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Key Takeaways Michael Brandt set out to capture the effect of ketones in a bottle before anyone else did.
Being first to market brought a handful of challenges he didn’t see coming.
High-profile backers, including Joe Rogan and co-owner Jon Jones, helped turn a fringe product into a mainstream one.
Most founders chase a trend and try to flip the company before it fades. Michael Brandt did the opposite. The Stanford computer science grad and marathoner was deep into biohacking. That led him to discovering ketones, a backup “super fuel” your body makes by turning fat into clean, steady energy. The catch is it only kicks in when you starve it, during a long fast or a hard workout. To get the benefits, you basically had to deprive yourself to make it.
“I thought, what if you could take this and make a bottle of it?” Brandt says.
This was around 2014. There was no market, and barely any customers who knew what a ketone was. One investor put his odds of success at less than 1%. A decade later, his company Ketone-IQ is a $100 million business. The sugar-free, $5 shot sells direct to consumers and on Amazon, and it has rolled into retail locations like Target, Sprouts, and Vitamin Shoppe. The company is backed by Andreessen Horowitz, with investments from Chris Hemsworth and Jake Paul. UFC champion Jon Jones is a co-owner. Joe Rogan is among its many fans and talks it up on his podcast.
Brandt joined me on the One Day with Jon Bier podcast to discuss how he scaled the company, the challenges of being first to market and why he actually wants competitors to copy him.
Related: She Was a Broke Backpacker Surviving On Oranges — Now She Runs a Wellness Empire. Here’s How.
In the early days, it tasted 'crazy'
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