The Carnivore Bar

The Structure of Value
about 5 years ago – Wed, Oct 02, 2019 at 02:47:09 AM

The Structure of Value

First let's talk about the structure of our timeline.

We’ve experienced some delays in our production schedule as you all are aware. However a break down of what we’ve been doing and our timeline might be helpful for evaluating whether or not you think that’s a good or bad thing. 

All things considered, our project is doing well, it just turns out the product that our community wants, is more demanding than we originally anticipated. We want to deliver a product that is outstanding. The goals of this product are ground breaking in many categories and it just takes longer than anticipated to do something that's never been done before.

Secondly let's talk about the structure of texture.

Sample A is almost perfect. It’s crunchy and flavorful while not hitting you over the head with the fat. This version was born during this delay, and only a handful of people have gotten to try it so far. I’m extremely excited to share with you. This is something I can be proud of. And it’s the kind of product that you’ll actually want to reorder.

Sample B is great, but the tallow floated to the top and made a layer of icing. It’s tolerable but not ideal.

Sample C is well mixed but too mealy. This is what most of our influencers got as samples. It’s a little lacking as far as texture goes. It was especially challenging to the palettes of those who have eaten Standard American Diets or haven’t ever tried a high fat food. We put out what we had, but the standard for free sample is much lower in my book, than goods that are paid for. I can make food for free that’s passing, but not great. However as soon as I take money for something I feel like it needs to be excellent. Hardcore carnivores know that even the worst of these its a huge improvement over pemmican, but low carbers think its only barely tolerable. Uninitiated react like vegetable police’s mom.

Sample D is a hot mess. Way too soft, the tallow got sort of whipped when mixing by using too much velocity. Additionally the tallow got a touch too hot as well so it tastes a little scorched as well. Just wholly a failure as we often learned the hard way, what not to do. 

Funnily enough all of these have identical ingredients and near identical ratios of fat and protein, yet are completely different in taste and texture. 

This was was one of our intermediate prototypes that failed. This one was oxidized (like from normal air) High Polyunsaturated Fatty Acids (like Omega 3) are extremely vulnerable to temperature and exposure to oxygen. We've covered this in previous updates.

Thirdly, let's talk about the structure of our values and what it means to create a product that people will find valuable. How are we creating value?

The Carnivore Bar Values and Objectives

1. Freedom of movement. I need to get out of making pemmican in my kitchen every weekend. In order to do so I need a product which is:

Satiating: High Fat, Zero Carb, Quality Protein
Shelf Stable: no need to meal prep, because who has time?
No Preservatives: None at all, because I don’t know what’s safe.
Tastes Good: Passing the average person taste test

1. Sustainability: We need to make this a successful business so we can keep doing this long term. If you’re not enjoying a lasting freedom then you’re not really experiencing freedom. It’s important that we are profitable enough to maintain growth, and meet the expanding demand for this product.
    

Bottom Line: If we don’t make something that an average low carber would want, then we don’t have a sustainable business model that can support hardcore carnivores over time.

In conclusion:

We should have a dramatically improved production capacity now that we are starting with a fresh batch. We have hired labor to assist in manufacturing now that the process is more finalized. So we estimate that we’ll have these bars out by the end of the year. We’ve messed up before in setting impossible timelines for ourselves, so we’re going to set a conservative target. But I’m looking at starting shipping as soon as is humanly possible.

And….. Bonus!!!

Introducing Hedgewood Inc as a new Carnivore Bar partner.

Because of all of you, we’ve managed to attract an incredible investor, Hedgewood Inc, which happens to be led by a hardcore carnivore. They are going to not only going to cover the cost of our small mishap, but also provide the remaining funds and logistical support needed to scale up this business for the long term.

You all are the reason that these investors gave us the time of day. You absolutely blew us away with your support and engagement. That the carnivore movement and the surrounding LCHF community are exploding with enthusiasm for the health that is possible through diet and lifestyle changes right now, and it is inspiring! The support for this zero carb bar among those groups, reveals that the need and demand for this product and others like it, isn't met. And that is priceless!

I can’t emphasize enough how much I’m in your debt. I don’t know exactly what I expected but I didn’t count on how many genuine and authentic connections I’d make in this community through this project. You all made me realize that my simple selfish wish to not have to make pemmican in my kitchen every weekend was only the beginning. This Carnivore movement and the overall larger low carb community are like a giant family. I was extremely touched by everyone’s interest in this project. Because of your support and attention, you’ve legitimized the core concept behind this company. You’re the market that has given investors the rationale for investing in this crazy dream and bringing something like this into existence. You’ve willed us into being through your belief. Thank You!

Now that we are funded, staffed, and we’ve got a new and improved version of the bar to send you, I think we really have a fighting chance. I can’t thank you enough for all your support. You’ve given me something greater to fight for than just myself, something I consider truly meaningful. I am more motivated than ever to deliver a product that is exactly what you’ve been asking for. A zero carb whole food product, that is a safe haven in an otherwise nutritionally barren world. I hope it delivers the freedom I dreamed of for myself, for all of us.

-Phillip

Slow is smooth, smooth is fast
over 5 years ago – Wed, Sep 11, 2019 at 02:40:56 AM

 It was the first day of combat medic training when I first heard those words "Slow is smooth, smooth is fast". I had no idea how profoundly they’d affect me across time. We had put away our EMT textbooks, pulled out our tourniquets and TCCC (Tactical Combat Casualty Care) Cards and headed off to the dusty treeline at Fort Sam Houston to torture our battle buddies with nasopharyngeal airways and very high and very tight tourniquets.

 It turns out that if you approach a casualty with the full panic and anxiety that is emotionally  warranted from watching someone you love get hurt, you aren’t much help to them. In fact you’re more of a liability than an asset. I owe all of you the same emotional gravity as I do someone who requires my care. Which is why I can’t let the magnitude of the responsibility I owe this community make me hesitate. It takes practice, discipline, and character to maintain one’s demeanor during a trauma. Going slow and therefore smoothly, actually gets the job done faster and with fewer mistakes. You have to silence the screaming anxiety and panic in your inner dialogue, and focus. Otherwise you’re not helping your patient or your company.

 So here it is: our freezer had an equipment malfunction and was not at the correct temperature, but it was cold enough to evade detection for several months. The worst possible scenario. Frozen solid food that’s safe to eat but of a diminished taste and quality. It was a slow and insidious degradation by tiny degrees over the last two months...impossible to detect in the short term, but now impossible to ignore. And now we have to be willing to sacrifice it in order to save The Carnivore Bar. Tourniquets by their nature are a brutal tool. When the damage to an extremity is too great, the best option for the good of the whole, is to cut off the blood supply to the entire limb. You are purposefully risking the limb in order to lower the risk to the patient’s life.

This is definitely a disaster, but I’m glad for the training that I received as a medic that helped prepare me for this moment. (In other words: good.) A medic doesn’t usually get to do his job unless it’s a disaster, so it’s a place that feels familiar to me. Though I never lost one of my friends and I won’t pretend I know what that’s like, I prepared to do my job as a combat medic for years. The whole job is based on the premise that we’d be having a really bad day.

Almost 2000 lbs of grass-fed beef is freezer burned on our watch. The faulty components have been replaced, but the damage is done. Although this batch of beef holds up to food safety standards, we consider those regulations appallingly low. It doesn’t hold up to our standard of quality, flavor, and nutrient density. We want you to have a great-tasting bar. Something we’re proud of, and something you’ll want to order again. Unfortunately none of the product we have created so far is usable as some of it was freezer burned. So we will have to start over. We are devastated by this revelation. We were finally on track to ship at the end of the month. But now that is in serious jeopardy. I don’t know how long it will take us to recover but we will put out another update shortly as soon as we know.

 Just like with tourniquets, the worst thing for a mission is a quick fix that doesn’t solve your problem. A record breaking tourniquet application that doesn’t stop the bleeding, helps no one; likewise, there is no point meeting this deadline if we push out a product that doesn’t live up to expectations. I think of all the inferior versions of this bar we have scrapped. This new bar bears almost no resemblance to its predecessors. It is in a league of its own. We are not trying to only fulfill a Kickstarter, we are trying to enable you to take a low carb diet and lifestyle on the go with a preservative free, high fat, whole food product. We want to permanently fill a niche that no one thought was a viable market, until now. But it's a fragile market; we’re a small community. We can’t afford to launch with an amateurish product and disappoint our backers. We want to support the low carb movement and help those whose lives make it very difficult to give zero carb a try (like being a soldier). We have so many allies in the Paleo/Primal/Keto communities that all jumped at the opportunity to support this venture. Our combined families are all fighting for better quality of life through better food. There is a burgeoning network of people all over the world, that want to change how food is made, and what we allow in it. We can still do this!

We can make those changes. And with your help The Carnivore Bar can be a start to that. To show the world that there really is a market for zero carb foods. We can establish that there is a population out there that won’t compromise health for convenience. And that meat can be a healthy and viable nutrition source even in our increasingly chaotic and modern lifestyles. Thank you for entrusting us with this mission, helping us meet our funding goal, and driving us to push the boundaries of what is possible. Above all, thank you for your patience. We wouldn’t have been able to do this without you.

The Good:

• After our initial delay, we were able to essentially triple our production capacity.
   
• Customizations with scaling up have been applied
   
• Increased cooking capacity (doubled)
   
• Tripled drying capacity (previous choke point)
   
• Increased cooling capacity (better quality control)
   
• Texture is stable and consistent for the first time at volume (new process)
   
• Texture is the best it’s ever been by an order of magnitude (better crunch)
   
• Production is ready to go at a much higher rate (most of what we accomplished isn’t undone)
   
• The next batch of meat was already ordered and should arrive next week. (We should hit the ground running when it arrives).
   

We’ve made huge leaps forward. We’ve made at least three giant breakthroughs in the last month in the process. This latest stumbling block is a huge blow, but it will not stop us. We are bloodied but unbowed. And I won’t stop until you have the quality product I promised you. Not some sloppy rush job. That's who we are and what we stand for. With optimism, tenacity, and a fidelity to excellence in the face of daunting challenges.

Sincerely,
Phillip

Carnivore Aurelius is not affiliated with our project in anyway that I know of, but I’m a big fan of his. This was a great article on pemmican, that basically explains the whole point of what we’re trying to do with our bar. This was also just a great read. If you’re sick of waiting on us to figure this all out, you can even try to make some on your own pemmican with his recipe. Or Amber’s photo tutorial.

I recommend trying it. Then when the carnivore bars are done, you’ll know just the kind of pain in the but, you’re being saved from. Or who knows, maybe you can do it better? Either way we all grow as a community. Thank you.

We have a delay….. Good.
over 5 years ago – Wed, Jul 17, 2019 at 02:17:15 AM

We have had a lot of opportunities to grow and to learn this month. Fans of Jocko Willink will understand what I mean by that. Long story short, the idea is that you face the challenges ahead of you, standing up straight with your shoulders back, and look at the positive aspect of your "problems" and redefine them as opportunities. No matter how dark things get you find the light within them. So in that spirit we'd like to share with you a list of: Unanticipated opportunities for growth.
 

• Shirts going out before the bars was confusing because the automated emails insinuated that all rewards would be delivered together.

Good. We had an opportunity to show our responsiveness and answer messages directly about that confusion, showing our supporters how important they are to us.
 

• No USDA co-packer could handle the complexity of The Carnivore Bar process.

Good. That means we get to do it ourselves, and maintain greater quality control over the process.
 

• The facility we need to do it ourselves has very specific requirements and is unlikely to be found in the midwest, unoccupied.

Good. By being willing to look, were able to find a facility with a 700 sq ft walk-in freezer in Columbia, MO right under our noses, despite the challenge.
 

• The shipping time for equipment that we needed took longer than anticipated, and we had to wait to order it until we had found a space.

 Good. That provided us more time to plan the layout and design a workflow.
 

• The equipment needed a loading dock to be delivered, and could only be delivered in the facility that we had yet to acquire.

 Good. We ordered it in advance, and sent it to the address we didn’t own, and hoped the lease went through. And it did. We saved two weeks by being bold.
 

• The previous tenants were making cookies, so the freezer floor was caked in cookie dough and needed some repairs before it would be operational.

Good. This gave us an excuse to be more thorough in our cleaning processes and make sure the freezer was up to our standards.
 

• There was no sink in the facility because the previous tenants had removed it.

Good. We were able to install a sink that directly fits our needs and get something smaller to conserve working space in the factory.
 

• When the equipment came and was first installed we blew the fuses on our electrical box on the first round, because although each outlet was rated correctly the breaker box was not. 

 Good. We identified the problem early. Since we started with a test load and not a full load it helped us not waste resources on a larger run.
 

• The electrical system, while it appeared to function with the loads first applied, it blew in the middle of the drying cycle making the end product of that test load not up to our standards.

Good. More undeliverable carnivore bars for us, so we are not drawing from our best version of the bars which we owe to the backers first. So now we have a batch of failed bars to call our own.
 

• The whole breaker panel needed redone in order to run our machinery. 

Good. Now that we’ve been forced to redo this, we can make sure it’s done correctly and safely. No part of our electrical plan will be unknown or uninspected from now on, because we will have had it installed ourselves.
 

• The wrappers with outdated nutrition facts failed, the black coating of ink rubs off when shipped in cardboard boxes.

 Good. Another reason to get better wrappers with correct information on them.
 

• The reorder of wrappers got delayed, which meant that instead of being there July 2nd and having a full month to produce the bar we are unable to get started until midway through the month. They still aren’t here.

Good. This allows us to redesign how we’re delivering the bars and make a custom-sized box so that the presentation of the bars is improved, and the shipping cost is lowered.
 

• Because of the delays and learning opportunities we have to admit that even if we don't sleep there is no way to meet our original target deadline of the end of July.

Good. We avoid attempting a breakneck pace and the potential of making mistakes that degrade the quality of The Carnivore Bar and take away from your first experiences.
 

• The insulation and cold packs that had we planned to put the bars in to keep them from getting soft in the summer heat... turned out to be ineffectual. 

Good. This encourages us to abandon this half-measure, in favor of better presentation and honest messaging that comes in each package to reflect the reality of our situation. We are shipping a high fat bar in the hottest part of summer. It might get soft, but it is not diminished because of it. That is to be expected of a natural product, without fillers or stabilizers.
 

• While designing the box it became clear that 10 bars at 4x2 didn’t make a presentable formation. No amount of manipulation was going to make a suitable box fit 10 bars.

Good. We decided to offer you at no additional cost, 12 bars in each half box of Carnivore Bars and 24 bars in every full box. In consolation and as a thanks for your patience and trust, you will get more product, and it will look better, and be of a higher quality.
 

• We were recently publicly criticized for offering a grain-finished version of the bar in addition to our original 100% grass-fed & finished version. 

Good. We have an opportunity to stand resolutely by our decision to put people first and ideology second. And we are proud to be associated with other prominent members of the community that also value human life and health, over ideological camps.

(P.S. oxidation occurs in normal atmospheric conditions, because the air you breathe contains oxygen…. that is if all is going well, at least. Also, don't be alarmed, there are no pink slime monsters in our bar--only beef.)

We are proud to be a part of this movement. We are proud of you as fans. Some of the biggest hearts in the carnivore world saw fit to back us and give us the chance we needed to make this product a reality and free us from our kitchens on pemmican-making day. We can not thank you enough. We are simply in awe of the response. Many of you also took to social media to show your carnivore pride and support. We are so grateful and blown away by your outpouring of encouragement. We couldn’t have done any of this without you! 

Thank you so much for investing in us and being so generous with your patience. We now hope to deliver the bars to you by the end of September, and while that seems a long way away, we will strive to exceed that expectation in every way possible. In general, everything in a startup takes longer than you’d like it to. We have a responsibility to deliver a product that we’re proud of, and that you’ll value and appreciate. The carnivore community means the world to us. We simply cannot let you down. You’re our family. Thank you!
 

Sincerely, 

Phillip & Merry Ellen

Shirts are shipped!!!
over 5 years ago – Wed, Jun 05, 2019 at 03:05:22 AM

Thank you all for your patience! You should have received emails confirming your addresses a week ago and this is why. I've sent all your shirts to you. You should all receive your shirts this month. Some of the international orders will take some time to get to you. 

Currently we are on schedule to ship out the bars in July. Thanks to your support on Kickstarter, we finally have the equipment and facility we need to create the bars at scale. We have experimented with several batches to refine our process before we assemble everything. It is entirely possible that even if you've met us in person and tried a version of the bar we've made significant improvements to the bar since then. I think we are on our sixth major change in our recipe. Still just beef and salt as ingredients, but cooking drying and mixing can change a lot. We want it to be crispy and tasty as possible without adding any junk, maximizing the shelf stability, and keeping with the highest quality ingredients as possible. It is a constant challenge to make this bar with such a strict goal/vision, but we believe that it's worth it. Thanks for believing in this with us! 

In the spirit of sharing t-shirt love, I'm wearing a cool t-shirt by Health Coach Kait in this photo. We also believe in eating in "REAL FOOD". Merry Ellen and I love traveling though, and we hate being sick when we accidentally eat something we shouldn't. We are soooooo excited to bring this bar to market. I can't believe we are so close to filling our pantry with these wonderful bars. I hope you like them as much as we do. 

Sincerely,

Phillip & Merry Ellen

Funding and next steps.
over 5 years ago – Sun, May 12, 2019 at 01:19:44 AM

Hi everyone!

OK so I thought I would write up a quick update for you all. The month of the Kickstarter was really uplifting to see that so many people wanted us to succeed. We pushed hard to try and be as responsive as possible on this platform, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Thank you all for engaging with us and giving us constructive feedback. 

Last week our funds finally dispersed and we paid  Kickstarter and Backerkit their fees first thing off the top. We are grateful for both platforms making this a good experience for all of our backers, as a lot of you are first time backers. Thank you! The coming weeks now that we are funded we can actually get started on manufacturing in earnest. The end of last week I finalized the order for t-shirts and we settled on a 50/50 blend at a pretty high quality t-shirt. We hope you'll be happy with them. Those shirts should be out in the mail by the end of May. 

As far as manufacturing the bars, there are a lot of twists and turns ahead but we are diligently pursuing manufacturing and sourcing solutions that will meet our anticipated July deadline. Thank you all for your patience. Please feel free to reach out to us if you have any questions or concerns regarding your pledge. To keep in touch you can follow us on Instagram, Facebook, & Twitter. 

I keep saying thank you, but I feel like I can't say it enough. Thank you for coming along with us on this journey and making this bar a reality.

Sincerely, 

Phillip

P.S. Michaelanthony gave a terrific review of The Carnivore Bar that I think you should see. I do not have an affiliate program in place now that Kickstarter has ended. So if you wouldn't mind giving his channel a like I'd appreciate it. He's a great guy and runs a really interesting channel. And this really is the most detailed review we've had to date.

As a contrast, here is Vegetable Police's review; a hilarious but we'll go ahead and call it an unfavorable review. His opinion was just "meh if it gives you energy, then ok." His mother (who does not eat a carnivore/keto diet) hated the bar, and Kasey did a very silly slow-mo montage making fun of it. I still gave his video a thumbs up! I think its funny and love his channel, whether he likes my bar or not. I think this bar could really help him if he ever decided to clean up his diet and be strict again. I mean, putting ketchup on everything is just gross!

What's fun is that these reviews are exactly the same batch of carnivore bars, with very different takes. I hope you like yours. I think the odds are high. But I wanted to give you a fair and balanced update.