kevin edwards  0:00  
Welcome, everyone to this episode of the Real Leaders Podcast. Before we begin, I just want to ask you all to rate and review this show. Please take a quick break, go down, scroll down, leave us a review. Let us know what you like, what you don't like, and how we can improve. Trust me, I read them all. Also, we have a fantastic new magazine out today with Tony Robbins on the front cover who shares his Crisis Leadership Playbook. And for all you lucky listeners today, you're getting that first edition for free when you go online to real-leaders.com/subscribe, and enter in coupon code "podcast25." That's all lowercase "podcast25" at checkout to get your first magazine for free with a year subscription. The subscription is $69, it's 25% off, you can do the math. Trust me, it's a great read, I wake up every morning, take a look. Or if it's at nighttime, I just want a little inspiration, just want to maybe think of a different perspective for tomorrow. It's a great read, I'm telling you real-leaders.com/subscribe, coupon code, "podcast25." All right, that's it for me. Let's dive into this episode of the Real Leaders Podcast with the real Michael Kuech. Enjoy.

Michael Kuech  1:27  
I was on a path to become a consultant and started Accenture to be a consultant. And for me, I'm always saying now that if you can make the worst day of your life the best day of your life, then you did everything right. And that was how it was for me, right? The worst day of my life, diagnosis turned out to be the best best day in my life because otherwise I wouldn't have started the business, I wouldn't be where we are right now. We wouldn't have 50 people employed and growing and helping millions and thousands of people to eat healthier.

kevin edwards  2:03  
You are listening to the Real Leaders Podcast, your number one source for impact leaders harnessing capitalism to sustain the planet, people and profits. I'm your host, Kevin Edwards. And that message comes from Michael Kuech, the co-founder and CEO of Your Super who overcame cancer at 24 and is now on a mission to help consumers make healthier food choices while transforming lives. On today's episode, Michael shares all the struggles he and his co founder face during their early days. The reason they decided to structure as a certified B Corp, and how he made the worst day the best day of his life. So without further ado, ladies and gentlemen, please welcome the real Michael Kuech. Enjoy. And welcome everyone. To this episode of the Real Leaders Podcast. I'm your host, Kevin Edwards. Here today to share the journey of Your Super is its co-founder and CEO, Michael Kuech. Michael, guten tag. 

Michael Kuech  3:15  
Guten tag. Thanks for having me. Excited.

kevin edwards  3:18  
Thanks for coming on the show today. Now the reason I say that is is because you speak German, is that correct? Where are you from?

Michael Kuech  3:25  
I'm German. I'm born and raised in a small town in Germany, it's close to Cologne in the west part of Germany. And yeah, very German with my German accent as you can tell. Hopefully everybody can understand me today. 

kevin edwards  3:40  
My stepmom's German, so I had to give her a call beforehand. And I said, alright, alright, his name is K-U-E-C-H. 

Michael Kuech  3:52  
Exactly, exactly, she knows.

kevin edwards  3:56  
So I'm trying to get that right in the show. Maybe the one thing we'll get right today. But Michael, Your Super, it's a company we've been interested in for a while, and obviously healthy products, you guys are doing an incredible job on your e-marketing. I want to dive into that as well today, but let's just unpack this story. How does this go? What is the origin of Your Super?

Michael Kuech  4:20  
I mean, the origin is super personal. When I was 24, I was diagnosed with cancer. And actually before, I was studying, I was traveling through Sri Lanka, and just finished my Master's, so I was on top of the world. So the diagnose came in I was obviously completely shocked. Going through the treatments and chemo and everything, I realized I can't control everything in my life, but I can control what I eat. And the more I researched about why people are getting sick and why people are experiencing diseases is to a certain extent about lifestyle choices and what you eat. It's not everything, there's a puzzle, a big puzzle. But one big piece of the puzzle, how I can prevent from getting ever sick again, is the way I eat. And once I realized that, I felt really empowered, and my co-founder, Kristel, she was in my life already for five years. We met in college back then in the US, but she was introducing me to superfoods. I was like, what are superfoods? Is it something new, or what is the wheatgrass? She put me on some matcha and detox and I was like, what is going on? I'm like a meat eating German, and she's putting me on superfoods. And I realized, okay, every time I ate them, it was like, I felt so much better and I had more energy and more productive. And I realized what is so incredible, superfoods can really help you eating healthier and get  so much more nutrition and it's super easy. And I was like, great, let's look into superfoods. And I realized they have been used for hundreds, thousands of years as food as medicine. And then I was hooked and wanted to actually inspire. And both of us, Kristel and me, wanted to inspire more people to eat more superfoods, more plants and fruits and veggies every day because we realized and read studies like 9 out of 10 people in the US and 8 of 10 in Europe don't eat enough fruits and veggies every single day. And we're like, great, superfoods can help them, easy way. Let's kickstart this business. Your Super in Holland, back then, six years ago, 2014. And then we moved the company from Holland to Germany, because Germany was a bigger market. And then pretty quickly went to the US and really launched in the US only actually two years ago. 2018 we launched in the US, and now we're growing really fast and inspiring people to eat healthier, and improving people's health with the power of plants. 

kevin edwards  6:50  
So Michael, what stigma did you have against it? You said you were an elite athlete. I would have assumed you'd have been eating healthy already. I mean, what was the stigma you maybe have had against it, and what was your first experience like?

Michael Kuech  7:03  
So I was, yeah I was this typical athlete eating pasta before matches. I was playing tennis all my life, played college tennis in the US. My co-founder Kristel as well. So we have always been athletes and semi-professional in a way, but nutrition-wise we didn't really have a clue on why we're doing what we're doing. So we were like typically a little protein after the matches, loved chicken and rice and all those kind of things. But we never really thought about, hey, we need fruits, veggies more in your diet and to really get healthier. And so I wasn't aware of it, how what a huge impact is what you eat and how you feel. And that through my journey, I realized that it's something you can control. You can control how you feel on a daily basis and what nutrition you put in your body and how important nutrition is to the way you perform, the way you feel, and the way your body is structured. 

kevin edwards  8:04  
Do you believe Your Super or just the superfoods had a direct impact on your recovery for cancer?

Michael Kuech  8:13  
So I went through traditional treatments, and so chemo and stuff, so for me it came after. So I would never say, hey, there was a reason why I got healthy, but it helped me after to recover in a sense of it helped me building my immune system back up. Because every time you go through something like this, through like a three, four month treatment, your immune system is compromised because that's part of the treatment, to to kill everything in your body with with chemo, including the cancer cells. So my immune system was very low. And I remember that the doctor said, hey, you are healthy now, and I didn't feel healthy at all. But he said, "Hey, you're cancer free." And back then I was like, I didn't feel healthy, I wasn't fit at all. So building that help again with good nutrition, that was the biggest "aha moment" for me when I was like, oh my god, I make huge strides in my building up my immune system back up with superfoods.

kevin edwards  9:12  
So, eating healthy is one thing, getting back on your feet is another. Walk me through what made you start a company? I mean, that's something that's very difficult for any entrepreneur. What inspired this vision?

Michael Kuech  9:32  
I think it really came through my personal journey. And I realized, I want to help people, I want to help people making the right choices, and I want to help millions of people that maybe just don't know better like me. I didn't know better, and I educated myself, and I'm still educating myself on all the various things in how nutrition plays a role. And I thought, hey, there are millions of people out there that could be not going through what I had to go through, with the way they eat, right? And can reduce the risk of getting sick and getting cancer, getting heart disease, getting obese, getting, you know, like diabetes, right? All these things where food plays a role, and the way we have our lifestyle. So I was like inspired by really making a difference for so many people's lives because I didn't want anybody to go through what I had to go through, because it's not fun, at all.

kevin edwards  10:26  
So you mentioned earlier that the foods have been around for hundreds of, thousands of years, but you know, are now just being adopted. What are some of the challenges that you ran into in order to get this product to someone's table?

Michael Kuech  10:41  
Yeah, I think the awareness of people is starting now. I mean, people realize more and more, and that's makes me so excited, and makes us as a business so excited too that they really have a feeling that more and more customers and people get the connection now with food and how they feel and how their overall health leveles improve. I think they've heard for so long, and now it's kind of the time to really adopt it. Because we have so many people also in our community who have people who are sick, who  people in their family have cancer and family obese and have heart problems and diabetes. So we hear it all the time every day, and people now waking up saying, "Okay, I have to do something, I have to shift my mindset, and I have to really do something different." And we use food as kind of medicine there. And the steak was, yeah, for us it was hard in the beginning because we were new in industry. We also knew in the superfood industry, and in every industry, you have people who are doing it the right way, who're doing also superfoods the right way, and grow like the wheatgrass and barley grass how it's intended to grow, and some others who don't do it right. So we, from early on we always said we want to have the best ingredients, the best quality, the most transparent supply chain. Because when people hear powders, oftentimes, like anything packaged people are like, "Ah, I don't really care where it's coming from." For us it was like no, we care where it's coming from, we need to have all nutrition in there because we really want to improve people's health, but we have to make sure that what we sell is highly nutritious. So we had to go through a journey and find the right ingredients, find the right suppliers, and realize that you can buy a lot of things from Southeast Asia very cheap, while they're not maybe origin there. And you can buy from Germany, for example, wheatgrass or from the US a wheatgrass, that is much more expensive than let's say from China, but it's much more nutritious and much better quality

kevin edwards  12:40  
Michael, I'm smiling because I just know you went through the journey, you went through the entrepreneurial journey, you experienced the struggles. Maybe paint the picture for our audience, like what the first product looked like when you looked at Kristel and said okay, "Now we finally have a product." Paint the picture. What happened?

Michael Kuech  13:03  
I mean, we just, we were big believers, and our big mantra is "just do it." And we didn't have a big market research. We didn't have a big business plan. We said, we'll just try it. We'll just do it. And so within two weeks, we had a website up and running. And we wanted to pre-sell our different mixes and wanted to see what the feedback was from customers. So we started pre-selling, we got orders in, and we didn't have a product. And we didn't have a label, we didn't have a product, we don't have anything. And then we were like oh shoot, now it's real. Now we actually have to deliver products. And I remember first getting our cans, we have like canned canisters, where our product is in. And remember we ordered the first couple thousands without the label because we didn't want to have plastic. We just wanted to have paper based everything because we want to have it sustainable. And people we're saying, "Odd, looks a bit like a toilet roll, because it's just paper and there's no label around it." We thought it was pretty great. And then the truck came and we were everything doing all of our apartment in Amsterdam and had an organic certified room where we were all mixing the stuff. And the truck came in this very small street in Amsterdam, and Amsterdam is tiny, tiny streets. And he couldn't, he couldn't park anywhere because it was like a 28 ton truck trying to deliver products at a factory, but he didn't know that it was actually a residential tiny apartment. And it was a huge drama, we couldn't get it off the truck, and he couldn't park anywhere, he blocked the street for hours. It was fun. 

kevin edwards  14:43  
Yeah, I'm sure it was. 

Michael Kuech  14:45  
In retrospect it was like a huge drama at the beginning, but retrospect was fun. And yeah, so many obvious things you had to learn. We had to learn what a delivery normally looks like, and how our label looks like, and everything.

kevin edwards  15:01  
So maybe help our audience understand. I think the struggles are things that get overlooked a lot. And I think those are really the things that make good companies, moments like yourself. You know, being diagnosed with cancer, getting a different perspective, this is what builds people's character and builds company's character. Now, explain to our audience what some of the struggles were. Like, were there any moments that jumped out to you? That go, oh shit, we are in the thick of this and like, we don't have orders, we don't have this stuff--maybe explain to our audience some of those moments.

Michael Kuech  15:36  
There's so many. I mean, this struggle never ends, I would say, because now, I mean, I just got off calls where we're struggling right now, then, because we were like, hey, we don't have enough stock, this, this, or we have too much stock and the problems always shift. And I think the problem, sometimes it seems so big in the beginning, are laughable after. And now problems that seem so big, in three months they will seem laughable. So it's, it's a constant journey. It's a crazy roller coaster. We always call it true today, the great things like in a day happen, like this podcast is great, but for me it might be the high of the day. And then I might get a call saying, hey, our delivery didn't get through and we have a major supply chain issue or whatever it is, or so it's always different. A few examples, early on we had, we had very few customers. And we had a delivery over Christmas, where basically 30% of our 40% of our customers didn't get the package in time over Christmas. And the other 30% got the package and every single canister in there exploded. And we were like, that's it, the business is done. And 80% of our customers are gone. They hate our customer service. We didn't set it for weeks, we had to wait. And we were realized, like a couple of major things realized, "Oh, we have to put packing paper in boxes." We didn't know packing paper exists, so the cannisters don't fly in the shipping box, and we didn't even know. So our DHL and FedEx said, "Hey, why don't you guys have actually packing paper in there and cushions and stuff?" And we're like, oh, yeah, that's a good idea. So back then we were like, that's it, we we missed our deliveries. But somehow we always kept going. I think that's that's the biggest thing. Through all those lows, we had to--for years we didn't have money. We were like, okay, we were bankrupt already six times. And somehow work with our vendors. They extended credit lines, and this and this and this, and somehow always made it and I think, yeah, there's so many examples. It's just a crazy, fun, challenging journey.

kevin edwards  17:57  
I guess, learn as he go. Now, did health play a factor in this perseverance and in this overall mindset?

Michael Kuech  18:08  
Yeah, I think I mean, I think I have so much energy. Obviously superfoods help, I'm using them every day and multiple times. We have some great energy mixes that I can highly recommend for everybody who wants to get things done, with acai and guyana in there.

But yeah, health plays a role. I think it's, as a journey, also as entrepreneur, it's hard to find a balance. And we're still working on it, to find the right balance of going completely crazy with working hours and have some time to actually rest. And that's one thing maybe in my life that's not as healthy because, as an entrepreneur, you have tons of stress and we all know stress is not super healthy. But it's something we as a leadership teams still kind of navigate, right? What is enough? What is not too much? We always see it's in cycles. Like some months are crazy, and some months are a bit more relaxed, and some others crazy. And so we try to find a balance

kevin edwards  19:12  
In terms of marketing, I'm assuming right now this is a big assumption, but I'm assuming that your orders come from online. So in terms of marketing, what was the strategy here? Walk me through kind of when you started. Did you want to be a specific company? What are some of the things that our audience can take away?

Michael Kuech  19:32  
In the beginning, we want to do everything just to get some some revenue in. So we did, I remember we sent pallets to Malaysia early on, just because he wanted to buy pallets and we're like, yes, buy a pallet. It's like 10,000 bucks in cash, without even thinking so much about a strategy. But early on, the one thing we really want it to be is an online brand, and start online because we wanted to start internationally right away and in Europe. Kristel, my co-founder, she's from Holland. I'm from Germany. So we already started in two markets straight away. And as an online brand, we always wanted to be, there's no boundaries, we felt. We wanted to always sell everywhere. So anybody in the world can buy products, basically. And that was kind of from the early on and from the get go. And the early strategy marketing was influencer marketing, where we didn't have money. And back then influencers were still fine with just getting products and testing them and posting about it. It was like 2014/2015. So that was our earliest marketing strategy. Can we get big on Instagram and Facebook and get our audience engaged that way? And that really propelled our international brand exposure. Because as you know, social media is not bound by boundaries from any country. So early on, we had a huge following in the US, and early on, we had orders from US, there was actually a reason why we went to the US at one point. But influencer marketing was the biggest strategy in the beginning. Then it moved also to, as it got more expensive, we moved more to, to Facebook, Instagram, social paid PR, the whole marketing kind of suite. And now it's obviously more organic and social paid and all the other great stuff we're doing all the marketing. And now actually developed, now we're in the middle. We said, okay, online work so well, we want to be 100% direct to consumer e-commerce company. And that's who we are right now also, where 98% of our sales come from online, and 99% comes through ononline channels--not even for Amazon, just online channels.

kevin edwards  21:49  
So are they coming primarily from just Google searches? Are they coming from, like is Instagram your favorite channel? What, maybe like a pie chart for your social?

Michael Kuech  21:59  
Yeah. I mean, the whole suite and the whole marketing, everything in marketing. But predominantly, I would say Facebook and Instagram, that's that's our biggest channels. Google is part of it then, other social channels like Pinterest and other channels we test. Then PR word-of-mouth is a big part, affiliate marketing, influencers still as part. So yeah, that's kind of the pie chart. I would say.

kevin edwards  22:33  
I love it because you're bootstrapping. You know, you're doing what you say you had a small budget. Now, the company has gotten much bigger. So how big is the company now and what were some of the pains and struggles of bringing on more members?

Michael Kuech  22:49  
Yeah. So the first, like to your point, bootstrapping, the first one and a half years we bootstrapped and then we got some, some funding. And we also got some bigger funding earlier this year, which is great, from great investors. But I think it really helped us being that bootstrapped in the beginning, not having a lot of money in the beginning, which really helped us being very careful in what we're spending, very determined to make it profitable, and also throughout the growth. We're now like 50 people, over 50 people from maybe even 20 people last year, to 50 this year, so huge growth in the team, but very rapid, very late. We're still pretty much understaffed everywhere and we like that because we like people having multiple responsibilities and being in that startup grind. But we had to learn too. It's funny how you learn the first people in a company that didn't like to be in a bigger company now, right, so they left. Or we didn't have the right people we really want to grow, and wanted to grow as fast as we wanted to grow. So we're making mistakes every day I have a feeling, but overall it's a fun journey to build a team where they can do so much more and extend your brand in so many different ways. I'm excited about even further growing the team too.

kevin edwards  24:20  
That's impressive. Now what about the leadership for you, being the CEO of the organization? You came from just you and Kristel to now over 50 employees with investors that may bring some pressure, depending on who they are really. But how does the leadership change from a small startup to now a 50 person company?

Michael Kuech  24:42  
I have to remind myself every day still to not do everything by myself. I think it's so ingrained in Kristel inand me. We did every job in the beginning. I packed boxes, for years I packed boxes, and called the customers and enrolled customers, and I think remember myself, I'm making that step also now as a leader to let people do their own thing. And rather being only strategic. I think that's a huge learning call for any CEO. It's not easy to let go--I think that's really tough for all of us in leadership roles--to letting go and saying, hey, no, you do it your way. And we're only giving feedback and then doing it next time differently. That's the journey I'm on and Kristel is on. And I'm learning every day. And I'm excited about being that more leader-like leader and strategic guidance for most of the people.

kevin edwards  25:35  
Now, it's no secret that if you're going to have a healthy product, you're going to have responsible packaging, you're going to do all the work to make sure your supply chain is 100% transparency. It's going to cost you more. On average, it's going to cost you more. When you grow the company and maybe budget gets tight, you want to stick to that mission. Do you have any struggles with going away from your mission? How do you view your fiduciary responsibilities?

Michael Kuech  26:11  
Yeah, since we a B Corp, it's not only about revenue size. And that's why it was so important for us to become certified B Corp, and change even the entity to become a B Corp. We're registered to B Corp now and that makes us fast. And so important to not only about revenues, top revenues, but about all stakeholders. And it was something we always wanted, like your podcast said, right? Business as a force for good. There's something that is to our heart. From the time we started, there was the one thing we always want to do. We looked at Patagonia and Toms and all these amazing companies who  have a social mission and we want to do the same. So we always never only looked at kind of the products as a means to just make money, we always wanted to say, hey, if we have products and we're sourced from all over the world, we have to make sure we have to pay fair wages, we have to make sure we actually increase the wealth of the community where we're getting it from. And we want to actually test everything and be transparent. We always want to do the right thing. And I'm super excited because I'm getting on these trips last year was in Peru, and earlier this year before, before COVID I was in Brazil over the New Years. And I was in the communities where we sourced from, and everything I always heard from them, they were so thankful the way we sourced. And I saw the impact of the supply chain and for us, it's such an important part of our business that we can actually make sure that we have a win win win all along our value chain and supply chain. That not we just extrude things and get things cheap from somewhere to make the money, but no we would make and have a positive impact on the supply chain, we have a positive impact with our products, and we have a positive impact with our company in general. And that's engrained in our values, and you have to stick to your values. And you see tons of brands who don't do that and they get in trouble. So we got to stick to our values. That's the way we want to do business. And there's no way other than that.

kevin edwards  28:28  
If you were going to speak with a new entrepreneur, and they're deciding about how to structure their company right now, and you tell them exactly what you just told me, what would you say for maybe your, I guess your argument would be, to grow a responsible certified B Corp, mission driven company?

Michael Kuech  28:49  
I think in turn, that's the only companies that will survive in the next 50 to 100 years. I think that's the way business should be done. Business should be done responsibly and make a win win win for all the way in the supply chain. I think, if you think about the resources in the world, they're not endless, right, they're not unlimited so I think if we can install that in every new entrapreneur, that it's not enough only to look at the customer here and doesn't care about the supply chain. I think that will be a big step to having real change in the world and really tackling all the problems we're trying to tackle. With our business, we're tackling multiple problems. We're tackling problems like global warming because we make people eat more fruits and vegetables which help global warming, right? So if we can use business as really the answer to problems in the world, and major problems in the world, I think that's the right way to do business and then you have the chance to build a big business. And I think the big businesses that are not doing this, they will get in trouble because ultimately, and I'm excited about our generation, and we're excited about this. We are the generation I think that traveled more, that know more what the impact is, and have seen more things around the world, and are more connected than ever. And so we see what's going on in other parts of the world if there is a problem, environmentally, or something else, we hear from it. And I think that's where the consumer goes, and it's just natural that we as business owners, will lead the way and make sure customers--then consumers have the choice as well.

kevin edwards  30:40  
Michael, are you finding more employees are coming to your company, applying for your company because of these values?

Michael Kuech  30:48  
100 percent. I think more people want to have a real impact in their life and it's not enough to just go in a big corporation 9 to 5 and 30 years and same job. I really feel like more and more of the younger generation wants to have an impact. However, that is either with our giving back program they're excited about or helping make people healthier with our products or our supply chain. And I think people will look for more jobs like that. And it will, again, to your point earlier, it will be an advantage in your business, being more mission driven, to attract talent and attract people who were aligned with you. 

kevin edwards  31:30  
When you're onboarding these employees, what's the philosophy? What are you telling them about your organization and how they should treat themselves?

Michael Kuech  31:41  
Well, we always tell them about our mission, right? And our mission is to improve people's health with the power of plants. And that is our main mission and core mission on what we want to put out in the world. And then we tell them about our values. That we really value a transparent supply chain, and that's the way we do business. And that we value very, very clean products, you will never ever find products from us that have artificial flavors or sugars or anything added and synthetically added. They have only five, six ingredients. That's super, super clean. That's a major thing for us. And then we always feel here that we have a giving back program that it's not only enough for us to sell products, we also want to actively donate to charities we work with. We work with Action Against Hunger that distribute food to people who don't have any food, let alone superfoods. So we always want to give that giving back as well as part of our story and values. And everything is customer focused. That's kind of the other value. It's all about the customers and consumers and who we want to target. And that's kind of the values we have and people hopefully are excited about it when they're on board.

kevin edwards  33:01  
Michael, you mentioned the term "impact" quite a few times. What does impact mean to you?

Michael Kuech  33:09  
And it's a great question. I think impact for me is leaving something more positively, or having a positive influence on something. So having an impact on the way we source means we are having a positive influence on communities where we source. So that's our impact because with us actively as an organization, we generate income for farmers, right? And we got the feedback from some of the farmers in Brazil, who're are like, thanks to you guys, because you're growing as a business, and with you paying us the way you pay us, because we do organic stuff, we could send our son for the first time to college. And we actually could buy a fridge for the first time. Because it's the middle of the jungle and no electricity, and now they finally have that. So we have such a massive impact, right, and influence on their livelihoods, that we don't want to take lightly. And we want to even increase that. Can we build these communities out? What else do these community's need, right? Where we source from. So that's something really that excites us. And that's only a supply chain side. Now, if you move back to actually our products, right, and we really are transforming people's lives with our products. We have a massive impact there because people who have not had the chance and didn't know anything about healthy food, they can come to us and we can actually teach them. The superfoods or just the first part of their journey, and we can actually teach them about healthy foods. And we have so many customer stories that transformed their life through our products. They did all the work, we just helped them with the product. So that's the customer side. So it's again, we have a huge positive influence there. So that's kind an example of how I think about impact. It's leaving something more positive and more value added, than before. 

kevin edwards  35:13  
I think you said perfectly. Just simply put, transforming lives. And that's why I want to get to this next question of--I want to paint a picture of a before and after scene. When you when you first visited, when you took that trip down to Peru, what did it look like? And now when you go back, what are you hearing? And how are the farmers interacting with you?

Michael Kuech  35:35  
I can only hear stories because it was the first time there. And the stories from them was, hey, we didn't have any income source and now we can sell acerola. In Brazil, there was acerola, and now we can actually buy a car, now we can actually pay more people in the community. Now they've become the middle class, and they were so thankful because they were like, this is such a great way of now boosting the economy here locally. Because before there was not a lot, and now because of your program and some things that the projects that were going on there, were able to grow acerola, great acerola. And because you guys are growing, now I'm growing too in my wealth. So I think wealth distribution there, I think it's great to not only benefit as a company, but like make your supply chain benefit too. And I know you had great other leaders on this podcast who we think the same. And I think that's the way you should do business. 

kevin edwards  36:41  
Absolutely. Yes, absolutely. And they all say the same thing. You know, it's like, the traditional business right, will grow, make a lot of profit, squeeze as much profit as you can, lower the costs, and then give back. But what they're saying is they want to flip that model on its head. Let's do the right things as we grow and that's going to become the sole driver of growth. And like you said, inherently, it's going to transform these lives.

Michael Kuech  37:07  
And I want to show that as a vision of the company, I want to show that we can become a billion dollar company the way we do it. I think that stigma is always like, oh yeah, it's so great when you're cute and little, and we want to like break that through. We want to show that we can, the way we source, the way we do business, has nothing to do with whether you're small or big. The way we do it, we can become a billion dollar business, and I think that's kind of the major goal we have. Also to show people all the strategics, there's a different way now of doing business. Exactly how we said is what everybody else is saying. And you can do big business, because that's always the argument, right? You can't do big business like this. No, you can. And we are there to show it and help people along the way. 

kevin edwards  37:56  
Now a lot of investors maybe listen to this or people just with a basic business sense. They'll say, you know, do they pass the eye test? And certainly you can tell which businesses are going to pass that test during a small recession like this pandemic, or I guess it's not a pandemic anymore, this the COVID scare right now. What happened to your business, and did you make any changes because of it?

Michael Kuech  38:25  
Actually, it was pretty stable for us. And I think that is good news for us, because it we saw growth throughout it, but not like, exponentially, because people were scared and just bought everything and the next week, they didn't buy anything. So we saw gradual growth, very stable. And because we have great, that's the thing, because we have great partnerships, because we're doing the right thing with our suppliers, we didn't have these huge problems of supplies breaking away because we were in constant communication with them, we're working with them. We have suppliers in India, we have great partnerships with them saying and they're like, do everything they can to to help us, and to make the right choices. So I think it rather shows if you have great partnerships, you can sustain crisis much better because you're in constant communication with people, and you're more sustainable. And we also want to show that we're not just like now growing because of what's going on. We're here to stay also in terms of people always want to have more healthier options now, and I think that doesn't go away. It's a macro trend. People maybe wake up more now, because they realize the way you eat is connected to your immune system as well. And having a strong immune system will help through everything. But in general, I think we're super happy how we went through it, and I think more and more people now realize, hey, I really need to take care of my body and my immune system and strengthen that.

kevin edwards  40:08  
Certainly, certainly. Now what about the work culture itself? Are you planning on having employees back in the office? Are you able to operate right now? It's almost 10pm there. Thanks, again for being here. You're operating the company right now, virtually, are you not?

Michael Kuech  40:26  
Yeah. Yeah, the transition was pretty smooth for us. Because we as an online company, and B2C company, we're doing everything online anyways. And we always had two offices, one in Berlin, in Europe, and one in L.A. So anyways, that combination was a lot online, a lot virtually. So for us it was okay to have a transition. I'm a big fan of having people in the office and building that culture. Maybe that's old school for me, but I really feel there's a power of human interaction that you can't replicate over Zoom, where you can really spark things and inspiration. And so we feel like, like right now we're all still remote. But our office will move to more co-work space, where people can come in office if they want to, they can collaborate in the office at team meetings if they want to. And that's kind of where we see it in the future, that people come in office if they want to, otherwise they'll stay at home and be more productive there. Yeah, but fully remote, I don't think that's also the answer. Because a lot of these young people, we havein our company too, they really want to work with other people, because they will learn, right? They want to learn how to be professional level and learn how it is with a manager and the founder in the same room, and learn from all our strategic discussion. So especially for young people, it's very important that you have kind of fixed point in office and I can't expect everybody to have a perfect setup at home. If you just come from college, I know for myself, I had four roommates and then expecting them to like be professional and not in the bedroom, it's hard. So we want to open the office for people to come in if they want to or need to. But obviously, have a safe environment there, but have it more as a co-working space moving forward. But somehow there is something of human interaction that really sparks a culture and that creates creativity too.

kevin edwards  42:34  
Now, Michael, we started off the show saying, you know, you were diagnosed with cancer at the age of 24. When you were 23 years old, did you ever think you'd be in the position you are today?

Michael Kuech  42:44  
No. No. 100% not. I was on a path to become a consultant and started Accenture to be consultant. And I'm always saying now, if you can make the worst day of your life, the best day of your life, then you did everything right and that was how it was for me, right? The worst day of my life diagnosis turned out to be the best day in my life, because otherwise I wouldn't have started the business, I wouldn't be where we are right now. We wouldn't have 50 people employed and growing and helping millions of thousands of people to eat healthier. That makes me so excited that, I tell everybody hey, don't don't let this worst day define you, make the best out of it, and really learn from it, and move forward.

kevin edwards  43:38  
I love it. I love it. Now Michael, for people listening to this right now, they're saying, Kevin, what are his products though? You know, I want to pay for some of these products. I want to support the local farmers in Peru and Brazil. I want to support recycled packaging. I want to make sure this company is a billion dollar company. What are the products that you sell and where do people find them?

Michael Kuech  44:01  
They can go on yoursuper.com. We have a range of different superfood blends in powder. And people can add them to anything they eat and get the extra portion of fruits and veggies in their diet. And we have a great, great detox program. I would highly recommend all your listeners to start off with our five day detox program, where you can really see the power of clean plant-based eating for five days. No alcohol, no caffeine from coffee. That's a huge difference for a lot of people and it will change your habits, it will change your tastes, and will make you be healthier in the long run. So check that out. And otherwise, we're here for all the support we can. If people have questions about the way they should eat, or recipes, we have an app. Download Your Super in App Store for recipes and everything surrounding healthy eating. And we're here as the health buddy, from everybody always say we're the health buddy from people that never had a health buddy. And, yeah, let's, have them call us, email us, whatever they want.

kevin edwards  45:14  
Now Michael, from the cancer, to the packages that were bursting, to the truck that couldn't fit in the street, to the first growth and investment of the organization, moving to California, to visiting Peru, to now these tasty, healthy products that are transforming lives to you, Michael Keuch, what is your definition of a real leader?

Michael Kuech  45:38  
My definition of the real leader is always having other people's best interests in mind. And having a huge positive impact on the world, tackling biggest problems in the world, and really mentoring other people to be better than they thought they could be. And I'm not afraid of tackling big, big problems in the world with business and using business for some good.

kevin edwards  46:06  
I love it. I love it. Aell Michael, I just want to appreciate you coming on the show. From Michael Kuech, I'm Kevin Edwards asking you to go out there, tackle big problems, and always, folks, keep it real. Thanks for coming on on show, Michael. 

Michael Kuech  46:18  
Thanks. 

kevin edwards  46:20  
And thank you good people. We're hanging on to this episode of the Real Leaders Podcast. We hope you enjoyed it as much as we did. And for the lucky listeners today, well you're gonna walk away with a free magazine. All you got to do is go online to real-leaders.com, enter in coupon code "podcast 25" and you're to get your first magazine for free with a year subscription. Currently on the cover, as the date today is July 2020, we have Tony Robbins, who shares his Crisis Leadership Playbook. Now, what I like to do kinda is in the morning, I'll wake up, do my routine, and I'll kind of just sit on my desk, and I'll just kind of go through the magazine. Read, and it's almost impossible to not be inspired. There are so many great stories like Michael's in this magazine that really helped you change your perspective for the day. So again, folks, go to real-leaders.com/subscribe, enter in coupon code "podcast25" and you are going to get 25% off a year subscription. Your subscription costs $69, do the math there. For all the visual learners, well, we record all of these episodes for a reason, check out the new YouTube channel. It's at Real Leaders Magazine, where you can watch this episode with friends and family on your phone, TV, tablet, anywhere that you have access to YouTube, you can watch all of these interviews with these real leaders. Alright, that's it for me. Thanks for being a real leader, and stay tuned for the next episode.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai