How My Food Blog Inspired Me To Launch Four Businesses [Update]

Kiran Shahbaz

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Published: March 29th, 2022

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Kiran Shahbaz

Founder, Snackable Studios

$40K

revenue/mo

Founders

Employees

Snackable Studios

getsnackable.com

from Toronto, Ontario, Canada

started May 2016

$40,000

revenue/mo

Founders

Employees

Discover what tools recommends to grow your business!

Discover what books Kiran recommends to grow your business!

Want more updates on Snackable Studios? Check out these stories:

1. $15K/Month Helping Video Creators Grow Their Business (2018) ➜

This is a follow up story for Snackable Studios. If you're interested in reading how they got started, published about 6 years ago, check it out here.

Hello again! Remind us who you are and what business you started.

Hi everyone! My name is Kiran and I’m the founder of 4 businesses:

eCommerce store - OverHead Pro helps busy video creators produce amazing content from their home studios with video equipment, video editing services and a creator community.
Productized Service - Snackable is a recipe video production agency that offers recipe video production services to food publishers, consumer packaged good companies, and other food brands.*
Content-as-a-Service (CaaS) - Buffet is a licensed recipe video pool (think Shutterstock for recipe videos) which offers branded recipe videos on subscription.*
Remote Worker Platform - Goodwork helps females from underemployed regions find online work with international companies, while helping businesses find quality talent for under $5/hour.

Currently most of the revenue is coming from eCommerce store and our Productized Service which averages about $30K/month.

Our CaaS launched a couple of months ago and is bringing in $1K/month. Finally, our Remote Worker Platform is still in beta, but we have successfully placed about 6 hires and have just gone live.

Tell us about what you’ve been up to! Has the business been growing?

As much as I try to grow systemically, my businesses have all grown organically. This was never the intention (who wants to run 1 business let alone 4?! haha) but alas, here we are. :)

It’s a win-win -- growing my business, helping females make money, and playing a small part in smashing the patriarchy ✊🏾❤️

Originally it started as a food blog (currently inactive but something had to give :P) where I was trying to figure out how to create overhead videos with my smartphone. This led to designing a product to help others do the same thing!

I launched an eCommerce store selling an overhead tripod to help folks film overhead videos. After that, I added a recipe video production service. Our prices are premium for that, and we noticed a market segment that wanted recipe videos, but couldn’t afford custom ones. So, we launched a licensed recipe video service to address that.

My latest business is the business behind the businesses -- how I make all of this work!

In order to scale, at a price point I can afford, I have almost exclusively sought out talent from females in Pakistan. Being a daughter of Pakistani immigrants, I was aware of the many, many barriers females face trying to find equitable job opportunities in Pakistan. Many women are highly educated and incredibly talented. But, because of societal and cultural norms it can be incredibly difficult and sometimes dangerous for them to work outside of the home.

Conveniently, after doing research of the cheapest outsourced workers, Pakistan came out on top. So I hired very good talent, paid at the top end for similar jobs in their region, for no more than $5/hour. I pride myself on providing a really supportive culture, where people can be themselves, and freely talk about their mental health challenges. This is not common for young Pakistani females -- especially in the workplace.

So, it was a win-win -- growing my business, helping females make money, and playing a small part in smashing the patriarchy ✊🏾❤️

I mentioned my approach to a few founder friends and they wanted in.

Enter the latest venture: Goodwork. Goodwork helps females from under-employed regions gain financial independence by finding them online jobs with international companies. Each job is listed at the top 10% of similar jobs in the region. And still, employers can access this quality remote talent for under $5/hour.

I’m really excited about Goodwork’s talent community. We have ambitious goals to create a thriving environment for female workers in underemployed regions, which could include career coaching, digital skills training, mental health support, financial literacy -- and so much more.

In terms of time allocation as a founder, up until a few months ago, I was the dedicated sales person for the Productized Service, which, as you can imagine, affected the other businesses lines: attempting to run multiple businesses while ALSO doing sales for one of them -- is not ideal.

We also had zero social presence and were spending virtually no time or money on growth marketing. Our eCommerce store traffic came from organic search; our Productized Service and CaaS businesses got leads from my sales efforts (cold outreach). Our Remote Worker Platform has a community we’re growing, but we haven’t done much marketing for it yet.

Don’t do it alone. Find a community, find a co-working space (in-person or virtual), join a mastermind group, whatever -- but find your squad.

So, we decided to hire a sales associate and digital marketer to help growth across all the business lines. It’s been a couple months, but this approach seems promising.

Throughout all of the businesses, we have a total of 7 full-time employees, and actively work with 20+ contractors.

What have been your biggest lessons learned in the last year?

My biggest lesson learned in the past year has been to stop waiting for the thing I want to do and start doing it now.

My academic and previous work experience has been in international development. My last “job” was working on a First Nation reserve in the Rockies and I did that for three years. Unfortunately, I got sick and ended up moving back to Toronto. Long story short, I stumbled into the startup scene and started working on my own businesses. Eventually these businesses funded me and my partner’s life.

I love being a business owner and I love building teams but I always wanted to fulfill my itch of having impact (I went into International Development for this reason). I always thought I’d sell/retire from my current businesses before I’d do my “impact” business.

But when the idea of Goodwork came along, I couldn’t pass it up. And so, instead of waiting to have to complete things to do the things I want to do, I’m just doing the things I want to do. :)

I’m working on my impact business while also running my other businesses and doing the digital nomad thing along the way. My partner (life and business) and I try to find locations in nature with beautiful views and set up shop for 1-2 months at a time. Pre-COVID, it was international, and during COVID, it’s been domestic. It’s renewed our appreciation for this beautiful country we live in. 🇨🇦

What’s in the plans for the upcoming year, and the next 5 years?

The plan for the upcoming year is to expand the team across all business lines. We plan on hiring a General Manager for each business line, and building growth and technology teams to service them. With my track record, in 5 years from now, there might be some new business lines added to the mix. 😅

Have you read any good books in the last year?

One book that has had the biggest impact on how we run the business has been Traction by Gino Wickman. It lays out the Entrepreneurial Operating System, or EOS -- a set of processes and tools to help carry out your business’ vision. It has changed the way we make goals, communicate those goals with the team, run meetings and keep everyone aligned and moving towards our KPIs and Goals.

Another really good book I have read is Never Split the Difference by Chris Voss. Voss is a former hostage negotiator for the FBI and talks about his strategy in negotiation. I’ve re-read this book twice and plan to review it again. It’s been really helpful -- not only for sales, but also for team management.

I’d also recommend Can’t Hurt Me by David Goggins. Goggins went from hitting rock bottom (overweight and depressed) to a world-renowned athlete and military leader. His story goes from heavy trauma to extremely inspiring. It makes me want to get off my arse and get to work. :)

Advice for other entrepreneurs who might be struggling to grow their business?

Staying motivated is hard. I have to constantly keep reminding myself why I’m doing this. Luckily, I work with my partner and my team, but I remember the suffering of doing this alone all too well.

Don’t do it alone. Find a community, find a co-working space (in-person or virtual), join a mastermind group, whatever -- but find your squad.

You have to be motivating yourself all the time. Whether it’s in books you’re reading, videos you’re watching, Twitter threads, a vision board -- find out what works for you and do it. And do it all the time. Make it part of your practice.

I also am trying to constantly optimize my routine to improve both my business and personal life. I know the things I need to do to feel good about myself: I need to work for a certain number of hours a day, I need to take care of my body (workout, eat, sleep) I need to take care of my mind (meditate, spend time with family & friends), and I need to rest on the weekend. So I try to do all this, in a routine that I enjoy.

Are you looking to hire for certain positions right now?

Most of our hiring is happening through Goodwork, but we are always looking for recipe videographers for our Productized Service’s North American team. :)