SPEARHEADING HINT WATER
INTO A $150M BRAND

Mission Makers has the pleasure of welcoming one of the most impressive CEOs in America for this week’s episode, Kara Goldin. Kara gives us an expert insight into what it has taken for her to build her company, Hint Water, into a $150 million venture, entering the highly competitive beverages industry with zero industry experience. We also talk about the premise of her best-selling novel, Undaunted, which perfectly sums up her attitude to risk.

 

We begin the episode by exploring Kara’s career path and how she got to where she is today. Her ambition is a clear driver of her success - she started at Time Inc straight out of college, followed by a stint of sales at CNN, and then worked her way up to AOL where she became the Vice President of Shopping and E-commerce Partnerships. In this position, she astoundingly built their business revenue to a billion dollars in revenue.

 

Kara then tells us of how she took a step back from corporate America to focus on raising a family, and that it was at this point where the lightning struck for Hint Water. Goldin realized that she, like so many million Americans, was caught in an unhealthy trap, consuming far too much artificially sweetened food. Determined to break her coca-cola habit, she began experimenting with water that had fusions of fruit to maintain some level of flavor in her beverage, and it was during this process that she realized there was an untapped market for people who wanted to avoid soft drinks but still wanted something flavorsome in their water. At the time, unsweetened flavored water didn’t even exist as a category in the beverage industry, and so the rise of Hint Water began, taking America and corporate boardrooms by storm. Today, Kara happily shares the story of how Hint is the beverage of choice in some of the biggest boardrooms in Silicon Valley like Google and Facebook. 

 

Our conversation moves on to discuss the inevitable backlash that she faced -

particularly as a mother to young children. She recounts how she was constantly told ‘you can’t have a family and a career,’ often by senior men in boardrooms. Kara defied those who doubted her, spearheading Hint Water and her family to happiness simultaneously.

 

Unsurprisingly, Kara advocates for increased gender representation in the boardroom and better support towards working mothers. As we dive into Kara’s novel Undaunted, we discuss the importance of blocking out the doubters and that you cannot allow ‘other people to build your walls for you’. 

 

Finally, we discuss what the future of Hint looks like and Kara highlights how the focus will be to continuously find ways for the company to step outside of its comfort zone. ‘It’s okay if we fail. It’s our ability to be humble and our ability to own it.’ 

 

Kara’s episode is an important one that proves we truly are the makers of our own destiny and the words of society should not stand in our way. We must be fearless and undaunted in our approach to life.

 

Kara’s episode can be found on the video below and on iTunes and Spotify.

 

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