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Copyright © 2016 by Dave Zilko. All rights reserved
Published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey
Published simultaneously in Canada
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data:
Names: Zilko, Dave, author.
Title: Irrational persistence: seven business secrets that turned a crazy
startup into a #1 national brand / Dave Zilko.
Description: Hoboken, New Jersey: John Wiley & Sons, [2016] | Includes index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2015043063 (print) | LCCN 2016000691 (ebook) |
ISBN 9781119240082 (hardback) | ISBN 9781119240099 (pdf) |
ISBN 9781119240105 (epub)
Subjects: LCSH: Zilko, Dave, 1963- | Garden Fresh (Firm) | Snack food
industry – United States. | Businesspeople – United States – Biography. |
Entrepreneurship. | Success in business. | BISAC: BUSINESS & ECONOMICS /
Entrepreneurship.
Classification: LCC HD9219.U64 G379 2016 (print) | LCC HD9219.U64 (ebook) |
DDC 338.7/66458 – dc23
LC record available at http://lccn.loc.gov/2015043063
WHAT’S IT LIKE TO TAKE A BANKRUPT startup and eventually sell it to a Fortune 500 company for almost a quarter of a billion dollars?
This is a different type of business book, one that tells a story – an “Only in America” story.
Just not from the place in America you’d expect.
“Salsa from Detroit? You’re kidding, right?”
We’d hear it all the time, and frankly I couldn’t blame anyone for asking the question. It’s counterintuitive at the very least and borders on irrational.
I’d love to say the idea was born out of some ultra-chic marketing incubator. Where some bold and brilliant entrepreneurs concluded launching a fresh salsa company from Detroit was “so crazy it just might work” and “all we’ll need now is a slick ad and PR campaign and we’ll be on our way.”
But to be honest, we’re not that clever.
Instead, Garden Fresh Gourmet was born in the back of a small bankrupt restaurant just outside of Detroit when a 44-year-old man named Jack Aronson pulled out a five-gallon bucket and in 15 minutes developed a recipe for fresh salsa.
“I was just hoping to pay my electric bill,” Jack has since told me.
