Erin Hall
April 30, 2024
Ben Zaver is a Minnesota State University-Mankato graduate. He is also the founder of a protein powder company. In 2020 he started his journey to build what became known as Seeq Protein. All from his parents garage in Plymouth, Minnesota to start. Let's take a look at that journey.
Ben Zaver went to school (Minnesota State Mankato) for mechanical engineering and graduated right before COVID-19 hit. He was at a job interview in Arizona about to get an engineering job. COVID-19 hit while he was there and the company he was interviewing with paused on hiring processes. He had the idea to start a business a few months prior to this interview. Due to COVID-19, he couldn’t find a job since no one was hiring and was living at home. To him, there was no better time to try and start his own business. Seeq Protein was started partly out of Ben seeing the necessity in having a job, as well as he always wanted to start his own business.
Zaver stated that the biggest risk that he has taken was probably at the very beginning regarding the financial aspects. At the start, the very first manufacturer that he met with told him the minimum amount he could order from them was 4,000 units of protein, but it would be around eighty grand. Originally, he said that there was no way he was going to do that. After a year and a half of looking and trying to find other manufacturers or people who would do it for cheaper or have a lower minimum purchase amount, they returned to the first manufacturer. It was the cheapest and the producer was the best. After a year and a half, Ben was still living at home. Every day when his parents would get home from work, he would tell them about his progress, no matter how big or small it was. Ben stated that after that year and a half, he thought his parents started believing in it more than he did and told him if he was going to do it that he needed to go back to the first manufacturer and order the $80,000 of inventory up front. All of the inventory was sent to his parents’ house to store it at the start. So the biggest risk was ordering the inventory and spending that kind of money up front without knowing if the business would succeed or not.
One of the biggest advantages of being self-employed in Ben’s eyes is being able to set his own schedule. Recently, he has been planning his day around when he knows he’ll have the most energy. For himself, he likes to work by himself in the mornings and have meetings in the afternoon. So while he has more energy in the afternoon to complete things, his brother, Will, who works for him, works best at two in the morning and gets to set his schedule for then. So just working when it’s most beneficial for him is his top advantage for being self employed.
For Ben, one of the most rewarding things is being able to work with his younger brother, Will and his younger sister, Maggie. To him, that was one of the coolest things early on. He was able to hire Will as his third employee and claims to enjoy being able to work with him everyday. Another rewarding thing for him is being able to build something impactful. He also finds it cool to work with a bunch of young entrepreneurs his age and build a cool company with cool people.
In Ben’s opinion, the hardest challenge for him as a first time business owner, is the mental challenges he faces. He says this rather than selling the product or marketing it or financing it, like he feels most people would say. Day to day he deals with things he never thought he would have to. He says while the business side of things has come naturally to him and that that part makes sense in his head, dealing with stress is harder for him. It has led him to making sure he puts effort in to get enough sleep. He has also started seeing a therapist and doing that sort of thing so that he can show up as his best self for his team everyday.
On the marketing side of things, he was looking at other people and business owners on TikTok and how they were sharing their journey and in his words, “they were killing it.” Although he didn’t think they had a revolutionary product of any kind, he thought he could produce better content, as well as a better product. Before starting Seeq, he had never made a TikTok or used social media much in general, but he knew if he wanted to succeed that he would have to. He taught himself how to make videos and edit and produce them. The first year of business he got all his sales through his personal TikTok. Ben used his personal TikTok to begin rather than a brand TikTok because to him, he figured people would rather follow a person than a brand. Seeq ended up making its first million in sales just through TikTok. Early on he realized that TikTok could be a phenomenal way to get customers for free, which he realized could be extremely beneficial in the long run. His business ended up getting hundreds of thousands of customers for free just from TikTok. Ben claims recently 80% of their sales have come from paid advertising, but they are trying to get back to making more organic social content.
In order to get clients for Ben and Seeq it’s a bit different. They currently really only sell on their website and on Amazon.They have four main ways to gain clients and new business opportunities. The first one being organic social media, so Tiktok, Instagram, YouTube, other social media like those. TikTok Shop, recently, has started to be a big one for them. The second way, that is a much more recent way for them, as well as something they don’t do much of yet, is influencer affiliate marketing. This is hiring influencers to talk about your product and having them give out codes to customers. This was something Ben stated he wants to work more on this upcoming year. The main way they gain new customers is through paid advertising on social media. The final way is just through SMS and emailing their mailing list and sending stuff like that out.
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Interview Transcript: Ben Zaver (Seeq Protein Supply)
Erin Hall: Hi, thank you again for agreeing to do this. So the first question is why did you start your business?
Ben Zaver: Why I started it. Let's see. I think at the start I started kind of like it was during COVID, so I didn't really have a job. I went to school for mechanical engineering and when I graduated it was right during COVID. And so I was actually at a job interview in Arizona, about to get an engineering job and COVID hit like while I was there. And so they like pause hiring. And I had this idea to start a business like a couple months before then. So I was like, all right, COVID hit. Can't find a job and living at home. Like there's no better time to start. And so I started a little bit out of necessity and a little bit just how I always wanted to start a business.
Erin Hall: Got it. The next question is what risk would you say that you've taken?
Erin Hall: Got it. The next question is what risk would you say that you've taken?
Ben Zaver: Risk. I think the biggest risk was probably at the very start financially. Essentially, to start, okay, so like the first ever manufacturer we met was like, okay, in order to do this, you need to order 4,000 units up for protein.And that was around like 80 grand. And at the time we were like, yeah, there's no way we're doing that. That's insane. And so I spent the next year and a half trying to find other manufacturers, trying to find people that would do it for cheaper, trying to find people that would do it for cheaper, trying to find people that would let us order less bottles up front to make it less risky. And after a year and a half, we couldn't find anyone that could do it. Like the first one we ever talked to was just, it was the cheapest, the product was the best. And so basically after a year and a half, this was, I was living at home at the time. And basically every single day after my parents got home for work out, kinda just telling the progress I was making and all that kind of stuff. And after like a year and a half, my parents like almost started believing in it more than me and they were basically just like, all right, if we're gonna do this thing, we're gonna have to go to that first manufacturer and order the $80,000 of inventory up front. And we sent this to my parents' place. So really the biggest risk was ordering all that inventory up front. But at the time it was the only way to start. So yeah that was probably the biggest risk.
Erin Hall: Yeah that would make sense for the financials being the biggest risk.. What would you say the advantages are of being self-employed?
Ben Zaver: I think the biggest advantage is being able to make your own schedule. One thing I've been doing recently is planning my day on when I can have the most energy. For example, you can decide, hey, I want to have meetings in the mornings versus I want to have meetings in the afternoons. For me personally, I like doing work by myself in the mornings and then doing meetings in the afternoons. I just have more energy to have meetings in the afternoons. So I think that really the biggest thing is being able to just, it's kind of cliche. I feel like probably every person's gonna answer this, but you just get to make your own schedule and you get to work around how you work best. If you want to wake up at 5 a.m. And you work the best at 5 a.m. Then do that. If you work the best at 2 in the morning, which my brother does, then you can do that.
Erin Hall: That makes sense, especially for Will working best at 2 in the morning. What has been the most rewarding thing about being an entrepreneur?
Ben Zaver: I think one of the most rewarding things for me personally is definitely being able to work with my brother and my sister. I was probably one of the coolest things early on. Like being able to hire Will as like our third employee and being able to work with them every day. And I think the other rewarding thing for me is just being able to build something impactful and I don't know, just it's really cool in my opinion with a bunch of people like my age, a bunch of just like young entrepreneurs as well.That's like just being able to be I guess being able to like build a cool company with cool people.
Ben Zaver: I think one of the most rewarding things for me personally is definitely being able to work with my brother and my sister. I was probably one of the coolest things early on. Like being able to hire Will as like our third employee and being able to work with them every day. And I think the other rewarding thing for me is just being able to build something impactful and I don't know, just it's really cool in my opinion with a bunch of people like my age, a bunch of just like young entrepreneurs as well.That's like just being able to be I guess being able to like build a cool company with cool people.
Erin Hall: Got it, I bet it has to be fun working with your siblings and getting to hire them. And then like this one's kind of like the risk questions, but what are some of the biggest challenges that you faced in owning your own business?
Ben Zaver: The weird part is I feel like a lot of people would say like, oh, like the hardest part for me has been like marketing, like selling the product or marketing this or financing this.I think the biggest one for me though has been like the mental challenge of basically the mental challenge of being a first time business owner. There's so many things that come up on the day to day that I just never thought I'd have to deal with. Like for example, I'm personally not the best with confrontation and that comes up a lot. And so the mental challenge for me has by far been the hardest. Some of the business stuff has kind of come natural, I would say. It just, it just makes sense in my head, but a lot of the, yeah, just, just dealing with stress. A lot of the mental stuff's been actually like super challenging for me and it's really made me focus on a lot of health stuff like just being able to show up my best every day like getting better sleep, seeing a therapist like all that kind of stuff so I can actually show up my best self for my for my team every day.
Erin Hall: Alright. What marketing tactics have been successful for you?
Ben Zaver: All right so very early on we well this was like kind of right when, when TikTok was the thing, but I saw other, other people on TikTok, other, other business owners basically sharing the journey of building their company on TikTok and they were killing it. And I didn't think, no offense to them, I wouldn't say they had like a revolutionary product. So they were, they're basically, I saw these people, they were killing it. I thought I could make a better product and maybe make better videos. And so, the crazy part is before I started the business, I'd never made one single TikTok, I'd never made one single, honestly anything on social media to be honest, but I knew it was such a big opportunity. So I basically just taught myself how to make videos. And the whole first year in business, we got all of our sales through my personal TikTok. And the reason I started my personal TikTok versus the brand TikTok, like a, like a seat TikTok was because I think people would rather follow a person than a brand.
Erin Hall: Yeah, that makes sense.
Ben Zaver: Yeah, and so that ended up working really well. And we actually got like, I think like, we definitely got our first million in sales just from TikTok. And so that was definitely one of the biggest things early on because the other thing that did was these other companies to get their first million, they would have had to spend a bunch of money on ads or commercials or whatever it is, but we got all those customers for free, which has really set us up to, I guess, be successful in the long term. So we got hundreds of thousands of customers literally for free on TikTok. So I think TikTok is probably one of the bigger ones. More recently I would say like 80% of our sales probably come from paid advertising. But now we're trying to give back to making more just like organic social content and to try sales, which we've kind of gotten the way from, but we're trying to get back to that more.
Erin Hall: Good to know. And then this one kind of goes along with this. But like, how do you get new business or clients?
Ben Zaver: Yeah, for us, since we're only, we only sell on our website and on Amazon, It's a lot of the online thing. So I think the four main ones are organic social media. So that's TikTok, Instagram, YouTube, all that. TikTok shop is a big one. Remember to that? Yeah. It's been doing good for us. So it's organic, social. It's influencer affiliates. So like, we don't do much of this yet, but it's hiring influencers out to talk about your product. And then affiliates is more like giving giving your customers codes to like whatever you know to fill it says like giving discount codes to other people using their name basically yeah so influencers affiliates is a big one that we want to even focus more on influencers coming up this year. Definitely the main one is paid advertising. So advertising on TikTok, Facebook, all the social platforms. And I would say the other main one is email and SMS. So we have a list of a bunch of our customers that give us their phone number and email. So It's marketing to those people through email and SMS.
Erin Hall: Alright, that's all the questions I have. Thank you so much again for doing this
Ben Zaver: All right, sounds good. It’s not a problem at all.