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I spent about a decade running purchasing teams for food companies and startups before changing careers. People with tech or academic business operations backgrounds tend to approach food businesses like this, whether well capitalized startups or less ambitious pet projects to start, say, a pie company or a coffee shop, and consequently go to zero very quickly. The people I've seen have the most lasting success in this space are, perhaps unsurprisingly, non-tech people who have simply worked in the business from the ground up, often without much formal training. The short of it is that food business is different and extremely difficult in that, aside from the razor-thin margins, culture and relationships are absolutely critical, moreso than in any other industry. In other words, you won't get far treating your employees and vendors (and by extension, your customers) like fungible APIs, because word that you're kind of a jerk will spread quickly, and they'll all end up killing you. Anyway, all that said, the parent has the right intuition about this. Work on the ground floor, because doing that will give you much better intuitions and insights about the economics and cadence of the business and you'll probably end up interacting with employees, vendors, and customers. Then learn the economics more formally. Ideally find a mentor in the industry, and remember to humanize everyone at every step, no matter who they are. |