Neil Dudley: Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Pederson’s Farms podcast. We are so excited you’re here. We appreciate you joining us. And we look forward to sharing these conversations with thought leaders from our industry. They’re going to paint a picture from every perspective – consumer, customer, vendor, employee, and peer – that I think is going to be super valuable, and we’re really excited to share. So, thanks for tuning in. Remember don’t tune out, and grab life by the bacon.

Charcuterie. How many of you know what that word means? Well, if you don’t, you must’ve been living under a rock, or you’re just not in the better-for-you food space, you’re not paying attention to all of these Pinterest boards where they’re making charcuterie boards. If you don’t know, well, go check it out because today’s guest is an expert in charcuterie. They make charcuterie that is highly flavorful. It uses top-notch ingredients. They pay close attention to their raw materials and the products that go into their food. And that is really just a super important piece of where your food comes from. And we want to share this conversation with you. That’s what this podcast is all about, giving listeners a bigger network of people to learn from, a better understanding of where your food comes from, a broader picture of the industry as a whole. So that’s what we’re up to. I hope you stay, stick around, listen to our guest today, Martinique Grigg. She is the co-founder of Coro Foods. We’re going to talk about all of those things and more. 

In case this is your first time, or even if you’re a new listener, maybe you skip past the intros and this time you choose to listen, I want you to know who I am. I’m Neil Dudley, the VP of Business Development over at Pederson’s Farms, where I’ve been there for 20 years, worked myself up from a QA tech position to a VP in the company. So, I have a lot of friends, relationships, network within the better-for-you meat business. And I just believe we’ve got to share those. It’s my job, it’s our job as a brand and a company to be a resource for those people who are interested and want to know more about where their food comes from. I’m super lucky. I work with my best friend since high school, my wife, his wife, a lot of other really awesome, brilliant people at Pederson’s. Matter of fact, we have an employee on every month to tell their story about how they became a PNFer. I hope you listen to the podcast. I know your time is valuable to you, so we try to make these conversations really insightful and something you can’t find anywhere else. So, if you love it, please tell somebody. If you don’t, tell us. We want to know; we can make it better. I hope you enjoy this conversation on the Pederson’s Farms Podcast with Martinique Grigg. Thanks for listening. 

I just want to say welcome to the Pederson’s Farms Podcast, it’s that welcoming kind of intro for the show. We’ve got a really cool guest. She’s a customer of Pederson’s. But that’s not really what qualifies her to be on the show. She’s a business owner, a lady that can tell us a lot, teach us a lot about what it takes to be an entrepreneur, to be a business owner. And that is really the reason we want to have Martinique Grigg. Hey, welcome to the show and thank you so much for taking the time, and I know is a busy schedule to come be a part of our podcast. 

Martinique Grigg: Oh, Neil, thanks so much for having me. It’s a pleasure to spend some time talking with you and swapping stories about being in the meat business. 

Neil Dudley: That’s right. And this, I hope, paints a picture for the listeners of where your food comes from. Our food comes from a very dynamic, intricate system of people, businesses. And this is a good way of giving everybody that wants to know a little deeper insight into where your food comes from. So, tell us about your business and how it got started just kind of quickly. We don’t have two hours to go through it all, but just a quick rundown for anybody that’s interested. What is your business, Martinique? 

Martinique Grigg: Yeah. Well, I’m Martinique Grigg. I’m one of the co-owners of Coro Foods, and we make high-end charcuterie and salami, so all different kinds of very flavorful salamis with the best possible ingredients. And we also make muscle meats like prosciutto type products as well. And we’re based in Seattle, and we are loyal customers of Pederson’s. We’ve been using your pork for quite a while now because having the best ingredients is a big piece of what makes our products so unique and special in the marketplace. And we’ve been making salami for over 20 years. My co-owner Clara and I just have been running this business for about five of those years. And prior to that, it was a small deli in Seattle that had some notoriety called Salumi. And the family that ran Salumi came up with their own way of making salami and charcuterie. And we took the business over from that family when they were ready to retire about five years ago and built a larger production facility where we’ve been making salami and selling it to grocery. And we continue to run the deli in downtown Seattle in Pioneer Square, one of the oldest neighborhoods in Seattle. And so, the salami and the charcuterie that we make we sell out of that deli on sandwiches. And it’s been written up in the New York Times as one of the best sandwiches in the nation. So, we’re proud to say that.

Neil Dudley: That’s right, gold star. Congratulations. I mean, anytime you can get a little press, that’s positive. I mean, because every business is battling this, just the truth of doing business, little fires popping up here and there, you’ve got things to do, especially if you’re making food. So, it’s nice to get recognized for doing that work and really doing it at a high level. So, congratulations. Now I’ve got a question. Did you work in the business prior to buying it? How did you even know they might be ready to retire? Like how do you get your hands on a little business like that? I say little, a business of any sort like that? 

Martinique Grigg: Yeah, that’s a great question. I had not worked in the business before, but my co-owner Clara does have a culinary background and had worked in both fine dining and in some food businesses and also had done some cookbook editing for Joanne Thomas who’s a James Beard award-winning chef. And so, she and I have a business background. And so, we were looking for a small business in the area, a food business in particular, that we could start our entrepreneurial adventure with. And just through lots and lots of conversation and kind of networking and being in the industry, we got connected with this family. And then the more we talked to them, the more we realized it was a good fit for them and a good fit for us. And we just really love the space. We have a passion for the food, and we knew already about this deli because we were both big fans. And so, it was really exciting for us to have the opportunity to learn the trade and the craft, and then just sort of take it to the next level. So yeah, we spent a year being able to apprentice with the family and just learn everything about the business, the special technique that they use to make salami and cured meats, and then we also spent another year just kind of mapping out building our new facility and figuring out how we’re going to do that. And then we were proud to kind of add our own stamp onto the product. That’s where we really leveled up all the ingredients. That’s how we found Pederson’s to make sure that we had premium pork. We have all the best spices, and we even use all natural cures in the salamis. 

Neil Dudley: So that really aligns with our vision for Pederson’s. You almost said Pederson’s. I think it’s worth mentioning, you can say it any way. I think there’s a good chance most people say it Pederson’s. It just happens to be that Texans don’t know how to speak, so we say Pederson’s. 

Martinique Grigg: I mean, you and I were talking about this when we first met and I was asking you, is it Pederson’s or Pederson’s? You were pretty sure it’s Pederson’s. 

Neil Dudley: It is all good. As long as somebody is looking for what we do, we’re totally happy. Say our name the way that makes sense to you. Because I imagine in your company, when y’all say be sure you order the Pederson’s pork, so that’s just the way it’s said within the company or even our customers. So, it’s not really that big a deal. I thought it was worth pointing out because it is kind of funny. It’s kind of a funny story. We really don’t know how to pronounce our name. What’s it like making salami for a living and running a retail store where you try to sell sandwiches? I mean, paint that picture. Is that easy?

Martinique Grigg: It’s definitely not easy in this environment. And I’m sure a lot of your listeners can relate to that. Starting with the positives, I will say I do love making food. I love making something that connects with people, that they enjoy, that brings a little piece of happiness and joy to their day. We’re known for having very bold and surprising and flavorful salamis that really surprise and delight people when they taste them. And so that part I really enjoy. And the same with our deli, like we consistently get five-star reviews on Google and people come there for special occasions or just for their lunch break to kind of brighten up their day. So that part I really enjoy. But I do think it’s been challenging over the last three years, and I’m sure everyone can relate. Just going through COVID, we had to shut down our restaurant for several months and just flat out shut it down and figure out how to ensure that our employees could come back to us when we could reopen. And then, it’s been challenging in downtown Seattle as well. We’ve been in the news for having some homeless and crime issues right in the area where our restaurant is. So, trying to get the restaurant kind of back up to what it was pre COVID has been a challenge. But we are happy to see some of that starting to come back just in the last couple of months as the pandemic really recedes in the Seattle area. And then starting up the new plant, we launched Coro as the grocery wholesale brand of our salami literally two months also before the pandemic. So that has been challenging as well, just managing through that, because a lot of stores saw huge demand in products that they were already carrying, but it was really hard for them to add new products for while because they’re trying to work through supply chain issues. And we all see that now, I think too, just with battling inflation, labor turnover, and supply chain issues I think that we’re all facing, whether that’s like for us casings during the fourth quarter were really hard to find. So, it’s a challenging environment to be a small business operator.

Neil Dudley: That’s totally true. I think everybody can empathize with that, even being a small business employee, any piece of that puzzle. It’s been dynamic to say the least. So now I want to roll it back to putting your own stamp on it with a level up of your raw materials and ingredients and those kinds of things. Dive a little deeper into that. What do you mean by leveling up? What did you change or what is the thought process or what are the values within that supply chain that you really feel like sets you apart? 

Martinique Grigg: Yeah, when we bought the business, we had our own proprietary technique for fermenting and aging. So, your listeners may know that salami is a fermented product, so it’s not actually cooked. It’s slow air dried, cured. And so, the process is basically that the salami is stuffed- 

Neil Dudley: At Pederson’s, we’ve wanted to do that, but our plant, our systems are not set up. Like we’re running everything through a smokehouse. We’re just doing it differently than what you’re talking about right there. So, I think it’s a great truth to highlight so everybody understands a little better how salami is made. 

Martinique Grigg: Yeah, that’s a great point. So, salami, salumi in general is the art of curing meat where it’s just basically like you take some pork and take some salt. And it came about thousands of years ago when people really had to make the most of their meat and there was no refrigeration, so they had to find ways to make it last. Now, in modern times, basically the process for salami specifically is that you grind up the meat, you grind up fat, you add a starter culture, you add some sugar to kick start the fermentation process. You stuff it in a casing, kind of like a sausage, and then you hang it, and you put it in these very special rooms, which is probably what you’re referring to, Neil. 

Neil Dudley: You’ve got to be able to control the humidity really closely, and there’s a real art to drying meat. Oh, and you said another thing there, casings. Just for those- I mean, there’s going to be super educated people and not educated people. Martinique is talking about a fibrous casing, so you will stuff the sausage in a fibrous casing, outside of what you might think of when you think of sausage, which could be a lamb or pork or collagen casing that you find that goes on smoked sausage. There’re different kinds of casing, one’s edible, one’s not.

Martinique Grigg: Exactly. Yeah, so salami is typically, I guess it can be in some cases, edible. But typically, it’s not, to your point. And so, yeah, so the salami goes into first a fermenting chamber where you have a very specific process about how you control the humidity and temperature, and that’s where the fermentation happens. So that’s basically the good bacteria use that sugar to kill off the bad bacteria. So, salami is never cooked. And it’s through that process that it becomes shelf stable. And after the fermentation process, which takes one to two days, then it gets moved into an aging room. And again, the temperature and humidity is controlled in that aging room, very specialized equipment that comes from Europe that does that. And it can be there anywhere from another 10 days to 4 or 5 months, depending on the product. So, because in addition to the salami, which is stuffed into a casing and looks like a sausage, we also do what’s called muscle meats. So, we do cuts of the pig like guanciale or coppa, which is like the shoulder, guamciale is the jowl. And we will cure those. We also do a culatello, which not many people in the United States do. That’s the heart of the prosciutto, so the heart of the kind of hock of the pig, and we will cure that for up to 8 months. So that’s the longest one. 

Neil Dudley: That was a great piece. You mentioned prosciutto, and it’s almost like whiskey. Like you have a lot of money in product before you ever get to sell the first package of salami or package of prosciutto. It could be news to our listeners that companies like this, that’s part of why you have to have good banks or either really good personal financing to spin up a business like this. It takes a little while to get the first package of sellable product produced and out to the consumer. 

Martinique Grigg: Yeah, it can be, for the culatello, it can be almost up to 8 months. And so just one of those, they’re much smaller than a prosciutto because they’re basically just the little center of prosciutto. So, they’re more like the size of a small, like a volleyball, a small volleyball kind of, and they can be a couple of hundred bucks just for one of those, just as an example. So, yeah, and then, to your point, we learned that process from the Batali family that ran Salumi beforehand. And then as we built our own facility, we kind of thought about, well, what are some other things that we would really love to do to take this amazing process that they’ve built, these wonderful flavor profiles, and just enhance it even more. And so, that’s where we layered on what was important to Clara and I, and that’s how we found Pederson’s. We think it all starts with the pork. So, like the better pork you have that’s humanely raised, vegetarian fed, and antibiotic free, the better products you’re going to have in the end. And so that is number one for us, just sourcing the right pork from the right supplier. That’s the foundation of everything for our product. And that’s how we found you. And then we layered on, we also use an all-natural cure. So, in the process of making salami, you can add either a chemical nitrite or nitride or an all-natural nitrite or nitride. And in the all-natural case, it’s typically celery juice powder or kale powder. In our case, we use a pre-converted celery juice powder. And it’s actually kind of proprietary, again, to what we do and how we’ve developed our own process so that it’s all natural. So, our whole label is all natural. And we use like sea salt instead of regular salt. We use turbinado sugar instead of dextrose. So, we really make sure that all the ingredients that go into making that salami are the best that they can possibly be. And it really comes through in the flavor.

Neil Dudley: Absolutely. And I think it comes through in setting yourself apart as a brand. And I mean, that’s important. You can’t- I would argue, I think Pederson’s certainly can’t go to market and be just like everybody else. We need to find a group of people, a community, you guys, Coro Foods, people that buy our products at the store, we all need- we need to know and look for that group of people that want something a little different than what’s out there. And then we go try to solve that problem. 

Martinique Grigg: Do you mind if I ask you a question? Because I was actually explaining this to some of my employees the other day, we were talking about G.A.P. 1 certification and how Pederson’s has G.A.P. 1 certification. Can you talk a little bit about that? Like how would you describe that, like if I was going to give my employees a sound bite about what it means, how you got it, and what it requires you to do to keep it up?

Neil Dudley: Yeah, totally. I think for somebody that just wants to really read the nuts and bolts of it, you can find that program on globalanimalpartnership.org I think it is, .org or .com. If you just Google Global Animal Partnership and find their pig regulations, that’ll give you every line item. But for the layman, just basically, we don’t use gestation crates, which is basically like a dog or cat crate that a pig fits in. Not even that much space really; they can’t turn around, so they just stand up, lay down. We totally abolished those from – and I say we, Global Animal Partnership, lots of farmers and ranchers just said, hey, we’re not going to use those things. So now, we use what is called pen gestation. So, the pigs are just in big pens. And pork production step one, there is no actual outside access required. And that’s kind of hard to understand when you think about humanely raised and happy pigs, as a human, it’s hard to interpret or understand the truth that they wouldn’t be more happier outside. And I’ve never actually been able to have that conversation with a pig, but I judge based on are they eating? Are they vocalizing a lot? Like they’re unhappy. Are they just looking kind of unhealthy? And so, we make sure our pigs are raised in an environment where those things are checked closely, and it is our goal really to move as much from those gestation crate realities to these pen living courses of reality, where we haven’t found a margin available to us or to pay us to go higher steps within pork. I think there’s margin in beef and chicken. All those different proteins have different steps and ways to move higher. I don’t even know, I rambled a little bit, but the gist of it is we don’t dock tails. That’s another thing that happens in commodities. We don’t clip their teeth. They have these little pointy teeth, and they want to take those out in a lot of cases to keep them from biting each other and hurting each other. And you can make the argument that, well, that’s maybe more human, taking them out, then leaving them in. We have this basic thought process, even when we make products, we want that to happen in a way where the animal is letting it happen, or the meat is letting it happen. We’re not making it happen. So anytime we can omit clipping teeth or cutting off tails, although it does, it creates a few problems down the chain with abscesses and stuff, where pigs will get to fighting and chew each other’s tails and then they get a little abscess or something. But it’s a tradeoff. And we choose to make that humane- lean towards the humane treatment. And in our gestation pens, they have bedding they can play in. Pigs are really cool. They kind of sleep in the bed area. They go to the bathroom in the bathroom area. And they go eat in the kitchen area. So, some other proteins, they don’t keep those things as separate. You think of pigs as wollering in the mud, being real dirty. They’re one of the cleanest animals to raise out there. 

Martinique Grigg: Interesting. I didn’t know that. That makes a lot of sense.

Neil Dudley: That’s what happens when you ask me a question; I take up all the air. 

Martinique Grigg: No, that’s super fascinating. I didn’t know, I didn’t know pieces of that. Parts of it I knew, but some of the other stuff that you observe by being there, I did not know. 

Neil Dudley: And I think I’m so glad you asked it because that’s part of the where your food comes from story. I think it’s part of why it makes the pork better. 

Martinique Grigg: Yeah, I agree. Have you guys always been G.A.P. 1, or did you achieve that certification?

Neil Dudley: Yeah, we had to achieve it. So, I would say Pederson’s, our life as a company, my career, it’s a journey. It’s today, I’m doing the best I know how, but I might learn something tomorrow or I might get better. Actually, I should. I need to learn some more things tomorrow. I need to get better tomorrow. So, we follow that real life growth trajectory of just learning as you go, figuring some- We’ve got somebody in the plant today filming our process, and they’re asking like, cool, how did you do that? How did you know to do that? I was like, well, we didn’t start out at this level. We started out five pigs a day or something. And then we went to ten and then we went to a hundred and then we went to a thousand. So, it’s that process of you figure out how to scale it over time. It’s like you don’t drop in day one knowing all there is to know. 

Martinique Grigg: Yeah, we have the same exact process we go through in our plant as well. We opened it with just small volumes, and then we figured out how to do more and more and more. And then, we became SQF certified, which is a food safety certification and going through and learning how to do that. And then we updated our HACCP plan. We just added a slicing and packaging line. So before, we had just made the sticks of salami, and then we had to co-pack the slicing, but we just added that line a few months ago. We had to learn how to do that. And we had to learn how to write a HACCP plan for that. So, yeah, it’s a journey. 

Neil Dudley: Well, for anybody listening that doesn’t know what HACCP is, it is a protocol for food safety that was developed by NASA to really keep astronauts healthy. I mean, once they got into space, they had to have a really tight plan and protocol to make sure they didn’t get sick out there. So HACCP was developed and it stands for hazard, analysis, critical, control point. So, define your hazards, make an analysis how to mitigate them, and you check your critical control points. Anyways, and you said SQF, that’s another really, it’s safe quality food. It’s a way that companies like Coro and Pederson’s make sure we are very, I guess, easy to trust because we have these third-party audits. SQF is a thing that’s recognized globally. If you can say, I’m SQF, they know you’ve had the right kind of auditors checking the right kind of things, making sure that they can feel safe about doing business with you. It’s always nice to have people that just kind of have those boxes checked. 

Martinique Grigg: Exactly. It’s like a shorthand so that people we work with know we meet a certain standard for food safety, or you, if guys have it. You guys have SQF too?

Neil Dudley: Yes, we are SQF. Like in my career, we’ve always been heavily audited. I think that probably goes to building our business with Whole Foods in the early years. They were just kind of a leader. Matter of fact, they were a big piece of even getting Global Animal Partnership off the ground. Whole Foods had a big piece of that. So, we’ve just always done a lot of audits. We never knew there were companies that didn’t have to go through a lot of audits. We were just always kind of a part of that. So, it’s been nice that that’s never really crossed our mind as a pain in the tail or something. It’s just that’s normal business. It’s an easy way for us to set ourselves apart. What’s your favorite product that you make? 

Martinique Grigg: Oh, my favorite salami is our Mole salami. So, we’re known for crazy bold flavors. Our tagline is born bold, made better, so born bold with bold flavors and then made better with better ingredients. And so, our whole twist on salami making is that we’re not afraid to experiment with the fun, interesting flavors. So, we have a lemon grass that’s kind of Thai inspired. We have limited time offers salamis. Like this year we had a [inaudible 26:31], so that was Northwest inspired. But my favorite is our mole which is a recipe we developed that is a play on Mexican mole. So it’s got ancho chilies, cinnamon, cocoa, and people are always a little bit like, hmm, And then when they put it in their mouth, it’s so fun to watch their eyes just kind of get wide and be like this is so delicious.

Neil Dudley: As soon you said mole- I said mole, that’s my Texan way of saying mole. Anyways, you had my ear because I’m a huge fan of Mexican cuisine. And of course, living in Texas, the TexMex options around the state are just awesome. And mole is one of those you can find; it’s really cool.  

Martinique Grigg: Yeah, we just came into Texas this month. We’re in Central Markets in Texas, and the mole is going crazy. People are loving it. 

Neil Dudley: That was a good idea. All right, so I mean, time flies. We’re already like 20 minutes in, 25 minutes, maybe 30, getting close, but before we wrap it up, I’m just curious, what are your plans for the future? What are you guys- is there anything? Is it sometimes maybe the plans for the future are stay in business, do whatever it takes?  

Martinique Grigg: That for sure is number one, particularly in this environment where we’re all battling inflation and just getting the product out there. So, number one, stay in business. And then number two, we’re excited to keep expanding. We had been mostly in Seattle then Pacific Northwest and California. But now we’re finally starting to expand eastward. Like I said, we’re super excited to be in Texas. We just got into the Midwest as well. We’re talking to some folks in Florida. So, we’re on the cusp of really trying to go national. And so that’s exciting. And then the other really exciting thing is we just brought this slicing and packaging in-house, and we know that a lot of people really like to have their salami pre-sliced. That’s just the way most people like it. So, we’re very excited to get that off the ground, too.

Neil Dudley: Man, that sounds cool. And I know that adding a packaging line is not like just roll it in there, plug it in, and it starts working. I mean, it takes a lot to do it. I’m also curious, for those listening, somebody else that might be wanting to do salami or already does salami, like how are you making the march east? Are you doing that work? Do you have people within your team that go and present your products? Like what is your strategy? 

Martinique Grigg: For selling?

Neil Dudley: For sales, for growing sales and for expanding your market.

Martinique Grigg: Yeah, we I work within- yes, it is me. I had the sales portion, and then Clara, she does a lot in the facility and is sort of our CFO and does a ton of that work. So that’s sort of how we’ve currently divided our responsibilities. So, I get to work with our awesome Sales Director Brooke. And then we have an awesome support person who helps us kind of behind the scenes on inside sales. But between the two of us, it’s just the two of us. 

Neil Dudley: That’s really what I was needling at. It’s not like- I think people that want to go support people like Martinique or just businesses that are- you know who you’re supporting here. It’s her. It’s one or two other team members. Those are the families your dollar is supporting, it’s the business you’re helping grow. I know personally, I like to know where my dollar is going, who it’s going to. And sometimes, it’s no knock on these bigger companies, I mean, Pederson’s is even beginning to be a bigger company. So, it’s not really a knock. It’s just telling the true story. If we don’t give people a chance to understand that or hear it, they’ve got no- they just have to guess it all the time. And when you start letting people guess, there’s a new guess for every person, or you let somebody else start controlling your story. We don’t want to do that. We want you to control your story. As they expand, as you start seeing Coro in Texas, Florida, New York City, you’ll know it ties right back to Martinique and her team and those two founders, her and Clara, that I think just have the coolest story. And it’s fun to see two people that work so well together, that have- you kind of handle the sales, she handles the I want to say money and production side of things. And it’s hard to ever find one person that really has that wheelhouse in both ways.

Martinique Grigg: Yeah, you’re absolutely right. And we’ve been really lucky. I feel really blessed to have such a great partner. Like we have worked now through the ups and downs of the last four or five years, and it’s just been, it’s been wonderful to have a partner and someone that you can work really well with and have complimentary skill sets and kind of go through those ups and downs together, especially running a small business and really trying to make it go and grow it, it is really nice to have support and partner. 

Neil Dudley: Awesome. So now, what is the most heated conversation y’all have? Like, isn’t that the trick? To be able to passionately debate opposite thought processes. Did you all ever bump into that? 

Martinique Grigg: Oh, yeah, for sure. I’m sure; I know we do. We’re very good- The philosophy we have is that, because we have so much respect for each other, is that if we don’t agree on something, we usually will talk it out until one of us comes around because we know that if the other person isn’t agreeing-

Neil Dudley: They are smart enough, there is a good reason they don’t agree. 

Martinique Grigg: We should probably listen a little closer. 

Neil Dudley: I’ve lived that, that’s totally true.

Martinique Grigg: But we definitely have those conversations. That’s part of what makes everyone better, is being willing to engage in those conversations and listen to other people, and then push yourself or push them.

Neil Dudley: Even as a company, I think it’s true, you have to, you can’t just stay comfortable. You have to push that, just go find that little, okay cool, we don’t know all of that. Like you need to fail a little bit. I was telling my kids this, what did you fail at today at school? Like if you go to school and you don’t fail, you’re just coasting. I want you leaning forward, trying, failing, and that’s how we get better. I just really look up to you guys. I know building a plant, adding a slicing line, all that stuff, that’s leading into new stuff, but you don’t really understand can easily be a stumbling block. 

Martinique Grigg: Oh, for sure. I love that, Neil, that you tell your kids that. I need to do that more because so many- so often people are afraid to fail or they’re afraid to take chances with the risk of failing. And I think it’s even more exaggerated when everything is documented nowadays, and everyone can see your failure. But it’s so important for personal growth and professional growth. That’s a great philosophy. I love that.

Neil Dudley: Well, thank you. Now you made me feel good. I want to say thank you so much for being a customer. We appreciate your business. If we ever fail at that, we want to know about it. We just have to communicate, tell us quickly, whatever. We want to be the best partner we can be. And thanks for coming on the show, the podcast, YouTube. Hi, everybody out on YouTube; we’ll be putting this on YouTube as well, just to tell that story of where your food comes from. Anybody that buys something from Coro now has a little insight into y’all’s business, your thought processes. And this is a lot of fun for me. Partially, just selfishly, I love having these conversations, so I’m able to do it on a platform, and I think it has a good chance of getting out to more people all the time.

Martinique Grigg: No, it’s my pleasure. And thank you guys for what you do.  I mean, I know it’s not easy to hold the standards that you hold. And we really appreciate that there are people like you out there willing to do it so that we can also make the best product possible. So, thank you. We really appreciate it. 

Neil Dudley: You’re welcome. Everybody, thanks for listening. If you’re this far, you’ve spent 30 minutes of your life with me and Martinique, and we really appreciate that. That’s not free. Time is probably our very most valuable asset. So, if you’re spending your time listening to us, we want to make it valuable. I hope it was. And if it was, tell somebody. If it wasn’t, tell me. I want to know. I want to know how to make it better. And come back or listen to another episode. There’s people just like this lady who are going to give you insight into where your food comes from and probably other just great nuggets of information on how to be a businessperson, a good human, all those things. Thank you, Martinique. 

Martinique Grigg: Thank you.

Neil Dudley: Hey, everybody. Thank you so much for listening to this episode of the Pederson’s Farms Podcast. It’s been a blast bringing this to you, and I sure hope you enjoyed it and found value. If you did, tell a friend, share it out on social media, hit that subscribe button, or go check us out at pedersonsfarms.com. We sure hope you do. And thanks for being here.