E06: How To Clearly Communicate Your Product's Value
Struggling to get your team aligned with your company's goals?
It's probably because your mission statement feels more like an empty promise than a clear directive.
Find out why most mission statements fail and how to craft one that not only communicates your vision clearly but actually drives results and team engagement.
📒 Show Notes and Resources 📒
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Kellen Ketchersid
Kellen is a co-founder of Stag Business Coaching, business strategist, and a systems thinker. He leverages his extensive experience in biotech and consulting to empower entrepreneurs to navigate complex challenges with strategic growth solutions.
Albert Gillispie
Albert is a serial entrepreneur, business efficiency expert and co-founder of Stag Business Coaching who has founded several multimillion-dollar companies. With expertise in optimizing operations and innovative systems, he mentors business leaders who want to unlock their business’s full potential.
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BUSINESS GROWTH MASTERCLASS PODCAST
Introduction
00:00 Albert Gillispie: Welcome to the Business Growth Masterclass Podcast, where business growth is made simple. Listen, as we discuss best practices to streamline your operations, increase your profits, and ultimately create healthier, more stable, and more valuable companies. Hear from experts on how they grew their businesses, learn from their wins, their losses, and everything in between.
00:22 Albert Gillispie: I'm your host, Albert Gillispie. And with me as always is my co-host, Kellen Ketchersid. Hello. And today's episode is special. We get to interview a local entrepreneur trying to make a nationwide impact.
Our guest today is Sarah Burnett, and she is the owner of Texas Earth. Texas Earth manufactures natural products designed to balance and sustain the soil for farmers, while also lowering their expenses and improving their yields.
00:55 Albert Gillispie: Her business checks all the boxes. So in today's episode, we learned how she got started and how she uses her why in business to educate and solve her customers' problems. Welcome to the podcast.
01:07 Sara Burnett: Thank you for having me.
Introducing Sarah Burnett and Texas Earth
01:08 Albert Gillispie: All right, back at it. We had some technical difficulties, completely my doing. I'm, I'm certain, but would you tell our audience, what does Texas Earth do?
01:19 Sara Burnett: Yes. So we're a family-owned business located in Lubbock and we manufacture natural and organic soil amendments and ship them all over the U.S. to all kinds of growers. That's something I left out the first time. All right. Every size of grower.
01:34 Kellen Ketchersid: Even better the second time around here. So tell our audience what soil amendments are.
01:38 Sara Burnett: Yes. Soil amendments are products designed to enhance different features of the soil or soil profile. So good things, doing good things in the soil.
01:49 Albert Gillispie: And why, why would a farmer want that in their, why would they want to do that for their soil? What does it do for them?
01:56 Sara Burnett: Well, it could be that they're fixing a certain problem or a deficiency, say of a micronutrient. Or they want to enhance some sort of plant function through the addition of an amendment designed to enhance a certain, let's say root exudation for instance, or they want to try to balance their carbon to nitrogen ratio, or they have some other purpose in all of those things.
So to improve the overall health and wellness, or you think of this as fitness, you want to improve the fitness of the soil so that their crops grow better, have better yields, or are more profitable essentially.
02:31 Kellen Ketchersid: So your, your products are putting more new microbes right in the soil and fungi is, is that
02:38 Sara Burnett: are like, are you a fun guy? I try to be as much as I can. Yes. I used to have a t-shirt that it said fungal strains doing fungal things.
02:47 Kellen Ketchersid: Nice.
Benefits of Soil Amendments for Farmers
02:47 Sara Burnett: It is fun. Yeah. So our, our flagship product is Bionectra liquid, which is a liquid microbial amendment, and it is designed to enhance that soil fitness. Through the addition of beneficial bacterial and fungal strains.
03:03 Kellen Ketchersid: So it's like giving the soil a probiotic.
03:06 Sara Burnett: Yes.
03:06 Kellen Ketchersid: If I was trying to put it in layman's terms. Nailed it. Okay. Perfect. A plus. Thank you.
03:10 Albert Gillispie: There seems like such a, I mean, at least in, I don't know if COVID broke everybody or what, There is definitely a more functional medicine movement, at least in, in some of our, our friend circles is everyone is trying to look at the root cause, you know, what food am I putting in my body and how is that affecting, affecting me? And so some of this seems like the same vein of, of how can we take care of the soil that then, you know, what chemicals are we putting in that?
03:45 Albert Gillispie: And I know that that affects, Yields, it affects people's health. I don't know. Is that all the same thing?
03:52 Sara Burnett: So you hit on several different important topics there. So after post-COVID life, you know, it is a raised awareness. People go, I can't go out. I need to grow my own food. What does it take to start a market garden? What does it take to grow something in my backyard? How do I know that this–
And so I think so much education has come from, you know, that experience that there's not more awareness now, especially in the home market and landscape and backyard gardener, DIY kind of section. They go, I want better food for my family and for myself. I feel better when I eat better.
And it starts with the soil. And so a good way to measure, people can measure what they're growing in their backyard is through something called a refractometer. And it measures the bricks of sugar in a fruit or a vegetable.
And it's a very inexpensive piece of equipment. And you put a little, you know, liquid like fruit juice, essentially from the plant, and you look up at the sun and there's a measurement there, but those bricks correspond with the sugars and those sugars tell you hey, is this a nutrient dense product or is it not very high quality?
So essentially when we go to the grocery store, we should be shopping for hybrids. We should not be shopping for something that says, you know, I mean, organic is great and that's fine. But like, you know, it's not, it shouldn't be by price. That's for sure.
Educating People about Soil Health
05:19 Kellen Ketchersid: Hybrids, meaning nutrient dense food, yeah.
05:22 Sara Burnett: And that's a very easy way for anybody listening to this to go, okay, I can now take a little bit of control back in the food that I'm, you know, putting in my body or giving to my kids as I can shop. Buy bricks, which means quality. We need to be shopping by quality.
05:37 Kellen Ketchersid: So is that on the label when you're buying it? Heck no. Okay. I didn't think so. I've never seen that before. You
05:42 Sara Burnett: think there's people out there that want that on the label? No, they do not, but it's just a way for people to. Kind of cut through all of the labeling question marks and go, is this, and there are other foods that are now becoming more GMO or designed that to enhance the bricks in that way, but most things aren't there yet.
06:01 Kellen Ketchersid: So you would say, or I'm, I'm guessing, would you say that Texas Earth's products Are the kinds of things that farmers need in their soil so that they can increase the bricks and the nutrient density of the, the things that they produce or the sure. Okay. And
06:16 Sara Burnett: the, the modality of that is that the bacterial and the fungal strains are breaking things plant. Available nutrients down and making them available for the plant to take up and then to use and, you know, the addition of microbial products, a lot of times allows for a reduction in a chemical application because the plants are now making what they need versus having to be supplemented.
06:39 Kellen Ketchersid: So meaning if I'm a farmer and I use your product now, I may not need to spray as much or maybe use as much of whatever it was synthetically, because, you know, Well,
06:50 Sara Burnett: you, you have to, you can pay more attention and you have a little bit more flexibility.
06:54 Sara Burnett: I don't think that one replaces. another necessarily when you're farming in a certain way. There's people that farm completely chemical free. There's people that are full on chemical. I mean, but
07:05 Kellen Ketchersid: at
07:06 Sara Burnett: any stage, good soil health is going to benefit your production. Right. So as we talked earlier, it was kind of like the, the methodology of the people that maybe are. heavy tillage and all these other things, they could really benefit, everybody benefits from it because we just want to move the needle for people. We just want to edge them a little closer to knowing more about soil health and appreciating the benefits to being a good steward of the soil. This is not an exclusionary situation.
07:36 Sara Burnett: It's not what's right or wrong. There's none of that in this conversation. It is simply about. Educating and improving overall soil quality through amendments. I just happen to have amendments that are natural or certified organic.
07:51 Albert Gillispie: Very cool.
07:52 Sara Burnett: Yep.
The Role of Soil Amendments in Agriculture
07:52 Albert Gillispie: So if I can rephrase some of that, a lot of this is Farmers that are rotating different crop fields because they're depleting the nutrients and maybe there's disease that is becoming an issue or the nutrients aren't in the soil, so they're not getting the same yields.
08:09 Albert Gillispie: And so this is a treatment to put back in the soil, make the foundation that much healthier so that then you have better yields and healthier crops.
08:20 Sara Burnett: Yeah, I mean, there is going to be a natural depletion of nutrients and resources as people farm over and over again, and it is super beneficial to rotate.
08:30 Sara Burnett: It is super beneficial to incorporate, you know, animal husbandry, if you will, into your program. And those people generally are generally, I should say, are more open to like soil health kind of topics and ideas. They've heard of it before. A lot of people want to refer to what we do as regenerative agriculture.
08:47 Sara Burnett: I think that has a pretty broad definition really when you can get down to it, but it's more about approaching production from multiple levels and our particular piece of the puzzle is soil health.
08:59 Kellen Ketchersid: Healing the soils of the earth. Is that what you said? Yeah, absolutely. What was so cool to me as I was learning about you guys and what you do is how long this has been going on, because I feel like this is a cool hot thing, you know, that people talk about, but Texas earth has been around for a long time, right?
The Challenges of Being a Business Owner
09:18 Kellen Ketchersid: So can you tell us a little bit about the origin story and how Texas earth came to be?
09:24 Sara Burnett: Very good origin story. It's not like Star Trek or Star Wars, whatever. But so my dad started Texas Earth in 2004. He really was doing it a few years before then. I'd kind of been in and out of agriculture his whole life and was reintroduced to a natural product called bioflora that sort of opened the door for him.
09:43 Sara Burnett: And it was a natural type chicken based fertilizer. And from there, he just. The seed was planted and it just flourished. And so 2004, he incorporated, we were in Brownfield at that time. And, and then 2016, we moved to our location, Texas earth to the Idaho highway, so same road, other side of town, right. And he passed away in 2016.
10:06 Sara Burnett: And so I've just kind of tried to keep the flame alive and keep making quality products for our customers.
10:13 Kellen Ketchersid: It's awesome. It's just, he was so far ahead of the game, your dad in starting this and, and seeing the need for good soil health. I just think it's amazing that such a visionary to be able to, to understand that problem way before the conversations that we're having today, right?
10:30 Kellen Ketchersid: Yeah,
10:30 Sara Burnett: Absolutely. He was ahead of his time. There was a group of people that he worked with, some kind of was the dream team, if you will. And they all live different places and have different Products across the U S and they sort of formed this group and they would go around and solve people's problems for them and in natural ways.
10:47 Sara Burnett: And so anyway, it's, it's a really great story. And I know that he would be excited about kind of the direction that we're still heading and that we're still helping people after 20 years.
10:56 Albert Gillispie: Yeah.
10:57 Sara Burnett: I'm sorry he's not here to see it. That's for sure.
10:59 Albert Gillispie: Yeah. Yeah. Tell me about, so second generation now owner of this business.
11:07 Albert Gillispie: Tell me about that. Tell me about that process of you coming in and, and picking up the reins and kind of learning a different side of the business. What was, what was that like?
Taking Over the Family Business
11:17 Sara Burnett: Sure. My dad asked me to kind of come back and help him when I moved back to Lubbock in 2012 and I had another full-time job at the time.
11:22 Sara Burnett: So I did both, sitting at, you know, my desk in Brownfield. And I'd always known what he did in a certain way, but really sitting there, listening to him talk and interact with customers and seeing the backside of the business all the way from learning QuickBooks, which I had no idea how to do, all the way to logistics and production and employee management—it was the entire picture of the puzzle that I got to experience, kind of one level at a time.
11:50 Sara Burnett: And really what I took away most from that was the passion. That he had, I mean, the commitment, the connections, the reasoning behind it. And I'll tell anybody y'all never need to be my dad. I'm never going to be the person that he was, but I'm going to be the person I am. And we're going to take it forward in a way that makes sense to me as the leader.
12:09 Sara Burnett: Now, 20 years, a lot has happened. Just look at the marketing aspect of a business, you know, 20 years later, we used to, he used to send out postcards, right? That's part two. Yeah. And now we're podcasting on a, whatever day this is, Thursday. So lots has changed, but the marketing aspect, social media has been a huge, I think, benefit to us and it has expanded our footprint.
12:36 Sara Burnett: We have a couple of different, one retail website, one informational website, and I've really sort of tried to find the strengths I have personally and build on those because the science was there. And that continues to grow and change, but, you know, his legacy was to heal the souls of the earth and figure out how to do it in an affordable and effective way by a locally, you know, locally made products by a family-owned business.
12:59 Sara Burnett: And one thing that we kind of excel in, in a very commodity-driven, hostile world events type, you know, market is that most of what we have is sourced domestically. So we're not as susceptible to those giant fluctuations in ingredients or delivery times or world events. It's something that you can get very quickly and we're able to keep our costs affordable because of that.
13:25 Sara Burnett: That we're not out there, kind of, you know, importing things essentially.
13:29 Kellen Ketchersid: That's awesome. I feel like you're checking so many boxes that a lot of people in the ag industry and farming care about in terms of, I mean like having healthy soil and having something that's American made and family-owned. Like these are all, it just
13:43 Sara Burnett: cue the flag.
13:44 Sara Burnett: You see the flag back here. Yeah,
13:46 Kellen Ketchersid: but that's
13:46 Sara Burnett: important to me too.
13:47 Kellen Ketchersid: That's good. I feel like your dad maybe took the business, you know, had this established product line, but there's obviously this advantage to you now and what you bring to the table. It's just cool to see. It's always cool to see second-generation businesses and how, how things evolve over time, you know, as yeah.
14:06 Sara Burnett: And from a, I don't know, financial side, we can talk about that too. I didn't inherit the business. I bought the business,
14:14 Kellen Ketchersid: which is unique for second generation. Yeah,
14:17 Sara Burnett: absolutely. So there's a misconception that, you know, my dad passed away here, here's this token run with it. And that was not the case. I didn't want to do it that way.
14:26 Sara Burnett: It's mine to grow and it's mine to lose. And this is not anything that was given to me
14:32 Kellen Ketchersid: skin in the game.
14:33 Sara Burnett: Absolutely. And I wanted it that way too, because my mom had, you know, a legacy in this as well. You know, she needed to benefit. And so anyway, we designed it that way on purpose, but it is kind of a misconception that every legacy business or every family business is just going to be inherited.
14:48 Sara Burnett: And that is not the case in a lot. I think a large, I think people would be surprised about how many. They're actually purchased over just given or inherited or in a trust or things like that.
15:00 Albert Gillispie: You've talked a lot about the, the legacy that your dad built, and then mentioned the different strengths that you now bring to the business.
15:08 Albert Gillispie: Well, so describe what are the, what are those, what strengths do you see in yourself that you've developed since taking over the business and growing it? What, what do you, what is like your, your wheelhouse? What are your strengths? You brag, this is cue brag on yourself. Can
15:26 Sara Burnett: I hide? This is not, well, so I'm just, I'm able to utilize more marketing and get a little creative in that regard.
15:36 Sara Burnett: I enjoy meeting people. And so did he, I think that I've put myself out there in ways that he may not have or made connections that he might not have, you know, cultivated because he was busy. Yeah. So I think I'm, I have a lot of energy and I'm creative in that vision. And it's very important for me to seek wisdom and guidance from people who are experts in their area.
15:58 Sara Burnett: I don't know everything there is to know about everything. That's why we're friends, right? Y'all are the experts in a lot of, in a lot of areas. And I have to go find those people that are. Are excited about my business and want to help and can lend advice or education or services. So I'm not saying he didn't do that, but I recognize the importance of bringing in a great team of people and what their seats are on the bus.
16:25 Sara Burnett: You have to have the right bus, the right size bus, and the right people on the bus and the right seats. And that's really what my goal is, is to find the perfect team of people that we're all heading in the same direction.
16:36 Albert Gillispie: Great answer. You did it. So one thing that, that a strength that I have seen in anytime you start going down this path, like you just, you light up, I feel like you are an educator at heart.
16:49 Albert Gillispie: Like as soon as you start talking about the science and what this can do for people, like you light up. Thanks. And, and, Which I mean, which means you care, you're passionate about it. And that that's amazing. You know, the listeners of our podcasts are business owners, business leaders in other areas. And so maybe can you talk about how do you go about educating?
17:13 Albert Gillispie: Because a lot of what you do, like. You need to get it. And sometimes they have to, you know, you need to understand in order to see value. And so how do you go about educating customers? Like, what does that look like?
17:25 Sara Burnett: It depends on the customer and what their level is of interest is. I love to host little like first and second graders at Texas earth.
17:32 Sara Burnett: And we do little field trips and it's so cute. And I have a little spill for the first graders where we talk about earthworms and what they do and we get, you know, we kind of have that level and then all the way up to our professors at Texas Tech who are way smarter than I am, but can see past my knowledge level, you know, just really try to meet people where they're at.
17:55 Sara Burnett: And key in on something that really interests them. And then maybe deep dive into why [00:18:00] that it's important for them to understand. Most people understand nutrient density. Does my food taste good? And is it good for me? That's kind of the general place to start with most people. And then you can build on the reasons behind all of that.
18:12 Sara Burnett: Um, I have a friend who lives in Nebraska and every time we talk, it's about the periodic table. You know what I mean? Like super boring, but I love it. And that excites me too. So you just really find that connection and then build on that. I have had the ability to have a little bit more outreach through the opportunities at the Texas Tech Innovation Hub.
The Importance of Education in Business
18:33 Sara Burnett: That sort of opened a lot of doors for me to talk about my passion and this business and to educate people about what we do and why it matters to them. I do think that there is a, you know, belief most people can't grow their own food. They don't know how, they don't know where to start. They don't know what matters.
18:52 Sara Burnett: Some of those sweet little first graders that came didn't know what a carrot looked like. They pulled it out of the ground and held it up. And he said, what do I do with this? Sweet little kid, he had no teeth. It was so cute. I knocked off the dirt and I said, well, eat it. I don't think so.
You know, it was like, you have to, you know, you have to educate people about where their food comes from, but he'd never seen a carrot that wasn't cut up in a perfect little shape in a bag, you know, and that's not a problem, but it is exciting when you can open people's eyes about the most important thing, you know, the food that we eat, probably that's something we do every day, all of us, right. We need to be paying more attention to it.
19:31 Kellen Ketchersid: Well, something that I'm taking away from this that I think would be great for any business owner to think about is what are you passionate about? How can you connect to as many people as possible in relation to what you're doing with your business? And I think it's so cool that you're, you're having conversations with first graders all the way up to tech professors.
19:48 Kellen Ketchersid: And I think there's a lot that a lot of business owners could learn from that in terms of just being able to speak on multiple levels and also having the humility to know when this is in my wheelhouse, but that guy over there at tech, he sure knows a lot about this. Maybe he can open up some ideas for me and my business.
20:06 Sara Burnett: yeah, and it's important for me to have accurate information to give to our customers. This morning I was working with Dr. Young, the turf grass professor at tech. We were putting out trials today, but when it was running before this, because I want to make sure to be able to tell my customer, uh, Best practices, application rates, not just take a guess at it.
20:23 Sara Burnett: That's not what we're here to do. We really want to help people in a way that they're not overspending and that they're educated about what they're doing and that they have a choice. And I think that's really important to highlight today is that, you know, you can do, you can grow your food any way you want to grow your food.
20:40 Sara Burnett: But I want to make sure that you have the choice of natural or organic products that are effective. Here in the love book area or available online or wherever the case may be. Because people don't know what to buy. They don't know what to, you want to go buy a soul amendment. Do you, can you name a soul amendment?
20:58 Kellen Ketchersid: Yeah, me neither.
20:59 Sara Burnett: But you know that they're out there. You just don't really know about them.
21:02 Kellen Ketchersid: Well, I know about bio nectar liquid. I've heard it's pretty good. Texas earth. com. Yeah.
21:06 Sara Burnett: Yeah. So it really, I mean, it's about education. You're a hundred percent correct. And I just have recently developed a product called perky turf.
21:18 Sara Burnett: And that came to be through an influencer. Her name is Angel Gist. She's the perky plant parent and we sort of partnered up. There's a lot of peas and all that, but, uh, I just thought I'm going to take what we have and I'm going to put it in a blend that somebody could buy in a bucket or a bag and know that it was already designed.
21:36 Sara Burnett: With the appropriate application amounts and just I can enhance my soil immediately without having to think about it and knowing that all those products are safe and natural.
21:47 Kellen Ketchersid: That's instead
21:48 Sara Burnett: of having to go out and buy a bag of this and a bag of that and do research on every single individual product.
21:54 Sara Burnett: I put what we had together. And made perky turf so that you can just buy what you need and not worry about it.
22:00 Kellen Ketchersid: I was thinking about this yet. Like, I don't know. It was not yesterday. It was two days ago. We were in the garden and it's basically clay and I was like, what do I need to mix in here to make this?
22:09 Kellen Ketchersid: Actually good. So we just need to get some perky turf, I guess.
22:11 Sara Burnett: There you go.
22:15 Albert Gillispie: It is super striking, just like the creativity you have, like the education piece, like educating people about your products, like that, that's hard. And that's not everybody's, that's not everybody's strength, but you just breathe that and the, the, the creativity there of like the field trips, the, engaging with the local university and, and trying to get in, into, you know, put together different studies that, that also helps the universities.
22:43 Albert Gillispie: And so like your education, what is, what I'm pulling from that is your education opportunities, you're creating win-wins. And so it's a school, they need field trips, it's local, it's easy, it's, they get their hands in the dirt, you know, that's, that's like a win for the school, but also you're, you're getting to spread your message or, you know, I mean, that's, that's a long term play for first and second grader, but, and then the, the, on the university side, it's, they need studies, they need to publish papers.
23:13 Albert Gillispie: They need to apply for grants or whatever that helps the university, but it also helps you. And so just how creatively your brain works in that is how can you create win-win scenarios and also educate people and spread the message and share your service and the goods that you produce with people. That's like, that's fascinating.
23:35 Sara Burnett: The selling is really the by-product, honestly. I mean, it's what funds everything. Sure. But that's the consequence or that's the, you know, what happens after all of these other. You know, things bounce off each other and that's just a side effect really is getting to sell something.
23:52 Sara Burnett: But all of these other things over here that you can just aim for what's important and provide value.
23:56 Kellen Ketchersid: And then sales come, right?
23:58 Sara Burnett: I think so. Provide education. I mean, you don't know what you don't know until you don't or until you do, however you want to look at that. And so I think I'd like to have the opportunity to just educate people about some basics and.
24:14 Sara Burnett: Make it not so scary, honestly.
24:17 Kellen Ketchersid: So I'm curious, we've been talking about a lot of great things about Texas earth, but I know that being a business owner isn't always easy, right? So can you share with us maybe one of the challenges that you've had to overcome? And just kind of talk us through what that was like,
24:35 Sara Burnett: pick one.
24:37 Kellen Ketchersid: And it's up to you.
24:39 Sara Burnett: Geez. Well, so I'm in a unique position because I am everything from the COO, CO, CFO, C whatever, and all the O's all the way down to like the janitor, like there's only have one full-time employee and then we utilize 1099 folks as well. And. I have to know every facet of my business.
25:01 Sara Burnett: I might have different challenges if I had a little bit more help in an administrative way, or if I had, you know, some HR person or whatever the case may be. So planning ahead has become more and more important to me, really knowing what the numbers are, what the numbers mean? Just because you have money in the bank, doesn't mean that you're doing good.
25:20 Sara Burnett: You're doing okay. It just means that today you have money in the bank or lack thereof, you know, just depending on the situation. So knowing and accepting that I can't do it all. Yeah. And finding the right people because there have been several bad actors, if you will, along the way that say, Hey, I can help you.
25:38 Sara Burnett: I know all about that. And I didn't do my due diligence and, you know, vetting them or their skillset wasn't exactly what we needed. And you waste time and money that way. Goes back to the right people. And that is a process it's hard to find,
Innovation and Strategic Growth
25:55 Kellen Ketchersid: you know, it's funny when we talk to business owners, how often when we ask this question that it comes down to people and the people that they're surrounding themselves with are the people they're working with.
26:06 Kellen Ketchersid: And. It's always, I think it's a big challenge for any business owner to build the right team and to, to find people that they can trust and, and work well with what do you do to try to, I mean, I know you've learned some lessons from all that you're saying, so do you, how do you go about trying to figure out who do I want to work with?
26:27 Kellen Ketchersid: And you know, who can I, who do I trust? To be a part of this business journey that I'm on.
26:33 Sara Burnett: That's hard to answer because it's so much about what their job, their role would be. And I think probably their energy is, would be the first thing that I try to measure gauge or, you know, are they centered? Are they, are we synergistic?
26:49 Sara Burnett: You know, um, do they believe in what our goals are? Do they understand things may come up that are not normal in normal agriculture or normal business, how open is your mindset and what are you willing to explore during this journey? Because every day we're doing some sort of research and development on something.
27:10 Sara Burnett: There's a lot of things that change. You know, by nature, we're dealing with live organisms that have a life of their own sometimes. So a lot of flexibility. Yeah, absolutely. You can't come to work and expect every day to be the same, right? There are never two days that are the same and you have to wear several different hats and be flexible.
27:30 Sara Burnett: And I don't expect anything out of my employees or team members that I don't, I wouldn't do myself. And so I do know every role of our company. I can make every product. I can do everything anyone else can do. So I understand on a really personal level what their struggles are or can be. And I'm willing to just jump in and let's figure this out together.
27:50 Sara Burnett: But it really takes a person that has a positive mental mindset and has a lot of energy and really understands our purpose, which is like I said, education. And. Restoration and exploration really of kind of the things that we're not even sure about, you know, you go look at fungal strains on ChatGPT or Google or whatever you're doing, and it'll say newly discovered, you know, benefit unknown.
28:21 Sara Burnett: I live in the deepest ocean and the brightest and the widest sky there is, and it's all in a spoonful of soil. I mean, it's the wild west, right? So there's always new things to be discovered. There's nobody that knows it all, nor will they ever. So it's exciting to me because there's always something new to learn, but you know, it takes 500 years to naturally create one inch of topsoil.
28:45 Kellen Ketchersid: Really?
28:46 Sara Burnett: And then, and one day,
28:48 Kellen Ketchersid: That's amazing.
28:48 Sara Burnett: It blows away. Right? In West Texas it sure does. That's what we're trying to, to change is that, to create that connection for that soil to stay where it's supposed to be, because that's a tangible result. Of soil health is that you can drive on a really windy day and some fields are blowing and some are not.
29:07 Kellen Ketchersid: Yeah.
29:07 Sara Burnett: I mean, that's a very basic way to see what will you do and how it matters.
29:11 Kellen Ketchersid: Yeah. So having people on your team that appreciate that, and then having generalists, right? When you've got a smaller team, you need people who can. Can be flexible and have conversations with the professor over here, the farmer over there, or go back in the back and start mixing things up or do production, whatever that looks like, you know, I think a lot of small or medium sized business owners can relate to that.
29:38 Kellen Ketchersid: And
29:39 Sara Burnett: absolutely.
29:39 Kellen Ketchersid: Yeah. Building that team out.
29:42 Albert Gillispie: What's a project that you're excited about right now? What's, what's next for Texas earth?
29:48 Sara Burnett: Payroll. No, I'm just kidding. Spoken like a true business. Right. Exactly. What's the next bill to pay? BioFluth obviously is kind of on the forefront for us.
29:56 Sara Burnett: And it's a product that I developed through the opportunities at the Texas tech innovation hub. And from their accelerator grant, I was in cohort six. Did y'all do the cohort thing too?
30:07 Kellen Ketchersid: No, no, but we're, we're tied in with the hub. So in the community,
The Journey of Biofluf
30:11 Sara Burnett: That's a wonderful community to be in. Yes. And thank you to Lita and all the people that work really hard to fund that.
30:17 Sara Burnett: Received the cohort accelerator six grant, and then that led us into. earning, receiving, however you want to put it, a USDA grant in the small business innovation research category for the USDA. Isn't that a mouthful? And that was to research biofluf and arid climates as a soil amendment designed to improve the water holding capacity and soil fitness.
30:46 Sara Burnett: Of the crops that we tested. It was a long explanation there. So that research was completed and showed positive results. So we are writing for a phase two grant of that same award and talk about things that are hard for business owners. Do you, do you pursue something like that? Or do you just say, do I, what do I have is enough?
31:07 Sara Burnett: You know, do I need that? How's that really going to, cause it's so much work. It's a year to write it. It's a big
31:11 Kellen Ketchersid: investment.
31:12 Sara Burnett: It's a year for them to grant it and then it's two years to research it. So three or four years later, you finally have this piece of paper that says, what you already knew, right?
31:23 Sara Burnett: And so is it worth it is always a question, but we are excited about that. And again, cultivating the partnerships at Texas Tech to help us support that writing, but also to commercialize that product. And we're, we're doing a little bit of a pivot, right? And so not moving away from row crop agriculture or gardens or market gardens, but to explore the landscaping side of things or, you know, more so amendments that you would be able to purchase in a, a big box store or something like that.
31:53 Sara Burnett: Yeah. So we're using that as a, a springboard to see kind of what other avenues we can as Texas Earth Explorer in the sole amendment market. And it. you know, is may or may not be kind of a row crop focused, which is new for us. But I do think that there's lots of people that are excited about what we're doing with that particular product.
32:13 Sara Burnett: And
32:14 Kellen Ketchersid: sounds exciting. The potential
32:15 Sara Burnett: of it locally sourced by product affordable, effective, improving water holding capability of the soil while inoculating with beneficial microbes and trace minerals. So it's not this, you know, Singular focused product. It's very versatile and I'm excited to see how it positions really in the market to maybe as a peat moss alternative.
32:42 Albert Gillispie: Very cool. Okay. That sounds like an amazing product. Where are you at in that, in that, in that process you described where, what stage are you at?
32:49 Sara Burnett: Grant writing.
32:51 Albert Gillispie: I
32:51 Sara Burnett: say that weekly. And testing. No, really in the, in the research and development kind of still phase of that. I don't think that really ends, but now it's sourcing material and setting your pricing and doing those backend things that are required.
33:05 Sara Burnett: To approach a commercialization plan. I don't even really know almost sometimes I'm kind of lost on words about really what's the next step. But you know, every day is a new day to discover something about how to move it forward, having conversations, attending seminars, sharing kind of the idea about it, testing the water for potential interest, interested parties, and just seeing where it goes, really.
33:32 Albert Gillispie: So how, how far from commercialization, what does that mean? Until how, how long until if everything goes right, could I buy that and put that in my, in my backyard?
33:42 Sara Burnett: You can buy it now, but the packaging is not going to be looking really good. You know, as I got a patent on it and, or is in the process of getting a patent and that takes a lot of years and you know, there's a lot of things that go in between all of that, but it is available now.
33:58 Sara Burnett: It's just, how do I get it in the hands of the people that need it? That's the commercialization step.
34:04 Kellen Ketchersid: It's so cool as a business owner. And I know you mentioned this earlier, but you have to kind of take leaps of faith sometimes. And
34:12 Sara Burnett: daily it's like, yeah, and
34:15 Kellen Ketchersid: here you are, you've already got this established product line and bio nectar that is used in row crops, I think is what you said.
34:23 Kellen Ketchersid: And, but now you're, you're willing to explore something that's not going to be like taken away from that, but in addition to it requires your time and money and energy. I mean, what would you, what advice would you give to a business owner who's thinking about maybe making a strategic move pivot in their business that might have the potential to grow the business, but it's also going to be a sacrifice like what you're doing.
34:49 Kellen Ketchersid: Do you think it's worth it? Or, and maybe, maybe whether or not it's worth it is more complicated than just. Yes or no. How do you decide whether it's worth it?
34:59 Sara Burnett: Well, you know, as the old saying goes, you better dance with the one that brought you right. Don't abandon the ship for the rowboat, but you know, stay with what makes your core business work and then add things that are a la carte that go with the menu.
35:15 Sara Burnett: Right. That's kind of what we're doing because part of the production of BioFluff, I'm using products that we're already making. So I'm double dipping. If you will, you know, I'm building, I'm building layers of, you know, quality and energy and purpose into this new thing. I'm not buying somebody else's widget and, you know, painting it a different color and then selling it as my widget.
35:39 Sara Burnett: I'm creating a whole new system. It has a purpose that is in line with the other things that are already in full commercialization and what we are known for.
35:50 Kellen Ketchersid: So does, so Biofluf includes a lot of the benefits that the bio nectar. Yes. Okay. That's cool.
35:57 Sara Burnett: Yeah, absolutely. So it is about soil health and it is about, you know, fitness, the fitness of the soil.
36:02 Sara Burnett: And this is another way, another option because you get out in the real world and some people have certain types of equipment in the row crop industry, like they may have a wet kit or they may just have. A dry land, or they may be no till. You have to figure out how people are going to get it out. But BioFluff is one of those things that I think will have legs in more of the homeowner marketplace, the touch and the feel and the.
36:24 Sara Burnett: You know, personal application of this product or have those benefits. So it's a whole new way for me to think about how I need to convince what is the value proposition of this product and who's it going to appeal to. And the I Corps program helped with that through the hub. And, you know, I've just learned so much.
36:42 Sara Burnett: And to answer your question in a long roundabout way is, Really dip your toe in and if the water's warm, you know, you just sort of ease into it. I definitely could never do a cannonball into all of this. That wouldn't be good for anybody. But for me, I mean, I hope it's okay. If this has been just a God thing for me, every step of it has just been doors I never thought would open and nor could I have opened of my own accord or will.
37:11 Sara Burnett: So I'm just very open every day to like going, okay, well, We're going to figure out a new thing today. What's it going to be? And not, and again, having another line of business that really is your main focus allows you to have a little bit of risk and a little creativity. And, um, it's not so stressful when you know that it's not going to make or break you because you don't have that much in it.
37:36 Sara Burnett: So just cautious approach is what I would say. Cause it's easy to go. It's easy to go headfirst into things if you really believe in them. But luckily this is something that has had support at each train stop, if you will.
37:51 Kellen Ketchersid: And you're clearly seeking out counsel and help. So that's good to what you're doing.
37:55 Sara Burnett: Yes.
37:56 Albert Gillispie: Q
37:57 Sara Burnett: stag.
37:58 Albert Gillispie: Right. Great segue. I mean, your approach to innovation, like in. To you, you're like, this just makes sense. Like this is how you do it. But like, all of that is so strategic of, you have your core business. You've, you've established this. You're, you know, your business is cash flowing. It's, it's operating.
38:19 Sara Burnett: Yes.
38:19 Albert Gillispie: And you're like, how can I make this a little bit better? And so you're, you're betting on yourself in a strategic way, using some of your own resources and, and raw materials to develop something new, strategically. In a small way until, until you're validating it and it, and it, it can sustain itself.
38:39 Albert Gillispie: Innovation is, is hard. Like, like that, that isn't like 95 percent of businesses, like we're, you know, it's a good or service that a thousand people, you know, a thousand different businesses do. And that's a great way to do that. That's, I mean, there's 95 percent of businesses. Yeah,
38:59 Sara Burnett: exactly.
39:00 Albert Gillispie: And, and, but that, that 5 percent that is working.
39:03 Albert Gillispie: On innovation. Like this is a really practical, like, this is just how it's, it's not all unicorns, it's not all Steve jobs and Elon Musk, like they're unicorns. You know, but, but this is a practical, this is how a real business goes about innovation is they're not abandoning everything. They're just slowly dipping their toe and they're seeing what is synergistic with what we're already doing and how can we offer something new that adds more value to our, to our clients.
39:35 Sara Burnett: I'm doubling down on what I know already works. I am taking. And so if I ever wanted to license that product out, I have a revenue stream that they're going to have to have. Separate from that individual product to be successful, you know, so it's the designing of how, you know, what I want my future to look like too, which is to, you know, be able to have this thing, this little piece of the pie that I can take and move to a different area, but still benefit from because I am manufacturing the ingredients for it.
40:04 Sara Burnett: I don't know if I should say that or not. No, no, that's, I mean, that's great. That's the truth is, I mean, you have to make sure that you have long term production goals. You're not trying to meet the demand for tomorrow. You need to be looking at what's going to be the demand long term. And that is with product development.
Believing in Yourself and Embracing Opportunities
40:21 Sara Burnett: That's not sitting on the laurels and just still making the same X. But I can tell you, I never saw myself with the ability to be able to design anything. When my dad passed away, I thought, I'm just going to keep this going. I'm just going to keep the doors open. I'm going to be the best QuickBooks operator I can be.
40:42 Sara Burnett: I'm going to be the best, and it never crossed my mind that I had the capability to develop something new or the gift or whatever to ever be an innovator or entrepreneur, even in my own way, or so people need to know that really and truly things happen that are. You don't plan on and a lot of times are really good things, but to have the, the faith to know that, you know, if this opportunity presents itself, don't sell yourself short.
41:08 Sara Burnett: You'll figure it out if you want to. And that's what I just have to do kind of every day is going, well, I either have this answer or I don't, who knows this answer. And I'm going to go seek that out. But again, I'm still paying attention to what's keeping the wheels turning over here, but it has been a wild journey because I never, ever saw myself as.
41:27 Sara Burnett: Creative enough or capable of being, of, of patenting anything or having any original ideas.
41:34 Kellen Ketchersid: Well, clearly you proved that wrong.
41:38 Sara Burnett: Well, I suppose I did, but it is, you know, believing in yourself to a certain degree too.
41:42 Kellen Ketchersid: Yeah, that's cool. That's a good takeaway for anybody out there.
41:46 Albert Gillispie: So we try to keep our episodes to 45-ish minutes long. We're right at that time. How can people get ahold of you? How can people do business with you?
41:56 Sara Burnett: With cash money! No, I'm just kidding. So we're located on the Ida Louis highway. They can come see us. You can visit our website at https://www.texasearth.com/ all spelled out. We also have a website where you can buy individual garden home size products and that's https://www.growtexasearth.com/
So kind of the retail versus the bulk information site. You can call me, you can email me. It's all online, Sarah Burnett, info at https://www.texasearth.com/
42:23 Kellen Ketchersid: Yeah. And we'll have all your info in our show notes.
42:26 Albert Gillispie: Absolutely. If you have gotten value out of this podcast, hearing from stories like Sarah's go ahead and subscribe to our podcasts and keep coming back for more.
We're grateful for people like Sarah entrepreneurs that are growth minded, that are looking to add more value than they're taking. And so Sarah, thank you for being on our podcast.
42:50 Sara Burnett: Thank you.
42:50 Albert Gillispie: All right. Hope you enjoyed it!
