Chloe Sorvino leads coverage of food and agriculture at Forbes, and writes the newsletter Fresh Take. Her book Raw Deal: Hidden Corruption, Corporate Greed and the Fight for the Future of Meat published on Dec. 6th, 2022 with Simon & Schuster’s Atria Books.
Country Archer ’s Eugene Kang grew up stocking shelves at his parents’ gas station convenience stores. Now he’s producing one of the fastest-growing better-for-you snack foods in America.he tang of vinegar and soy sauce laced with the pungent scent of raw beef hits immediately as Eugene Kang, CEO of Country Archer , steps into his jerky factory in San Bernardino, California.
But Kang will need a lot of cash to take on deep-pocketed brands like Slim Jim, owned by $12 billion food giant ConAgra. At least Country Archer is capital efficient and profitable—with as much as $30 million in annual profits estimated. “How big can it be? This brand presents to me—and even the way they both started, with a major Starbucks partnership— it’s very similar to,” says Monogram cofounder and partner Jared Stein, referencing the snack bar brand, which Mars acquired a majority stake in for $5 billion in 2020. “ is elevated. It’s premium. It’s innovative. But it’s approachable. It has tremendous runway ahead of it to grow into a house of brands across the snack space, that are all protein-led.
That time in his father’s stores taught Kang that investor acquisitions dominate the food and beverage industry and that those deals dictate what is available in stores. The treat was so delicious that Kang left college to create a full-blown business out of it. In 2011, along with his aunt Susan, who had grown up helping her immigrant father sell jerky door-to-door to independent cash-and-carry stores around southern California, bought out Mirarchi, who was 77 and whose children who weren’t interested in the family business, which had around $360,000 in annual sales. Through a small business loan, they paid $500,000.
Kang almost got swept up in the boom cycle hype. But his father brought him back to reality. Once while explaining to his dad that one of his competitors, Krave, had been acquired for such a large amount—roughly 6 times revenue—without being profitable, he realized what he was describing made no sense.
Country Archer Jerky Eugene Kang Country Archer Eugene Kang Jerky Beef Jerky Country Archer Snack Foods Eugene Kang Forbes Under 30
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