Juliette Binoche and Janett & Erika Liriano (INARU) Transcript
Kerry Diamond:
Hi, everyone. You are listening to Radio Cherry Bombe, and I'm your host, Kerry Diamond, coming to you from Newsstand Studios at Rockefeller Center in the heart of New York City. I'm the founder and editor of Cherry Bombe magazine.
We've got a great show for you today. Our first guest is superstar Juliette Binoche, of the new film, "The Taste of Things," which opened on Friday. “The Taste of Things” is one of the most beautiful food films ever, and Juliette is amazing in it. Stay tuned for my chat with Juliette Binoche. In the second half of the show, it's Janett and Erika Liriano of INARU, a very modern chocolate company. These sisters have an incredible story and you'll be very inspired by what they have built and their plans for the future. I have a feeling you'll be hearing a lot about INARU in the years to come.
Some housekeeping. Today is the very last day to take part in Cherry Bombe's community round on Wefunder. The campaign was extended by popular demand, so this really is the end. Cherry Bombe is raising money for the very first time after bootstrapping for 10 years. I'm thrilled to report that more than 250 folks have taken part. Almost all of them women and many are investing for the very first time. If you'd like to invest in Cherry Bombe, check out our campaign at wefunder.com/cherrybombe. The link is in our show notes, and be sure to check out the investor FAQs as well. That is important. Thank you to everyone who has taken part. The team and I are very excited about the next decade of Cherry Bombe. We have big plans and we would love for you to be part of our future.
Now for today's guest, Juliette Binoche, welcome to Radio Cherry Bombe.
Juliette Binoche:
Thank you. Thank you for having me.
Kerry Diamond:
Congratulations on this beautiful film. The reviews have been amazing. They're calling it one of the best food films ever up there with the likes of “Babette's Feast.” It must be so gratifying.
Juliette Binoche:
Thank you. Yes, that's thrilling and I'm so happy for the director, Tran Anh Hung, food has always been very important to him. As he described it, that when he was living in Vietnam, he was living in a very poor area. His family was poor, but what was beautiful always was the kitchen place where his mother was working and all the ingredients looked so beautiful in his eight years old eyes. And so, the fact that he's made films about food, the first one he did like 30 years ago called, "The Scent of Green Papaya," and this one is a worshiping of what the earth gives us, which is food.
Kerry Diamond:
There's so many layers to this film, but I'm curious, why did you say yes? You get a lot of scripts, a lot of people want you to be in their movies, why this one?
Juliette Binoche:
Well, it was not because of food, it was because of the director. It was because of the love story, about his sensibility, the director's sensibility and his films. He has the sensual way to film. There's always a sort of a softness in him and care that he's having while he's shooting, and I like that very much. I'm sensitive to his sensitivity.
Kerry Diamond:
You've called this film a love letter to your daughter. Why is that?
Juliette Binoche:
Well, I didn't know it was going to be because I didn't know who was going to play the man's part, Dodin Bouffant, that's his name in the film. And when my daughter's father said yes to the film to playing that part, I was very surprised. And at the end of the day it became a film for her. It was the film with her parents gathering and suddenly being in front of each other and working together and expressing feelings through the situation that were written in the script and words that were written by the director. So it was special and she avoided to see it when it came out through different festivals like Cannes Festival or San Sebastian Festival.
And so the film was shown at the Cinémathèque in Paris and she decided to come and she was very overwhelmed by it. Tears came up, like a volcano of emotions. And then two days after I said, "So how do you feel? How did you feel about watching the film?" And I asked her, "Was it healing do you think?" Or something like that. And she said, "Absolutely." It had a feeling of sort of a big tenderness on the wound of parents separating the child. It's so overwhelming to have parents being separated, so it was a nice way to see them that they could talk to each other, recreating words and feelings, but it's always coming from feelings inside us anyway as actors.
Kerry Diamond:
If this isn't too personal a question, how was it for you?
Juliette Binoche:
I was so happy that we finally could stay in the same room and enjoy each other's presence and work and creation, because recreating life, that's what we do. We're actors, it's our way to go into an artistic world from life to an enhancing place called art. And so it felt wonderful to be able to do that together because we had to create characters and yet coming from a place that needed to be truthful.
Kerry Diamond:
I read that you only got one day of culinary training. Is that true?
Juliette Binoche:
Yes. We rehearsed and we were shown how you do this exactly. Because we've had some videos of some of the work that the chef prepared for the recipes that he chose to do for the film with the director. And we had those videos, so I watched them several times, but then to actually really rehearse with the real elements, the ingredients. Then we had just a day before and we had to with the director know who was doing what because we didn't know. And the next day we started shooting, and that's the senior scene at the beginning and after. And we had three days of shooting from one scene to the next one to the next one, and Hung was very precise. He always wanted me to have this kind of ravishing feeling of doing things with joy and pleasure and savoir faire. So it felt natural and genuine because, well anyway, there was no other way because we had very little time, very little money to make the film, and so we had to plunge into it and make it work.
Kerry Diamond:
I thought maybe they had sent you to Le Cordon Bleu for six months?
Juliette Binoche:
No, there was no money and time for it.
Kerry Diamond:
Oh my gosh. So just a day of culinary training. Honestly, you are the best actress in the world. I watched that and I thought she has gotten trained for ages to do this. I mean, people will think the same thing when they see the film. Were you nervous with all the cooking that takes place?
Juliette Binoche:
Not really, because for me it was like painting. It was like you get all the ingredients, you've got to do all this and all that, you shouldn't burn your hands. There's a rhythm thing that you've got to catch. I didn't find it very difficult. Also because I do cook because I have two kids and I like cooking, not that I'm an expert on it with cooking because I can't spend too much time in the kitchen. It's easy for me to use my hands and do things. It feels natural to me.
Kerry Diamond:
You also had the great Pierre Gagnaire helping you. What was that like?
Juliette Binoche:
Pierre Gagnaire decided the recipes with our director, but then after that he gave us his right hand that worked with him for 40 years, Michelle. And so he was there all the time to help us with preparing the cooking before we did it. Sometimes when he needed to be peeled or when it needed to be pre-cut, precooked, the gestures sometimes say, well, maybe try a little more like this or that in between takes. So it felt wonderful to have him. It was like always a net with us in case we didn't do properly the cooking.
But what I learned with Pierre Gagnaire actually after is that you're not trying to be perfect, you're trying to be truthful to what you see, the temperature, the way it's cooking. So there's an adaptation with what's happening in the moment. And it's not like a rational way of doing things. And I like that because you always, there's an artist in a chef, you're looking if it's grilled enough or cooked enough or you add a little more. There's a little more that different from cooking cakes or with the sugar, which is more mathematical. But the savoir faire of the salty side of cooking is very much with the knowledge and the inspiration, I would say.
Kerry Diamond:
I read that all the food was real food, there was no trickery on set and that the cast and crew got to enjoy all the food when the shooting was done. What did that lend to the atmosphere of the set?
Juliette Binoche:
Excitement, because we knew that some of us were going to have the satisfaction after the shooting, but we were a small crew and very much together in a sort of urgency of trying to put the best we could. So there was the sense of family too.
Kerry Diamond:
Where did you film the movie?
Juliette Binoche:
Next to Angers, and it's in the countryside, maybe 200 kilometers from the sea, the ocean, so it's very in a soft kind of area. We call it la douceur d'Angers, the softness of Angers area because it's not too cold in the winter, it's not too hot during the summer. There's a sort of place that is protected somehow, very soft feeling.
Kerry Diamond:
And was that a real kitchen or was it a set?
Juliette Binoche:
No, they made this huge entrance in this little castle and they made the kitchen in that. So the set designer organized it so he could shoot in certain ways and have the stove really in the middle of the kitchen. And I have to say I bought a house like two years ago and I'm dreaming of that kitchen and thinking that's the place where it happened. Things happen, the best conversations, the best times you can share with friends and family, and so it's kind of the idyllic place.
Kerry Diamond:
Yeah, you want to move into that kitchen, absolutely. The garden scenes were also spectacular.
Juliette Binoche:
Yes. It reminds us that at the time people had protege, a place where you could grow your vegetables and your fruits and herbs and it was part of respecting the seasons, the cycles of life, and having the animals living in the countryside in a respectful way. When we see today how animals are being put together in factories, it's so disrespectful for life and those animals. I mean, I'm not against eating meat, but I think it needs to be well-respected and not treated like things. They're alive and special.
Kerry Diamond:
The film is a beautiful reminder of food and the actual source. It's a period movie as most people know who've seen the trailer. Do you like doing period films?
Juliette Binoche:
Yes, I don't mind. I mean, I'm not particularly loving doing period. I want to tell the story that is close to my heart, close to art. I would call art, which is lifting yourself into a place that you create a world with thoughts, with feelings, with relationships, and this film created that, whether it's today or a century ago or a thousand years before, it doesn't matter to me. The attention needs to be somewhere else.
Kerry Diamond:
Tell me about the relationship between Eugenie and her boss. We all know the French culinary world has been and still is somewhat patriarchal, but this is very much a relationship of equals.
Juliette Binoche:
Well, what I liked about this film is that we don't know who's running whom because it's really a couple working together. He has this kind of vision about the recipe, and he's sharing his vision with this Eugenie woman, and seeing her reflection gives him even more ideas. So there's a real exchange between them and he needs her to do the cooking, but he can be a cook as well. They share this kitchen and those recipes and they add things to the core of the meal, the junction of the different tastes and textures and colors, and it's very much about directors and actors. There's a moment you don't know who's in charge of what because especially on a set, of course, because after that, the editing room is another story because it's more in the hands of the director and the editor and producer here especially. But in the film, you really have those two that are sharing a common territory and in an art form, which is called cooking.
Kerry Diamond:
I loved reading about the director and his wife because it adds a whole other layer to the movie because it's also his love letter to her.
Juliette Binoche:
It's true, yes, Yen Khe, she was in charge of the costumes and also all the scenery in a way, putting flowers together, putting how to put the things on the table, arranged all the details that the image gives us in this film. And it's a very painting really. It's gorgeous to see delicacy, that meticulous attention on every detail, and yet it needed to be truthful to be taken by an emotion you wouldn't control. And that was, I think it was a mixture of putting Benoit and myself in front of each other and not having seen each other that much 20 years and being surprised by this reconnecting that brings something special to this relationship as to characters. And meanwhile, having the Director, Hung and his wife, Yen Khe taking care of costumes and all the arrangements, the designs of everything for the film and having their relationship. So it brought into the film this kind of vibrant, intense and yet silent as well, certain moments. So it brings another yet layer.
Because what I loved in this film is there's no score, there's no music added. You have the birds, you have the cooking sounds, you have the, it's boiling, it's all this, it's those details that makes a kitchen, a kitchen and all the breathing. We miss that living in big cities. We miss that. It is great to be able to experience that in a film to remind us.
Kerry Diamond:
I'm sure everyone's asking this Juliette, are you cooking more these days?
Juliette Binoche:
Not at the moment, I've been moving quite a lot, so I've been away from my kitchen, but I do go back to my kitchen quickly and I mean, I don't do sophisticated meals. I like it quite simple, but the ingredients are very important to me. The quality and organic, the real organic, not the one you buy sometime in shop that says organic, the one that you feel that you just took it from the tree and it has a different smell and taste and it's so wonderful when it feels really truthful.
Kerry Diamond:
When you are in-between films and in-between shooting, are you a farmer's market fan?
Juliette Binoche:
Totally. I'm always, that's one of the first things I'm doing when I come somewhere. I know I'm staying for three months in that place, is to go to the farm market and try and find the most organic ingredients I can find.
Kerry Diamond:
I love that.
Juliette Binoche:
Sometimes it's hard to find.
Kerry Diamond:
It is. We're blessed here in New York, and I know you are in Paris too with amazing markets.
Juliette Binoche:
Yes.
Kerry Diamond:
Want to ask you a question about Paris because the next issue of our magazine is all about Paris. If you had to send friends to one place in Paris to eat, where would you send them?
Juliette Binoche:
Well, it depends how much money you have. Pierre Gagnaire is an experience, definitely. And if you have some money and you feel like going on a trip, the sort of tasteful and being surprised by Pierre Gagnaire is a good place to go and I would suggest to ask for them to choose for you. That's what happened to me. I was invited by Pierre and he said, "Let me surprise you." But otherwise I would go, there's a little restaurant behind Beaubourg, called Le Hangar, H-A-N-G-A-R. And it's a little restaurant that actually a lot of tourists go to, but you have to know about it and it's simple, but it's tasteful and not too expensive. I like to go there once in a while.
Kerry Diamond:
How's your kitchen at home?
Juliette Binoche:
It's convenient. I have a big sort of block in the middle of it and I use it as a cutting board so I don't have to take a board in order to cut. And it's big and it's very convenient. There's a picture in the Washington Post of my kitchen.
Kerry Diamond:
Well, Juliette, thank you so much for your time. It's so nice to see you again.
Juliette Binoche:
Nice to see you too.
Kerry Diamond:
I have to thank you. You gave such a beautiful gift to the culinary world with this film.
Juliette Binoche:
Thank you very much. Thank you.
Kerry Diamond:
I hope you all go see, "The Taste of Things," it is a beautiful film. Our next guests are Janett and Erika Liriano of INARU, a very modern chocolate company. They are building bean by bean. Learn why they pivoted from tech to chocolate, how they're working with farmers and producers in the Dominican Republic and how they're growing INARU with both profit and people in mind. We also talk about how they've navigated the complicated world of fundraising and what it's like as sisters in the food startup world.
Janett and Erika, welcome to Radio Cherry Bombe.
Janett Liriano:
Thank you.
Erika Liriano:
Thank you.
Janett Liriano:
So excited to be here.
Erika Liriano:
Yes.
Kerry Diamond:
So excited to meet the two of you and talk chocolate. You two were working in the tech world. How did you pivot from tech to chocolate? Janett, do you want to start?
Janett Liriano:
Yes, I'll start. It's a funny story. So I have this little joke that there's two types of businesses, either you move atoms or you move bits. So either it's digital or physical and it's not very different in the making of things. I worked in the startup space in apparel and then in biopharma, which was a little weird, but always on the manufacturing side. But my family comes from the Dominican Republic, we have a cocoa farm. And Erika and my dad challenged me a couple of years ago to think about how can we apply all of the learnings as tech entrepreneurs and in Erika's case, venture capital to build something really meaningful with this family crop, with this family legacy. And I like a challenge. So I was like, can I go from tech to chocolate? That's kind of the brief version of my story.
Kerry Diamond:
What was the tech company again? I looked it up, tried to understand it. I think I got it, but tell everybody what you were doing.
Janett Liriano:
Okay. And actually Erika and I worked together at this company as well, she was Chief of Staff there as well. We clearly like working together, so I'm sure everybody knows a circuit board. So now imagine a circuit board that's fabric, so fabric that conducts electricity, that can heat up, that can light up some of those applications. You can think of a ski jacket or more industrial applications like having sensors in floors and so on. So we were making pretty advanced technical textiles.
Kerry Diamond:
So you were CEO, were you the Founder of that company as well?
Janett Liriano:
I started as an assistant, became the CEO over the course of four years. So that was a fun little journey.
Kerry Diamond:
Whoa, whoa, whoa, stop for a second. You started as the assistant and became the CEO in four years?
Janett Liriano:
Yeah.
Kerry Diamond:
That's not a normal trajectory.
Janett Liriano:
Yeah, it's an odd one. I think one of the things that I'm grateful for is that I don't want to say I don't take no for an answer very easily, but I tend to not. So if there's a way to make something better, I'm going to push for it. And luckily in that environment I was able to grow and grow in my leadership and push the business in this direction. So yeah, it was an odd journey, but a fun one.
Kerry Diamond:
Okay, we got to come back to this one day, but there's a book in that story, no doubt. So Erika, how did you wind up working with your sister at this company?
Erika Liriano:
Yeah, it was actually a very interesting story. Prior to working with Janett at the company, I ended up actually, I switched from dance actually by training and education, I did drama and dance. So, it was kind of a flip, but I actually ran into some food related health issues that ended up with me not being able to dance for a few years. And I've always been really interested in the family that we grew up in. Our dad is a very technical guy, so we grew up with fixing VCRs, fixing microwaves, just learning how to fix things. So it was something that I've always been very interested in, but since I was ever consumed by dance and drama, it wasn't something I actually pursued.
And in that transition time when I was trying to figure out what am I doing, and I had always been hearing, because I think I joined Janett when she was two years into the company, and I just always was fascinated to hear about the journey and I was like, "This is amazing. This is great. If there's any openings, let me know. I'm happy to just assist." I actually ended up being an assistant there first and then I was also doing project management courses and certifications and outside of dance I love to do that. That's my thing. I love to organize, I like to project manage. So I walked in and that's what I did at LOOMIA, that was the job. It was a great time.
Kerry Diamond:
I know you two have your hands full with chocolate, but I feel like you could have a robust side hustle as career coaches.
Janett Liriano:
Honestly, Erika and I have books of side hustles. We're like, "How do we..." We've got this project and I feel like it'll facilitate the side hustle enterprise. Maybe that's what it is. Side hustle enterprise sheet. That's a vibe. That's a brand actually.
Kerry Diamond:
Absolutely. And if there are any agents or publishers listening to this, I feel like there's a book in your career story.
Janett Liriano:
Right. Also Erika, I have to give her some more flowers. She wasn't just a dance major, we both went to the Fame School, but I'm going to embarrass you here on air-
Kerry Diamond:
To the Fame High School?
Janett Liriano:
Yeah, she was a drama major. Now I was behind the stage being a little techie. I studied lighting design and actually audio engineering. So I appreciate a lot of what's going on in here. So we've always been attached at the hip because we went to high school together, did all the stuff. She was on the cover of the New York Times, went to Broadway Dance Center, drove massive sales at one of the largest studios here. So Erika, she likes her humble pie, but I'm her big braggadocious, so I got to do a little bit of that.
Kerry Diamond:
Aww. Not everybody loves combining family and business, but you two clearly do because you're repeat offenders.
Janett Liriano:
Repeat offenders, I feel like that could be the name of our podcast if we ever make one, right? Repeat offenders.
Kerry Diamond:
So Janett, why did you want your sister to come work for the company?
Janett Liriano:
So actually this is a funny story. I always thought Erika would be an ace, but I tried to be cautious because I joined the company, I wasn't the original co-founder, but the Founder of the business was like, "Your sister's really smart. Every time she's over here helping you with your side projects." Because Erika and I are always working on something. "She has good inputs. Would you feel comfortable hiring your sister as an assistant?" I was like, "Would I feel comfortable hiring my sister? Yes, yes, I would." So she was kind of poached by the co-founder to work there. And then, I mean, I know Erika has all this capability, and then she started process improvements, project management and driving our stakeholder relationships and so on. And then was promoted to Chief of Staff. So I didn't actually bring her in, she got poached for being naturally fabulous.
Kerry Diamond:
So this is not an nepo baby situation, Erika?
Erika Liriano:
No, no. I have to say Janett has always my entire life, she's older, she's the one right before me. But my entire life, and I know that some families are you saying it can be kind of difficult to work so well with a sister, with a sibling, but my entire life, Janett's always been right there, super supportive. So I've always felt like I have to work hard. I have to not embarrass her, not embarrass anybody for, because it's obviously a help. It's a help when a sister or friend or whatever helps.
Janett Liriano:
Well, it's easy if you it helps. Yeah, she makes me look great everywhere I go because she's super smart.
Erika Liriano:
You got to work for it though. You got to make sure that you earn your stripes though.
Janett Liriano:
I always have a concern someone will poach my sister. That's actually the bigger risk because to be really honest with you, it's like not Nebo baby, it's that I will lose this amazing partner. So that's kind of what happened at the first company. It's like she'll be my assistant. I was like, "Well, she's my sister." And it was a big push and pull for her capacity. Then she worked at a venture fund in New York that focused a lot on food and tech, right Erika? You were at-
Erika Liriano:
So it's a good time. It's a good time.
Kerry Diamond:
So interesting. That could be your second book working with family, right? You kind of dropped in there earlier that your dad is also involved in some capacity. You mentioned a challenge that your father issued. Erika, can you tell us about that?
Erika Liriano:
Yeah, so both our parents are Dominican from the Dominican Republic. We were born and raised here, but our parents are from there and our two oldest sisters were born there actually as well. And so our father, he's always had a cocoa farm. It was always his hobby. His job by trade was actually a mechanist. So he used to just fix a bunch of stuff and when he was in the D.R. He was in the Dominican Air Force. My dad is a very technical guy, but he's always been all about nature.
And so we grew up with both of our parents being like the D.R. is an amazing place, but what's missing is people who have maybe a bit more education in certain ways to go back and make better use of the resources that are there. And so the challenge he issued was cocoa's huge. You are constantly buying your five to $10 chocolate bars and the best chocolate comes from the Dominican Republic. And he was just like, "Why?" Why with all the education that you have, are you putting all your efforts into another company that yeah, you like, you believe in, but it's not yours? Why not go back and do something with the resources that are there that are basically given to Dominicans?" So I was like, that's valid.
Kerry Diamond:
I love that your dad was such a fierce advocate for entrepreneurism. A lot of parents just want you to have a safe job. They don't suggest that you go out on your own.
Janett Liriano:
Well, that's one of those things that I think we've really learned to appreciate. Yeah, that's a really good point. We grew up with these very progressive, I like to say my parents were like, was it the black sheep or the purple sheep of their family? They were just kind of the progressive weirdos. My youngest sister wanted to join the circus and literally, this is not a made up story. She wanted to-
Kerry Diamond:
Not Erika?
Janett Liriano:
Join the circus, not Erica the youngest, Natalie who works with us too. So if you like our social media, shout out to Natalie. She told my mom, "I want to join the circus." And my mom was like, "All right, well we have to sign you up for an acrobatic school if you want to join the circus, you need to have these physical skills and blah, blah, blah." She signed her up and she wasn't sure she wanted to join the circus because she was like, "Oh, wait." They were very much a do whatever you want, but take it seriously, be the best commit, bring your best to it. We literally could have joined the circus if we wanted to. We would just have to be in Cirque du Soleil. Those were the standards at home. Do what you want, but really do it.
Kerry Diamond:
So now you have your own circus, which is essentially what having your own company is like, right?
Janett Liriano:
Basically, yeah. So we kind of did end up joining I guess the chocolate circus.
Kerry Diamond:
Can we go back to your dad's cocoa farm for a second? Was this just a hobby farm that he had or was he actually producing a significant amount of cocoa?
Erika Liriano:
Yeah, so our father, it's always been a hobby for him because he was living here for most of the time that the cocoa farm was running. So he has a farm hand over there who manages it when he's not there because we were growing up here, so he's had that farm for I want to say about 50 years. So he bought it. His family actually, his father was a baker and his mother was a seamstress. So they weren't farmers, but he always was just like, I love it. So he went out of his way. It was one of the first things he did when he was, I think like 20-
Janett Liriano:
20 or something.
Erika Liriano:
Or something? He was just like, "I need to buy a farm." It was just like something he's always been obsessed with. So he bought a cocoa farm, had it producing. Yeah, so it's something that I actually got curious about, I want to say about-
Janett Liriano:
10 years ago, I think.
Erika Liriano:
10 years ago, yeah, it sounds like a while back, but 10 years ago I got really curious about cocoa in general. I do buy a lot of chocolate and I love-
Janett Liriano:
I can confirm, this is true.
Erika Liriano:
I'm always stopping and buying just a bunch of chocolate. So I got really curious. Dad has a cocoa farm, I don't actually know what is happening on that farm. What's the process once it leaves the farm? I don't know. I knew how it was harvested, because I heard about it, but I didn't actually know what happens after. So went on a deep dive to understand what happens at the cocoa farm. So I started going, I was like, I'm going to go at least once a year for a month. It ended up being twice a year, a month each time. And then each year I was finding myself spending more and more time there to try to understand the industry in the D.R.
In particular, and it was something that he never relied on for income. So I think he didn't really think too much about the productivity, but everyone else and where his farm is, they rely on cocoa for their income. So I really wanted to understand because basically what's happening in the D.R. Is a microcosm of everywhere else where cocoa is grown of, what are the conditions that the cocoa farmers are living in? Essentially what I discovered was, well, it's just inefficient. We're constantly putting so much pressure on the cocoa farmers because we have a really kind of vague, cloudy supply chain logistics where it goes from the farm to a tipo con un camión-
Janett Liriano:
A dude with a truck. Who's got table to dry it.
Erika Liriano:
I'm trying to translate-
Janett Liriano:
This Spanglish to jump in there, I want to give Erika a lot of credit because she has this analyst sort of investigative journalism approach to doing anything, which is where I think the strength of building the business was. It was easy to do because of this time that she spent her kind of understanding what is going on with the supply chain and truth because my dad had two primary goals, build a business that adds real value, not just makes us rich because easy to do, but let's think about why our country is "poor" when we see other agricultural economies.
And he brought up the wine example like, France exports wine, they don't export grapes. There's this valuing of creating products from what comes from the earth of a region. Chocolate is this billion dollar industry, how can we create more value for the farmers in our communities? And while my dad doesn't rely on cocoa for income, as Erika already said, he's always cared quite a lot about this community. They produce over a hundred tons of cocoa. And the biggest thing that Erika discovered and kind of brought to me after her analyst investigative journalism kick there for a few months is, "Janett, there's seven different intermediaries that cut into the price of cacao and then it just leaves the country as beans to become a billion dollar crop with none of that value being returned. That's affecting the farming, that's affecting people wanting to stay in food production, like the food resiliency. And it brings me all of these problems. Here's all the stuff that's disastrous with the current system." I'm like, "Oh my God, this is fun."
So Erika likes to identify here are all the points of failure that can be changed. How are we going to build something to address these things? And I think that's probably where we are such a good team. I really enjoy architecting solutions. I don't necessarily want to spend months doing the investigative journalism all due respect and asking the right questions. It's a lot of presence and patience and listening, which she does very well. But building something new and answering for the problems, I think that's why we're a really good tag team. She's like, look at this. I'm like, okay. She sets a target and I like to take it down. So props to my dad really for the challenge and to my mom. They're just the cool purple sheep, I guess.
Kerry Diamond:
Absolutely. I want to go back to a little something you dropped in there, Janett, that our listeners might have caught. You said something about, "Building a company that makes us rich. That's the easy part." Most entrepreneurs out there are like, "Wait, what? We go back 15 seconds." Can you explain how that's the easy part?
Janett Liriano:
Oh, that's funny. Oh, yeah. I think the easy part, and I guess in this case Erika and I always think about there's so many ways to create value and I think the traditional structure is how do we extract value? And that's the thing that we're trying to challenge. In the cocoa landscape there's an easy way to make money and honestly simplify our business, which is we have access to in-demand supply directly, we can build and export business. We can kind of not really innovate on the profit sharing or the incentives that we pay our farmers. And just like if we wanted to build just a small brand where we're selling the primary product, we could do that and make a ton of money because the demand is, there in cocoa production. We have the flexibility of operating in western markets because we're also American. It's like unquote easy fruits to be had if that's what you want.
And you see that, that's why I think you see this big boom in the craft chocolate market because consumer demand around higher quality origin, brand story. We've got a great story, two awesome sisters from Queens just building a chocolate company. But the make a difference part and building infrastructure that commits you to your values. That's actually the hard part because the getting rich part can tempt you to take the shortcut for the fast feast kind of thing. So for me, we've always had this, maybe it's an abundance mindset, like making money's easy. Look at the world we live in. You can hustle a dollar. Anybody could do that with enough focus now creating something that's truly valuable to everyone involved. That's the problem we want to solve, which I think in some ways is why it's taken us longer to get here. It's like of our own doing. We've taken the time to get to selling product.
Kerry Diamond:
You've set a lot of challenges for yourself.
Janett Liriano:
Yeah.
Erika Liriano:
Yeah. It's something we often talk about. We're like, okay, well we have to sell product, but also the immediacy of the needs on the ground, trying to balance between the business needs and then our goals for why we even started this business, it's something we are often balancing.
Kerry Diamond:
I have a million logistics questions for you, but let's talk about the romantic side of INARU. First off the name, who came up with the name?
Janett Liriano:
Oh, it's another sister.
Erika Liriano:
It's another sister.
Kerry Diamond:
Another sister? Oh wait, I forgot to tell everyone. You're two of five sisters.
Erika Liriano:
Yes.
Janett Liriano:
Yes.
Erika Liriano:
Yes.
Janett Liriano:
My dad's lucky. He always jokes around that he had it hard. I'm like, "You got five people spoiling you, please." But go ahead, Erika.
Erika Liriano:
The one right before Janett, Anabel, shout out to Annabel. She came up with a name. She actually just had a baby when we were really knee deep and getting our business plan in order starting to do fundraising, we were trying to think of the name and we wanted something that A, would be easy no matter what language you speak to say. So we wanted it not only people who speak English or Spanish can pronounce it. So that was one. And then we also wanted it to mean something and kind of be a nod to the Dominican Republic. So Annabel actually ended up looking up Taino words. Tainos are the natives that were originally on the island, Espanola, the indigenous people. So it means woman, it means fertility. And we just felt like that's right, that's really right for this moment in time where we are building this business. And she was also always there just like, "Hey, this was something really interesting I came across." So it really came from her actually.
Kerry Diamond:
And also the timing is so beautiful because she was having her own baby.
Janett Liriano:
Yeah, she was having her own baby. When I think about that, she was like Annie with this big belly helping us research and then the baby was born and we were building financial models, maternal, generative, creative energy. I was like, yeah, that's the vibe for what we're trying to create.
Erika Liriano:
Yeah.
Kerry Diamond:
We'll be right back. The team and I are working on the next issue of Cherry Bombe's print magazine. The theme for our spring issue is icons and we're talking to a lot of trailblazers and inspiring folks for this one as you can imagine. If you're not a Cherry Bombe subscriber, we would love for you to become one. Our indie magazine is not like other food magazines. It's thick and gorgeous and packed with great features, photos and recipes. Get all four of this year's issues delivered direct to your home or office and get free shipping. Yes, all subscriptions come with free shipping. Learn more at cherrybombe.com. If you love print magazines, you will love Cherry Bombe.
Tell us about the products. First off, thank you for the chocolate that you sent me. I've been, of course, I've enjoying it all week. You sent me three of your different chocolate bars. What will people find on the website? What can they order right now?
Janett Liriano:
Yes. Well right now, so this is like a fun time. So you'll be able to enjoy our three different flavors from our first product launch, from our first harvest. I also takes a seasonal approach to our product launches. So we're gearing up for the 2024 season. Some new products are coming online, but today if you are there, it's the vanilla chamomile, which is a wonderful bar for those that prefer lighter and sweeter chocolates. We have our dark chocolate bar, which we call our signature dark and an Auyama, which is a Dominican pumpkin seed and cranberry bar for the dramatic amongst us. That's how I like to profile our fans, like the dramatic chocolate consumer, the classic, and the more delicate, softer palates who appreciate nuance. So we like to think that we did a really good job showing off how versatile Dominican cacao can be in these bars. But coming up next are some beverages, some new flavors, some interesting sizes, some colorful products, maybe bonbons, maybe truffles. I'm saying maybe, but definitely.
Kerry Diamond:
And do you have a professional line or is that in the works?
Erika Liriano:
Yeah, do you want to talk about our B2B?
Kerry Diamond:
Yeah.
Erika Liriano:
So it's definitely in the works. So we also, with the size of our factory, this is something we wanted to be very intentional about, that it's not just INARU bars, that the way we see ourselves with the rest of the chocolate industry is we don't want to compete with anybody. So if you want really great traceable, high quality cacao that you can actually come and say, "This is the roasting profile I want." We can do that. We can go and send you some paste, we can send you coverture. So that's the B2B side of our business. So that is actually something that this quarter is really gearing up. I'm very excited for that because I have a lot of chocolate maker friends and it's something that I think is missing in the craft chocolate space is that ability to control what is that input that they're getting that's not necessarily the beans.
There's a lot of risk associated with importing beans, and it's a way that I think we can have a win-win situations for the farmer and the other craft chocolate makers, so.
Janett Liriano:
For folks who, you guys can't see me, I just nodded my hand with my finger to jump in with Erika. One of the things when we started building this business, we saw the opportunity, the craft chocolate market is booming, but there's this parallel risk of low supply, difficulty sourcing. This larger group of smaller aggregate chocolate makers or chocolatiers don't have the sourcing power or the purchasing power that maybe some larger players do. So you see this demand and need for quality, but it's segmented and we're like, what if we could be a really right size fit for this community? And we are flirting around with this concept of a block to bar, right?
So you buy a block of paste and you get to benefit from all of the sourcing credibility, the profit sharing that INARU does. You get to inform what your chocolate mass is going to taste like and roast. You get all of the control that you might have in your own kitchen. But the sourcing security, the benefit and the scale of a larger plant. So I use this analogy a lot, the Intel inside of chocolate, but really building a brand that shares the benefit with the larger community of chocolate makers and having our own products that really show off what we do to create more financial impact obviously for our community. So we have a very yes and mindset and I really don't believe that competition is useful when you think about business in an ecosystem perspective. We all have a place in the system and being sure that you're offering the right value at the right time keeps you safe in the marketplace, I think.
Kerry Diamond:
When did you start selling your first product?
Janett Liriano:
Last year. Last year around this time actually.
Kerry Diamond:
Okay.
Janett Liriano:
Yeah, we launched the bars that I just described last year, right around Valentine's Day. And then we've done some smaller partnerships with Truffles and Bon Bons with different brands like flower company, High Camp Gardenias, did some work with Hello Sunshine and Private Label as well. So to kind of clarify now, use book of business, we do private label, we do branded B2B products like the paste, the coverture as Erika spoke to, and we're expanding our professional line as well. This is a very much test and learn year for us now that our 7,000 square foot factory is done.
Kerry Diamond:
Is your website the only place folks can buy the chocolate bars?
Janett Liriano:
Oh, that's a good question. Not only there. We're also at The Canvas at the World Trade Center at the Oculus. We're also at the South Street Seaport at the same location, The Canvas as well. And we will be in some more locations also if you're in DC we're in the Diplomatic duty free stores as well. So you can find us in some retail, but hopefully more.
Kerry Diamond:
Are you looking for stockists?
Janett Liriano:
Yes.
Kerry Diamond:
How can they get in touch with you?
Janett Liriano:
Oh, well, can I give my email?
Kerry Diamond:
If you want, yeah, absolutely.
Janett Liriano:
Yeah. Well, you could do sales@inaruvalley.com or you could just reach out to me. I don't mind. j.liriano-
Kerry Diamond:
inaruvalley.com.
Janett Liriano:
Yeah.
Kerry Diamond:
Okay. And what's your email?
Janett Liriano:
Yeah, j.liriano@inaruvalley.com. And even if you just want to say hello, don't worry, you can send me an email.
Kerry Diamond:
Let's jump ahead to raising money because that is a particular skill of yours. There are a bunch of stats about you. You're one of the only black women out there to have raised over a million dollars for two separate companies.
Janett Liriano:
Yes.
Kerry Diamond:
And while that sounds amazing on paper, I read it a few times and I was like, that shouldn't be a stat of interest.
Janett Liriano:
Yeah, I totally agree with people.
Kerry Diamond:
When you hear about all the money that other folks raise, you've raised more money than we have. We've been raising money for the first time ever. We were bootstrapped for the first 10 years and I find it so painful-
Janett Liriano:
It is.
Kerry Diamond:
To ask people for money. So I'm so impressed by what you've done. But at the same time I'm like, the numbers should be better for women of color. Tell us what's going on?
Janett Liriano:
One, I'm wishing you so much good vibes and aligned partners, you guys are going to get everything you need faster than you think. So I just want to put that energy out there. You're totally right that it's absolutely absurd. When I think about those stats, and I think I was one of the first, I believe and there is an old school or an old tradition of how value is created and who can create it. And some of this stuff is kind of basic human psychology where if someone hasn't seen enough examples of success, the fear factor of a new of like, "Well, I haven't seen a CEO that looks like you, that's done this stuff." It's very visceral. People like to think that investors are rational. And to any of the investors that are listening, I kindly will say the data shows that no, most of these investment decisions are based off of network. They're based off of the mirroring effect. We're all human beings. We make snap judgments based off of familiarity because familiarity creates this for better, for worse false sense of safety with a potential partner.
So I think for me, in order to successfully navigate fundraising in a climate that is hostile, not on purpose necessarily, but just because it wasn't designed for people like us to be moving in that space, I had to really have this, I like to think cheerful attitude of like, it's not personal, but I'm going to make it clear. It's not personal, but let me help you understand that I meet all of your requirements as a seed investment. I want you to rationally explain to me why me coming back when I'm more valuable, have more traction is justified to give you the same price what you're telling.
I would often walk investors through, "So let me understand, you agree with the business case. You think that the leadership is sound, you think the business plan is amazing, you are confident it'll succeed." You're sending me out to go make more money, come back at a higher valuation for you to then invest. You as an investor telling me, "Become more valuable, then come back to me." And that's okay if that's what you're saying, but I'm just going to clarify that that's what you're saying, just so we're on the same page.
So I think part of the reason I was able to fundraise is that I would in a, I don't want to say not non-combative way, but in a very accurate way. I'm not asking you to give me money, I'm giving you an opportunity to be a part of something that you yourself see has potential. And what I'm trying to find is partners that are committed to that potential.
And I will say no to "bad money". The money that's not aligned to where I want to be and how I want to build this business, which meant that Erika and I fundraised literally like 10K here, 25K there, 5K here, our savings there. And then, I mean it took a long time to get the first "large check" of $250,000 to hire other people. We're just all living in a one-bedroom apartment in the D.R. And I'm out here with a data room that's like a series A data room with financial models that to this day were so accurate that we were off by a dollar in terms of what we would be spending this year four years ago.
I don't know anybody that can greenfield the business model with that type of accuracy. And this is what I'm bringing for someone to cut a 100K check. So while that inherent unfairness is extremely frustrating, and I definitely lost a lot of my curls in the process, I'm telling you it was really like that. At the same time, I like to tell folks they're making us much better as leaders. The friction that we get in the marketplace just makes us so sharp, so agile, so cash smart. And then these companies that raise $78 million exist for a year and you've been here for a decade, right? Because you guys know how to run a business, you guys know product market fit. You know what you're doing. So as frustrating as it is, we're the sturdy trees we're going to last. So that's my encouragement to everybody out there. We're going to last.
Kerry Diamond:
I'm so happy for all the entrepreneurs out there to hear that. Tell folks how much you've raised.
Janett Liriano:
Oh, we've just crossed the 10 million threshold, which is crazy, but wonderful, beautiful.
Kerry Diamond:
Feel like if we had a bell in the studio, we could ring the bell. Congratulations.
Janett Liriano:
Yeah. And I also want to encourage folks, Erika and I, and this is just the accuracy of a good business plan. We said we need $10 million when we started building this business and the "we need $10 million", and for folks here, we built a factory in the Dominican Republic. It's an international business to do things right. A lot of people don't invest in the legal, in the tax guidance, in the free trade zone guidance, in the engineering guidance. We had a former Hershey engineer do the engineering, the inner engineering for our factory. We bought some of the best machines in our opinion for a chocolate making shout out to pack into wonderful Italian manufacturers of machines. We were very grateful. And building a factory is a costly endeavor. And in the meantime, paying people equitably, paying our farmers for their beans above market price to build that inventory in the honorable way that we know we want to, it's costly to do it over also, by the way, during the pandemic. But we built that drip for drip 50K here.
Really the last two years, our discipline around supply security and building these long-term relationships with partners, farmer partners, where we give them this profit sharing commitment off the factory has put us in a very competitive position now as a provider, which is where we've been able to close basically half of that capital came in the last year and a half. So $5 million came all together at this perfect storm moment where people are seeing, oh yeah, the farmers are looking for a better way and this business has all the fundamentals and the demand. This is a great place to invest. But it took three and a half years of feeling like crazy people, truly. I was like, "We might be crazy." I'm feeling Erika and I always kind of knew we were crazy, but now I really feel like we might be crazy.
Kerry Diamond:
You could have filmed a reality show around that one bedroom in the...
Janett Liriano:
We really should have. Honestly, I think about that all the time. I don't know how we did that with our parents. And then shout out to Israel, our first employee. I don't know how he survived with all of us in one place, but...
Kerry Diamond:
Erika, did I read that you have a great General Manager?
Janett Liriano:
Oh my gosh-
Kerry Diamond:
For the factory?
Janett Liriano:
Oh my gosh.
Kerry Diamond:
Tell us about her.
Erika Liriano:
Ingry. Ingry Lopez an amazing, amazing hire that we are so excited about. And she came on our team last June. So she's been, it's been about half a year, a little more. And she came from packaging and it's actually really interesting. So one of our largest investors, she used to work at their company when she was first starting and they didn't even know that we were interviewing her because she went on to be General Manager of a major packaging company in the Dominican Republic that's an international company. We just by chance had her resume come across our desk. I was like, well, we need someone who knows about free trade zones in here and really knows how to do the logistics of exporting from the Dominican Republic. It is not something I know how to do and it's not something we want to mess up. So we're like, we need an expert.
We interviewed her, we asked, Hey, we sent her resume along to our investor, La Aurora and we're like, "What do you guys think?" And they're like, "This is Ingry, she's amazing. You have to hire her. She's amazing." And they're like, "We were so sad to see her go." And we're like, "All right, great. We're hiring her." And it's just been such a complete, complete, at least for me, I had been, we always say Janett's a very forward-facing and a very internal-facing. So the factory build was largely my responsibility, my domain-
Janett Liriano:
A hundred percent. She killed that.
Erika Liriano:
Getting it staffed was a major stress for me. I've never ran a factory before. I don't know what I'm looking for and I'm reading and I'm trying to understand a little bit better, what should I be looking for and what are the things, but it's kind of you don't know what you don't know.
And then Janett's always like, "You got to ask the people in the network." So we're like, you know what, La Aurora has a factory. They know, so let me ask them. And it honestly, it's been a complete 180 in terms of how much more I've been able to do with her coming on, which is just a testament to just really amazing boss ladies out there. 100 percent. Truly. And I love her style. She's just so, does not take no for an answer similarly but very warm. And it's just such a great experience working with her.
Janett Liriano:
And the great thing about Ingry is the beauty of leveraging talent from different experience levels. So she's been in the industry for 25 years and has seen so many things. She's done zero to one multiple times. She's worked in sales, she's worked in sourcing, she's done all these different things. And it's really interesting to me that at this peak of her career, she would choose to start at this "risky venture", these young ladies from New York and brings this very unique experience, wisdom, savvy, sobriety as it were, but has that entrepreneurial spirit of we can build this from zero to one again. And it's just very committed to the mission.
And I think that that's also something I would encourage entrepreneurs of all ages, many different people can add value. It's not just like a group of 20 somethings or a bunch of senior cats. Having that diversity of experience creates really meaningful leadership outcomes, really meaningful growth in a business. And I have to, Erika often under place things. That factory, I'm telling you, we would not have had a factory on time in November if Erika wasn't in there every day, project managing, managing these contractors who did a great job, but they were also contractors. So you guys know how that is. Okay. We almost didn't have a ceiling all of October if Erika wasn't there, handling the business, handling the engineers, working closely with Peter Lord, shout out to Peter Lord, ex-Hershey engineers.
So I also do think, and this is one thing I would say in terms of mistakes that we made, is not trusting what we do know. So there's a bit of feedback I give Erika all the time, "You know more about this business and this industry than no joke, 80% of the people that we talk to." And it's easy to feel like an imposter and it's easy to feel like I got to trust an expert, but a lot of them are also hooligans and we know our business and we're willing to take the punch if we're wrong. But yeah, Ingry is incredible, but we also got Ingry because Erika picked her. So just got to say.
Kerry Diamond:
Well done, Erika. You also do profit sharing. How have you figured that out? How are you doing it? I know a lot of people are thinking about that these days.
Janett Liriano:
So I think an important thing is, I mean we've had revenue, but we certainly aren't profitable. So I think it's important to be transparent around the nuance. So in the meantime, we do an equitable premium, which is basically usually 20 to 30% above what the market pays. So regardless of our profitability, they're still earning more because we sell a finished or semi-finished product. Basically we're committing to a higher cost of goods sold regardless of the profitability. But we have that profit sharing commitment as the business grows and commercial strength to create an additional incentive. So even if you're not profitable, one of the things that I'm really motivated by is this concept of ethical margins. There is such a thing, you do not need 99% of the take on a sale. It can be 80, it can be 70, it could even be 65. If that means you have a strong farmer base, if that means that people will want to stay in the industry, you're adding value.
So in our case, we thought about this in the early days, how do we not harm ourselves as we're growing, obviously, but stand by our values? And it just simply became a case of this is the true cost of doing business, which means that we have to position as a premium product. It means we have to position in markets that are going to value these things. It means we're not selling 50 cent chocolate in order to stand on our values. It just limited certain growth paths. It means we're not doing mass. Mass, trying to be the next giant processor. That's not the strategy we're going to take. And I think anyone who's thinking about it, the balance that you need to strike is how fast do I want what I want and how well can I get there together, right? That's the question.
In our experience, the answer was the path to profitability has been slower, but the commitment from our suppliers is that much stronger and it's now putting us in a very demanding position in the marketplace because we have the space of producers who've seen us doing right by them when frankly we didn't have to. And I think it will pay off. It won't pay quickly probably, but when it does, it really does pay dividends as it were. So be patient with your integrity and trust it. People might eat fast now, but they might not eat later. Those are the Janett parables for the day.
Kerry Diamond:
It's so interesting listening to the two of you because it's clear there's no roadmap. You are really building this as you go. Do you have mentors in the industry who are folks you can turn to ask questions?
Janett Liriano:
Erika, I don't know if you want to take the folks you lean on, but I'm such a committee person. I believe in partnership a lot, but what are your thoughts?
Erika Liriano:
Yeah, so for me, in the chocolate industry specifically, I have a lot of chocolate maker friends, but I didn't know them actually before we started. So I feel like I wish I had seeked out sooner, people that I could have relied on earlier in this journey. But now I feel like I do have a pretty good base of people that I can talk to, whether it's either chocolate makers, our investors, two of our largest investors are just so, so brilliant. And so La Aurora is a Dominican company.
Janett Liriano:
Cigars.
Erika Liriano:
Yeah. So they do cigars. They also do the Dominican beer, the iconic Presidente beer. That's the family office that has invested in our business. And they know so much just about moving raw product to a factory, getting it done, and all of those protocols, all the things that for me I was like, "Well, this is very overwhelming." I don't know best practices. Just being able to rely on them has been really, really transformative.
Janett Liriano:
And they share our values. I think the other thing too is pick mentors that have success the way that you want success. I think when people talk about mentorship, it's like how do I get a mentor in an industry I'm not in? Yeah, I would love to have so-and-so be my mentor, but I'm Janett Liriano from Queens. How am I going to get an accurate mentor? And then what I kind of evolved in my own time was like, actually I'm going to find mentors of character and then I'll find mentors who might have the character and the success, but how I get there matters more deeply to me. So I have an interesting committee of mentors. Some of them are stay-at-home moms. One of our mentors is the former CTO of Hershey, Terry O'Day, who's incredible and amazing. But I only got connected to him because I had this other mentor in a completely different industry that I admire as a leader, but had nothing to do with what I was interested in.
This person works in the cannabis industry, it's got nothing to do with what we're doing, but they happen to know someone who knows someone. So I say all that to say, I think we can learn from people we admire and we want to make sure that we're admiring the right things because it'll inform our business and how we make decisions. And I also want to call out Endurance Capital partners. They do quite a lot in food. They're a Chicago-based firm, and it's in their values. We are building enduring equity, we want businesses that last, that create a lasting impact. And impact is defined in these ways. They're investors in a sibling, I call them siblings since we have the same investor, Prospera Foods that does a lot of gluten-free flours and so on. That also protects the farmers in Nicaragua and other parts of Central and South America.
And when I see the integrity and consistency in these investors and these leaders and how they put their beliefs into action, those are the people I care about what you say. I don't necessarily want to talk to someone who's made a trillion dollars by any means necessary. So I also do think be patient with your process and make sure that the person you're talking to is someone you'd like to live as on all sides, it's not just the material success.
Kerry Diamond:
Who are your buddies in the food world or who do you admire?
Erika Liriano:
This is a very little known, I think at least in the States. So there's Yukari Nakano, so she's from Japan. She's one of my dear friends and she has a new cacao brand called CACAOGOTO, and it's specifically ceremonial cacao, but Japanese tea ceremony type. Honestly, if your listeners are interested, which I feel like they would be, definitely check her out, CACAOGOTO.
I went to Japan last year, I went to go see her, set up her shop and it was just so amazing. It was a much smaller shop, much smaller vibe. Actually, she opened it up in her grandma's house, old house, and so she's going to set up a cacao tea ceremony situation there and everything. But right now her sales are mostly online and I look up to her so much because just her journey. So her father is a confectioner, big confectioner in Japan who ended up pivoting away from being probably one of the top five chocolate makers in Japan to being a smaller focused on quality chocolate, chocolate maker before it was even popular in Japan, and it's still not that popular. So just the courage that it took for her father to make that pivot, that change just because he was like, wow, cacao is amazing. It's pretty great if you actually are working with it from the bean and everything.
So I really, really appreciate her and her story because she was actually being raised to be a tea maker. So the traditional Japanese tea ceremony is what her grandmother did, and she was just like, "I just love chocolate. I want to do what my dad does." So for me, her courage to do that in a place where, again, this particular type craft chocolate is new in the states, but it's super new in Japan, and the courage and the care and quality that goes into her products just always blows me away. And she's so kind.
Janett Liriano:
She came to the D.R.
Erika Liriano:
Yeah.
Janett Liriano:
There's actually this amazing community. So a couple of people, I'll call out Charles Kerchner from Zorzal, the Bird Reserve. If you've had good chocolate, you've definitely seen Zorzal, he's also one of our sourcing partners. We deeply admire him. He spends about 10 days out of every month in the D.R. He has a bird Reserve and has some of the finest beans that leave the country are in this reserve. And he's so committed to ethical farmer pay regeneration, we share a lot of values. Altair Rodriguez who headed up our regeneration and sustainability efforts at INARU, but also has the first regenerative cocoa farm in the D.R. Human Rights Activist, just amazing. I'm just like name three people. Jens from Definite Chocolate, who also is our Director of Operations at INARU and is just a genius German Belgian who now lives in the Dominican Republic.
So we have a lot of beautiful people in the cocoa community that we deeply admire. And then one chef, Maria Marte, who's a Michelin star Dominican in Spain, who I hope one day uses our products in a dessert. So Maria Marte, if you're listening, you have fans here. Those are some of my favorite people.
Kerry Diamond:
So this is one thing I've learned raising money, the concept of an exit strategy. Your company is so young, I'm sure you're not super focused on your exit strategy right now because you're clearly in the building phase and doing so many forward thinking things. I'm sure you want to keep doing this for as long as you can, but what is your exit strategy?
Janett Liriano:
Yeah, so unpopular opinion. We don't believe in exit strategies for a business like INARU. So that sounds odd to it's like, so what are your investors going to do? So we have a mix of VCs, family office and private equity folks on the cap table. We are very transparent with our VC investors, like your likely exit is the business is wildly profitable and we buy back your shares or a larger player that's strategic will buy out your equity, but are we going to rush to go public rush to get acquired? That's not the case. We're actually very focused on building a profitable business along these values. And your likely exit is you're owning equity that's very valuable someone will want, and you'll get a multiple on that, but we're building the business to last. And I'll tell you that was not popular. It's like build this thing and sell it as fast as you can to one of the big three or the big five. We were just very emphatically not in that business, so we found go long partners, but it took us like five years.
Kerry Diamond:
Let's do a speed round because you two are clearly busy and have things to get to. Okay. Janett, one of your favorite books on food or a favorite cookbook.
Janett Liriano:
“How to Cook Everything.” It's just so classic.
Kerry Diamond:
Erika?
Janett Liriano:
ChihYu Smith's “Asian Paleo.”
Kerry Diamond:
Best food movie.
Janett Liriano:
“Jiro Dreams of Sushi.”
Erika Liriano:
“Salt Fat Acid Heat.”
Kerry Diamond:
I'm surprised neither of you said “Chocolat.” Have you ever seen that movie?
Erika Liriano:
I haven't.
Janett Liriano:
I haven't seen it.
Kerry Diamond:
You need to watch it.
Janett Liriano:
We're terrible, we haven't seen it. We're bad chocolate people.
Kerry Diamond:
You're busy, but put it on your to-do list.
Janett Liriano:
I will.
Kerry Diamond:
Okay. Janett, favorite kitchen tool.
Janett Liriano:
The cheese grater. I love cheese.
Erika Liriano:
Might be a processor.
Kerry Diamond:
Food processor?
Erika Liriano:
Yeah, I think so.
Kerry Diamond:
Okay. That's good one. Janett, one thing that's always in your fridge?
Janett Liriano:
Chocolate, jelly.
Erika Liriano:
Yogurt.
Kerry Diamond:
Yogurt. Janett, favorite childhood food?
Janett Liriano:
Pizza. I'm such a New Yorker.
Erika Liriano:
Well, since she said pizza, I won't say pizza. I will say La Bandera Dominicana, the Dominican flag, like the-
Janett Liriano:
Chicken, rice, beans.
Erika Liriano:
Yes.
Kerry Diamond:
Snack food of choice.
Janett Liriano:
Popcorn.
Erika Liriano:
Probably yogurt.
Kerry Diamond:
You love your yogurt?
Janett Liriano:
She does.
Erika Liriano:
I love yogurt.
Kerry Diamond:
Maybe that could be your next company. Final question. Have you had to be stuck on a desert island with one food celebrity? Who would it be and why?
Janett Liriano:
Maria Marte. She's a celeb to me. She started as an assistant at this restaurant in Spain and then transformed it into this two Michelin star. She's Dominican, I really admire her. She can cook everything, so I feel like we'd bond.
Erika Liriano:
ChihYu Smith. I was really upset that I missed Asian food after being diagnosed Celiac because of soy sauce. And just her recipes are so great and for me, they've really helped me be able to cope with I can't eat most food outside. So for me, yeah, I feel like she'd be able to figure it out, so.
Kerry Diamond:
Love it. Well, Janett and Erika, you two, honestly, my mind is blown. I mean, you're amazing. I hope all the success in the world comes your way.
Janett Liriano:
Thank you so much. We wish that for you too. I'm excited for your growth. This is going to be a big year. You're the dragon for us, we're just going to be roaring everywhere. We got this.
Kerry Diamond:
Absolutely. You two are the Bombe.
Erika Liriano:
Thank you.
Kerry Diamond:
That's it for today's show. Our theme song is by the band, Tralala. Joseph Hazan is the Studio Engineer for Newsstand Studios at Rockefeller Center. Our Producer is Catherine Baker. Our Associate Producer is Jenna Sadhu, and our Editorial Assistant is Londyn Crenshaw. Thanks for listening, everybody. You are the Bombe.