We recently connected with Sydney Poll and have shared our conversation below.
Sydney, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Risking taking is a huge part of most people’s story but too often society overlooks those risks and only focuses on where you are today. Can you talk to us about a risk you’ve taken – it could be a big risk or a small one – but walk us through the backstory.
The biggest risk I have taken was fully trusting myself and officially starting SydPlayEat. It was always a dream of mine to work in the food industry and eventually in something that related to nutrition and health. I worked in the restaurant industry for about four years as an event planner for the largest restaurant group in Chicago. During that time, my father was diagnosed with Pancreatic cancer. I wanted to know more about how you get cancer like that and how can you prevent it before it happens. I started listening to podcasts and reading food-related articles constantly and eventually enrolled in nutrition school while working at my job. Simultaneously, I was cooking a ton at home and sharing my amature recipes on my Instagram with friends and family, always coming up with new creations and telling everybody about all I was learning in school. Everything from healthy ingredients to look out for and which ones to avoid. I had dabbled in making a chili crunch but swapped out all of the inflammatory oils and used organic olive oil instead. I added truffle salt and it was so delicious I decided to start selling it on Etsy.
During the pandemic I was furloughed from my full time job and really started to delve deeper into the world of sharing my sauce and trying to make it a full time business. I created an LLC and opened up a bank account to make it all legitimate a few months later. I would take zoom calls with anyone and everyone who was in the CPG industry from my bathroom since we were in a one-bedroom loft at the time and my husband would be on calls in the main room during the day. We then joined a shared kitchen incubator in Chicago and started selling our sauce and salt at farmer’s markets and even in retail stores in addition to our website.
As green as I was to the industry, putting aside negative criticism from others was the best thing I could do. Spreading the word of healthy anti-inflammatory oils to use when cooking doesn’t have to be hard and it can still come with gourmet flavors.
In three and a half years, SydPlayEat has grown tremendously. We operate from a shared kitchen at the Hatchery in Chicago and have expanded to three sauce and salt lines. Our products are available on our website, in local retail stores, and in farmer’s markets. We were in Target’s Accelerator program as well as on WGN, and various other noteworthy publications.
A year into the pandemic, I was offered my job back at the restaurant group. Pregnant and knowing how nice the insurance and stability of a paycheck would be, I turned it down to trust myself and continue to grow my company. It still feels like a risk on daily, but the most empowering risk is learning to trust yourself and be vulnerable knowing you are helping others.
Sydney, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?
I grew up in Chicago surrounded by delicious snacks and treats from my family’s bakery supply business. However, it wasn’t until my father’s diagnosis with pancreatic cancer that I realized the importance of nutrition in our overall health. Determined to help others lead healthier lives through food, I pursued a degree in nutrition from the Institute for Integrative Nutrition (IIN) and joined the board of Common Threads. My mission is to provide a culinary experience that elevates everyday meals through the use of high-quality, unique, and flavorful ingredients. By creating gourmet and versatile products such as SydSauce and SydSalt, I aim to inspire and empower food-savvy people to explore new flavors and take their at-home eating and cooking to the next level. I strive to be more than just a brand, but a community of food enthusiasts who share a passion for delicious and healthy meals. To help you play with your food and discover new flavors, I offer a range of gourmet and clean ingredients, including my own line of condiments: SydSauce and SydSalt. These black truffle hot sauces and seasoning salts are made with natural, recognizable ingredients and can turn any meal into a gourmet experience.
If you have multiple revenue streams in your business, would you mind opening up about what those streams are and how they fit together?
Our revenue comes from a variety of different avenues. Our products are sold direct to consumer through our website as well as physical and online retailers nationally including Amazon. We sell at farmer’s and artisan markets in the Chicagoland area as well as selling directly to friends and family when they need more products or want to give them as gifts. We love having multiple sources of revenue and hope to continue to grow in numbers of retailers as well as wholesale sites. Additionally, it’s great when we are included in corporate gift boxes over the holidays as well as collaborations with other companies and brands.
Okay – so how did you figure out the manufacturing part? Did you have prior experience?
We started making the product out of our home kitchen at the very start. This went on for about a year when we were still very small and only making six bottles of sauce per batch. Once we became a legitimate company and wanted to start selling in physical retail stores, we knew we had to take our operation to a commercial kitchen. On a very cold Chicago winter day in the height of covid I was set up with a friend of a friend who made cookie crackers (shout out to Amie from Carolyn’s Krisps). We had coffee outside (covid protocols) and she had told me about this incubator kitchen in Chicago where they offer classes and have a commercial kitchen space. She was going to start the program in January of 2021 and I immediately went home and signed up for it as well. After months of zoom classes, workshops, interviews, licenses to acquire and much more, I was finally able to start cooking in their space 6 months later. I had my husband and parents go through the ServeSafe tests as well so they could help out. We still use this space and go a couple of times a month. It has been the most wonderful experience. We love the community that is fostered in the kitchen and have learned so much from other entrepreneurs along the way. We have certainly come a long way from cooking in our apartment and hope to one day move to using a co-packer.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.sydplayeat.com
- Instagram: @SydPlayEat
- Facebook: SydPlayEat
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sydkarp/