Kurt Seidensticker's Career at NASA and Motorola Led To Creating Vital Proteins

Kurt Seidensticker wasn't always obsessed with collagen. In fact, before he founded Vital Proteins, he worked at NASA, training astronauts and designing missions, developed cell phone networks, helped create the first internet in the mid- to late-90s and started a fresh-caught fish and steak eCommerce business. Everything he learned in these endeavors when coupled with chronic pain in his joints, led him to start the clean collagen company that's quickly evolved into a lifestyle brand. "I suddenly recognized that everything I had done, all the goals I had set in my life before ... I had this epiphany that I was built for this," Seidensticker told me in front of our very first live audience recording of #WeGotGoals. "This was my purpose. This is what all my other goals culminated in." Vital Proteins' portfolio of clean, minimally-processed products spans from creamers to bone broths to beauty waters, and from matchas to protein powders to supplements. It's hard to believe that only five years ago, Seidensticker was intrigued by the potential benefits of collagen but couldn't find the right product to help him. Alongside his daughter- a doctor - he said they "distilled research papers and showed that your body really needed a lot of collagen, especially as you age." "[We] realized [the body] needed probably 20, 30 grams of collagen a day outside of what it could produce itself, outside of what you were getting in your diet." Finding that he would have to take countless pills a day to add enough collagen into his daily diet, Seidensticker was dissatisfied. He decided to look for another way to take a larger quantity and more easily incorporate the supplement into his daily life. At that point he became obsessed with creating what would become Vital Proteins. "[We] probably spent about a year developing and refining some of the processing to develop a larger form of collagen that you can take." This laser-focus and complete dedication is in line with the way Seidensticker views any and all of his goals. "When you're thinking about goal setting, it's great to set a goal, [but] the commitment behind the goal is the key. You almost have to become obsessed with it, meaning nothing else matters." He illustrated this point with a fitness goal. When getting into shape with a personal trainer, Seidensticker made it a hard and fast rule that he wouldn't book on top of his workout hour. Four to five days a week, he was working out. And even though it was a personal goal, for Seidensticker it's always a little bit business. "If I don't take that time to set my own personal goals it actually takes away from my ability to lead and run the organization professionally," he added. Seidensticker and his team spent the past five years growing rapidly, increasing Vital Proteins' product offerings. All of that growth and innovation take trial and error and for any entrepreneur at the beginning of his or her path, he has a key piece of advice: start somewhere, accept that you'll have failures, but to learn from them, iterate and move on. For Seidensticker, it's those mistakes and iterations are exactly what's made him able to constantly improve.   ___   MU: Awesome! So thank you so much for joining us on the #WeGotGoals podcast and also for a SweatWorkingWeek lunch and learn, Kurt. It's so great to have you. KS:Thanks for having me. I think this is a great idea. I’m glad I can participate and be a part of it. MU:Amazing! All right. Let's jump right in because there's a lot a lot to get going on. So Kurt. Before you started Vital Proteins, which is the clean collagen product company that we know and love you first worked at NASA training astronauts and designing missions. Let that land. And also started many other business ventures including a fresh caught fish and steak e-commerce business. So what connects all of your endeavors? KS :Yeah it probably starts with my own passion to have challenges and to be able to work through those and kind of create something new. So when I first started off in my career at NASA my goal there was you know every kid probably has this dream to be an astronaut or something like that. So yeah I kind of set the goal like that's what I wanted to do and probably for about four years I worked on becoming an expert in flying the space shuttle and then training astronauts on how to fly the space shuttle. I tend to like—after about three years, what I've noticed in my career is about three years I master what I'm focused on and I go out and I want to seek the next challenge and the next thing in my career. And so I notice after like four years there I was ready for a new challenge. And so it's never just staying in the same place. It's really coming up with a new challenge, a new set of goals focusing on those. If you follow the path of my career there is always not only just taking on new challenges but always fitness and health were always like in my personal passion. And so I went from you know, flying simulators and training astronauts to developing cell phone networks using my software and technology experience that I developed at NASA to going on and doing investment banking and doing the starting up e-commerce businesses working, I actually helped create the very first Internet back in the mid to late 90s. And every time it's always just setting a goal working on it and then looking for the next opportunity. And over time that after doing all this I really wanted to just try to focus on marrying the two of what my passions were personally with fitness with that goal setting, the challenges that I was looking for ,the need to help other people and to be innovative. And so I found myself at Vital proteins so. MU: Founder yourself at Vital Proteins, really, founded it. KS: Yeah, founded it. MU:What specifically brought you into collagen? Like, where did that come into play and say you found the need and here you are . KS: You know, I was looking for for what to do next in my career. I had just done an e-commerce business that was the fresh seafood and steaks. And one thing I realized was, it's a challenging business right? We were doing stuff in Hawaii where we actually went down to the harbor got the fish and then that same day then shipped him overnight to people in the U.S. and logistically that's a challenge. You know keeping it fresh is a challenge. And I said, well, I want something a little more—next business is something a little more shelf stable and non-perishable and something that would really help people. And I started looking at a variety of different opportunities and personally in my own life I was going through—aging, right? I was in my mid 40s and I was still trying to run. I've always been a passionate runner and what I noticed was I was no longer able to run every day. And soon every other day became every four days or every five days because I simply wasn't recovering and my joint pain and my knees would start aching after even just a short run of 5K. So I started thinking I was going to change my diet. I was going to actually go on a paleo diet and this is probably in 2011, 2012. And that didn't quite do and I'm trying to look for protein sources because I was still lifting weights are still running and started thinking about what protein I should be taking because really try to get off dairy and get off of whey protein which is like a traditional fitness protein. And I wasn't really into full pea protein or things like that at the time and so I looked at as I started thinking about aging and you start thinking about collagen and you start, I started thinking like OK I know in my knee things are breaking down. And how can I repair that quickly? And I started thinking about college and my daughter who's a medical doctor. We kind of distilled some research papers and showed that your body really needed a lot of collagen especially as you age. So even that even at the age of 25 your body needs a lot of collagen and start to look at how much collagen and your body needed and realized it needed probably 20, 30 grams of collagen a day outside of what it could produce itself outside of what you were getting in your diet. And at the time there were just pills on the market and there was, I started, you know you need to take like 60 pills a day just to meet your body need. I’m like, I'm not going to do that. I have a hard time just taking one or two pills a day. So I started looking for a way to develop a protein that was clean that you could take in a larger quantity that you could incorporate, that you ...