Will Nitze

Founder, IQBAR (iqbar.com) 🍫+💧+☕️

🍫 Founder/CEO, IQBAR (iqbar.com)
🎙️ Co-Host, "Eating Glass" Podcast
🎓 Harvard BA

Founder/CEO

We make superior brain + body fuel. IQBAR® plant protein bars, IQMIX® hydration sticks, and IQJOE® instant coffees are packed with the functional compounds you need to win your day.

The answer is not to minimize wrongness.

It's to minimize the COST of being wrong.

So you can cycle through many, many wrong answers without dying.

That's the highest-odds path to getting to the *right* answer.

The alternative is buying a lottery ticket.

Run faster, Run longer, and/or Run in unique directions...

1/3 gives you a fighting chance.

2/3 gets you above 50% odds of making it.

3/3 creates an inevitability of success.

"Grass roots" growth sounds romantic.

It isn't.

Most of us are playing an old-school, economies-of-scale game.

Which means we start in a painful (i.e., un-romantic) unit economics hole.

The best (and, arguably, only) path out?

Volume.

And then a careful *leveraging* of that volume.

The best way to achieve volume?

Taking big swings early.

To me, that's romance.

The path to The Goal is the inverse of The Goal.

Reduce optionality so you can later maximize it.

Concentrate bets so you can later diversify them.

Channel negative emotions (jealousy, comparison, anger) so you can later jettison them.

Etc.

Of course this only works if you...

1. know *when* to flip the switch (timing is everything)
2. are able to *actually* flip that switch (many refuse to)
3. *avoid psychological disaster* along the way (which is mostly a function of how you execute on 1 and 2)

Hi! I’m Nick. 
I do innovation strategy.
Mostly for $50MM+ brands.
Mostly for founder-led companies.
First and foremost, to make more healthy + sustainable food.

Why?

Because we have enough unhealthy + unsustainable food.
Because I love founders – their passion, mission, and drive.
Because growth brands need help, and I can help them focus.
Because that’s when brands need an *innovation strategy*.
Because, together, we can make food with real impact.

My process looks, more or less, like this:
1) Brand Strategy – what is your advantage?
2) Consumer Insights – what unmet human needs exist?
3) Trends & Data Analysis – which needs are worth solving?
4) White Space ID – which gaps are we best equipped to fill?
5) Ideation – how might we fill those gaps with innovation?
6) Concept Testing – which innovation ideas are best?
7) Product Brief – what must the product deliver?

I can run with whatever data/strategy/hunches you’ve got.
I can also recommend new ways to help you run smarter.

I’ve done this before. 
A few times.

I spent 8 years working in-house, in brand management with…
Unilever (Popsicle, Klondike, Hellmann’s, Best Foods)
Wells Enterprises (Blue Bunny)
Yum! Brands (KFC)

Then I spent 4 years as a solo innovation consultant for…
Chomps
GoodPop
SkinnyDipped
Pitaya Foods
Unilever (Horlicks)
PepsiCo (Cheetos, Doritos, and Tropicana)

But I’m just getting started.
Because I’m on a mission too – 
To create $500MM in healthy + sustainable food by 2030.

So if our missions overlap,
If you need an innovation strategist,
If you’re looking to make the world of food better, 
Let's connect. Then let's get to work.

Cheers,
Nick

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The Battle

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