Taste Radio

Brian Rudolph is a big believer in cold calling. The co-founder and CEO of Banza -- a brand of chickpea-based pasta that’s promoted as a protein-rich, gluten-free and nutritious alternative to traditional varieties -- said that while rejection is to be expected with unsolicited outreach, persistence and civility have led to big wins for the company. “We got rejected all the time,” Rudolph said in an interview included in this episode of Taste Radio. “Sometimes people just don’t answer, but you have to recognize that it’s okay to follow up. And a lot times we wouldn’t get a response until the fourth or fifth time. So many of our early retail relationships came from cold outreach. You’d be surprised; you can cold call the headquarters of a retailer and say ‘who’s the buyer for XYZ?’ [and] you’ll find who it is, and just leave them a voicemail. Of course, be polite, but be polite and relentless.” The tenacity has paid off for Banza, which just four years after its launch has become one of the top-selling pasta b