157 | A Career Made from Stinky Kids | with Kyle Lafond

Honest Ecommerce

Kyle LaFond is the Founder of American Provenance.

Kyle started his career as a wildlife biologist for the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources but later transitioned into teaching middle school science.

During his years as an educator he became passionate about encouraging his students to use safe, natural personal care products.

This led to the launch of American Provenance from a renovated machine shed on his family’s 4th generation dairy farm.

Kyle is always willing to share his experiences and has continued to help and mentor startup founders across the country.

In his free time Kyle likes to work on various projects around his family farm.

On nice weekends you can find him hiking or fishing on some of Wisconsin’s wonderful public properties.

In This Conversation We Discuss:

• [00:00] Intro
• [01:09] Kyle’s very interesting founding story
• [03:25] Becoming more than just a project
• [04:49] First products that were brought to market
• [06:16] From brick and mortar to D2C
• [10:02] Amazon is a necessary evil
• [11:47] Sales velocity and economies of scale
• [13:29] Guidelines to consider in-house or partners
• [15:03] AOV is a big consideration
• [15:28] How Kyle increases AOV in their Shopify site
• [17:16] Sponsor: Electric Eye electriceye.io
• [17:36] Sponsor: Mesa apps.shopify.com/mesa
• [18:21] Sponsor: Gorgias gorgias.grsm.io/honest
• [19:51] Sponsor: BeProfit beprofit.co
• [21:18] Sponsor: Klaviyo klaviyo.com/honest
• [22:15] Lifetime value in relation to AOV
• [24:00] LTV formula is different for every business
• [24:39] How AP is different from competition
• [26:26] Just doing it and the importance of roles
• [28:01] Where to find Kyle and his products

Resources:

• Subscribe to Honest Ecommerce on Youtube
• Minimal-ingredient personal care products that contain no harsh chemicals, preservatives or artificial ingredients, and are always cruelty-free. americanprovenance.com
• Read Rocket Fuel: The One Essential Combination That Will Get You More of What You Want from Your Business eosworldwide.com/rocket-fuel-book
• Read Traction: Get a Grip on Your Business eosworldwide.com/traction-book
• Connect with Kyle linkedin.com/in/kyle-lafond-b11055b9
• Scale your business with electriceye.io
• Download Mesa at the Shopify App Store apps.shopify.com/mesa
• Level up your customer support gorgias.grsm.io/honest
• Visit beprofit.co and use code HONEST15 to get an exclusive 15% off any plan for the lifetime of your plan
• Get started with a free account at klaviyo.com/honest

If you’re enjoying the show, we’d love it if you left Honest Ecommerce a review on Apple Podcasts. It makes a huge impact on the success of the podcast, and we love reading every one of your reviews!