Pinky Cole, founder of the vegetable food chain slutty vegan, shares the details of a recent professional revolution in which she then lost control of her company and then fought to reclaim it. She also opens about the survival of a moving row -incident, the business mistakes that brought almost everything down, and the emotional and family serious of all this. It is a rough, unfiltered view of leadership under pressure – and what is needed to rebuild when everything falls apart.
This is a short transcript of an interview from Quick responseOrganized by Bob Safian, the former editor -in -chief of Fast Company. From the team behind the Masters of Scale Podcast, Rapid Response offers candid conversations with the best managers of today through real -time challenges. Subscribe to a quick response where you get your podcasts to ensure that you never miss an episode.
We last spoke on stage on the Masters of Scale Summit in October 2024. And it seemed to hum new stores, there were a number of controversial collaborations, and we talked about investors, including Shake Shack founder Danny Meyer, a big mentor to have. And then everything changed a bit. Bring us back to last fall, how you felt about the company and what unfolded when the year ended.
I want to precede this conversation as a warning story for founders. When I am talking about my journey and the things I have experienced, I have seen a huge amount of success. I received the title of every magazine that you can imagine. I have adorned all the lists. I got all the things. But what I also realized is that it did not come without challenges. And just like all things go up, some things go down.
And when I met you, Bob, I was in the middle of one of the most powerful but most pretty seasons of my life. Here it is: I still make millions with double digits, do it very well as an organization through income, but I was not healthy operational. And because I was not healthy, the ship sank. It started with a slow sink, and then that ship eventually went completely. And there is no way to save a ship that contains 10 holes. It doesn’t matter how many buckets you try to get the water out, whatever effort you try to make, there was no way to make it. I started challenges with cash flow. You know how it goes, Bob. If the cash flow is not logical, the company cannot be logical. And all these things happen very, very quickly.
Some people think it’s like a slow role. No, it’s just like you’re good one day, and you’re not the next day. And after I had done the taping with you, it really became. And really as I had to submit for an assignment for creditors. And for the people who listen to this: if you don’t know what that is, that is far away if the fourth cousin of the bankruptcy. It is an insolvency procedure that happens outside the court when a company or organization does not speak the income about the debt it has. My fault was above income. Here I am generally, I have about $ 20 million in debt. I burn $ 100,000 every week. That is stressful on an entrepreneur, especially if you have a sign that they currently have: “Okay, how did we come here? What happened?”
And when I look back on everything, I was not in the company every day. I am the mascot. I am the thought leader. I do all these things and put people in position. We have done many great things together as an organization, but there were some learning curves there. And what I have learned from this experience is that talent is the root of all the evil or the basis for your success. Do you want a really good organization? You really have to have good talent. And I’m not just talking about people who look good on a resume. I am talking about people who can roll with their punches, who are great problem solvers who can look at an organization and can identify ways to make it better. It is not enough to say that you worked at a company that was successful. No, you have to come in and ensure that it is successful. Learn a lot there, to say the least.
I want to ask you a few questions about that turn that happened – you said you would lose $ 100,000 a week. Now you could say: “Well, that’s the plan. We are going to invest $ 5 million a year to build a brand.” That it is part of what the strategy is. It doesn’t sound like that is where the losses came from. Was there a single primary business problem, or was it like a group of things?
It was a group of things. The model is always proven; We have a good business model. We have a cult follower. People love the brand. That was not what it was. What happened, is in the middle of the pandemic when we have our turnout. Could you imagine that we have collected $ 25 million and then inflation through the roof is? What would cost $ 600,000 to open a slutty vegan vegan cost almost $ 1 million to open a slutty vegan. We opened 14. We were very ambitious with our goals. On the surface, the company was very close, very organized. But the reality is, we were a bit above our britches. Our C-suite was super expensive. We paid Topdollar for construction and opening locations. In particular, we had one location where it took us four months after the completion date to be opened because of allowing – which takes it well, that cost money. All things just came together and it became a Domino effect.
I had three babies in three years. I had a baby in ’21, I had a baby in ’22 and I had a baby in ’23. And I am married and I do all these things. And when I started this company, I never devised myself as an operator. I am not a restaurant operator. I will tell the truth. But this has always been a passion project for me, so what I do very well is I my company very well on the market. I know how to connect the dots and I can bring people together. So I brought in people I thought they can manage the operations. And did they do a good job? Certainly. I am a professional, sure. But at the end of the day, the level of insight that we need for the momentum we have, I needed someone else. But I want to say that I needed that at the time when it happened, because it gave me the opportunity to erase my dop table, two, to free the fault. And then it gave me the chance to buy back my business and rewrite my story.
The only thing about entrepreneurship is that nobody tells you that it should be a straight line. You are going to get some curves, there will be some speed bumps and you will turn around a few times. But as long as you keep driving, you get the juice. And I was thirsty for this new SAP of 2.0 in Slutty Vegan, and that brings in a new president, who brings in a new accounting company, brings in a new HR team, even up to the damn assistant – everything that is new. And I wanted to be able to rewrite the story in a way where I could not only feel good about myself, but founders around the world can look at my story and know what to do, and know what to do not, because Pinky went through it.
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