Episodes

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Chuck Surack transformed a mobile recording studio in his mother's Volkswagen bus into Sweetwater, the largest online retailer of musical instruments and pro audio equipment in the United States. By rejecting price competition and instead building every customer relationship around deeply knowledgeable sales engineers, he created a billion-dollar company that still operates from his hometown of Fort Wayne, Indiana.

Guy Raz sits down with OtterBox founder Curt Richardson on the Advice Line to help three product-driven founders break through scaling and positioning walls. Andy Jeremiah wants to franchise his live game-show business nationally before proving the model remotely. Marissa Valenzuela needs a path to broaden distribution for her fairy-tale inspired teas without losing their narrative charm. Vince Giudice wants proof that premium sustainable baby gear can compete on value, not just ideals. Curt argues that clarity comes before scale, and the brand story has to sell before price or features ever enter the conversation.

After waiting too long to pay his restaurant bill, Aman Narang thought there had to be a better way. His first idea - a mobile payment app - flopped, but that failure revealed a much bigger opportunity. Restaurants were trapped by outdated, expensive point-of-sale systems locked to on-premise servers. So Aman and his co-founders built Toast, a cloud-based operating system for restaurants from scratch. They worked from an unfinished basement, crashed their first launch, survived investor rejection and COVID, and grew Toast into a company that now powers more than 20 percent of U.S. restaurants.

Kenneth Cole joins the advice line to help founders build lasting brands. Matt Jacobs of Pedestrian Project asks how to grow a bootstrapped wellness brand, Levi Case of Swing Sculpt wonders how to price custom golf jewelry, and Emma Fakwade of ISRAELLA KOBLA seeks advice on scaling a made-to-order fashion label. Kenneth shares lessons from 40+ years of Kenneth Cole Productions on storytelling, customer loyalty, and social purpose.

Tom Rinks turned a failed sunscreen concept into a $400 million empire by treating packaging like personality and distribution like performance art. From a fake Cocoa Beach headquarters to an iconic yellow gorilla logo, he engineered desire before most customers ever touched the product. He explains how the "Elvis Principle" of juxtaposed brand traits, a "Trojan Horse" retail strategy, and knowing when to hand off the CEO keys made Sun Bum an acquisition target for SC Johnson.

Jeni Britton returns for an Advice Line special on How I Built This, this time to discuss Floura -- her new fiber-forward food company launched after building Jeni's Splendid Ice Creams into a nationally recognized brand. She reflects on pivoting from ice cream to functional foods, the science behind her 13-gram fiber bars, and why she wants to make fiber accessible without sacrificing taste.

Guy Raz sits down with Krishna Kaliannan to unpack how a Type 1 diabetes diagnosis sparked a personal quest for better breakfast options and ultimately became Catalina Crunch, a high-protein, low-carb cereal brand now doing roughly $200 million in annual sales. Kaliannan talks about baking early batches in his New York City apartment, the challenge of making healthy food taste good enough to compete on grocery store shelves, and the strategic bets that carried the brand from direct-to-consumer experiments to Costco shelves.

On this Advice Line episode, Guy Raz and Spin Master co-founder Ronnen Harary help three small-business owners tackle scaling challenges. Ann Williams wants to expand her Nashville fine-jewelry brand beyond bangles without losing its personal touch. Felix Colon is ready to grow his family's Martha's Vineyard apiary but struggles with a limited product. Matt Smith shares how he turned personal tragedy into Wandering Soul Beer and asks how to scale without burning out.