Building a Nutrition Business from Inception to Sale with Chloe McLeod

June 18, 2024

In this episode of "How to Build a Profitable Nutrition Business," host Chris Hughes sits down with the remarkable Chloe McLeod, a seasoned dietitian and entrepreneur who has successfully built and sold two nutrition-focused businesses. Chloe shares her incredible journey, from her early days in private practice to becoming the head dietitian for the Parramatta Eels, and eventually founding and selling the Low FODMAP Challenge and Verde Nutrition.

Chloe dives deep into the nuances of creating a business with the end goal of selling it, offering invaluable insights into the process of finding the right buyer, negotiating terms, and ensuring the transition is smooth for both parties. She discusses the importance of having a clear vision, understanding your market, and the critical role of mentorship and networking in the growth of a business. Chloe also emphasizes the necessity of balancing personal life with professional aspirations, especially for those with young families.

Listeners will gain a wealth of knowledge on the practical steps needed to prepare a business for sale, from financial planning and legal considerations to building a resilient and adaptable team. Whether you're a seasoned nutrition professional or just starting in the field, Chloe's story is sure to inspire and provide actionable strategies for achieving long-term success in the nutrition business. Don't miss this episode if you're looking to transform your passion for nutrition into a thriving, profitable venture.

Episode Transcript

Chloe McLeod: [00:00:00] What one of my team members said to me once was she really loves how I can be like mentor boss Chloe, but I can also be friend Chloe.
Chris Hughes: Welcome to How to Build a Profitable Nutrition Business. If you love nutrition and you love helping people and you want to be in the game long enough to keep doing that. Then this is the podcast for you. Let's get into it.
So we're really lucky to have Chloe McLeod come on How to Build a Profitable Nutrition Business today. So Chloe has worked across multiple industries here in Australia. She's been in private practice. She was the head dietitian for the Paramount at EELS for five years. She's had multiple businesses.
She's worked across food industry, media, you name it. Chloe has been there. She's an APD, but she's also got a master's in public health nutrition. The main reason we're getting Chloe on today is because she's had two successful businesses that she has sold. The first was back in 2021 [00:01:00] when she built a program or a platform, I should say, back in 2016, which was the low FODMAP challenge platform.
She sold that successfully and then went on to start Verde Nutrition of which she's since sold that as well. So getting Chloe's expertise on coming up with a business idea from inception to sale is really what I wanted to speak to her about. So here she is. Let's get into it. Welcome back to How to Build a Profitable Nutrition Business.
I am super pumped to have Chloe McLeod from Verdane Nutrition on today. Chloe is a extremely successful business nutrition entrepreneur. And I really wanted to get Chloe on today To talk about a number of things. Again, this is someone else that we can talk about a million things in the nutrition business space, but really about building a business for sale.
So Chloe has recently sold her practice. So I'm still heavily involved and I'll let her go through all that, but just that process of starting a business, because often we might start a business. [00:02:00] Just thinking that they're doing it for survival and then all of a sudden a sale comes around and you're not prepared and that is how we were.
So Chloe I'll hand it over to you to initially introduce yourself, but thank you so much for coming on.
Chloe McLeod: Yeah, sure. Thank you so much for asking me to come on, Chris. Yeah, really excited to chat today and thank you for your kind words. I'm sitting here blushing a little bit. I think for me, a little bit about myself.
So I've been a dietitian since 2009. And so what's that? 15 or so years now. I've been really fortunate to work across a number of different sectors sort of everything from public system, hospital, community health, university lecture, university lecturing, if I can speak properly today, hopefully that improves, a high performance sport to private practice and food industry as well.
I should add in there too. So I've been really fortunate to have a really nice breadth of experience across the different sectors. A lot of different areas of nutrition. When it comes to the business side of things, there's three key businesses that I've been involved in. And two of [00:03:00] those, I've been fortunate enough to get them into a position to be able to sell.
With the first one, the FODMAP challenge, that was, I wanted to sell it. So I approached the person who ended up being the buyer. Because I was like, I'm not going to be able to, It's gotten to the end of where my expertise is. And I didn't have the capacity for a number of reasons to continue to grow it to where I felt it could get to.
Chris Hughes: So
where was it at? Sorry, Chloe, where was it at that point? Like when it was a platform? Yeah.
Chloe McLeod: So the FODMAP
challenge was a, an online platform that went, it was a, an IBS management platform. So it was dietitian supported Moving through the different phases of a low FODMAP diet and helping people to reintroduce them.
And the reason that business came about was I was working in private practice with a lot of people with IBS. And I was noticing that for people to invest in seeing a dietitian one on one that was often beyond what they might be able to afford or [00:04:00] felt that they could invest in, or maybe they felt like they could do it themselves.
But then on the flip of that, you'd go online and see everyone going on these low FODMAP diets and staying on them forever. Which, as dietitians, we all know that's like the opposite of what we should be doing. So, the idea was around, well, if we can support people through the process and then help them to reintroduce the higher FODMAP foods back into their diet in a really structured way, that's going to result in better health outcomes, but also at a lower price point.
So there was the online platform that went through all of that. That was on a WordPress site for the tech people who were interested. And we also had a private Facebook group and there was one on one support available as required for people. And if that needed to turn into consults, it also ended up being a bit of a funnel into the private practice as well.
So that's where it was at. It was, yeah. There was nothing wrong with it, but for it to be maintained because as we all know, that the research around IBS management is changing. And particularly over the last sort of 10 or so years has changed quite [00:05:00] substantially. I didn't feel that I had the capacity to keep on focusing on that platform with all the other things that were going on in my life at the time.
Yeah. And I didn't. Also it was like going and getting investment. So I'd looked at maybe turning it into an app or some other form of improved tech. And that was going to be a hundred K 200 K to do that. So I was going to need to find funding for that to happen. And. Again, I was like, I don't really have the capacity for this because if that's what's happening, they're going to want me to work in this business full time.
And that wasn't suitable. So yeah, I was, Oh, I still am good friends with some of the people who are at Healthy Life, which is a subsidiary of Woolworths.
Chris Hughes: Yeah.
Chloe McLeod: I reached out to one of them. Just throwing it out there. It's like, Hey, I know you've recently started in this business. This is what I'm thinking for FODMAP challenge.
I'm not sure if you'd be interested. And I got a reply almost immediately of like, This is actually exactly what my job is to [00:06:00] create health programs. So let's chat. And it was about a six month process of working with them to make sure that we had all the terms right for the sale. But yeah, it was a really interesting sale process in that my goal wasn't to stay involved, which is quite different to the Verde sale.
The goal was take it. I stayed involved for about six months or so afterwards. And just from a, it's a pretty normal procedure then. Yeah. Like, it's still nice to see it humming along there on their platforms, knowing that it's still being utilized and paid for and everything. But yeah, that's,

Chris Hughes: I love that story.
Chloe McLeod: Yeah.
Chris Hughes: So if you, you may not even remember the exact numbers, but like, what were the numbers in terms of users that you had that you built it up to because obviously it was a saleable product. They responded straight away that they were onto it.
Chloe McLeod: To be honest, I can't quite remember now and I'm not also, I'm unsure if I'm allowed to say I'd be making up a number if I said that, but I think it was working well, but it [00:07:00] wasn't working well enough for me to go, this is going to take all the focus.
And it's really funny, I still have people, even I had someone last week who reached out to me and I did your FODMAP challenge however many years ago and this is where my health's at the moment. Are you still going to be able to help me? I've got a couple of clients who were quite long term clients, well obviously very long term clients who started out in there and that's how we've come across each other.
With a chronic health condition sometimes you do need to help people. For a really long time, even if it's not frequently and yeah, it's been a really cool way of helping people and it's really nice to still get that feedback from people, how, of how wonderful it was for them. So
Chris Hughes: that's like, that's so cutting edge.
Like this is 2016. You built this.
Chloe McLeod: Yeah, it's really interesting when I started the FODMAP challenge, there wasn't any other online IBS programs that, that I could find. And that was part of why I was like, there's a huge gap in the market here. And then over time there's like a dime a dozen now, everyone's got one.
Yeah. And [00:08:00] I think to come back to again, one of the reasons for sale is because of how the research around IBS management has and was changing a few years ago. I think having the program As it was going to need to change substantially to keep, to do things like the more gentle low FODMAP diet or doing things really specifically as an example of that.
When I'm working with clients one on one now. So because I still do that because I really like it. I actually can't remember the last time I did a full low FODMAP diet with someone because now I'm more likely to do the gentle approach or choose a couple of things quite specifically based on their food diary.
Whereas 10 years ago, the research was saying put someone on a low FODMAP diet and figure it out. So
Chris Hughes: Yeah. Just rip it all out and work your way back to work your
Chloe McLeod: way back in. Exactly. So, but yeah, so yeah, no, when I started it, there wasn't any other platforms like that around and yeah, it was, I think I've always really enjoyed nutrition, [00:09:00] but I always, I've also.
Quite like being able to be a little bit creative and look at things in other ways and use different skills too. I
Chris Hughes: love that because I'm a bit the same in that I, I think we underutilize tech. We've got, even though there's great things out there, but there's Like life could be so much easier in terms of, I won't name any business, but I'm working with a business at the moment that they've got paper bookings and I'm trying to set a few things up for them.
And it's just like the owners holding back on, on using tech, they're scared of it or whatever. I'm thinking, what else could your staff be doing with their time?
Chloe McLeod: Yeah. And the way that I often look at it is every business is different in, and I think as well, looking at what the owner wants to achieve.
From that business. And I totally, I'm totally with you. I can't imagine we don't have paper, anything, everything's digital in, in that day, but if that's what the business owner wants to do and that's working for them, more than one way [00:10:00] to skin a cat, so to speak.
Chris Hughes: Oh yeah, absolutely. I, but I just see that like, not even from, okay.
You're not even from the business side of it, but from the client side, things are so much easier to deliver and. You can controllable, customizable from a client's perspective, but anyway, there's a lot out there that we need to do, but I'm just thinking what a visionary you must've been like back in 2016 to jump on a WordPress site.
Chloe McLeod: It's funny. It's funny like, cause now everyone's not, or hardly anyone would be using WordPress. I think it's, everyone's using more like your Squarespace or some of your other sort of more like off the shelf. Type situations. Plug and play,
Chris Hughes: low code stuff. Yeah. Yeah.
Chloe McLeod: But yeah, with WordPress it was all, I was really fortunate.
My, my now husband, one of his mates happened to be a web developer and he had some space in his diary, and which he helped us out hugely with building that website. But then I also learned how to do it as well, which was pretty fun. And
Chris Hughes: yeah, there there's a real benefit I think to that. [00:11:00] Obviously we've built MEALZEE, but I'm not the developer, but obvious, I've learned so many tech skills throughout the process.
Yeah. That I think is really beneficial because I don't think a developer doesn't know what a dietitian needs. Whereas if you've got that little bit of both, you can be that conduit. Exactly. Brings it together. Yeah,
Chloe McLeod: exactly. And neither of us are going to go and develop a website, but knowing the basics.
And I think this is across any area of business as well. So you're not an accountant, you're not a marketing person, not an HR person. But particularly when you're quite small, you need skills in all of those areas, but even as you grow, you still need to keep those skills so that you can stay across everything, even if you're not doing those things.
And I think particularly when you're moving from being a team of say one to a team of five to a team of 20. More, you're going to be less across those other parts of the business, but not being like, and I say less across, that's not quite the right wording. You're going to be less in those parts of the business, but staying across them is so important because if you're not, I, yeah, that's [00:12:00] fine.
Things can go pear shaped.
Chris Hughes: My wife is a social media marketer, so she specifically, her niche is online course creators and she says that she deals with so many businesses that just want to completely delegate that role. But yeah, no one knows your business like you do.
Chloe McLeod: That's exactly right. And I'm all for getting experts in to help with certain things, the finance team and whatever.
And we can talk about that from a Verde perspective as well, but like you need to know your business. And if you're just asking other people to do it, I think again, that's a recipe to the things to end up falling over. They might not initially. But if you're not across it, then because you're just asking everyone to do everything else, then no one's going to care about it, like care about it.
Like you do either.
Chris Hughes: Yeah, totally. I think you've got to do the things in business that you don't enjoy as much as things you do enjoy. And too often, and I would have been guilty of this, no doubt. But yeah, I've certainly, one of the lessons I've learned is Like you say, you've got to be across it all. So let's jump on to Verde Nutrition because this is what fascinates me is that you had the business [00:13:00] two years.
Is that correct?
Chloe McLeod: It is. It is.
Chris Hughes: And you've sold it this year, I think back in March, maybe April, March.
Chloe McLeod: So January, everything went through. So yeah, no, that's all right. So yeah. So January 1, everything became official, but the papers were actually signed in November last year, but then there was a cooling off period and we wanted to make sure it was.
By the end of financial quarter, keep things clean for the accountant. And yeah, we thought it would be New Year. That's a nice time to be announcing something like that, rather than at Christmas time when everyone's busy with everything else. So yeah, fresh start. Yeah.
Chris Hughes: So can you like, take me back? Well, now probably two and a half years.
Like, so run me through the journey of Verde Nutrition from sort of inception to sale.
Chloe McLeod: Yeah. So I've been working for myself since 2016 and I was living in Sydney until the end of 2021. I say the end around September, 2021. At that point I had a team had another business [00:14:00] that I ended up leaving.
And so I started birthday in January of that year of January of 2022. And the, when I started it, the plan was never, I'm going to keep this thing forever, but I always wanted to sell it. And wasn't planning on selling it this soon, but the whole premise was around, we'll do it online. So at that point in time, I had my youngest daughter was eight or nine months old and my oldest was two and a bit.
And so they're about 18 months apart. And it was a case of, Do I actually take some time off and be a mom, but I have always really loved what I do. I'm very career oriented. I still love being a mom as well, but I think you can do both. And so I decided to start Verde and really fortunately have got a really awesome team of people who I've known for a really long time.
And we started working with people to do the telehealth consultations and do the corporate work. Some of that was utilizing some existing clients that I had, but. The, to be honest, the majority was starting from [00:15:00] scratch and rebuilding a brand again. And
Chris Hughes: sorry, Chloe said, did you start with the team? Like when you started the business?
Chloe McLeod: Yeah, essentially. So there was another business that I was a co owner of and me and the other co owner decided that we wanted to do really different things with our careers. So we went our separate ways and the team came with me and
Chris Hughes: yeah,
Chloe McLeod: So yeah, Very fortunate that was what they wanted to do and they're all still with me today, which is great.
Chris Hughes: That speaks volumes of you.
Chloe McLeod: Oh,
thank you. No, I'm really lucky to have all of them. But yeah, we're very close team, which is great. Yeah, they're awesome. I couldn't ask for a more supportive or wonderful group of dietitians to be working with and all the other people who are around. Yeah, but moving forward from that, so one of our, one of our clients is that was the people who now have acquired Verde, so there are an exercise rehabilitation business.
So a nationwide company of APs, I've known [00:16:00] their general manager since before we both. Since before I started working for myself and he had moved over to Guardian. So we worked in a private practice together early, early days of our careers and became really good friends. And then he reached out and was like, we're running these programs.
I want to include dietetics in it. Do you guys want to be involved? And so we started to roll that out. We did a pilot. With New South Wales police, which went super well. This is specifically in the work cover space. I actually just got an email yesterday. I'm going to be talking about the program at the DA conference in August.
Yeah. We got incredible outcomes from that pilot program over that sort of first year or so. Fast forward to March last year, and I met with Tom, I think we're having a, I can't remember now if it was a beer or a coffee or whatever it was, but we, I was in Sydney for something and we caught up and I made this really throwaway comment of like, Oh, maybe you should just buy us one day, Tom.
And he laughed and I laughed and in my mind, I'm [00:17:00] like, maybe in like five or six years, you might want to buy us
Chris Hughes: seed planted.
Chloe McLeod: What I didn't know was. Like I knew they brought in a new CEO to the business, but I didn't know that his whole MO was acquisition and they were going to be looking at acquiring some businesses.
So then a couple of months past when I get this text from Tom, are you going to, to digital health festival, which was in, in Melbourne last or it's in Melbourne every year. I was like, Oh, I wasn't really planning on it. I was like, he's like, I think you should come. Our CEO is coming. I'd really like you to meet Rob.
And then there was going to be something in Sydney that same week. It's like, if you can come, like, I want to invite you to this awards night. And it was the program that we'd been running. So behind the scenes, it was like, come to digital health festival so you can meet Rob. And then if he likes you, then we'll like, see what happens.
And as far as I was aware, we were having lunch when we got all, like, when we all got to Sydney to talk about, like having . Like a more robust contract because the agreement that we had was like it was fine because It was fine, but it wasn't very durable if anything [00:18:00] happened. So,
Chris Hughes: On where you're good people.
Chloe McLeod: Yeah.
Chris Hughes: Yeah.
Chloe McLeod: Any contracts, find where you're good people. They're at Rob invited me to this lunch and I thought we were talking about that and like our entree hadn't even arrived. And he's sorry, I want to buy a Verde. Oh, it's like, and he talked me through a little bit about what he was thinking. And he's like, sorry, are you interested online?
There's a lot of factors that would have to work here. For me to be interested at this point, but as a short answer, yes, because you guys are the ones who I probably would have wanted to sell to in that five or six years anyway. You're wanting to do it now. It's not quite the plan, but you don't have to stick to the plan.
No plans are there to be changed. And yeah, really fortunately then over the next six months and multiple conversations and Lots of numbers and forecasting and all the things. Yeah. That's, we ended up agreeing on some numbers and some other bits and pieces. And here we are.
Chris Hughes: Here you are. Yeah.. Oh, wow. So you plan to sell, just to give you a bit of our example, [00:19:00] but we just lived in our business, actually never intended to sell.
I started out just, I needed a wage. I needed to feed my family. I went in completely blind. I've learned about businesses. I've had this business. And then in the last 12 months before our sale, we had personal stuff going on with family and young, we had four young kids that were, we were not neglecting, but you know, they were busy with business and that was tough.
Our business wasn't ready for sale, but we just tried to offload it basically as quickly as we can. We decided we were traveling in a caravan and so we never really run the business. To sell it, which I know you should do, but ultimately we, we put all the expenses in the business and the numbers, like it was a great business.
It was good turnover and everything else. Like when you started out two years ago, were you just so disciplined? You thought, no, I'm going to sell this business. I'm going to run it. So if someone wants to come in here, it's systemized finances are in check.
Chloe McLeod: A bit of column A and a bit of column B there.
There was definitely a lot of expenses being put through the business, but also just from an accounting [00:20:00] perspective, all that we had to do was just show how, if we pulled those things out and like, it would make the business look more profitable when it's all that sort of stuff. So that was a, that was just an accounting treatment that they were happy with.
And we were happy with to, to be able to make the numbers more, more real. And part of the agreement was that if there's anything pre accounting, Like official sale date, then that's still going to fall on me. And if there's anything post date, then that's going to fall on them. That's we just made it. So it was a pretty transparent, clear agreement.
I think that the reason that I had in my mind, I wanted to set it up for sale is I think when it's just you and you're the brand of the business, there's only really so much that you can grow it before it's going to reach a cap. But also if you're required in the business. For it to work, then is that how you really want your life to look like long term?
And I think in your situation, you went, no, that's not how I want my life to look like. And [00:21:00] I knew that wasn't how I wanted my life to look like either. Like, I love what I do, but I don't want to have to be there for it to be a functional thing. And I also really like the idea of knowing what had happened with the FODMAP challenge.
Like that process I actually really enjoyed. It was, I really enjoyed going through all of the minutiae and the negotiation and the process. The complete non nutrition stuff and still the like talking to people when sorting things out. I really enjoyed that whole process. So I think knowing that I was like, it was like, that's this one, then this is the next one.
And let's see what we can get it to. And I'm sure we'll talk about reasons for sale. But for me, one of the reasons was that. With the investment from Guardian, it meant that the business is going to get to where I think it can get to from a financial perspective, significantly faster than it would have been able to for me or my own.
So, so I think that one of the things you need to think about with your business, when you're owning a business is your business is another person. So they've got a seat at [00:22:00] the table. As well, when it comes to making decisions about the business, so you need to think about what's best for the business.
So overall, yeah, you've got your team. You need to make great decisions about as well, but the business needs to come first and selling was what was best for the business. Sorry. Then there's the personal reasons of having a little bit more work life balance. I have two little kids and Lily starts school in a couple of months and they have a mid year intake in South Australia, which is apparently really weird for everyone in all the other States.
And I'm like last year, I was like, I've got a year before she starts school and I can't spend time with her during the week, but I'm working five days more and so work most evenings as well. And I just realized that I'm like, I love work, but I want to be a little bit more present for my kids. And so now we have Lily Tuesdays and Grace, my youngest, once Lily starts school, cause it's quite close, we'll have Grace Tuesdays.
So yeah, it's been a really nice change for me. And I still get that satisfaction of running the business. It's [00:23:00] not mine, but it still feels like it's mine. Yeah. I feel like it's mine, but I think I'm a bit better at having some boundaries around being available or not all the time because. There is that sort of extra layer of assistance there.
Chris Hughes: And so the team from Guardian giving you quite a bit of autonomy then, like when it comes to the Verde side of it.
Chloe McLeod: Yeah. It's again, like really fortunate. And one of the, one of the things they did a great job of selling me on, if I'm allowed to say that, but the, like people ask me, how's your life changed?
I'm like, to be honest, my day to day is actually not that different. I just now have a finance team to help me with. Reports and doing all the things. And I have
Chris Hughes: Yeah
Chloe McLeod: A marketing team, like there's a full marketing team to help with things. Now there's a HR, there's a, there's all of the things that the business needs to scale more quickly without me having to go and look for them or be doing them myself.
I can actually see more clients now than I was last year, which again is like super weird to me, but it's nice to be able to have that [00:24:00] client contact, which I, yeah, as I said before, I really love that. But. Do we have that management role as well
Chris Hughes: so did you consider whether, were there multiple options on the table, like in terms of rather than a complete sale, like an investment in your business or a partnership thing, or was it always just a complete sale?
Chloe McLeod: We spoke about that and. We ended up agreeing that a complete sale was the best way to go. There's, with the way that it's worked, there's certainly an incentive for me to be up to stay. Like I, I have to stay for a certain amount of time, but there's also an incentive for me to stay on top of that as well.
It makes a lot of sense, made a lot of sense in my mind to do it this way. So yeah, it's
Chris Hughes: It's win. And you can't tell me how long you've got to stay or you're not even answering that, but. Do you intend to stay there like for a long time? You're so happy in it. Or do you think, can you see yourself in the future, potentially having your own business again?
Chloe McLeod: Oh, it's a really big question. For the second question, I'm not sure. As I said earlier, like I really love my team who I [00:25:00] work with. And probably more than anything, I'm like, I just like working with them. I can't see myself going anywhere. I need to be there for three years. That's I'm happy to be there.
Be open about that, which is, it's funny. Some people say it's a really long time and others are like, Oh, that's not long at all. The way that I look at it is I'm like that three years brings us to about that five year mark that I was initially thinking about. Anyway, I've got some numbers in my head of, There's the targets that we have or the forecasting that we have, but there's also the number that I have in my head of where I wanted the business to be at by that times.
Yeah. It's going to be interesting to see what happens over the next few years and when those different things are achieved.
Chris Hughes: Yeah, it's refreshing to hear your story because I won't go into details about it, but it was messy and ugly and I hated the whole process. It was, I've got PTSD from it, but sorry, but it's so refreshing to see that.
Like you've sold two businesses and you've got what seems to be a great relationship with both of your buyers [00:26:00] still. Yeah,
Chloe McLeod: I'm having dinner with Sarah next week actually, and she happens to be in Adelaide. So yeah, no it's awesome.
Chris Hughes: Which I think when you go into a deal like that, win has to be the outcome.
I think, and this is good, this sort of blow up. Like if you've got someone that's just in it for them, it's never going to work in a sale. Yeah.
Chloe McLeod: But do you know what? I think that's in any business arrangement. If you're trying to work with someone who's only looking out for themselves, how can, how you can make it work for everyone?
It's impossible because you're not going to be able to keep everybody happy. If one it's, yeah, it's just not going to work, but I think what. In that sort of, if it's like a hostile situation where it ends up being, yes, you were seeking it, but then ended up not being such a good experience. The way that I would look at that is, yeah, that kind of, maybe that kind of sucked, but think about the learning you got from that more than anything else.
Chris Hughes: Yeah.
Chloe McLeod: I think the saying, or like the fact that pressure [00:27:00] creates diamonds. I think when you're under that kind of pressure, you're under that kind of stress and things are really hard. That's where. Sometimes where the magic ends up being found, and if you hadn't gone through that, you wouldn't have MEALZEE, you wouldn't be doing what you're doing now.
Exactly.
Chris Hughes: I'm so grateful for so many things of that, like the things that we've learned. It gave us a year traveling the caravan with our young family, lots to complain about it. But yeah, it's just great to hear a story like yours where you can. Have a sale go successfully and everyone's happy and still got a great relationship, but you're still heavily invested in Verde.
You are the face of it still. A lot of people think Verde, they think of Chloe McLeod. And you're an amazing team. I'm going
Chloe McLeod: to be like that forever. Can't be like that forever.
Chris Hughes: And you're an amazing team. So. So there's three things that you talk about that, that are critical for growing a good business.
And that was relationships, a great team and being great at what you do. You're clearly great at what you do. You're clearly great at relationships and your team obviously. You've got some [00:28:00] dynamic there that you're able to keep a team together. They want to work for you. What's the key there? Is it just something that comes naturally to you?
Is it, were they friends beforehand? You get your, what's the secret sauce?
Chloe McLeod: I don't know if there is a secret sauce. I think what one of the, what one of my team members said to me once was she really loves how I can be. Like mentor boss Chloe, but I can also be friend Chloe and we'll be in mid conversation.
I'll be like, I just have to take like dietitian hat off, boss hat off. And for that, for the team, I think looking out for their best interests above everything else for them and talking to them about, I obviously want what's best for Verde and for myself, but also let's not be selfish. If it's going to be better for you to go and take a different role or not.
Be in the business, then I would actually prefer you do that because that's going to make you happier. And I think it's about being, not being selfish is probably the best way to go. [00:29:00] Excuse me. I think there. So when this person said that to me, I was like, Oh, like that's just how I really try to operate in my life in that obviously I want the best for myself but I tend to be pretty empathetic and giving most of the time.
Okay. So maybe that's a secret sauce. I'm not sure.
Chris Hughes: Well, whatever you're doing, it's clearly working.
Chloe McLeod: Yeah. I think the other part is that like with two of the dietitians at the moment, they, like I've known them since they were students, but like two of the others. We worked together previously. So I think having known each other for a really long time helps to build that relationship.
But yeah, I think being able to not just think about it from a selfish perspective or how it can benefit you and having your team know that you've got their back is super important.
Chris Hughes: Yeah. Yeah. I love that. Yeah. Well, Chloe, thank you so much for your time today. I normally finish with one question and this is really about passing on some of your wisdom to any of our listeners.
What would be any key advice? If [00:30:00] you can come up with three, that's amazing. But any advice that you would share, with anyone starting out in the nutrition space or anyone currently in the nutrition space that's just keeping their head above water, the key bits of advice you would give to help them succeed in the business.
area when it comes to nutrition?
Chloe McLeod: Yeah, so if we look at it specifically from a business perspective and with that sale lens, I think having an accountant or somebody who works in M& A, so mergers and acquisitions, helping with advice around the tax Side of things and the financial side of things that can save you like hundreds and hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Like I know it, that has for me, it's incredible. The impact that can have is having somebody who's very skilled in that area. So there, those people are worth their weight in gold. I think having a great lawyer is also really important. So somebody who is able to help out with making sure that the contracts.
Don't just work when you're happy and that they're going [00:31:00] to be really clear and unambiguous when things aren't happy. So I think, I actually think the more simple, the better, like sometimes you read legal documents and you're like, I don't even know what this is saying. So having a lawyer who can explain it to you, but I actually think being like, no, let's just change the language so we all understand it.
Because if there's no ambiguity, then when you're not friends. Hopefully it doesn't ever happen, but it means that there's no ambiguity. It's just going to make life significantly easier. I think probably the other thing isn't so much from a sale thing, but is more from a growth thing. And it's been one of the things that I have found to be a really big learning over the past few years is around how you work when it's a really small team to getting to be a larger team.
And yeah. I was actually at a talk that with someone recently and the speaker was talking about as your business scales and grows and how you manage differently. And the way that he spoke about it was you've got different cliffs. So you've got your one person cliff when it's just, you can do what you like.[00:32:00]
It's relatively easy, hard parts as well, but relatively easy when it's just you. And then you grow to. Five or six people, and then you grow to the 20, like I was talking about earlier, but the way you have to manage and not match as managed people, but the way you have to have the business set up is quite different as you get bigger, because what's worked for a few people where it can be a little bit more ad hoc, a little bit less strict from a systems and procedures perspective, you have to get much more specific on that as it grows, which.
Well, honestly, that doesn't come naturally to me. I have to like spend a lot of time focusing on that side of things. But again, that's part of why we do things is to learn. So I think that's been a, that's a really important thing as well, because you, the skills that you need to manage yourself or a very small team are very different to what you need as you scale, if that's what your plan is.
Chris Hughes: I went to a conference, I've spoken about this previously on the podcast. We went to a conference and it was, they're saying one to 12 employees. It's great. And you're building, you're working, you're building a business. 12 to [00:33:00] 50 is an absolute nightmare. We were at 12 and we had a job ad out because we needed to grow.
And we grew to 18 and that it was so, I don't know, it was just so on point that next six employees, not them specifically, but just managing it was a lot harder, which kind of was part of our demise too. So it was, yeah, I certainly sympathize. You need HR, you need like big things. The skills that got you to 12 won't get you to 50.
Chloe McLeod: No, they won't. So I think having. Having people around you who have been there is really important. Same as what we said earlier, it's not outsourcing everything, but it's having people you can bounce ideas off, having people who, even if it's not the same sector, but who have grown a business to that 50 people who have.
Done these things, because if you can talk through that lived experience with people and people who you trust, I think that's one of the best ways you can learn as well.
Chris Hughes: Yeah, I love that. Oh, thank you. You've been so valuable with your time, Chloe. My
Chloe McLeod: pleasure. Thanks for inviting me on. This has been so fun chatting.
Chris Hughes: Oh, it's been great. It's been great. I was so [00:34:00] excited when you agreed. So now all the best with the rest of better nutrition and whatever endeavors you partake in the future. And hopefully we cross paths at a conference somewhere along the way. All right.

Chloe McLeod: That'd be lovely. No worries, Chris. Thank you.
Chris Hughes: Do you find this podcast valuable?
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