Shownotes
Episode Summary
Co-Founder at Ekonoke, Inés Sagrario, joins the show to share her eclectic background, including her time at The Cluster Competitiveness Group, and the work she’s currently doing at Ekonoke, a sustainable indoor farming start-up. Ekonoke develops knowledge and technology to produce great quality hops year-round with significantly lower water and carbon footprint. Today, Harry and Inés talk about their shared experience as startup entrepreneurs, the power of strategic analysis, and how the indoor AgTech industry is evolving. Inés shares the growth cycle of hops, her passion for sustainability, and her special relationship with her co-founder, Ana.
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Key Takeaways
07:13 – Harry welcomes to the show, Inés Sagrario, who talks about the Rioja wine region of Spain and her experience living in ten different countries
15:54 – A passion for sustainability
17:33 – Inés reflects on her time working at The Cluster Competitiveness Group, and the power of strategic analysis
20:26 – The accidental entrepreneur and the genesis of Ekonoke
27:06 – The impact the global pandemic had on Ekonoke
30:59 – Inés speaks to her relationship with her co-founder (and cousin) Ana
33:00 – One final pivot to growing hops indoors
42:44 – The growth cycle of hops
44:08 – A touch question Inés has had to ask herself recently
48:23 – Future endeavors for Ekonoke
52:01 – Harry thanks Inés for joining the show and lets listeners know where they can connect with Ines and learn more about Ekonoke
Tweetable Quotes
“Competitiveness, for me, was the school of my life. I had brilliant bosses. The Founder and the other founder partner at that time were amazing in terms of strategic analysis. Everything I know about strategic analysis I learned from them.” (18:33) (Inés)
“So, when we started with the vertical gardens at the restaurants, we were growing in a greenhouse with the ZipGrow Towers. We’d grow the leafy greens or the herbs to be ready for harvest and then we would take them in the ZipGrow Tower and set them up at the in-store or in-restaurant garden. The truth is, I think we were a bit too advanced for the market in Spain at that time, and they weren’t ready to pay a premium for that. So, they used it more as a Marketing thing for decoration.” (22:54) (Inés)
“From March 2020 onwards, over the next three months, we managed to secure different business angels that we’d been talking to. Everything we’d been explaining about how it’s important to redefine the food system, and stop having all this food travel thousands of kilometers, but rather have the knowledge and the technology travel instead, it just made sense.” (27:52) (Inés)
“Our plan right now is to grow globally. We want to handle a really large market. And, even though right now we’re a local startup in Madrid, we want to make sure that we establish all the controls, procedures, and processes from the beginning that will allow us to grow quickly and to scale at the level that we aim at scaling.” (32:37) (Inés)
“Basically what we want to bring is climate resiliency to a crop [hops] that will eventually disappear if we don’t do anything about it.” (41:56) (Inés)
Resources Mentioned
Inés’ Linkedin – https://www.linkedin.com/in/inessagrario/?originalSubdomain=es
Rioja Wine Region of Spain – https://winetourismspain.com/wine-regions/rioja/
Ekonoke – https://www.ekonoke.com/
Ekonoke LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/company/ekonoke/
Ekonoke Instagram – https://www.instagram.com/ekonoke_/
Ekonoke Twitter – https://twitter.com/ekonoke_
Sponsor Info
Cultivatd’s Website – https://cultivatd.com/
Cultivatd’s 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
2025 Precision Ag Report by iGrowNews
Transcripts
$680 million poured into precision ag last year.
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Speaker:Precision Agriculture Intelligence Report From iGrow News is now
Speaker:available. Get your copy today at
Speaker:igrownews.com/precision. If you are starting a vertical
Speaker:farm and don't know where to begin or which technology would suit your needs,
Speaker:then reach out to the experts at Cultivated. As indoor farm brokers, they
Speaker:help connect you to the right technology and ensure your project is successful.
Speaker:Best of all, their service is free because they work on behalf of their partners.
Speaker:Visit cultivated.com to learn more. And that's spelled
Speaker:C-U-L-T-I-V-A-T-D.com,
Speaker:or click the link in the show notes. So when we started
Speaker:with the vertical gardens at the restaurants, we realized
Speaker:that all the conditions— so we were growing in a greenhouse with the
Speaker:ZipGrow towers. We'd grow the leafy greens or the herbs to
Speaker:be ready for harvest, and then we would take them in the
Speaker:ZipGrow tower and set them up at the in-store or
Speaker:in-restaurant garden so that the restaurants could harvest there and
Speaker:use it. The truth is that we were a bit too advanced for
Speaker:the time of the market in Spain at that time,
Speaker:and they weren't ready to pay a premium for that. So they used it
Speaker:more as a marketing thing for decoration.
Speaker:Welcome to the Vertical Farming Podcast, weekly conversations
Speaker:with fascinating CEOs, founders, and agtech
Speaker:visionaries. Join us every week as we dive deep into the
Speaker:world of vertical farming with your host, Harry Duran.
Speaker:Vertical Farming Podcast Season 6 is underway.
Speaker:Welcome back. To all of you who were listening and
Speaker:anxiously anticipating the kickoff of season 6, thanks for your
Speaker:patience. It's really a passion
Speaker:project of mine, and we put a lot of work into making sure
Speaker:we get the best folks on the show and we put out a quality product,
Speaker:and sometimes that takes a little bit longer than
Speaker:expected. So, I appreciate you. Thank you. hanging around. And if
Speaker:you are new to the show and you are listening for the very first
Speaker:time, first of all, thank you. I'm sure you're in the right place
Speaker:as this is the show where we interview fascinating CEOs and founders of the leading
Speaker:vertical farming companies from around the world. I'm your host, Harry
Speaker:Duran. Hopefully you had a chance during this hiatus to catch up
Speaker:on season 5 episodes. We finished off that
Speaker:season with founder and CEO of VegBed, Albert Lin, so make sure you've
Speaker:listened to that one. He joined the show to talk about the work he's doing
Speaker:to create a better and easier way to use a growing medium for the hydroponic
Speaker:community. And he talked about his experience as an early-stage startup ops
Speaker:expert, the entrepreneurial mindset, and what he's cultivated
Speaker:that would be advice he would give to other founders. Very, very
Speaker:inspiring. I love the entrepreneurial nature, being an entrepreneur
Speaker:myself. So I know you'll enjoy that episode with Albert. Okay, we are
Speaker:kicking off season 6 with Inez Sagrario.
Speaker:She's the co-founder at Ekonoki, and Inez and I met at
Speaker:Indoor AgTech NYC, fantastic event. I've gotten
Speaker:so many follow-up interviews from that conference,
Speaker:and we were able to connect and we hit it off, and I knew I
Speaker:needed to have her on the show. She talks about her eclectic background, including her
Speaker:time at the Cluster Competitiveness Group, and the work she's currently doing at
Speaker:Ekonoki, which is an indoor farm specializing in growing
Speaker:quality hops. They do that year-round with a significantly
Speaker:lower water and carbon footprint. On this episode, we talked about our
Speaker:shared experience as entrepreneurs, the power of strategic analysis, and how
Speaker:the indoor agtech industry is evolving. She shares some insights into the growth
Speaker:cycle of hops, her passion for sustainability, and her special relationship with her
Speaker:co-founder, Anna. I'm always fascinated to see all the different
Speaker:crops that are being grown indoors as I delve deeper
Speaker:into this space, and so I'm really fascinated by everything that's
Speaker:happening. I want to remind you that if you're enjoying this episode or past episodes,
Speaker:I would love it if you leave a rating and a review at ratethispodcast.com/vfp.
Speaker:I'd love to read yours out next episode. As I've mentioned before, this
Speaker:is a labor of love and a lot of work goes into the production of
Speaker:these episodes. And we are always on the lookout to partner
Speaker:with like-minded companies in the space, such as the ones that
Speaker:you hear about on this show. So if you are interested in partnering
Speaker:with us to sponsor a season or a batch of
Speaker:episodes, reach out to me directly,
Speaker:[email protected]. I'd love to have a
Speaker:conversation with you. Okay, before we get into this uninterrupted
Speaker:conversation with Ines, a few words from the folks that support this
Speaker:show. This episode is brought to you by Vertical Farming Weekly. Each week, our team
Speaker:member Noah brings you the latest and greatest in the world of vertical farming, including
Speaker:updates when episodes go live. Sign up today at
Speaker:verticalfarmingweekly.com. This podcast is produced by
Speaker:Fullcast, our full-service done-for-you podcast agency. If you are
Speaker:interested in learning how a podcast would be beneficial for your brand, learn more
Speaker:at fullcast.co. So, Inés Sagrario,
Speaker:co-founder at Ecanoque, thank you so much for joining me on Vertical
Speaker:Farming Podcast. It's a pleasure to be here. Thank you.
Speaker:So, uh, where, uh, is home for you right now?
Speaker:Home for me is boiling Madrid. We're in the middle of
Speaker:a heat wave. So yeah, it's about 40
Speaker:degrees Celsius outside. That's about 104 Fahrenheit, I
Speaker:think. So that's really hot. Wow. Yes.
Speaker:Are you near any sort of body of water you can get to pretty quickly?
Speaker:A pool. Yeah. Okay. That's about it. Yeah. That's helpful.
Speaker:Yeah. Yeah. Were you— is that home? Were you born and raised
Speaker:there? I was, I was born in Madrid, but I've
Speaker:actually lived in 10 different countries over the course
Speaker:of my life. So, I'm a bit of a
Speaker:true citizen of the world. And actually, the place I consider my
Speaker:origin is a small village in the north of Spain, in La Rioja. It's a
Speaker:place called Uruñuela. Okay. That's where my mom is from, where my
Speaker:grandparents are from, and it's where we spent all our
Speaker:summers when we were kids. So, it's sort of The place where happiness takes
Speaker:me. How often do you get there?
Speaker:I go normally like 3 or 4 times a year. Yeah. Yeah. And
Speaker:my kids love it too. It's a tiny village. You can roam free,
Speaker:sort of. It's freedom. So that sounds beautiful.
Speaker:If you have any pictures, always happy looking for fun stuff to drop in the
Speaker:show notes every now and then. So. Well, it's Rioja is the wine
Speaker:region. of the wine regions in Spain. And this is actually in the part of
Speaker:Rioja that has the wine. So it's, you know, the scenery, it's
Speaker:all vineyards and stuff. It's really nice. My
Speaker:partner likes specific kinds of wine, and she went to a restaurant one time
Speaker:and she liked the wine, or she had them explain like what type of
Speaker:flavor it was. And the word they gave her was barnyardy, like a
Speaker:barnyard where, where you raise farm animals. But that was like
Speaker:the 'Cause it's very, it's like a bit darker. It's not as sweet. And
Speaker:it's, you can kind of taste like, not the dirt, but like the land in
Speaker:it. So a lot of times I've brought Riojas home and
Speaker:there's been a couple where she's just like, yep, like that's it. Like that's the
Speaker:flavor. Like it's a very earthy, Rioja usually has a very
Speaker:earthy taste. And actually I can usually recognize
Speaker:a Rioja pretty easily in a blind taste because we've
Speaker:tried, we've had wine Actually, since I can remember. Of
Speaker:course, you know, at family meals, if they open a bottle of wine that was
Speaker:specifically unique or very tasty or something,
Speaker:they'd pass around the whole table with the 9 grandchildren
Speaker:so that we could recognize this is good wine, you know. So we just wet
Speaker:our lips and say, ah, okay. And that's education.
Speaker:I love that. That's beautiful. And it's such a complete change in
Speaker:behavior here in the States because people have talked about this a lot, how
Speaker:we're so like Restricting in terms of what our
Speaker:kids can't do, and we don't allow them to make mistakes, and we're just like,
Speaker:don't, you know, don't drink. And we're holding them like we pretend it's not gonna
Speaker:happen. And obviously everyone knows the story, like these kids go to college and then
Speaker:they just start drinking for the very first time ever, and it never ends up
Speaker:well. For us, wine is, and beer too in
Speaker:Spain, but especially wine in, in La Rioja is part of
Speaker:culture. So it's not a, trying to get drunk, but rather I'm
Speaker:enjoying a social moment normally with family or with friends.
Speaker:Yeah. And so we met at Indoor AgTech NYC
Speaker:and you had reached out because I think you had been listening to the show
Speaker:already. Yes, I'm a super fan. You've accompanied me on many
Speaker:a trip when I'm running away from Madrid and going to the beach.
Speaker:So it's a long drive and I sort of binge listen to
Speaker:podcasts and the Vertical Farming Podcast is always very entertaining.
Speaker:How long have you been a podcast listener? I think I started with the
Speaker:pandemic, like more solidly. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So
Speaker:during the lockdown, but I used to listen to a few every once in a
Speaker:while, something that was recommended. But since then I've sort of hooked
Speaker:onto it. I've tried to make it easy by giving it a very
Speaker:simple and clear name. It is very simple and clear.
Speaker:It's very obvious what you're going to get. when you see
Speaker:a show called the Vertical Farming Podcast. So let's rewind the clock a little
Speaker:bit. We can go as fast as you'd like, but coming out of university,
Speaker:what type of jobs were you interested in? What type of industry were you interested
Speaker:in working in? I studied economics in university,
Speaker:and actually when I was, I think in my third year,
Speaker:one of my professors started talking about the Rio
Speaker:Conference and about sustainable development. So this was back
Speaker:in '94, I think. Okay. And that just sort of
Speaker:clicked in my mind and I really found sort of my purpose.
Speaker:This is what I want to do for a living. So actually I finished university
Speaker:in Madrid and I went to Oxford to study development economics there.
Speaker:And then from there, I knew I wanted to go understand
Speaker:what were big development program problems. So I
Speaker:went to India. And I spent 3 years in India.
Speaker:And I initially, I was working for the Spanish
Speaker:embassy there and then started working for a Spanish
Speaker:company called Chupa Chups. They make lollipops. I know
Speaker:Chupa Chups. So yeah, I was there for 3 years and
Speaker:then moved back to Spain and sort of shifted over
Speaker:to, okay, I want to start working on real development work and
Speaker:joined the African Development Bank. In Côte d'Ivoire, lived through
Speaker:the coup there and the beginning of the civil war. So
Speaker:that was an experience. Moved to Tunisia, still with the
Speaker:bank. And then I left the bank and joined a
Speaker:consulting company that was focused on regional development
Speaker:projects using sort of cluster-based approach of looking at sort
Speaker:of analyzing strategic challenges and the opportunities
Speaker:for specific sector linked to a territory. And that's
Speaker:what I was doing for the remainder of my career
Speaker:until I started EconoQue initially with a different
Speaker:name. And yeah, and with that consulting company, I lived
Speaker:in Argentina, in Chile, in Brazil,
Speaker:and then eventually I came back to Madrid. I came back home and
Speaker:that's when I decided to start this project.
Speaker:That's a wonderful story. Out of all the places you've been and lived, do
Speaker:you have some favorites? Obviously, like nothing like Spain, but there's so many
Speaker:mixes of cultures, I imagine. I don't know if I would call it culture
Speaker:shock, but just differences, even just in going to Oxford and then
Speaker:going to India and Africa. What are some of the experiences
Speaker:that stand out for you? I don't know. I can't say I have a favorite
Speaker:place because each place was unique for the time of my life that I
Speaker:was there for. But India, I think, got me
Speaker:hooked on sort of surprises, on
Speaker:not having a monotonous life because there, you know,
Speaker:from opening the tap in the morning and wondering, will I have water
Speaker:today? You know? Wow. But anyways, and all the amazing
Speaker:places that you can discover in India just by taking a night train from
Speaker:Delhi anywhere else. So, that was fantastic. But I would say,
Speaker:I mean, any place. Argentina, I was in Bariloche, the absolute
Speaker:amazing nature that you have there. Chile, I traveled,
Speaker:I moved actually sort of from one city to the next
Speaker:for a couple of years. Amazing country. Brazil is where
Speaker:I met my husband and— I love Brazil. So, obviously,
Speaker:a special place in my heart. I don't know, I think I lived in the
Speaker:US as a kid, so, and that's made me a big
Speaker:part of who I am. So, I think I'm just a combination of all these
Speaker:different places and like to think that I took a little piece of each
Speaker:place with me. It's like you're a citizen of the world.
Speaker:Yeah. Where in the US did you live? I lived in Maryland. Okay.
Speaker:How was the culture shock there? This was
Speaker:1987 when we moved there, so 35 years ago.
Speaker:The world was much, much bigger at that time. It was a
Speaker:big shock precisely because of that. I remember like
Speaker:just writing back to my grandmother and saying, everything here is
Speaker:just very big except for dogs.
Speaker:and tomatoes because we'd never seen a cherry tomato. And
Speaker:suddenly all I could see in the US was cherry tomatoes. I'm like, why are
Speaker:these tomatoes so small? And everybody had these little tiny dogs
Speaker:that we weren't used to seeing too much in Spain. So yeah.
Speaker:That's funny. You mentioned part of what was driving some of your early
Speaker:choices was working in the field of sustainability. When did this
Speaker:become like awake for you? Is this something just values that you
Speaker:picked up from your family, or is this something you saw as you
Speaker:started going through your education process and seeing the condition of the
Speaker:world and realizing how this was something that was important to focus on?
Speaker:I think it's probably a combination of both things. So my
Speaker:grandparents are farmers originally, and my
Speaker:mother is a scientist and worked with
Speaker:biomass, with renewable energy since the '70s. So
Speaker:sort of a very advanced sort of focusing on new type of
Speaker:energies from the beginning. So I think I always had that
Speaker:at home. And then I studied economics because I wanted to
Speaker:understand how the world works. And then it was just the
Speaker:explanation of sustainable development, of combining
Speaker:the economic, the social, and the environment. It just made click
Speaker:in my head. For me, everything became clear when that professor,
Speaker:David Riva, he explained this and I was like, it makes sense. This is why
Speaker:I'm here. Yeah. Having parents like that made for some
Speaker:interesting conversations at dinner. Yeah, I
Speaker:think, I mean, my dad's an engineer too. I think it's very
Speaker:sort of science and asking questions sort of
Speaker:focus. And the coolest thing is that they're also translating that
Speaker:over to their grandchildren too. So many of the
Speaker:grandchildren in our family want to become scientists because
Speaker:of the inspiration that they get from their grandparents. Yeah.
Speaker:And so, prior to Ekanoke, the company or
Speaker:the consultancy you were with was Competitiveness? Yes, that's it. And that's the one
Speaker:where you— looks like you did a little bit of the traveling. Yes,
Speaker:quite a bit of traveling, quite a bit of traveling, sort of being living in
Speaker:those places. But apart from that, I think I worked in about 15 or 20
Speaker:different places just traveling to those projects. Botswana,
Speaker:Belarus, Kazakhstan, Mexico,
Speaker:Colombia, Ecuador. I mean, just really all over.
Speaker:It's an amazing experience. Yeah.
Speaker:Did you ever pick up a habit of like collecting one specific thing from every
Speaker:country? Earrings. Earrings? Okay, there you go. I was always
Speaker:sort of living off a suitcase, so all I could get were little
Speaker:earrings. That's smart. Yeah, something light. Yes. Yeah. If— when you
Speaker:think about your time there, given how it was a
Speaker:significant portion of your career. What were some of the takeaways
Speaker:as you started working on all these and completing all these projects from your time
Speaker:at Competitiveness? I think, I mean, Competitiveness for me was the
Speaker:school of my life. I had brilliant bosses. The
Speaker:founder and the other founding partner at that time were
Speaker:amazing in terms of strategic analysis, and I really just
Speaker:learned everything that I know about strategic analysis. I
Speaker:learned it from them. And I think it's really helped
Speaker:me to— I've seen, I've worked with so many different industries in so many different
Speaker:places that in the end, you realize analysis is
Speaker:about connecting lots of different dots. And the more
Speaker:dots you have, the more you can connect and the more creatively that you can
Speaker:connect those dots. So, I think I am where I am today, and
Speaker:I've been able to create together with the rest of my
Speaker:co-founders this really cool project because I had that
Speaker:background from competitiveness where all I did for
Speaker:15 years, or a big part of what I did, was understanding
Speaker:trends, buyer purchase criteria, technologies, how
Speaker:things are changing, how fast they should be changing, all these
Speaker:challenges. All that I bring from my experience in
Speaker:competitiveness. And in fact, I still collaborate with
Speaker:competitiveness. I love it. I can't break away 100%. But
Speaker:they know that now I have a new baby. Yeah. And
Speaker:how important were those relationships and working with
Speaker:folks that you consider mentors in terms of your growth?
Speaker:I think for me, it has been fundamental, really,
Speaker:being able to have people that have amazing
Speaker:sort of intellectual capabilities, but
Speaker:also a very direct human connection. and that
Speaker:have that, really that vocation to teach and to support
Speaker:others, to transfer that knowledge to others. I mean,
Speaker:for me, yeah, no doubt, very instrumental in
Speaker:the way I have developed my career. So which
Speaker:came first, the awareness of what was happening
Speaker:in the vertical farming space or this
Speaker:itch that you needed to scratch to become an entrepreneur?
Speaker:I think the first, I never thought I would become an entrepreneur. I never
Speaker:thought I would build something from scratch. I mean, at Competitiveness, I had
Speaker:become a partner, so I was really actually running the business together
Speaker:with the partners there. And so, that part I knew I could do, but I
Speaker:never thought of creating something new. But actually, I was working
Speaker:in a project with horticulture producers in Chile.
Speaker:And I started doing the technology prospecting,
Speaker:seeing the trends, what was going on. And I actually did a trip
Speaker:to the US to visit in New York and
Speaker:Brooklyn, what was going on, what were the trends in
Speaker:restaurants and sort of in the retail, et cetera.
Speaker:And that's when I found vertical farming, actually. The first one that I
Speaker:found was Freight Farms. Oh, yeah. Yeah. So actually
Speaker:the project, we started it initially using ZipGrow towers.
Speaker:Okay. Yeah, so from Freight Farms, we got to Bright Agrotech,
Speaker:and then, yeah. And so talk a little bit
Speaker:more now about the genesis of idea. You said that Ekanoke was called something else
Speaker:before as well? Yeah, so the original name is
Speaker:Achipampanos, and that's actually still the official name of the company, but
Speaker:we go by this other brand. Achipampanos, nobody can pronounce it,
Speaker:and it's actually a word that my grandmother made up. Oh,
Speaker:wow. Yeah. So it's the word that she would say when we
Speaker:asked on Sundays, we'd go have lunch at her house and say, Grandma, what's for
Speaker:lunch? And 9 grandchildren coming in the kitchen to ask you
Speaker:what's for lunch. She'd just, achipámpanos, you know? And it just really means,
Speaker:don't worry, whatever I give you will be good, you know? So
Speaker:that's the official name of the company. And we started the
Speaker:idea, the initial idea was to set up vertical
Speaker:gardens at the point of consumption. So in restaurants, in schools, Schools
Speaker:and cafeterias, even in community centers,
Speaker:anywhere that people would like to have access to
Speaker:live leafy greens and herbs. Yeah. So that was the
Speaker:initial idea. We tried that for a couple of years and then
Speaker:pivoted, and then we pivoted again. I think we've learned a
Speaker:lot about pivoting. What was the
Speaker:inspiration for the first pivot? Or the need for the first pivot?
Speaker:So, when we started with the vertical gardens at the
Speaker:restaurants, it was mainly at restaurants. So, we realized
Speaker:that all the conditions— so, we were growing in a greenhouse with
Speaker:the ZipGrow towers. We'd grow the leafy greens or the herbs to
Speaker:be ready for harvest, and then we would take them in the
Speaker:ZipGrow tower and set them up at the in-store or
Speaker:in-restaurant garden so that the restaurants could harvest there and
Speaker:use it. The truth is that I think we were a bit too
Speaker:advanced for the time of the market in Spain at
Speaker:that time, and they weren't ready to pay a
Speaker:premium for that. So they used it more as a marketing thing for
Speaker:decoration. And you know that edible plants, you can't have
Speaker:them for decoration. After you haven't eaten the lettuce, it'll just start flowering and
Speaker:going all over the place. So they ended up wanting to have the produce
Speaker:at the place for for too long without using it. And the
Speaker:conditions in each restaurant were different in terms of the heat or the
Speaker:cold or the light or the humidity. Of course. The waiters,
Speaker:which were usually charged with sort of putting, extending the light at
Speaker:night or filling up the water tank, they would forget. So—
Speaker:That's the last thing you wanna do as a waiter, I'm sure. Yeah, exactly, exactly.
Speaker:So it ended up being sort of very artisanal. At
Speaker:that time, we also joined an accelerator program, Edible Adventures
Speaker:in Madrid. And they sort of very nicely
Speaker:questioned us so that we started thinking of other alternatives.
Speaker:And so in 2019, we
Speaker:decided to start trying something that some of the restaurants were
Speaker:asking us, but also something we thought that could eventually get to consumers, which
Speaker:was our, we called them mini gardens of leafy greens, of baby
Speaker:leaf. Okay. So we'd grow them on a substrate,
Speaker:so vertically and without using the Zigro towers anymore. And
Speaker:then we'd sort of transplant them to little compostable trays. and they would be taken
Speaker:live to either the restaurant or the consumers.
Speaker:So that was sort of our first pivot. Also,
Speaker:that came coupled with moving out of the greenhouse. Okay. In
Speaker:2019, we had a terrible month of March
Speaker:in Madrid. Temperatures outside went to like 32,
Speaker:33 degrees Celsius. Inside the
Speaker:greenhouse, without having set up the protective measures
Speaker:and stuff, it went up to like 42. And it just,
Speaker:all the plants just sort of stopped. They said, okay, I don't know what's happening.
Speaker:I'm just gonna stay put. And really in June, there was
Speaker:another huge heat wave. They even had to close down schools. I mean, it
Speaker:was just, we just realized climate change was here. It wasn't
Speaker:something that we were reading in the news of things impacting— You're experiencing
Speaker:it firsthand. Pacific Islands or things like that. No, it was here. It was gonna
Speaker:stay. Even if we wanted to build sort of a high-tech
Speaker:greenhouse and stuff, we realized, okay, the sun
Speaker:intensity and the length of the summers in Madrid is not going
Speaker:to make it feasible. So at that time also, we met
Speaker:another team of founders. So Antonio and Javier, they'd
Speaker:been growing microgreens indoors already. So
Speaker:we really hit it off. It was, we realized we had the same values,
Speaker:the same, we were looking for the same thing. They were researchers at the university.
Speaker:Okay. Ana was very good, my co-founder, I didn't mention her. She's an
Speaker:agricultural engineer, so she knew what she was doing. And
Speaker:myself, I was doing more of the sales and the
Speaker:business organization, and Ana all the production. So we said, okay, why don't we
Speaker:join both projects? And that's when they convinced us to move indoors.
Speaker:They said, look, we've been already doing it for a year. No, a couple of
Speaker:years. Said, we can do it. You can control it much better. Let's try it.
Speaker:So we joined forces. We joined the 2 projects. That's when we also
Speaker:changed the name to EconoQue. And so it's a
Speaker:result of the fusion of these 2 projects. And we moved
Speaker:indoors. We had our first harvest ready
Speaker:to take to restaurants the first week of April
Speaker:2020. So all the restaurants closed
Speaker:and we ate lots of lettuce. Yeah. Talk about
Speaker:timing. Yeah. It's always interesting to— I started the
Speaker:podcast in March of 2020, but it It's
Speaker:interesting because it sort of brought to light the exact reason
Speaker:why this was important to talk about. The disruption in the
Speaker:supply chains, the loss of access to fresh local food,
Speaker:and just seemed like it just appeared at the right time to be
Speaker:having these conversations. Yeah, actually for us, the
Speaker:pandemic was obviously very harsh, but for
Speaker:example, all the things that we'd been talking to, I was trying to fundraise
Speaker:at that time. Up to then, we had been really just moving on
Speaker:our own savings. We got some convertible notes
Speaker:from family and friends, like, at the end of 2019, because we were dry. Yeah.
Speaker:But actually, sort of from March 2020
Speaker:onwards, like, in the next 3 months, we managed to
Speaker:secure, and like, different business angels that we'd been talking
Speaker:to, just suddenly, like, everything that we'd been explaining
Speaker:about how it's important to redefine the food system
Speaker:and stop having all this food travel thousands of
Speaker:kilometers, but rather have the knowledge and the technology travel
Speaker:instead, it just made sense. So we especially got to
Speaker:one of our business angels, an Argentinian investor who just like
Speaker:said, Ines, this is the future. Let's go. And he
Speaker:decided to, he just fixed the investment. He closed
Speaker:the round and everybody else just sort of Confirmed immediately. And in July
Speaker:2020, we closed our first round. So I do think that sort
Speaker:of just put it in front of everybody's face of the way we're
Speaker:doing it, it's not working. Yeah. Yeah. Well, it's
Speaker:so funny. There's so many interesting things there. And it's always great to
Speaker:have the person that believes in what you're doing. And this
Speaker:Argentinian investor, he saw the vision and it's
Speaker:sometimes the access to capital, with the ability to see
Speaker:the bigger picture and not be influenced by events that are happening
Speaker:like in the present moment. Because a lot of times people constrict when
Speaker:events like this happen. And what I noticed, and I saw in some of my
Speaker:entrepreneurial friends too, there's people that actually grew during the pandemic because of
Speaker:the ability to think that this is an opportunity. Every recession is
Speaker:always an opportunity. You can always look back and every single one—
Speaker:2008, you know, the the financial crisis in the States. Like, people
Speaker:understand these are cycles and that there's going to be a light at the end
Speaker:of the tunnel, and you just have to figure out where that's going to be
Speaker:and how you can position yourself in the best place to succeed. And it's also
Speaker:interesting to see that having someone who is
Speaker:respected and can see the vision gives the follow-up
Speaker:investors that little piece of confirmation that this is the
Speaker:right move. And that's nice to see that everyone then came on board
Speaker:That was— it's just so important to have that one person who believes in you
Speaker:because they sort of lead the way for the rest. Yeah, I think, I mean,
Speaker:for me, the business angels that came in in that round were really
Speaker:instrumental because, as I say, I mean, I have quite a global
Speaker:vision. It doesn't compare with the scale of the experience
Speaker:that these investors have. I mean, Gonzalo, my
Speaker:Argentinian investor, he was this global CEO for Louis Dreyfus.
Speaker:huge commodity company. Juan Ignacio,
Speaker:he's the current president of JDE Coffee in Europe.
Speaker:Wow. César, he's been vice president and president and
Speaker:sort of all these different positions in PepsiCo, in Mondelez,
Speaker:in Colgate-Palmolive. José Luis from Eatable, he's like
Speaker:super referenced. I mean, Rafa, Paco, I mean, they're these
Speaker:people that have such a wealth of experience that
Speaker:They've been super important for us in sort of being able to
Speaker:guide and validate a lot of the decisions that— and
Speaker:a lot of hard decisions we've had to make over the past couple of years.
Speaker:Very interesting. What's the origin story between you and Ana? Like,
Speaker:how did you guys meet? We met at birth. We're cousins.
Speaker:Okay. Yeah, Ana's my little cousin. That's great.
Speaker:So, okay. Yep. I think you can guess from all the references I've made
Speaker:to my grandparents, but they were amazing and they really kept the
Speaker:family very close together. Okay. So, all the cousins, we have
Speaker:a really tight relationship. It's like they're cousins and they're
Speaker:sisters and brothers. We've spent a third, at least, of our
Speaker:childhood together because we spent all our summers there at the village with my
Speaker:grandparents. So, it's a very close relationship, but also
Speaker:she has very different skills because She's an agricultural
Speaker:engineer. She specialized, she went and did a master's in
Speaker:Wageningen. She's done further training. And so she
Speaker:brings a lot of the technical knowledge that obviously I don't have.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah, yeah. It must make for really fun holiday
Speaker:gatherings to have so much family together. Well, yeah, actually
Speaker:we've had a third cousin join now the team. Family business.
Speaker:Yes, it's not and it is. I mean,
Speaker:it's not because obviously, and our other founders, Javi and
Speaker:Antonio, they're not family, and, but we're also very close. But
Speaker:Yolanda, she's an economist, but she comes from
Speaker:finances. So she's worked in controlling and
Speaker:now more recently in internal audits and in large
Speaker:public or private companies, but multinationals. I mean, now she was coming
Speaker:from Adeo, which is Leroy Merlin. I don't know how you pronounce it in the
Speaker:US and Bricomart and these companies. So we went out to
Speaker:convince her to join us because Our plan right now
Speaker:is to really grow globally. We want to really
Speaker:handle a very large market. And even though right now we're a
Speaker:local startup just in Madrid, we want to make sure that we
Speaker:establish all the controls and all the procedures and processes from
Speaker:the beginning that will allow us to grow quickly and to scale
Speaker:at the level that we aim at scaling. So we— that
Speaker:brings us almost to The close to present day, but there's one more
Speaker:pivot, right? Because you've changed now because what you're producing is not what you were
Speaker:producing when all of you came together. So talk about that last pivot. Yeah, I
Speaker:think it was the pivot itself sort of officially was
Speaker:last summer. So a year ago, but we had actually started in
Speaker:2020 while part of us, especially Anna, was
Speaker:going to the farm, to the indoor farm to work with our
Speaker:mini gardens with the leafy greens, etc. A lot of us were more working from
Speaker:home and we started researching other crops that we
Speaker:could grow indoors and especially looking at crops that would
Speaker:have today already climate risk. So
Speaker:hops came very high on that list and we managed
Speaker:to get our hands on some rhizomes of hops. As soon as we
Speaker:were unconfined, they set up the R&D team, Javi and
Speaker:Antonio. As I said, they're researchers from the university.
Speaker:It's always a, why not? Why not? Let's try. So, you know, they
Speaker:put up 4 plants and a few months later we actually had hop
Speaker:cones. Wow. We made lots of mistakes and we had very few hop
Speaker:cones, but we did have hop cones. So we started talking to
Speaker:some of the breweries in Spain. We realized that they
Speaker:had a very strong interest in finding a
Speaker:solution for their supply of hops. So hops,
Speaker:I don't know how much you know about the crop. It's very, it's
Speaker:grown in very few places. So I think like
Speaker:40 or 45% comes from northwestern US, from
Speaker:Washington State and Oregon. Around 40% comes from
Speaker:Germany. And then there's Czech Republic, Slovenia,
Speaker:China, a little bit in Japan, a little bit in New Zealand, sort of a
Speaker:little bit spread out. In Spain, there's like really tiny amount
Speaker:that's grown in the north of Spain. And it requires a lot of water
Speaker:and it requires sort of long summer days and a moderate
Speaker:climate. Okay. And with climate change, that's
Speaker:being a big problem. And there's actually research
Speaker:that at least in all the European regions, the combination of
Speaker:extreme drought and higher summer temperatures can lead to
Speaker:30% reduction in yields per hectare and up to 60%
Speaker:reduction in the quality of those hops. So
Speaker:that is a big problem for brewers. If you get a hop
Speaker:that has half the amount of alpha acids, which is what gives it the
Speaker:bitterness, but twice the amount of hops to make the same beer.
Speaker:Okay. Okay. And with the limitation in supply, if on top of
Speaker:that, there's a problem in the production, then you end up
Speaker:having a big issue. They need, they buy contracts,
Speaker:future contracts, they need to insure. those contracts. So it's really,
Speaker:it's a bit of a nightmare for them to supply themselves with the hops.
Speaker:So really the interest of this was, we saw it very quickly.
Speaker:We actually finally partnered with, it's one of the main
Speaker:brewers in Spain. It's a medium-sized brewer at a global scale,
Speaker:Estrella Galicia. I don't know if you've tried the beer. I think I
Speaker:have. Yeah. When I was in Spain. Yeah. It's very, very good and it is
Speaker:about to get better. So with our hops. So yeah,
Speaker:they're a family-owned business and For us, it was very
Speaker:important that we really connected in terms of values. They
Speaker:are very focused on sort of sustainability,
Speaker:on doing things right, on making sure you have natural ingredients.
Speaker:So on innovation, on doing things differently. So
Speaker:there was really like a love match in those first conversations. And
Speaker:they actually were also very quick in taking a decision. So,
Speaker:you know, we just— That's great. It was very quick engagement. So. Yeah, and
Speaker:that's interesting. Yeah, we started in parallel. The leafy greens
Speaker:and the microgreens were not pulling off. We weren't getting the rotation
Speaker:that we were expecting, and we were still a small company with limited
Speaker:resources. And at one point, we actually had one of these
Speaker:advisory board meetings where I had all the business angels, and we had an
Speaker:amazing conversation. I actually record the meetings, and I
Speaker:watched it like 5 times because it was like the best
Speaker:MBA class ever, you know, having all those different perspectives
Speaker:of all these people that have so much experience. But they really, they
Speaker:helped us to take a very hard decision, which was sort of parting
Speaker:with, or at least for the time being, with our leafy greens.
Speaker:So, and focusing all our efforts on hops. Well,
Speaker:it's interesting that the timing is funny because a friend of mine here in Minneapolis
Speaker:invited me out to a boat and we have some friends mutual
Speaker:friends, and one of our friends is a brewer. So we were having this
Speaker:conversation yesterday on the boat, as a matter of fact, and I was telling him
Speaker:I'm speaking to someone tomorrow. Essentially, they grow hops indoors. He's like, indoors? He's
Speaker:like, you can do that? He's like— he was really like amazed. But he was
Speaker:just explaining like how his process is and how important every
Speaker:single ingredient is like in the flavor
Speaker:composition of the beer. And shout out to Arbiter Brewery here in
Speaker:Minneapolis. He's the head brewer there, my friend Aaron. If he wants to talk to
Speaker:me, more than happy to do so. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker:Have you been talking to any companies in the States? Not yet. Not yet.
Speaker:Okay. We'll get there. Yeah. How big is the company now?
Speaker:So right now we have 9 people and growing. So I
Speaker:hope to incorporate probably 2 more people by September and then
Speaker:3 more by November. Yeah. So we are growing.
Speaker:We have a really cool team, you know, it's probably not very
Speaker:humble to say it myself. I'm probably the most unsurprising of
Speaker:all of them, but it's really, I mean, I think growing hops
Speaker:indoors is not easy. It's very hard. It's not a
Speaker:simple crop. It's a very complex problem.
Speaker:And addressing such a complex problem requires
Speaker:sort of a complex solution that requires this combination of lots of different
Speaker:skills. So we have— Anna is an agricultural engineer, but
Speaker:Javi and Antonio are chemists. Julen is a
Speaker:biotechnologist. Dani is a computer scientist.
Speaker:Andrea is a specialist in mechatronics and microsystems.
Speaker:Arantxa is a lab technician. Yolanda and I are economists. So
Speaker:it's this combination of all this different knowledge
Speaker:that is really allowing us to work very closely and sort
Speaker:of trying to figure out these ways of addressing it and making it work.
Speaker:And I think it's really sort of the— we're seeing the fruits.
Speaker:Actually, we started harvest today, so it's a very exciting
Speaker:day. Do you do videos of the
Speaker:inside of the production? We're actually going to be recording a video tomorrow.
Speaker:Yeah. Okay. So I'll share it when it's ready. Yeah, yeah, please do.
Speaker:Are there anyone else that you know of that's doing hops indoors?
Speaker:We've seen there's like a small startup in Finland. it's doing. Okay.
Speaker:I think they're doing it a bit more complex. And yeah, I don't know if
Speaker:they're just not too much online or I'm just not finding it because it's all
Speaker:in Finnish and my Finnish is not very good. But yeah, they seem to be
Speaker:going not very fast. And then AeroFarms
Speaker:tried hops. Okay. So, and I talked to them at the Indoor
Speaker:AgTech actually last month. So they weren't too
Speaker:open about sharing information about what they were doing, but you know, it was
Speaker:obviously— but yeah, So, I think there's few of us, but
Speaker:I think eventually there'll be more. But we hope to be really
Speaker:the best just by the fact that we're really— Yeah, of course. We're focused on
Speaker:this. We're just doing this. Yeah. And we have all the
Speaker:brainpower just doing this. I think also the
Speaker:partnership from Estrella Galicia is very important because we're
Speaker:working very closely with them. It's really true open
Speaker:innovation at heart. and they're giving us feedback on the
Speaker:quality, on their experience. And I think we're going much
Speaker:faster because there is this really close relationship between
Speaker:us and them. Are you getting the attention of the
Speaker:conventional hops farmers now? Yes. They have a
Speaker:lot of questions. I'm sure they're curious about what you— Yeah, actually earlier this
Speaker:month in early July, there was the International Hops
Speaker:Convention Group. I don't remember. I don't remember the exact name. I didn't
Speaker:go to that. My, the scientific team attended and they
Speaker:presented a poster there. They actually took a cluster of
Speaker:hops that they just cut from the plant because they were ready for
Speaker:harvest and they took it. And harvesting of hops in the Northern
Speaker:Hemisphere only happens in September. So nobody has hops right
Speaker:now ready for harvest. And so that was like, okay, if you don't
Speaker:believe me, here. Here's the fresh hops. I harvested
Speaker:it this morning and here it is. And they got a lot of
Speaker:attention. They got a lot of questions, a lot of doubts. The
Speaker:product itself is speaking straight at them. And I think it's,
Speaker:maybe some of them will be finding it as a threat, but I hope they
Speaker:do see it as an opportunity. I mean, basically what we want to bring is
Speaker:climate resiliency to a crop that will eventually disappear if we
Speaker:don't do anything about it. Yeah. 'Cause obviously, I mean, I don't know how the
Speaker:harvest is gonna be this year, but it's not looking good. We have a crop,
Speaker:a hop farmer here in Spain that told— we had a heat wave in
Speaker:May and he said his plants started flowering in May and they weren't big enough.
Speaker:So, you know, he's lost. He knows he's not gonna be getting much yield because
Speaker:of that unusual heat coming 2 months early. So,
Speaker:I mean, I think this is not the same as with sort of this
Speaker:debate that there is usually between vertical farming and traditional farming. I don't think
Speaker:it's an either/or. It's really how can we work together? No, no. To find a
Speaker:solution to a very difficult problem that we've generated
Speaker:for ourselves over decades of not paying attention to
Speaker:taking care of the planet. And what's the entire growth cycle look like for
Speaker:hops from the very beginning? When you think about the conversations I've had with
Speaker:others, we need to take leafy greens, it's the seed to the seedling
Speaker:to then towards grown indoors. And I'm curious what the equivalent
Speaker:is for that cycle of hops. So hops outdoors,
Speaker:they usually multiply by rhizomes. Okay. That they put on the ground
Speaker:and they'll start sort of coming out in March and they'll be
Speaker:harvesting normally in September. So they get one crop cycle per
Speaker:year and then they go through the winter. Indoors, it's completely
Speaker:different. So we've actually been able to use in
Speaker:vitro plants, which is great because this
Speaker:completely sort of helps us to shelter ourselves
Speaker:from pests, disease, fungi. So it
Speaker:goes from a lab-like condition to a lab-like condition
Speaker:indoors. So we use no pesticides, no
Speaker:herbicides, nothing, because we are sheltered
Speaker:from the outdoors. And then
Speaker:actually the harvest that we're starting today, today is
Speaker:3 and a half months since we transplanted the in
Speaker:vitro plants. Wow. So it is quite amazing.
Speaker:We think that by the next iteration, we'll probably bring it down to 3.
Speaker:So we would be able to get 4 crop cycles per year, which
Speaker:is amazing. Oh, wow. That's incredible. Yeah. What's a tough
Speaker:question you've had to ask yourself recently? Many.
Speaker:I have tough questions every day. I mean, that's what being an
Speaker:entrepreneur really— Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I don't
Speaker:know. I mean, for me, obviously it was tough to let go of our leafy
Speaker:greens. And it's also
Speaker:tough to be making these choices about the speed
Speaker:of how to do things, of being more
Speaker:cautious and trying to advance sort of slowly but
Speaker:surely. Sure. Which is sort of the way that we've advanced right now.
Speaker:But I think at this time, we're realizing that we need to have
Speaker:a combination of slowly but surely, but also sort of being
Speaker:more ambitious and probably being able to do that scaling much quicker,
Speaker:even though it takes us into our— outside of our comfort zone,
Speaker:if there is such a thing of a comfort zone when you're starting or
Speaker:running a business. But yeah, it is difficult. You make difficult
Speaker:choices, I think, every single day. Every day. Yeah, I'm sure.
Speaker:I'll be the first one to vouch for the power and the strength of really
Speaker:going niche because now not only are you an indoor farmer now,
Speaker:but you're specifically early adopters in the— in this crop,
Speaker:right, in hops. And I think there is power because you're learning things
Speaker:probably people are figuring out for the first time in terms of how to work
Speaker:with this crop indoors and all the intricacies and discovering. And
Speaker:it feels like you have just the right team there with all the proper skill
Speaker:sets to continue to innovate and try new things. But I think if I may
Speaker:add that on this idea of the niche product, it's true that— and
Speaker:I've been, I just finished the new funding round, but it's taken me
Speaker:6, 7 months talking to a lot of VCs and many of them are
Speaker:saying, ah, this is beer hops is a small market. It is
Speaker:sort of niche. But the thing is what we see is that hops really
Speaker:has a lot of potential beyond beer. So hops is,
Speaker:it's a cousin of cannabis and its essential oils have
Speaker:many of the similar properties. that CBD has without
Speaker:obviously all the psychotropical derivatives. So it's really
Speaker:the stress relief, the fighting insomnia. Wow.
Speaker:It's even been proven to address the symptoms of menopause
Speaker:for women. The santumol that it contains has really strong
Speaker:anti-tumoral properties. So there's a lot of potential
Speaker:for this, both in terms of functional food and
Speaker:drink, also in terms of medicinal products for pharma
Speaker:industry and even for cosmetics. I mean, and it's been known
Speaker:that it has a lot of potential for cosmetics. It's just not used there because
Speaker:you can't outdoors, you can't grow it without pesticides and herbicides.
Speaker:So you can't use it for cosmetics and for pharma, but indoors
Speaker:you can. So we do think that there's, even though it's coming as
Speaker:sort of a small niche, I think we're going to make this really huge.
Speaker:That's interesting. And I do believe that eventually this will be sort of the new
Speaker:CBD. That's very interesting. I mean, it sort of
Speaker:opens up opportunities which aren't even on the map yet, but they're in
Speaker:your mind and in terms of the possibilities. So just obviously starting with the
Speaker:crop and the relationships with the brewers, but because of the medicinal
Speaker:qualities and because of your ability to control the consistency—
Speaker:because this is really the big thing. One of the conversations from last night that
Speaker:I had was how amazed he is because he's a small brewery, they've got a
Speaker:small shop, a brew brewery here in Minneapolis, but he just marvels when he
Speaker:thinks about like Coors Light, how they're able to consistently like create the same
Speaker:flavor profile for that beer at that massive scale,
Speaker:which is another skill set. But I imagine being able to
Speaker:deliver consistent product with every cycle, I think, is
Speaker:something that's very attractive. I would imagine that's actually our biggest selling
Speaker:point, and that's what's opening also the doors to some of the global
Speaker:brewers too. But also they like the fact that we do it
Speaker:pesticide-free, that we have a 20 times lower water
Speaker:footprint, that we use only renewable energy, that we can grow any
Speaker:cultivar anywhere in the world. There's really a lot of selling
Speaker:points that we bring, but the first one is that guaranteed
Speaker:supply in terms of quantity and quality that really
Speaker:makes their life lots easier. So what's the roadmap
Speaker:look like? I know there's a lot we've talked about, but maybe even just thinking
Speaker:about 12 months, and obviously plans can change. But in terms of
Speaker:the current business model, who you're looking to partner with,
Speaker:what's that look like for you? So right now we're building pilot
Speaker:facility in Galicia with Estrella Galicia in northwestern Spain.
Speaker:That's going to be 1,000 square meters. And we'll
Speaker:be obviously making some mistakes in that and incorporating that into the
Speaker:design so that we can scale to a larger commercial scale, which will be
Speaker:10,000 square meters, also with Estrella Galicia next to
Speaker:their new factory. And it's actually going to be pretty cool because we will be
Speaker:able to develop sort of synergies that would make it
Speaker:even more sustainable. For example, like using the CO2 from the
Speaker:fermentation process to feed into the plants so that they can do the
Speaker:photosynthesis faster, or using all the excess water that they
Speaker:have, just filtering that and being able to use it to water the
Speaker:plants. So it's really going to be— obviously we need to do all the numbers
Speaker:to make that claim, but as carbon and water neutral as
Speaker:possible. So I think that's going to be pretty cool. That should be the
Speaker:next 18, 24 months for us, but we're already having
Speaker:conversations with global brewers worldwide to start
Speaker:negotiating, okay, where do you want us to build it in 2024? So
Speaker:if there's a brewer listening to me and they're interested in
Speaker:discussing this, we're more than happy. We do want to have our pilot ready
Speaker:before we start anything else anywhere else, because we do want
Speaker:to make sure that we can do this at scale. Yeah. But from then on,
Speaker:I think the world is going to be small. Yeah, what's so fascinating is
Speaker:this ability to build this synergistic relationship between the brewer
Speaker:who has a really vested interest in the quality and the consistency
Speaker:of a core ingredient for their product, and just being able to— and then
Speaker:leveraging the fact that you're using and sharing resources together,
Speaker:which I think is very smart. It sort of reminds me in a way of
Speaker:sometimes when you see these animals that have these synergistic relationships, like you'll see this
Speaker:shark and there's like— there's other fish that's connected to it, and they just like,
Speaker:they need each other in a way that's very beneficial to both.
Speaker:And I think that's also the future of how we're going to make growth
Speaker:more sustainable. If we try to find these synergies between
Speaker:different industries or different companies so that there's less
Speaker:waste, and what's waste for them is an input for me.
Speaker:So there's no such thing as waste. Yeah. So you
Speaker:did make a call out to the brewers, but to your peers in the vertical
Speaker:farming space, given the audience for this podcast, is there a specific
Speaker:ask or anything you want to share with that audience? I think
Speaker:many of the players in the vertical farming industry are
Speaker:looking at other crops. And I think the Indoor AgTech, there was a
Speaker:session where we actually presented, which was What's Beyond Leafy Greens.
Speaker:And I think it's a good moment to use all the lessons we've learned from
Speaker:growing leafy greens or microgreens or herbs and really try to
Speaker:use that, all that accumulated experience to be able
Speaker:to come up with new crops that usually the ones that are already
Speaker:having climate risk that we can start solving all those problems too.
Speaker:I think that would be something really cool for the whole industry to do.
Speaker:Yeah. What's your next conference you plan on attending? I don't have
Speaker:any plans right now. I think we have pretty heavy 6 months ahead
Speaker:with the new pilot and just finished the round. A bit
Speaker:exhausted. You needed to catch your breath. Yeah, we have a
Speaker:lot of work to do sort of here, focused here. But yeah, well,
Speaker:for 2021— 2023, sorry, we'll be looking
Speaker:at other events that we can take part in, certainly.
Speaker:Yeah. Well, Ines, I want to thank you for reaching out and connecting with me
Speaker:at the conference. I'm really always excited. I never really
Speaker:understood where this journey would take me when I started the podcast, but I'm just
Speaker:going to Indoor AgTech NYC. I came back with probably 20+
Speaker:names of people to interview for the show. Yeah, obviously yours was one of them.
Speaker:And but just seeing where the industry is going in terms of different
Speaker:crops and people doing really fun and interesting things has really been fascinating.
Speaker:So I appreciate you coming on and sharing your story and the story of Ekanoke,
Speaker:and I think it's really exciting and inspiring for people who
Speaker:are also thinking of branching out beyond leafy greens and seeing what the
Speaker:future is and hearing about your challenges, but also hearing about your
Speaker:successes as well. So I think that's going to be really inspiring for the listener.
Speaker:Right. I'm happy to share, and it's been a pleasure. I've really enjoyed the
Speaker:conversation, and I look forward to hearing other
Speaker:episodes too, because I do find all the guests that you have on your
Speaker:show really inspiring. There's always a part that I take from the conversation
Speaker:that really keeps me thinking for a while, and it's great to
Speaker:motivate and to bring out ideas that maybe we hadn't thought of. So
Speaker:thank you. Yeah, and it'll be interesting, I guess, when you listen to this episode,
Speaker:because now you're hearing yourself on the show. That's going to
Speaker:be weird. Well, econoche.com. Anywhere
Speaker:else you want to send folks to connect or learn more? Yeah, also on LinkedIn.
Speaker:So Econoche, and you'll find us there. And
Speaker:certainly they can reach out to me directly through LinkedIn. I'm pretty
Speaker:sure, usually tend to reply fairly quickly. Not the first week
Speaker:of August, I'm going to be disappeared, but anywhere else, yes.
Speaker:Yeah, we'll be sure to include all those links in the show notes. Thanks again.
Speaker:I appreciate it. Thank you. Thanks again to Ines for coming on the show and
Speaker:sharing her really inspiring story. I'll be following their
Speaker:journey very closely. I always appreciate it when they share an hour of their time.
Speaker:It's not anything I take lightly. As always, full show notes are
Speaker:available at verticalfarmingpodcast.com. We go through
Speaker:a lot of work in putting these together for you, the listener. It's a summary,
Speaker:timestamps, key takeaways, and any resources mentioned in the show so you can
Speaker:focus your time on listening and not worry about having to take notes as you're
Speaker:listening to the show because there's a lot of value-packed information in these
Speaker:episodes, as I'm sure you'll agree. Thanks again to our season 6 title
Speaker:sponsor, Cultivated. If you are looking into a vertical farm and don't know where to
Speaker:start or which technology would suit your needs, reach out to them today.
Speaker:Best of all, their service is free because they work on behalf of their partners.
Speaker:Learn more at cultivated.com, and that's spelled
Speaker:C-U-L-T-I-V-A-T-E-D.com. Just leave out that last E.
Speaker:Podcast production marketing provided by Fullcast. Learn more at
Speaker:fullcast.co to see if a podcast would
Speaker:be helpful for you or your brand. As a reminder, if you are enjoying the
Speaker:show, leave us a rating and a review at ratethispodcast.com/vfp,
Speaker:and we'll be sure to read those out on future episodes. Tune in next
Speaker:episode for another fascinating conversation with a female founder from
Speaker:the world of vertical farming, Amy Wu, Chief Content Director
Speaker:of From Farms to Incubators. Amy was another contact
Speaker:from Indoor AgTech. I got to see her talk at the
Speaker:last day of the conference, and I'm so glad I did. We had a fantastic
Speaker:conversation. I'm looking forward to sharing that with you, and that's coming up next episode.
Speaker:Until we meet again, Here's to your health. Thanks for listening. To read the
Speaker:full show notes for this episode, which includes any links mentioned in the
Speaker:episode, as well as a full show transcription, visit
Speaker:verticalfarmingpodcast.com. There you can sign
Speaker:up for our email list to be notified when new episodes are published.
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