Wow, I forgot all about Smashmallow until this incredible read about "the Theranos of marshmallows."https://t.co/IRhuxYIJ6J
— Molly Longman (@MollLongman) March 15, 2024
Everyone has a story about a friend who ran a store or a service and had more customers than they could handle. You ask why they don't hire assistants or open a second location, and the answer is usually "I don't want to work that hard." That wasn't the case with Jon Sebastiani. He was born into mass market business and wanted to make his own mark and to change the way people ate. One of his big ideas was to sell artisanal marshmallows, the kind he saw in France, and make them an upscale snack with a variety of flavors.
It was difficult enough to find a small bakery to make his marshmallows by hand, but they were a hit. Sebastiani wanted to move into large-scale manufacturing. But there was no way to scale up hand-made marshmallows, and there was no factory or equipment that could handle large batches. That equipment had to be invented. Still, a deal was made, and he fired his small bakery. What could possibly go wrong?
The story of one business that went wrong is also the story of many other businesses that scaled up too soon and too fast. Read about the rapid rise and explosive bust of Smashmallow and find out why staying small is sometimes for the best. -via Nag on the Lake