Natalie Paterson of Ingarden talks about food technology and growing microgreens

Natalie Paterson of Ingarden - Podcast Transcript

Scott:	Hey, it’s Scott Orn, Kruze Consulting, and thanks for joining us on Founders and Friends for another awesome podcast. Let’s give a quick shout out to the Kruze Consulting accounting team. We’re very fortunate, we have a ton of people at Kruze who work on the monthly books for our clients and get them all set up, due-diligence ready, rocking every month, answering all the clients’ questions, making all those adjustments and there’s no better moment for a founder and for us really when a founder says, “Hey, I think I’m going to get a term sheet. Are my books ready for diligence?” And we get to say, “Yes, they are. Fire away, send them over, give them access.” That is a great feeling, it’s the feeling that lets us know we’ve done a job very well done. And nothing is better than watching that cash at the bank count. So, if you are a venture-backed startup, you’re going out to fundraise, maybe check us out. Check us out at kruzeconsulting.com. We love what we do. At taping here, I think we have 575 clients. Clients raise over a billion dollars a share, so we know what we’re doing. And hopefully we can help you be successful in your fundraise. All right, let’s get to the podcast. Thanks.
Singer:	(singing) Founders and friends, with your host, Scotty Orn.
Scott:	Welcome to Founders and Friends Podcast with Scott Orn at Kruze Consulting. And today my very special guest is Natalie Paterson of Ingarden. Welcome, Natalie.
Natalie:	Thank you for having me. It is a pleasure to be here and I am excited to just give away so many golden nuggets to your listeners.
Scott:	I love it. Well you’re a celebrity in our house so this is exciting. Maybe you tell everyone about Ingarden and retrace your career a little bit.
Natalie:	Yeah.
Scott:	And then I’ll explain why you’re a celebrity.
Natalie:	I already feel so special. Right, so, Ingarden, we are a DTC brand and we sell indoor hydroponic smart gardens for growing micro greens indoors. So, my background is very much in the world of academia. I am a scientist at heart. And throughout my academic career, a big issue we faced in the world of food science specifically, which is my specialty, is what does the future of food look like? How will we sustainably feed a growing population expected to reach 9.1 billion by 2050? How will we, not only sustainably but nutritionally, feed everybody? And so, this movement has begun and that is tech to table, I.e. Technology to the table, how can we use tools, technology, to improve our lives, make us healthier, happier individuals. Whether it be on an industrial scale with indoor farming, hydroponic farming, that’s a big movement. We can control parameters. We can give plants the exact nutrients they need, et cetera. But not only an industrial scale but on a home, personal level, personal touch, how can we as individuals start making a difference, start taking steps forward to what the future of food needs to be? And how can we be more sustainable with our actions?
Scott:	I love it. And so, you were an academic and then it sounds like you had a commercial idea.
Natalie:	Yes. So, my idea for Ingarden definitely stemmed from my passion for understanding health and wellness and the science behind it. But also, my passion of, a scientist, I think we get stereotype as the evil villain in white lab coats in movies and films. Or we’re just a geek who is really unsearchable. And so, my thing was-
Scott:	The two big stereotypes are scientists and accountants.
Natalie:	Yeah.
Scott:	We’re both highly stereotyped in the world.
Natalie:	We can relate, then, yes. And so, I just feel like I wanted to make a bigger difference. I wanted to have that relationship with the market, with consumers today. Because I think even you can reflect on the global pandemic. I think there is a lot of controversy with scientific communication. I think that we’re not doing good enough as a field to really deliver value. And so. I hope with what we’re doing with Ingarden is one step closer for people realizing that technology isn’t a bad thing, and technology applied to food isn’t a bad thing. For example, we all carry our iPhones around now. My mom talks about the days where you had pagers. Maybe we were resistant to the idea of a smartphone, carrying a laptop around with us. But now, oh, my God, it is wallet, keys, phone and masks now, I guess. But yeah-
Scott:	Yeah, yeah, yeah-
Natalie:	… It’s an essential and I think that technology, smart devices applied to the kitchen, bringing science back to the kitchen is what we need. And so yes, my interest and passions all combined together in the sense of, “Okay, we have a problem. How do we nourish ourselves when we are busy individuals? Maybe we have kids, maybe we have multiple jobs. Maybe we’re working and in school like I was, how do we have tools in our life that is going to make being healthier easier?” And that was my vision and my passion, and luckily, I was able to combine these ideas and meet the right individuals and really make this vision of reality. And so, it’s just waking up, that is the purpose that just fulfills my day every day.
Scott:	I love it. Well there’s also one word that you didn’t mention which is why you’re a celebrity in our house, which is fun, actually. Ingarden makes science fun for our family. And I want you to say exactly what you’re doing. My family, we have a young daughter. I haven’t even gotten to the point with her where we’re eating the greens yet, and things like that. Right now, it’s just purely fun. She’s too young to understand science but it’s actually like you’re introducing a whole group of people to something that’s like science and health being entertaining and interesting. You know what I mean?
Natalie:	Yeah. Yeah, I think when we think of growing food we’re like, “Oh, my God, don’t know how. I’m not a green thumb, don’t have the space, don’t have the time, don’t have the energy.” Thinking of adding another thing to our to-do list and responsibilities, I know that deters most of us. I know it deters me, like, “Another thing to do. No, I don’t want extra things to think about.” So that was my vision, “Okay, how can I create a system that is autonomous, that is hassle free, that doesn’t have soil and it stinks and it’s messy that grows quickly?” Your micro greens grow in seven days. As your daughter has noticed, each day you will see new growth, and that is exciting. If you have a low patience then micro greens are for you because they’re going to be fully growing in seven days. You get to enjoy them within a week. And even tomato plants or strawberries, some of the common things people might dabble in if they want to try indoor gardening, they take a good while. Even fresh hubs, they take maybe a month. So, you forget about it, you lose that motivation of trying something new and so all of this kind of issues were something I faced. My background, obviously, everyone can hear, I grew up in New Zealand and England, so both. But my young childhood was in New Zealand and my heritage is the Maori people of New Zealand. And we-
Scott:	Oh, no way-
Natalie:	… Have a saying-
Scott:	… That’s awesome-
Natalie:	… [foreign language], which means “Food from my hands.” So, your connection to your food, your connection to the land is really valued down there. It’s a priority. Any time you say New Zealand I assume people think, “Oh,” like, “Nature wonderland.” And that’s truly what it is. But then in my adolescent years we moved to central city London. And in London-
Scott:	Oh, my Gosh-
Natalie:	it is that urban-
Scott:	… What a change-
Natalie:	… City … Yes, right. It is that urban, city lifestyle where you don’t even have a balcony for the most part, so you are indoors. Kind of like, I assume New York, you need to bring the outside inside. And so, these experiences I had from this passion of connecting with our food and the benefits of nature and what plants do for us as humans, and then the stark environment of the urban, fast-paced modern lifestyle, I was like, “Wait a minute.” There is a crossroads between these two, and for me in my head, that was Ingarden.
Scott:	It makes total sense. When you go to the website you’ll see that there is, I don’t know how to describe the product, but there’s a tray with lighting-
Natalie:	Yes-
Scott:	… Lighting embedded in it. And then you can grow micro trays of greens in different varieties. We’re growing three different ones. And so, I told you we used to live in the city and we didn’t really have a garden. And so, my wife and daughter, when my daughter was very small, would huddle over. It was a different kind of product. It was something different but it had the same effect, which is it was a bonding moment for them and they’d be watching things grow.
Natalie:	Yeah.
Scott:	And so, when I-
Natalie:	Yeah-
Scott:	… Saw Ingarden I was like, “Oh, my gosh. This is amazing, this is exactly what we need.” And we’re in a new house now and more space. But it has the same family-fun, family-bonding effect. So just for the audience out there, if you have little kids, my daughter comes home from school every day, and one of the first things she does is she runs into the kitchen and looks at the Ingarden tray to see what’s happening with the plants. And it’s a 10-minute conversation and she loves it. And she points at them and inevitably they’re taller than they were yesterday. And so that’s what I mean by having fun. It’s a family-bonding thing. It’s almost the equivalent of a campfire. We’re sitting around it, looking at it, talking about it. Yeah, it’s a family thing. And again, as I said, we haven’t gotten to the eating part of it. I don’t even think she knows that we’re going to eat them because I haven’t really said anything about it, we’re just growing them.
Natalie:	Yeah, because one thing you mentioned, the product itself, how to describe it.
Scott:	Yeah.
Natalie:	So, I think that old school saying, “A picture is worth a thousand words.” So, I think obviously we can do our best to describe it but I definitely know that seeing it is understanding or seeing it is believing, in a sense. But my goal was three things, a little alliteration about to come your way. So-
Scott:	Nice-
Natalie:	… Simple, sleek and sophisticated. Simple design because it is very minimalistic. I don’t like bulky things. I don’t like plastic, trying to be more sustainable as well. There’s another S, there we go. So, in the sense of the material, the bowl is a ceramic bowl. I’m sure you’ve picked it up, it’s quite heavy. It’s good quality, ceramic material, not plastic, not metal. The colors as well, very neutral colors, four different colors that you can choose from. We do come out with limited edition colors, but the main OG colors, we have four different ones. Then the rest of the material to hold the seed trays, that is stainless steel. Again, trying to be more conscious with our materials that we’re choosing. And then the actual Ingarden itself, I always say, mine, I actually have three stacked up on a little shelf. You can have it on your kitchen counter, on your dining room table, on your coffee table, on a shelf like I have, in that sense, because it’s so sleek. And that sleek sophistication was a real goal of mine design wise, aesthetic wise. Because no one wants another bulky thing to take up space on the counter, especially if you are living in a small apartment like I am. I generally joke about how limited counter space I have. And so, you can’t have some big plant taking up too much space. So that was a great point you touched on, it-
Scott:	Well-
Natalie:	… Actual-
Scott:	… Can I jump in for one second-
Natalie:	… Designed itself. Yeah.
Scott:	On the aesthetic part you’re absolutely right because my wife, Vanessa, has definitely strong opinions about the way things need to look and what goes in our kitchen, or even our house. And actually, I had that exact thought when I was looking at the website. I was like, “She’s going to like this. This is actually her style.” And so, I gave it to her for, was it Christmas? I think I gave it to her for Christmas. And she really liked it and it’s been in our kitchen the whole time. Because that’s-
Natalie:	There we go-
Scott:	… The kind of thing if you got a gift that you didn’t really love you might put it in your kitchen for a couple of days. And then it mysteriously gets moved if it doesn’t look nice enough. But it’s there-
Natalie:	You know what-
Scott:	… And we’re recording this-
Natalie:	… They say-
Scott:	… In mid-January. Happy wife, happy life. Yes, exactly. But you’re right about the aesthetic thing. I’ve been dwelling on the function but it looks cool. And the lights thing, give the website out real fast so people, if they’re listening to us, they can just go to the website.
Natalie:	Yes. The website, it’s super simple, ingarden.com, www.in, I-N-G-A-R-D-E-N, ingarden.com.
Scott:	Yeah, so you’ll see-
Natalie:	That’s our-
Scott:	… The-
Natalie:	… Website-
Scott:	… Light is connected almost like to a holder, so it’s easy to move around and things like that. But yeah, so I didn’t know that you designed it personally, that’s really cool.
Natalie:	A team effort. “Team work-
Scott:	Sorry-
Natalie:	… Makes the dream work always.” Yes-
Scott:	That’s very-
Natalie:	… Team effort-
Scott:	… True.
Natalie:	And yes, the LED lighting system, that’s another great thing. You don’t need to consider the sun, you can put it anywhere in your house. You don’t need to think about having your planter by a window or by the sun. Anywhere in the house is where you can put it. Again, we all did our best to minimize how many things you would have to think about. The only thing you have to think about is watering, making sure that it has enough water in the bowl. Which, we advise once a week. But I’m here in California so it’s a bit hotter. So, I have to make sure that it’s maybe twice a week or else it-
Scott:	Well there’s another-
Natalie:	[crosstalk] too fast-
Scott:	So, my daughter gets the turkey baster out and fills a cup of water, and then turkey bastes the tray. So, if you-
Natalie:	That is-
Scott:	If you want-
Natalie:	… So cute-
Scott:	What we found-
Natalie:	I need-
Scott:	… Is you can-
Natalie:	… A picture-
Scott:	… Water as-
Natalie:	… Of that-
Scott:	… Much as you want. Yeah, I’ll take-
Natalie:	Yes-
Scott:	… A picture of it.
Natalie:	Yes.
Scott:	But if you’re looking for entertainment for a young one, you can actually water it once a day and it’s totally fine. It doesn’t-
Natalie:	Exactly-
Scott:	… Mess things up.
Natalie:	Exactly. Yes, whether you want to really be involved or not, yeah.
Scott:	Hey, it’s Scott Orn and we’re going to take a quick break from the podcast to give a shout out to the Kruze tax team. Gosh, it’s so nice to have an in-house tax team, I can’t even tell you. We have some really amazing professionals on team. It’s over, I think it’s 13 people now. And we do everything from your federal and state income tax return, state franchise tax filings, R&D tax credits, those are pretty popular these days. And guess what? They’re there for you when you go through diligence. A lot of people don’t know, but you actually go through tax diligence. Not just operational, financial diligence, but you do go through tax diligence. So, it’s nice to have Vanessa Kruze on the phone with her VCs and with the accounting firm they hired to diligence all your stuff, and the law firm they hired to diligence your stuff. Vanessa knows what she’s doing, she’s done this a million times. And it’s not just Vanessa, we have a really great team of tax professionals that will do those calls, too. Sometimes the difference between getting around a close or having to take another two weeks because something was disorganized, and the tax compliance wasn’t done correctly, we hear those horror stories from clients that come to us. So, if you want Kruze’s tax team on your side, we’re here for you. Check us out at kruzeconsulting.com. Thanks. Okay, for us it’s a family thing, but actually before we turned the mics on you had a really interesting point about nutrition which blew me away. Do you mind sharing that with the audience?
Natalie:	Yeah, I think I realize a step back really quickly. Micro greens, what on earth are micro greens? What are they? What are we talking about? So micro greens, super simple, super easy to understand. Micro greens are simply the miniature versions, baby versions of vegetables and fruits and grains that you actually know and love. Currently we are only doing vegetable micro greens. For example, we have red cabbage micro greens. We have broccoli micro greens, arugula micro greens, kale micro greens, mustard micro greens, et cetera. So, I’m sure we’ve all had broccoli at some point in our life. I’m sure we’ve all had maybe a kale, or seen it at least, some kale. And that is the point, micro greens are simply the underdeveloped versions of vegetables. So those vegetables I mentioned that you probably think of, images pop in your head when I say those words, those, we call them mature vegetables. And so, what’s cool about micro greens is another fun phrase, speaking of the word fun, is yes, what they are technically is the miniature versions of fruits and vegetables. But a fun descriptor we like to say is that they are vegetable confetti because they are so cute and small and they really do look like confetti flying around in a sense. And so, they can truly elevate any savory dish, whether that be a breakfast, lunch or dinner. They can elevate that dish not only aesthetically, making it more fun, but also nutritionally. And so, what many of us don’t understand about micro greens is that just because they’re small, we undervalue them. But they are small but mighty, and what do I mean mighty? So, I was joking with you before we started. As individuals listening, I assume, very financially savvy with their money, or learning or trying to understand it better, so my perspective when it comes to nutrition is you want to think of yourself, what you are putting into your body, as an investment. Your nutrition is also an investment into your health, yeah. And your health is your wealth. At the end of the day, unless your body is functioning optimally for you, your days aren’t really going to go successfully, are they? Thinking about nutrition as value, how much value are you getting from the food that you’re putting in your body? And when it comes to micro greens, you are getting a high value for your nutritional buck that you’re spending by eating the food. What do I mean by this? Take the same serving of, let’s say, mature red cabbage. We’ve all seen a circular vegetable cabbage, mature red cabbage versus red cabbage micro greens. Same serving size, so equal thing you’re getting for the money you’re buying. But how much more value do you get from the micro greens? So, something, because of my scientific background, it’s really important to validate my claim. So actually, we’ve done an entire nutritional analysis on Ingarden micro greens. So, to give you some numbers, those who love the numbers, let’s take again same serving size, mature red cabbage versus red cabbage micro greens. So, to list a couple nutrients, red cabbage micro greens provide you … I’m going to list four things, 230% more of your daily value for vitamin A.
Scott:	Really?
Natalie:	Yeah. 88% more of your daily value for the mineral manganese, 150% more of the daily value for vitamin B9 which is folate. And then, get this, you might have a bit of a jaw drop at this one, but for phosphorus, an important mineral for bone health, teeth, for immunity, you name it, 2150% more. So, I just told you from 230, 150 ADA and 2150, so double digit, triple digit, quadruple digit percent more nutrients in the micro green than the mature vegetables. So, if you’re paying the same amount of money, they’re both vegetables, and you’re going to get that much value from the micro greens, it’s a no brainer to me. I’m going to spend the thing that’s going to give me more, I’m going to eat the thing that’s going to give me more nutritional value.
Scott:	That’s totally true. That’s crazy. Is that because it’s a different genetic strain on the vegetable or something?
Natalie:	Yeah.
Scott:	What causes that?
Natalie:	So, interestingly, I use maybe a bit of a taboo kind of analogy. But the way I use the analogy, think of humans, think of young children full of life, can fall over and get right back up compared to my 85-year-old grandma who is more mature than the beautiful, young child. In biology, often the younger thing is, i.e., micro greens, are less mature than regular old vegetables, the better it is. And in this sense the better thing being the nutritional value. And so, you can think of it, the life span in the sense of humans is obviously much longer than a plant’s life span. But unfortunately, when it comes to food, as soon as it’s picked, as soon as it’s cut it does start losing that nutritional value. Does it mean you shouldn’t still eat regular? No. We should all be eating more produce, fresh food, we know that. We should all be doing a little bit more. But the point is, if we can get nutrients straight from the source, i.e, with micro greens that you’re growing on your counter, there’s nothing better, that is the best. That is the luxury in the food world, nutrients straight from the source. You can’t get any better than that. And as time goes on when it’s growing on a farm then picked, then has to be transported from the farm to the shipping facility, then to the supermarket, you don’t know how long the supermarket keeps it in the back of the store before it puts it on the shelf. And you buy it, it sits in your fridge for a week before you eat it and maybe you even forget about it and throw it away. Waste of money, contributing to food waste, there’s all sorts of problems. But the point is if you want to really tap into the top notch with your nutrients that you’re putting in your body, straight from the source is where it’s at. And what you mentioned, too, in the sense of it’s fun. Okay, micro greens can be for that health enthusiast who is looking for that next best thing. They’re already like, “Oh, yes,” very much into the game of health and wellness. Or plan B, for the other side, where you’re just trying to do a little bit better. You’re just trying to get started. Maybe you don’t like a big serving of vegetables. Maybe it’s your kids, you’re trying to get your kids to eat more vegetables. The fact that you can eat a smaller serving size and still get the same or a little bit more nutritional value then it’s a win-win. Whatever side of the spectrum you are on, micro greens can fit in your lifestyle, which is exciting.
Scott:	It’s super exciting. There’s one more thing I want to cover. And we have to be respectful of your time here, but I’ve often wondered, is there a energy or relaxation, or just by seeing greenery, plants, things like that, growing in your house, growing in your office, does it make people happier? Does it give them more energy? Does it clean the oxygen better? What’s the science behind that. Because I walk by it and I’m like, “Oh.” It’s like a micro smile. I get a micro smile. Do other people have that? What’s going on?
Natalie:	I’m going to steal that. That’s a good line, “Eat your micro greens. Get your micro-
Scott:	Yeah, yeah, yeah-
Natalie:	… Smile.”
Scott:	Your micro smile, yeah.
Natalie:	Yeah, no. So, yes, great question. Actually, great full circle to what I was sharing with my own heritage and upbringing and connecting to your food, and not only your food but the land or nature. And yes, for those of you who, like, “What woo-wooness did he just say? What are you talking about, Scott?” Like, “What have you been eating and what do these micro greens contain?” Anyway, yes, there are legit scientific studies. You read the scientific literature that confirm the relationship between plants and humans and that medicinal effect that we can get. Whether it be increasing energy levels, whether it be your focus, your calm. I don’t know if you’ve ever, your family, actually taken a walk outside and taken a breath and looked up at the sky and not at your phone, looked up at the sky or a leaf on a tree or a flower. We have an innate relationship with nature. Think of evolution, we evolved in this planet. This planet is filled of nature. And so, psychologically there is a real effect by having plants in your house. Whether they be edible in the sense of micro greens or a house plant. I know in California these succulents are the thing to have in your house.
Scott:	Yeah. We have some of those, yep, yep.
Natalie:	Yeah, yeah. And I liked what you mentioned about the oxygen, too. Now that we’re spending more time indoors just due to virtual work life or social life at the moment, it is a disadvantage to our health entirely in the sense of getting that fresh oxygen. And that’s what plants do for us, they take out the carbon dioxide in the air and they produce oxygen for us, which is wonderful, another reason to have house plants. And I think no matter what level you’re on, whether you are an experienced green thumb or not, indoor gardening, whether it’s Ingarden or it’s just indoor gardening in general, today, in today’s world it’s actually not difficult. There are many of us now do have that same vision of bringing technology to the table when it comes to plants and food. And I think that it’s now time to start taking action towards it because that’s your part of helping change the world for the better. Answering the question of like, “Oh, my God, how do we fix the world, fix the earth?” Like, “We’re doomed,” no, we’re not, if we just take daily small actions, whether it be investing in an Ingarden to save buying it from the store, save on plastic, save on wasting food. As I mentioned, I think fresh herbs and things like micro greens are the things that we waste the most because they’ll rot rather quickly. And then we end up throwing them away or don’t know how to use them in dishes or whatever it might be. And I think these challenges are now being addressed. It’s only up to us to actually take advantage of it, especially when we think of ourselves at the investment analogy I gave, how can you get the most value out of the food you’re putting in your body?
Scott:	I love it. I want to put a small plug in in that, which I thought was very smart. You have a subscription option. So, what I did, I bought the first one and tried it out to make sure everyone liked it in our family. And now I have it, I went back to the website and just bought the monthly subscription. So, we now get one every month, which is really cool. So, it’s exciting because it’s like opening a Christmas present or something like that, you’re like, “What am I going to get?” But I also don’t have to think about it and I don’t have to remember to go to the store to buy.” It’s right there.
Natalie:	Yes.
Scott:	So, I think that’s something-
Natalie:	Yes-
Scott:	… That you’ve done very, very well. So, I know we got to get going here, so apologies. But maybe you could tell everyone how to reach out. You gave the website out, but maybe give it out again and what they can do.
Natalie:	Yes. Yes, no, absolutely. Just to really quickly touch on what you said about the subscription. I think sometimes these days are bit afraid of the subscription word. But when you think about it with your food, I love the point you made. You don’t have to think about buying your micro greens or timing your purchase either. We time it. So, in an Ecopak, which is what you get in the mail, you have seven seed pads. Which you just place on the trays and then water them as you mentioned. Seven seed pads, so we optimize it, three per growth cycles. So, think of a month, four weeks. You’re growing for a month, because again, they grow in seven days. Excuse me, yeah, growing for a week, eating for a week, growing for a week, eating for a week, here comes your subscription.
Scott:	Yeah, yeah.
Natalie:	Growing for a week, eating for a week. We, I suppose, calculated this cycle in attempts to help everybody. But on that note, if you are interested in visualizing, what are micro greens? What is the Ingarden look like, et cetera? Our website www.ingarden.com, I-N-G-A-R-D-E-N.com. We also have a 10% discount code for the amazing Kruze listeners which is K-R-U-z-E, or as I would say, zed, E. But I don’t want to confuse anyone, and then 10. So, Kruze 10. And as well, recipes. I think stimulating appetite is always a good way to encourage buying. So, we also have recipes up there through our blog. Click the blog and you’ll find delicious recipes. Right, seeing is believing and our social media to that is ingarden_com for the Instagram. That’s of course, more static, with all the visuals and videos and it’s fun. So that’s where you can find us. That’s where I am, always happy to chat, answer questions as well. Because I think new year, new you, time to start using tools to make your health journey easier.
Scott:	And it’s fun, I cannot stress that enough. It’s really fun and entertaining and it looks cool. And as I would say for the people worried about the aesthetic, Vanessa Kruze approves. So, thank you so much, Natalie. Really appreciate your time, you’re doing something super cool and I’m so grateful that you could come on the podcast. Thank you.
Natalie:	Oh, my pleasure. Thank you so much, Bob.
Singer:	(singing) It’s Kruze Consulting. Founders and Friends, with your host Scotty Orn.

Natalie Paterson of Ingarden talks about food technology and growing microgreens

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