Today we’d like to introduce you to Mary Piper.
Mary, can you briefly walk us through your story – how you started and how you got to where you are today.
Three years ago, I moved out to San Diego from Omaha, NE to join my husband (who had moved out here to work for a tech company). That was right when I got in contact with our business partner who was looking for someone to create clean, delicious bean dip recipes that were plant-based, gluten-free and organic. As a food scientist who had spent many years on the finished product side of things, I was ready to take this project on! My husband, Seth, and I have done a lot of traveling and are extremely passionate about food, so I decided to take inspiration from our travels and incorporate it into BeanVivo. After spending a year in formulation, we finally scaled our product with our co-packer and launched a booth in the Little Italy Farmer’s Market in 2018! We spent the better part of that year at Little Italy, as well as other various Farmer’s Markets and events building a community around our brand. Seth and I went to Seattle late that summer to get a 1971 VW Bus and drove it down the coast to San Diego, but turned it into a “Bean Tour” stopping at various places like Pike’s Place Market in Seattle to promote BeanVivo and hand out samples of our beans. What an adventure! Once 2019 came around, we found ourselves hitting the shelves of major grocery chains in San Diego and Los Angeles – including Whole Foods! Although 2020 has just started, we are excited for what it has to offer!
We’re always bombarded by how great it is to pursue your passion, etc – but we’ve spoken with enough people to know that it’s not always easy. Overall, would you say things have been easy for you?
Ask anyone over 30 years old if it has been a smooth road. I think you’ll be hard-pressed to find anyone who won’t admit to having their fair share of woes. Though my life and business journey has had struggles, I don’t believe any worse than most. It’s always best to take any obstacles or challenges that present themselves and turn them into positive learning opportunities. I am reminded of a time when my business partner asked me to create a specific “heritage” flavor. Anthony Bourdain once claimed this particular flavor to be one of the most painstakingly difficult to make, yet one of the most exciting on the planet. Pairing it with beans and making it fit our criteria was going to be difficult. After a myriad of variations and lots of tossed batches, I finally came to what I believed to be something that resembled this heritage flavor. Unfortunately, I was never completely satisfied with the formula and neither was my team. We scrapped the project in favor of other priorities. As a perfectionist, this still burns a bit when I get to thinking about it. The best advice I can give is don’t be afraid to fail – embrace your failures and move on! Sometimes failures teach us lessons and influence other successes.
We’d love to hear more about BeanVivo.
I’m a food scientist and Director of R&D for BeanVivo. I wear various other hats, but my main gig is taking healthy ingredients and making them delicious! Thankfully, inspiration is EVERYWHERE when you love food like I do! At BeanVivo, we get to have fun by taking the inspiration from our experiences and combining them with ingredients which we know to be both healthy and sustainable. I love that I get to be creative, but I also love how tight our team is and how much we all contribute to that creativity. Just like everyone has a story, everyone on our team has a say in our product offerings, promotions, etc. In order to keep our product as universal as possible, it’s Organic, Plant-Based, and Gluten-Free. Outside of those few criteria, I’ve pretty much been given creative control, which for me is a dream come true.
Finding a mentor and building a network are often cited in studies as a major factor impacting one’s success. Do you have any advice or lessons to share regarding finding a mentor or networking in general?
As an introverted bookworm, I haven’t always been the best about finding a mentor or networking with my peers. But, owning a business forces you to step outside your comfort zone quite often. Outside of BeanVivo, I also consult for various other food companies on FDA laws and about six years ago, I was coerced (under protest) into teaching a soapmaking class (which I eventually fell in love with) and I have continued doing so at regular intervals ever since. With the soap class in particular, I found myself networking with other companies and groups very naturally. I’ve been very happy to teach the class at breweries, outdoor stores, mother-daughter groups, and various others which seemed to fall into place with little effort. So my advice is, if you need a push, find someone to push you. Otherwise, be passionate and confident and networking will happen on its own. Just remember to keep in touch with the people you meet.
Contact Info:
- Address: 1455 Frazee Road, #500
San Diego, CA 92108 - Website: www.beanvivo.com
- Email: mary@vivotribe.com
- Instagram: @beanvivo
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/beanvivo/
Image Credit:
BeanVivo
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