This post is in paid partnership with Caulipower.
Gail Becker, founder and CEO, Caulipower chats with Create & Cultivate editorial director, Sacha Strebe at the San Francisco Conference. Photo: Smithhouse Photo
Have you ever considered leaving your cushy, well-paying corporate career for a completely different line of work? It’s hard to put aside a steady paycheck (and benefits) to take a leap into the unknown but that’s exactly what Gail Becker did. She is real-life proof that following your gut and leaving your comfort zone can actually pay off—literally! At our San Francisco conference this year, we had the pleasure of hosting a fireside chat with the founder and CEO of CAULIPOWER and we were blown away by her incredible entrepreneurial story.
Not only did she leave her high-flying position as president of strategic partnerships and globalization at Edelman to pursue a business in frozen food (who would have thought?)—she made a product that everyone can enjoy, that is nutritious, convenient and tastes good. But where did it all begin? After discovering both of her sons had celiac disease, Becker was desperate for nutritious gluten-free food options. When she couldn’t find any healthy (or tasty) choices, she did what every mom would—she made her own. She found hundreds of thousands of recipes for cauliflower-crust pizza online and decided to try it. Her sons loved it, but it took 90 minutes—time she didn’t have as a working mom—so she figured she could find it in stores, but it was nowhere to be found.
Becker channeled her frustration with the lack of gluten-free options and the industry’s slowness to innovate into a groundbreaking idea to make cauliflower-crust pizzas available in stores. She quit her job to start CAULIPOWER and now, a little over two years later, her company is on track to generate $100 million in revenue this year—that’s the power of a frustrated mom! In that time CAULIPOWER pizzas have become the #1 better-for-you pizza and #8 frozen pizza brand in the U.S., and the company has expanded their family of better-for-you products, with a mission to reinvent our favorite foods, one healthy meal hack at a time.
Drawing from what consumers are meal hacking at home, their products now include cauliflower tortillas, sweet potato “toast” and their most recent innovation: baked not fried chicken tenders, the healthiest tenders on the market at only 490 calories for the whole bag (seriously!).
Follow along for a deeper look into why Becker started her business, what it takes to be successful, and so much more.
On not hiding the healthy ingredients…
“We’re so proud of being a vegetable, we put it in our name”
“We like to celebrate the magic of vegetables.”
On starting CAULIPOWER…
“Why did I wait so long to do what my heart wanted me to do?”
“CAULIPOWER was born out of the convergence of this realization that I needed something more meaningful, and my own frustration of trying to find more foods that are gluten-free.”
“Why can’t we all share from the same plate? That’s the ethos behind CAULIPOWER.”
“When you care about something so much that you’re willing to risk everything for it, there’s nothing you wouldn’t do—there’s no amount of hours of sleep you wouldn’t give up.”
“It’s (CAULIPOWER) more rewarding than anything I could’ve ever dreamed.”
“It does take a toll. I want to be super honest about that. There’s a lot of blood, sweat, and literal tears behind all of that. People never talk about that part.”
“When you care about something so much that you’re willing to risk everything for it, there’s nothing you wouldn’t do—there’s no amount of hours of sleep you wouldn’t give up.”
—Gail Becker, Founder and CEO, Caulipower
On how to hire the right people...
“Every single person at CAULIPOWER today feels like it’s their company, and that’s how it should be. Those are the kind of people you should hire.”
“You need people that are going to be as passionate and care as much as you—I hired people who wanted to take a leap, too.”
”They have to really have the passion to try to make the world a little bit better.”
On raising capital...
“To grow a business, you have to have money, and you have to have some sales before you raise money, ideally.”
“Don’t let the thought of raising money get in the way of actually building your business.”
On the brand...
“Everything about the brand is accessible—accessible in the way it looks, the way it tastes, the stores it’s sold in, and the fact that we donate to teaching gardens.”
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