, but yes. Yep.

Oh, all six. Okay.

Yeah.

And. And they're. They're right there. They're all. They all live close by.

Oh, yeah.

And they're watching this, and they're cheering you on. I mean, it sounds like there was no sort of remorse or anything on their part. They said, maybe we should do this together. And.

And you very politely, in a very diplomatic way, said, no, I'm going to. I'd like to buy it from you.

Yes.

Okay. But you didn't know anything about how to make maple syrup.

Well, when I was young, we used to carry buckets for my grandfather to make maple syrup. But no, what we do today to sugar is while rooted in the foundation of what my grandfather did and what we did every Easter, it looks very different.

And I wish he were alive to see the way things are done here, but no, I did not.

So this is when one of my lessons from, you know, Deloitte, it really kind of helped out, is I was always taught and reinforced that you don't have to be the one that knows all the answers. It's okay to ask for help, and it's better to ask for help if you don't know what you're doing so immediately.

I was in contact with a larger sugar maker who does installations for sugar makers, and I have maintained a close relationship with him.

And essentially he got us started in terms of what we needed to buy, how we needed to set it up, um, how big the building should be, where the drainage should be, all things that I would have never considered being important because I didn't have the background that he has because he's been a sugar maker for, you know, 40 years.

So is there some sort of waste that is potentially environmentally problematic?

No. The by.

So when you're making maple syrup, you do create a lot of water, because all you're doing to make maple syrup is you're accumulating the SAP from a sugar maple into a tank and then you're removing water from it. It's more complicated than that in that we use reverse osmosis, much like you would use one in your house to get rid of that first amount of water.

But imagine it comes in at 2% sugar and 98% water. That's how SAP starts. And for it to be maple syrup, it has to be 58% sugar. So it takes about 40 gallons of SAP to make 1 gallon of maple syrup.

So you're talking about, you know, 38 gallons of water for every gallon of maple syrup you make. And I target making about 4,000 gallons of maple syrup a year. So, you know, that's a lot of water.

So my byproduct or my waste is it's water, which I do use a lot of for cleaning and other purposes. But there's certainly, if there is waste, as we talk about it, that's your waste. So drainage is important.

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So how many acres of maple trees are you tapping?

So I purchased 800 acres of land. 813, Actually. But I only use the. The way the land is set up, it's not all maple. I have, you know, gravel pits and, you know, undeveloped areas.

And so I only have about 300 acres of maple Trees. So it's a small portion of the land that is actually used for sugaring.

I've driven by other, I have not seen your place, but I've driven by others. And there's just seems like miles of this tubing that's collecting from the trees.

Not the old fashioned way where you go up to a tree and there's a bucket. You're constantly draining it down downhill, using gravity to get it to your building. I, I, I suspect absolutely.

And, and I imagine you have to go and every year you have to do maintenance on all that tubing.

Hundreds of miles of tubing. And since moving up here, I have had the opportunity to marry a wonderful man who is a Christmas tree tree farmer by growing up.

And, and that's what his profession is. But he's also now a maple farmer.

And so not only do I have the support of my parents who started with me, but my now husband is really responsible for it. Does an amazing job maintaining the woods because, you know, while it's kind of in the background, it's the most important thing you have.

Without your maple trees, you have no maple. And the maple is what fuels all the business from here out.

So my husband spends a significant amount of time, you know, during sugaring primarily, but in the off season maintaining the woods. We have a crew of three to four gentlemen that work with us during tapping season. And you're right, you have to go to every tree.

We have 14,000 trees. And you have to go to every tree every year and tap the tree with a spout.

It's drill a 5, 16 inch hole in the tree in a certain spot, put the spout on the tubing that's connected to the whole network of tubing and then hammer that into the tree gently. And so you visit the tree then, then when the season's over, you have to go remove that spout.

Because the tree heals in the springtime when you finish maple syrup. So you want to get your spout out as soon as possible. So you go back to the tree at that point, remove the spout and continue on.

And then I would say throughout the course of sugaring, you go to every tree for either like looking for leaks in the system or you know, we have things that chew up our lines like birds, squirrels, chipmunks, bear, moose, take them down. And so you spend some time in the woods looking for that too. So it's a lot of, it's a lot of physical activity.

So I get, I'm getting the picture. Now. Wait a minute. How do you know when you've got 14,000? How do you know when you've. That you've visited everyone and you didn't leave one out?

So we. You alluded to collecting SAP is very much controlled by gravity.

But if you were to walk my land, you would realize that gravity alone would not work because, you know, land is natural. It goes up and down and it's not perfect. So in addition to having gravity, we have what's called a vacuum system.

And the vacuum system is connecting all of the lines to the sugarhouse. And so if you imagine that we have some main lines that run, they're like the highway, okay? So imagine, you know, there's like Route 93.

Route 93 is the main line for us. And then off of 93 you have different exits you can take. So there are those for us are 1 inch lines.

And then if you're driving up to Canaan, you'd realize you also have to take some small dirt roads to get here. Those are the lines that goes to the tree. So you take the highway, get off on the exit, and then follow the dirt road to wherever you're going.

And that's like our system. So our system is all connected through vacuum system. And vacuum is like it sounds. It's a. It applies, you know, a suction.

It does not pull the SAP from the tree. What we're doing is environmentally incredibly friendly, but rather it does two things.

It helps the SAP run better on days that it might run, and we could talk about that, but it applies a light, gentle pressure to the tree, suggesting to the tree that it's time to push SAP from the inner core to the outer. And then once the SAP is in the line, the vacuum system helps to pull the SAP SAP all the way to the sugar house.

So we have a monitoring system for the vacuum and each of those dirt roads that's connected to like the exits. On the end of every exit, there's a pressure monitor and it monitors the pressure.

So I can tell if there's an issue on Exit 1 to Kanan or Exit 2 to Cobra, the next town. And we would follow that exit and look at all those trees on that line. Does that make sense?

Yeah, I get it.

Now tell us why pulling this substance, which is obviously very important to the tree, why pulling it out of the tree so now the tree doesn't get to use it so that you can. Why is this?

Okay, I think a very small amount of the tree. So each tree from each tree, we only take out about enough to make About a third of a gallon of maple syrup.

So you're taking a very small amount of SAP out of each tree, and the tree doesn't know it's missing. And then also to. To ensure that we mitigate any possible damage, technology has allowed, you know, the size of the spout to go down significantly.

Right.

So spouts used to be, you know, larger than your thumb to put in the tree, but now we're talking about a 516 bit that goes in about 2 inches into the tree, about an inch and a half maybe. So you're talking about a very small puncture into the tree. And then we sugar, you know, from January to somewhere in April.

And in April, when the tree starts to blossom and bud, that's when it also starts to heal and correct. So what we do is as soon as we're done making syrup, we untap every tree so that the tree has the springtime to heal.

And if you were to test the theory, you can go out into the forest and look for previous holes. And within two years, you'd be hard pressed to see where you tapped the tree because it heals.

Well, it sounds like. Sounds like April is a pretty important month.

Yes, it is. You know, and as you know, my last name is Lame, which has May in it. So I am a double. You know, I have those two months kind of hanging over my head.

And April used to be known as the sugaring month before the seasons started to change a bit. April was the time that you made the most syrup. And in fact, up here in the Northeast Kingdom, we. We are a little bit further northeast.

So we still predominantly make most of our syrup in the month of April, which happens to be my name. So I'm not sure if, when my parents looked at me, they. They thought, what a sweet child. We should name her after the sugaring month.

Or they thought, this one day, April will make maple syrup. So let's just give her the basis of a good name alphabetically. It works. And it also works for the season.

Well, let's talk about climate for a second, because you're totally dependent upon the freezing and thawing process every spring. And if there's too warm a year or too cold a year, the volume you would get. I'm just guessing.

I don't know anything about sugar, maybe, but I would assume that if you had the wrong kind of weather, it could really hurt your production and therefore, you know, the finances of your business.

It's one of the stresses that I underestimated when I began with this endeavor. Indeed, Mother Nature is responsible solely for the type of crop that we are able to yield. But that's the case for all. I'm a farmer.

That's the case for all farming. You know, for us, it's the freeze, thaw cycle, right? For, I mean, I watched the flooding happen in the last couple of years in Vermont.

You watch crops go underwater. So very much like all farming and agriculture, you are subject to the whims of Mother Nature.

There are certain things that, you know, we are able to do because sugaring has advanced, so we are able to collect SAP, you know, more quickly now. But we certainly are at the limitations of Mother Nature. And in fact, this year we had a cold year. So it was very cold.

This was one of the hardest sugaring years I've experienced because it was cold for so long. And then what would happen is it would warm up really quickly for three or four days. And we prefer to have it freeze and thaw on a daily basis.

So your trees are, you know, able to stay fresh. They're not. They're not thinking about blossoming or budding because it's not that warm. And it gives you time to process what you've collected.

So, you know, if you think about, I told you, it's, you know, 38 gallons of water to, you know, my 2 gallons that I use to, to create maple syrup, I'm pulling in like hundreds of thousands of gallons of SAP every year, and I have for storage 12,000 gallons of storage space. So this year what would happen is it would be super cold for. It didn't. We didn't start boiling until the end of March, which is late.

Normally I get some runs in early March. We could test things out and then it would run for three days straight.

So we did a lot of overnight boils because the SAP would just run for 36 hours. So we would be here, you know, for 48 hours, trying to collect and turn that SAP into syrup, and then it would freeze again for three days.

So you now get to go back to sleep.

You do. But in that time, you have created such chaos that you have to recover from the chaos. Right? You've used your equipment a lot.

You know, there's certain amount of things that you need to clean. Your tubing network has, you know, there could be new leaks that come out.

So you think you're gonna get to go to sleep, but really you're waiting for that next SAP run. Tap it.

Farmers, other kinds of farming, a lot of times what they try to do is create a little Bit of a financial cushion for a bad year. Are you trying to do the same thing?

I at the moment have a small portion of my crop that is excess, I'll call it. There are different kinds of sugar makers.

Some sugar makers make their crop and sell it to a large sugar maker that also does, you know, distribution and bottles other people's syrup.

I am a different kind of sugar maker where I make my syrup and try to retail it in my store, at other stores or turn into value added products that I also will wholesale and retail. So I have about, you know, 10% of my crop that is an excess that I can sell to someone else. So that's my cushion.

I try to keep a buffer of maple syrup so that I never have to not sell. Right. So that my, my demand remains. I am able to. My supplies remains the same. Even when I've made less, I'm still. My.

My sales side is remaining similarly, you know, constant. But it is scary.

Yeah, I'm sure.

So when you started out to have a terrible year.

I'm sorry, I, I spoke.

Oh, no, I've been fortunate that it hasn't been. I do have ups and downs and that's why averages exist. Right. Every year cannot be great because then greatness changes.

But I've been fortunate to not have too many lower years in a row. So it's been. I've been able to maintain it. So.

So you started off basically selling bottles of maple syrup, and now I go into a couple of stores where you have a lot of different products. How, how have you thought about, you know, adding different lines of business since that first year? Hi.

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Well, when I first started, it was important to me that we do things that we wanted to, and to me, that could be a look a little different than what other people are doing. Because when I first started almost 14 years ago, I was. I don't look like a traditional sugar farmer.

I'm a woman and I'm younger than maybe some of the sugar makers that have been around for a long time. So it was important to me that my products Reflect who I am. And so we started out by doing, you know, just syrup in jugs.

And then we moved to syrup in like a glass flask, which, which is a little bit, was a little different at the time. And then we started to evolve to do some more traditional products, but a little differently.

So we make maple candy, which is a very classic maple confection made only with maple syrup. But we started to do things a little differently in just the shapes that we were making for our maple syrup.

So when I first started, it was hard to find a candy mold to meet my needs because there was something called a. It was called a fancy candy mold. And it's a very traditional, different small shell type shapes. And I, I didn't want that.

I wanted to create a new type of candy. So we found a moose mold and some owls and bears and frogs.

And you know, our candy boxes are designed around kind of just doing it a little differently. We have moose and friends, you know, so you have like the critters of the Northeast Kingdom and a little candy box, you know, stars and hearts.

And then similarly, we wanted to make something maple sugar, which is a popular and growing indeed as people watch their health, as an alternative to white sugar. So we started making maple sugar, but we found that you could get two size granulars out of it.

So we start to make something called maple crunch, which again, if you go to most sugar makers, it's not a product that you'll see on the shelf frequently, but it's one of our best sellers. And then what happened is from product development, I started selling food accidentally out of the sugar house.

And so then we started needing things for our products. So we're going to make pancakes. Well, we should make our own pancake mix with our maple and maple sugar and maple crunch.

So now we're making our own pancake mix with our own product with no white sugar. We're making a zesty maple mustard because, you know, it's really good on it. We use it in our, in our salad dressing, on our sandwiches.

So our products has been driven by a desire to be a little different, a love of food and creativity. I mean, I love the idea of food. I love cooking with maple. It's so fun. And that's really how we can.

Ways we can use maple inspires us to create products that we think people would really like to use on their own.

We're big pancake eaters. And I can vouch for your pancake mix. We've used it quite a bit.

Thank you.

And so you are showing up in Boston. There's events I see where I'll just turn the corner. And there's another sign about April's maple. And so how has that expansion gone? And.

And what is your vision for that?

You know, it's funny. When I first started, I didn't intend to leave my job. We mentioned.

I thought that I would sell my crop of maple syrup just maybe to like a large chain. I hadn't really defined my sales channel at the point, you know, I had. I knew there was need and demand, so I wasn't worried about it.

I knew there was demand. I could sell it to a large person and they could, you know, manufacture it for or retail it for me.

And as I started going down this path of selling, what I found is for some of those, you know, people like to buy from people they know and trust. I am. Was not known or trusted. Perhaps I have a friendly face. Perhaps I can convince you that I believe in what I do. But am I a going concern?

Is this something that's sustainable? So I was convinced to engage with one broker.

So I have one gentleman who sells my products into the outside of this New England area, and he's done a wonderful job cultivating some very regular customers. I, you know, we don't target large stores because we're not that big.

I mean, 4,000 gallons of syrup sounds like a lot to you, but in the scheme of things, there are much larger manufacturers of maple syrup. And then.

So that really helped me kind of move my sales channel from Vermont into the bigger kind of market, which for us is down in, you know, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island. And then I also did, as I was starting out, a number of food shows. The New York Fancy Food show is a huge food show. What a wonderful experience.

And we were able to be placed in a Vermont booth. So, you know, we had our 10 by 10 space next to a litany of other Vermont customer companies. And so I made contacts there.

And once I started having, like, my regular client list, I've been very fortunate that. Well, part of it is we do a good job, we do our best, we make our best product.

And a lot of my sales channel now is by word of mouth or people find my products at other locations like you when you see them and you're out. And that's how my.

My sales channel is just organically growing in that regard, such to the point that at the moment, I can't take on any more customers for maple candy because my customer base is regular enough that I think this is a very important part of thing of what I've done is I won't take customers on just to make my slow time busier, because I know my busy time is the most important time to make people happy.

So while my demand in certain times lags at certain times of the year, so I could take on a new customer, Christmas, for example, would be nearly impossible to produce the quality product that I want to if I took more customers on in my slow period. So being comfortable saying no is important. You have to know your limits.

I'm going to dive into our last topic. I'd like to. And it's not about maple sugar per se. It's about the word grit.

Okay, so grit is a very common theme of mine because every startup founder has to have it and does have it. And you know, sort of, it's obvious why that that has to be because you have to be resilient. You have to be. Have a lot of stick to itness.

You have to have a lot of courage. All of those things just in the stories you've told in the last 35 minutes are true of you. But where do you think your grit comes from?

What's your story about your grit?

You know, I always look back to when I was a child, and if I look back at both sides of my family, my mom and my dad, a lot of entrepreneurs in there, a lot of women entrepreneurs, and also beyond entrepreneurial, a lot of women who just knew that if something had to get done, you figure out how to do it. And that's my philosophy, because we do have problems, challenges, but I, I mean, there's a, there's a solution.

There's always a way to do something, and you just have to believe in yourself enough and care enough to make that true. And I found that that's worked for me.

And I believe that it truly comes from how I was raised from a very young age to, you know, target things head on and be creative. And it's okay, you know, if it doesn't work the first time, try again, you'll get there.

Um, and so, you know, just having that and the support of my family, whether it be, you know, when I was a kid, my, my parents, my aunts, my uncles, my husband.

Today, just the knowing that those that network stands behind you allows you to have grit because they won't allow you to fail either, because they know that you can't. They can't, you can't. So, you know, I'm lucky to have a good family.

Well said. And I Think. I think you're just.

What you've just done on this podcast is, is a, a great role model for a lot of women who are thinking about starting something.

I am very fortunate to have had a higher percentage of, of founder, women founders on this show than there are in actually percentage wise in the world. So that's, I don't know why that is actually, but I think it's really interesting.

And you're, you're, you're carrying the flag for them again, you know, so it's been, it's been great for me to hear all this and for everyone else is going to hear it soon when this episode gets published.

Well, speaking of family, I do, we do have some family in common. And so I will be sure to.

You know, I was introduced to you, the idea of you through someone who, your nephew who always regales tales of you and how you are his favorite uncle. So, you know, family is everywhere.

And I think that women or men that have the support of that family, you know, behind them and around them are so fortunate for so many ways and it, you know, it just can't be said enough.

Well, he is, his name is Braden and he's married to your cousin. Yes, Mindy.

And one of the things that's so amazing about Braden is that he, he's, he's a fantastic skier and he, he was, he got a job part time, I think at first at Sunday river in Maine, and, and then to me it seemed like before you knew it, he was the head of the whole ski patrol. And I've skied with him and with the ski patrol around, and he doesn't crack the whip. He is not a bossy boss. He, he leads through excellence.

And it's just, it's, it's wonderful to see. It's wonderful to see.

It is. It's a trait that should never go unnoticed. I was fortunate to have that at Deloitte and I. And it makes it easier to replicate here. Right.

So if people see you doing what you're supposed to do and doing it right, and you treat them the way you want to be treated and don't ask people to do something that you wouldn't do, it goes a long way. And Braden is the same. Right. If there's a hard job, you raise your hand. Just because you're the boss, it doesn't mean you won't do the hard job.

Yep. And I want to thank you, April, for being on this podcast.

Thank you so much, Jathi. It was my pleasure. Have a sweet day.

And here's your toolkit takeaway. First, your resume is your startup's first asset. April runs April's Maple on the very skills she built as a Deloitte partner.

Finance, Marketing, managing people selling. Before you assume you're starting from zero, take inventory of what you already know how to do. You are more prepared than you think.

Second, you don't have to know everything. April loved Maple, but she had no idea how to build a sugaring operation.

So on day one, she found a 40 year expert and asked name the one thing you don't know and go borrow someone who does. Asking for help is a founder's strength, not a weakness. Third, know your limits and protect your core.

April turns away new customers during her busy season because serving her best customers well beats growing for growth's sake. Not every opportunity is yours to take. Sometimes the most powerful word in business is no.

Now go make a list of the three skills from your old career that your new venture needs most and put one of them to work this week. And that's our show with April. The show notes contain useful resources and links.

Please follow and rate [email protected] designingsuccessful startups. Also, please share and like us on your social media channels. This is Jothi Rosenberg saying TTFN Tata for now.