Alan Goldstein on enabling defensible business that touch consumers’ lives. 

Welcome to the first edition of Breaking Through, Radicle's series of interviews with individuals at the forefront of big company innovation. We speak with individuals involved in everything from incubation through acquisition, external partners who are helping change how big companies approach innovation, and startups who are partnering with big companies to solve business challenges. We'll explore how some of the world's biggest companies seek to increase the odds of innovation success and break through. Feel free to subscribe below! If you’re interested in participating, please reach out: stu@radicleinsights.com

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Alan Goldstein is a Managing Director at P&G Ventures. He’s a passionate believer that science-based solutions can both touch and change consumers lives and create long-term value for Procter & Gamble. He’s also passionate about how P&G Ventures can be a partner to founders, leveraging P&G’s capabilities and assets to do the heavy lifting for resource constrained early stage startups. And that these passions and a rigorous focus on experimentation will lead P&G Ventures to partner with the next generation of great consumer brands.

If you’re a founder or have intellectual property in areas like Personal Performance and Women's Wellness, two of the 7 focus areas we discuss below, reach out to Alan and P&G Ventures. They are, as he says: “Open for business.”

Tell me about the focus of P&G Ventures.

Innovation is the lifeblood of P&G. Behind every great brand is amazing innovation, and innovation really is the differentiator in an otherwise cluttered marketplace. More than anything else, it’s innovation that creates value for the consumer and, in turn, the shareholders.

For P&G Ventures, in the short term, we’re focused on finding solutions that are based on science and will be able to deliver against certain pain points that we've identified for consumers. And as we start to create a network of partnerships, in the longer term, we want to become companies’ preferred partner.

As entrepreneurs and startups are trying to position their businesses for growth, we want to offer ourselves as a resource in key strategic areas. There are a few things that we bring to the table. Since we're not using capital to differentiate our corporate capabilities, it’s the things that P&G does and has done for many years – things like brand building, consumer insights, manufacturing, supply chain, distribution, communication – that set us apart from the competition. We're really in service of entrepreneurs and the mission of accelerating their businesses.

I think we’ll look very different as a company in ten years’ time. On one hand, we’ll definitely continue to do the kind of work that has gotten us to where we are today. But on the other, if we’re going to be a preferred partner in this digital world, we’re going to have to keep expanding our ability to efficiently test, iterate and prop up businesses. Ten years from now, we’ll have fully developed a unique methodology that I believe the startup community will be yearning for.

To do so, we’ve got to iterate and run a lot more experiments, specifically external-facing experiments, because let’s face it – if we all knew the answers, we would have acted on them already. The ability to reach beyond the core and seek answers to difficult questions is imperative for top- and bottom-line growth.

We’ve also got to focus on our ability to design to scale. Because anything that’s structurally attractive, anything that gives us a clear line of sight on supply chain and distribution, will make it easier for us to talk to consumers and create the value that they’re willing to pay for.

How is P&G Ventures approach unique?

So P&G Ventures is not an investment arm of the company. That’s because we realized that capital is not a differentiator in this world – there's already a lot of money going around. In this new world we live in, what matters is not how much capital you have, but how able you are to come up with unique solutions and deliver superior experiences to the consumer. This ability is always the strongest indicator of a startup’s entrepreneurial mentality. 

At P&G Ventures, I’m focused on scouting and discovery. So my work is primarily concentrated on external partnerships with the smartest and most talented entrepreneurs and startups. And since we’re aiming to discover new brands in core categories that are outside of what we already do, I’m mostly looking for unique, innovative solutions that have a strong foundation in science. That means that so much of what we do is new for us.

In partnerships, one size does not fit all, so it can take on many shapes. The form that a partnership takes depends first and foremost on what the entrepreneur is bringing to the table and where they currently are in their journey. So there are two essential questions we’re asking whenever we’re in the process of figuring out how a partnership will function. The first is, “How can we create value together?” And the second is, “How can we help accelerate their learnings, which will, in turn, help us?”

I’m really proud of our ability to partner with startup community entrepreneurs. We’ve shown that we can help create businesses and accelerate growth. And the second thing I’m proud of is our ability to create new brands. It's been some time since the company has created a brand from scratch, but we're well on our way to doing it again.

Everyday, I’m striving to acquire enough knowledge so that I can really lean into my work. With the proper expertise in a given field, it becomes much easier to recognize win-win opportunities when working with external partners.

The ability to touch so many consumers’ lives is really exciting. P&G has a pretty unique reach that allows us to touch about 5 billion consumers every day. There are very few companies that can do that.

You mentioned reach, how can P&G uniquely help science-based entrepreneurs?

Our biggest selling point is the corporate capability that we have to offer. We do a lot of the heavy lifting for startups, who tend to be resource constrained: they may not have the time to think about the consumer insights, messaging, brand building, how to set up supply chain and distribution, and sourcing raw materials for manufacturing –  all things we have plenty of experience in. And, of course, we pride ourselves on our ability to cater our work to the specific needs of each individual entrepreneur. So we’re only going to help out in the areas where our partner stands to gain from our assistance and guidance.

We’re never going to agree to a partnership with a startup if we’re not already confident that P&G systems can be scaled and leveraged to complement their business model. That means that every partnership we enter into comes with the strong belief that our systems can be implemented quickly and effectively. Most of us have started small businesses that became really big successes, so we've been in the trenches; we know how to do this.

Also, P&G Ventures is extremely serious about our commitment to science-based solutions – startups and entrepreneurs need to know that about us. We really believe that science provides our ultimate competitive advantage. As a company, we’re never planning to work in a given category for just another two to five years – we’re starting these businesses because we hope they’re going to be around for decades to come! And that kind of long-term commitment only works when we’re devoted to robust, groundbreaking science. Otherwise, we’d have a much tougher time delivering superior products to the consumer.

Are there any examples of new brands that you’d like to highlight?

One is Pepper & Wits (https://pepperandwits.com/), which is centering its brand around menopause – there’s a lot of pain for consumers in that area, and not a lot of solutions outside of a hormonal patch.

Another is Bodewell (https://www.m13.co/launchpad-companies/bodewell/), which focuses on treatments for dermatological conditions such as psoriasis and eczema. In this case, the solutions currently available to consumers are almost exclusively steroid-based, and consumers don't want to be on steroids for the rest of their lives. So Bodewell has a botanical approach to these problems that seems to be just as effective as steroids. It has really changed consumers’ lives.

Finally, there’s Zevo (https://www.zevoinsect.com/), which creates solutions for insect control. Nobody wants bugs on their body or in their home, but today’s most popular solutions are based in neurotoxins. We've partnered with some entrepreneurs who have solutions comprised of food-based ingredients. These solutions are completely harmless to humans but just as effective.

I’m especially excited about the reach that comes with new, emerging areas. For instance, thanks in no small part to tech’s expanding capabilities, health care and personal care are converging in order to meet the next generation of consumers’ needs. As these two sectors continue to consolidate, their respective reaches are expanding significantly.

What can big companies do to encourage experimentation?

No one is consistently doing great experimentation. The startup world as a whole does it really well, but there’s no one person who is doing it correctly time and time again, and there are a lot of entrepreneurs and company founders who have conducted very successful experiments. As far as big corporations go, I think some folks in the beverage industry are doing some solid experimentation – Anheuser Busch in particular. But everyone is consistent to some extent.

There’s nothing new about this inconsistency: back in the 80s, a study at Nestle generated a ton of value by inspiring the creation of Nespresso. But since then, Nestle hasn’t continued to do the same kind of innovative, daring experimentation. That's what's especially tough – how do you consistently move forward? 

And there’s no cure-all to this question, because each business and each partnership is a little different. You’ve got to keep teams lean on both sides so that you can learn how to quickly pivot and adjust when necessary.

I think some of the inconsistency absolutely has to do with public companies’ tendency to focus on short-term outlooks in lieu of long-term ones. There's definitely a ton of external short-term pressure. But I also think that ring-fencing and having the right kind of organization can go a long way towards fostering a culture of innovation. It's really hard for a core corporation to work on new innovations, because they’re so set on what has already worked and how they can continue to make it work, instead of attempting to iterate and innovate. More often than not, any idea that’s a little different is difficult for a company to embrace – that’s the problem.

What areas are you most excited about?

At the moment, there are seven core areas we're most interested in: Non-Toxic Home and Garden, Personal Performance, Women's Wellness, Chronic Conditions, Male Wellness, The Aging Consumer, and Sleep. 

For entrepreneurs in these areas, we're open for business, and that's the greatest part of my job – I get to meet amazing entrepreneurs in all different kinds of fields.

They can reach us on LinkedIn, or through the portal on our website. They can also reach me personally via LinkedIn or Twitter. I’m pretty responsive on that front, so reaching us should not be a barrier at all.

Relevant links:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alan-goldstein-87a20b9/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/asgoldstein

P&G Ventures: https://pgventuresstudio.com/