How Boxed founder Chieh Huang advises early-stage founders on scaling

Executive overview

Three early-stage founders call in with real scaling challenges: a beef tallow skincare brand growing faster than its kitchen can handle, a niche equine products brand stuck at a revenue plateau, and an anti-inflammatory coffee brand wrestling with a product formulation problem.

Chieh Huang, who built and eventually bankrupted Boxed, brings hard-won perspective on when to manufacture, when to raise capital, and how to think about distribution.

The core insight: solve the operational ceiling before it becomes a brand crisis — a late order or a bad brew is your problem, not the customer's.

Surfing Cow: skincare brand outgrowing its kitchen

• Brand doing $74K in year one, on track for $200K+ in year two, all from home production
• Priority is locking down the formula before engaging a contract manufacturer — small changes cost money
• Shelf life, heat stability, and consistency must be tested before handing off to a coman
• California and Utah have FDA-registered natural product manufacturers that work with early-stage brands
• On raising capital: dilution from 15% of a billion-dollar business is not a problem worth protecting against
• Raise conservatively — small checks from people you know, no more than $50K at this stage
• Brand identity is the surfing part, not the cow — lifestyle positioning enables future expansion beyond beef tallow
• Brand collaborations (e.g. Viori, Reef) and eventual Whole Foods placement are natural next steps, but not yet

Tail Cinch: equine products brand at a revenue plateau

• Reusable tail ties for polo ponies, now used across all equine disciplines — $70–80K/year for four years with no growth
• Going onto Chewy or Valley Vet is worth it as a zero-cost-of-acquisition awareness play, provided margins stay positive
• Risk: large retailers have long payment cycles — factoring receivables erodes already thin margins
• Hero product (tail ties) drives 50%+ of sales; expanding the product line hasn't moved the overall revenue number
• Distribution on pet platforms makes strategic sense — horse owners and dog owners overlap heavily
• The equine products market is a $20B TAM; the audience is largely price-insensitive
• Behavior change happens at competitions, through trainers, and at barns — not just online

Makōr Coffee: anti-inflammatory coffee with a brew problem

• Organic coffee blended with cacao, turmeric, Ceylon cinnamon, chaga, cayenne, and ginger — 300 subscribers, on track for $200–300K, 95% online
• The problem: fine spice particles cause overflow in drip machines above 6 cups, creating churn risk
• Two paths: modify the formula for broader use, or lean into the constraint and market it as "best brewed in a French press"
• A proprietary grind that solves the overflow problem would also be a defensible moat — hard to copy
• Office coffee is a high-value distribution channel: recurring, sticky, and hungry for innovation
• A less-potent formulation for large-volume drip machines could unlock the office channel without compromising the core product
• Single-serve freeze-dried pouches — like Justin's Nut Butter pouches — could drive trial, solve the brewing issue, and open outdoor and travel use cases
• Packaging needs to communicate the functional benefit faster at retail shelf level

Chieh Huang's closing advice to founders

• Entrepreneurship is problem after problem — the reward is the journey, not the destination
• The downs are real, but the people you meet and the problems you solve make it worth it
• Enjoy the ride rather than optimizing for avoiding the hard parts