From Wall Street to Popcorn: How This Ex-Trader Turned Around a 'Flatlining' Snack Company

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From Wall Street to Popcorn: How This Ex-Trader Turned Around a 'Flatlining' Snack Company
EntrepreneurshipFood IndustryBusiness Turnaround
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This article tells the story of how former Wall Street trader Coristine impulsively bought a struggling snack company called LesserEvil and turned it into a multi-million dollar business. Despite having no experience in the food industry, he leveraged his finance background and entrepreneurial spirit to grow the company's sales, secure funding, and create a successful brand.

. He loved the pace, even waking up in the middle of the night to trade in the Tokyo and London stock markets.

The business, which sells a variety of popcorns and air-popped Cheetos-like puffs and curls, has been profitable since 2021, according to company estimates. It made $14.4 million last year in earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization, or EBITDA. In 2012, he got his MBA degree and started his new full-time job as LesserEvil's CEO. Among his first moves: hiring his graduate school friend Andrew Strife as COO and CFO, and his wakeboard instructor as head of marketing.

That year, Coristine's personal nutritionist offered a health-focused suggestion: Use coconut oil to pop the popcorn. Coristine was skeptical that coconut oil would stay fresh in a snack bag, so he literally shelf-tested it, he says:"We put it on the top of a fridge, which gets really hot for three months."

The company still brought in $62 million in net sales during the first half of 2024. It used another round of funding — $19 million, in a round led by investment firm Aria Growth Partners, LesserEvil says — to buy out prior investors and open a new factory in New Milford, roughly 15 miles from its Danbury facility.

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