Taste Radio

It’s hard to overestimate the impact that Patty Spence, the founder of market research firm SPINS and CEO of stevia-sweetened beverage brand Zevia, has had on the natural food industry. With SPINS, Spence transformed the way that natural product sales data is tracked and aggregated and in doing so created a powerful resource for a fast-growing industry. After departing SPINS, Spence became the CEO of Zevia, a company that he acquired in 2010, and has since played a key role in stevia’s development as a leading natural and zero-calorie alternative to sugar. The sweetener is central to the formulation of Zevia, which is expected to pull in over $200 million in sales this year. In a conversation included in this episode, Spence remarked on the success of both SPINS and Zevia and pointed to a passion for continuous improvement as key to his business philosophy. “We never think we’re at the end point,” he said. “It’s about being one percent better each day, each week than we were before.” Hear more from our conver