🪺 Safeguard your corporate assets and brand equity 🪺
🪺 Optimize your tech stack 🪺
🪺 Create a resilient corporate strategic plan 🪺
🪺 Deploy AI tools and intelligent automation 🪺
🪺 Navigate the operational pivots of a scaling food brand 🪺
🪺 Manage talent for high-performing team 🪺
Cost: $95
What can I expect from GROW: Business Infrastructure
- This workshop series will help you build and strengthen the operational and corporate backbone of your business.
- You’ll receive expert-led instruction, tools, and group coaching.
- The series consists of 6 live, virtual group sessions in a concise, time-saving format.
- Through group instruction and consulting, this series taps into the expertise of leaders in food business law and intellectual property, tech stack optimization, AI tools and intelligent automation, strategic planning and long-range goal alignment, business evolution and real-world scaling dynamics, and talent management and human capital strategy to put your business track for an investible, risk-managed corporate backbone capable of supporting national distribution and sustainable profitability.
This is right for you if …
You haven’t fully protected your recipes, brand, and proprietary food formulations
You rely on spreadsheets and disconnected systems to manage production and sales
You aren’t using AI to streamline forecasting, marketing, and operations
You make decisions reactively instead of following a growth strategy
You want to scale production but worry about cash flow and operational strain
You lack the HR systems and leadership structure needed for growth
Participants Say …
“Thanks to FFI’s training sessions, we’ve been able to build new tools that improve our current processes and help us reach more customers in the future.”
— Francisco Guerrero, Redwood St Roasters
Included in the Training:
- 6 live virtual workshop sessions (1.5 hrs. each)
- Presentation and Q&A with food business experts
- Tools and resources to start using immediately
Session Topics and Experts
Jeff Glazer
Ogden, Glazer & Schaefer Law
SESSION 1
September 2, 2026, 1-2:30 PM CST
Organizing & IP: Safeguarding Corporate Assets and Brand Equity
A brilliant formulation and strong market traction are only as safe as the legal architecture surrounding them. Many emerging food and beverage brands scale rapidly only to face devastating disputes, copycat competitors, or un-investible corporate records. In this foundational legal session, veteran CPG attorney Jeff Glazer breaks down the mechanics of corporate governance, asset isolation, and intellectual property protection. Learn how to turn your recipes, brand name, and operational secrets into high-value, legally defended corporate assets.
You Will Learn:
- Corporate Entity Structuring & Isolation: Understand how to organize parent and subsidiary entities to shield critical assets (like proprietary formulas and real estate) from general operational liabilities.
- Intellectual Property Fortification: Master the strategic differences between trademarks, copyrights, patents, and trade secrets, ensuring your brand equity and proprietary processes are fully protected from infringement.
- Foundational Commercial Agreements: Learn to draft and execute enforceable Non-Disclosure Agreements (NDAs), Master Service Agreements (MSAs), and vendor contracts that protect your cash flow and operating rights.
- Investor Readiness & Corporate Records: Clean up and structure your corporate operating agreements, cap tables, and resolutions to satisfy the intense scrutiny of institutional investors and commercial lenders.
David Logan
Your Software CTO
SESSION 2
September 9, 2026, 1-2:30 PM CST
Designing for Throughput: Building a World-Class Processing Facility
The software systems that support a kitchen-scale business or a local brand will quickly fracture under the weight of multi-channel e-commerce, national retail distribution, and institutional inventory tracking. Piecemeal engineering—using disparate apps that don’t communicate—leads to manual reconciliation errors, stockouts, and margin erosion. Virtual CTO David Logan provides a finance-first roadmap for designing a scalable, integrated technology infrastructure that coordinates sales, inventory, and fulfillment into a single source of truth.
You Will Learn:
- Enterprise System Architecture Blueprinting: Identify your current software gaps and map out an integrated tech stack that unites e-commerce (Shopify), wholesale portals, accounting (QuickBooks Enterprise/NetSuite), and CRM systems.
- Automating Data Flow & Eliminating Friction: Learn the mechanics of API integrations and electronic data interchange (EDI) to automate order flows, cutting labor costs and processing errors.
- Inventory and Production Traceability Platforms: Evaluate the transition to scalable warehouse and manufacturing software to gain real-time visibility into lot codes, production costs, and fulfillment velocity.
- Data Security and Scalability Controls: Implement institutional-grade data backup, user permission tiers, and cyber security protocols required by national retail partners and enterprise auditors.
Eric DeLuca
Leverage Point Consulting
SESSION 3
September 16, 2026, 1-2:30 PM CST
Strategic Planning: Formulating a Resilient Corporate Blueprint for Long-Term Growth
Many emerging food entrepreneurs manage their organizations by crisis—reacting to sudden retailer demands, unexpected supply shocks, or erratic cash flows. Without a structured, long-range strategic plan, leadership teams move fast but not always forward. Strategic architect Eric DeLuca introduces an advanced corporate steering framework that moves your executive team from reactive firefighting to proactive growth. Learn how to align your innovation pipeline, capital resources, and distribution targets with a clear, measurable multi-year vision.
You Will Learn:
- Constructing the Multi-Year Strategic Blueprint: Learn step-by-step methods to define your brand’s long-range commercial destination, mapping out quarterly and annual milestones across sales, ops, and finance.
- Cross-Functional Objective Alignment (OKRs): Implement the Objectives and Key Results (OKR) framework to ensure your product development, marketing, and manufacturing teams are working in absolute synchronization toward shared financial targets.
- Capital Allocation & Constraint Modeling: Develop rigorous scenarios to allocate finite cash reserves and working capital toward the highest-ROI growth opportunities while mitigating downside operational risks.
- Formulating Corporate Financial Guardrails: Establish strict performance metrics and break-even thresholds that act as organizational guardrails, forcing disciplined trade-off decisions during market volatility.
Lori McDonald
Brilliance
SESSION 4
September 23, 2026, 1-2:30 PM CST
AI Tools & Intelligent Automation: Maximizing Operational Capacity Without Expanding Headcount
In the modern food and beverage industry, scaling your brand no longer requires a linear, expensive increase in administrative headcount. Artificial Intelligence has shifted from a speculative concept to a high-ROI, core operational lever. E-commerce and manufacturing expert Lori McDonald introduces a profit-first framework for integrating generative AI and workflow automation into your daily business operations. Discover how to streamline content creation, customer support, data analysis, and regulatory documentation to protect your margins.
You Will Learn:
- Generative AI for Marketing and Content Efficiency: Master advanced prompt engineering and workflows to automate high-converting email campaigns, SEO-optimized product listings, and digital marketing assets at a fraction of traditional agency costs.
- Automated Customer Support Integration: Deploy and train intelligent AI agents to handle routine consumer and B2B inquiries across your D2C and wholesale channels, guaranteeing instant response times while freeing up human capital.
- Data-Driven Insights and Executive Summarization: Leverage AI analytical tools to instantly process complex retail velocity reports, supply chain invoices, and customer sentiment data into clear, actionable executive insights.
- Document Automation and Compliance Control: Learn how AI systems can streamline the drafting of standard operating procedures (SOPs), onboarding manuals, and regulatory compliance logs to accelerate organizational scaling.
Matt Wetzel
Milwaukee Pretzel Co.
SESSION 5
September 30, 2026, 1-2:30 PM CST
Business Evolution: Navigating the Critical Operational Pivots of a Scaling Food Brand
The journey from a local artisanal startup to a scaled multi-channel manufacturing powerhouse is filled with high-stakes operational inflection points that spreadsheets cannot fully predict. In this case-study-driven masterclass, Matt Wessel, Co-founder of Milwaukee Pretzel Co., shares the authentic, unvarnished blueprints of his brand’s evolution. From managing massive capital expansion to navigating painful production pivots and multi-channel shifts, Matt delivers the practical wisdom needed to de-risk your scaling journey.
You Will Learn:
- Managing Capital Expansion Strain: De-risk the financial stress of transitioning from small-scale production to major facility investments, automated equipment lines, and the associated cash flow gaps.
- Multi-Channel Distribution Dynamics: Understand how to balance operational focus and maintain profitability when simultaneously serving direct-to-consumer, local retail, club stores, and massive foodservice channels.
- Leading Through Production and Operational Crises: Develop practical frameworks for executing emergency supplier changes, mechanical failures, and product reformulations without damaging retail relationships or brand reputation.
- The Founder-to-Executive Transition: Gain hard-hitting insights on how your personal leadership role must shift from hands-on tactical operator to a strategic executive focused on organizational design and culture.
Roger Fuerstenau
Connect & Simplify
SESSION 6
October 7, 2026, 1-2:30 PM CST
Talent Management: Structuring a Legally Compliant, High-Performance Human Capital Architecture
As a food or beverage brand expands, its greatest operational constraint quickly shifts from machine capacity or retail shelf space to the quality and alignment of its human capital. Mismanaging employee onboarding, payroll tax compliance, benefits administration, or leadership delegation can lead to expensive legal liabilities, cultural decay, and operational bottlenecks. Human capital expert Roger Fuerstenau delivers an institutional blueprint for structuring a compliant, high-performing corporate team that is fully equipped to sustain rapid growth.
You Will Learn:
- Designing a Legally Compliant HR Infrastructure: Navigate complex labor laws, worker classifications (hourly vs. salary vs. contract), and state-by-state regulations to eliminate employment liability and compliance risks.
- Scalable Payroll and Enterprise HR Integration: Learn how to deploy modern Human Capital Management (HCM) software architectures to automate payroll processing, time-tracking, tax withholdings, and shift reporting at scale.
- Competitive Benefits & Retention Frameworks: Design attractive, cost-effective benefits packages, health insurance architectures, and performance incentive programs that attract top-tier CPG talent without draining working capital.
- Organizational Design & Leadership Delegation: Build clear accountability maps and corporate reporting paths to seamlessly transition from founder-led task management to executive-led department delegation.
Scholarship opportunities are available, learn more.