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Alan Newman

Owner, ArtsRiot · 1 appearance on the record.

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founderexecutiveinvestorauthorWikipedia ↗

Newman co-founded eco-friendly household brand Seventh Generation in 1988 and founded craft brewery Magic Hat Brewing Company in 1994. He also co-founded Gardener's Supply Company, led incubator Alchemy & Science, and authored High on Business.

9statements → 6claims → 2claims resolved → 3.78/5average certainty → 1.78/5average debate potential → ≈4.5/5argument clarity, estimated → 4said about them ↓

1 supported 1 partly supported 0 contradicted 2 not yet assessed 2 not checkable as stated how the 6 claims stand · each chip opens the sources

1 prediction · 5 assertions · 1 opinion · 2 insights · every statement was checked. The prediction and assertions are the 6 claims: statements the public record can support or contradict. 2 are resolved, 2 are not yet assessed, and 2 name no date, number or outcome precise enough to check. Everything else (opinions, insights, what ifs, disclosures) can never be settled by the record, so it carries no assessment.

The record, in short

What the tape says about how Alan argues and how the claims held up. Everything they said, and everything said about them, is in the tabs below.

Their most notable supported claim

Assertion Supported
Newman: Magic Hat became a top 10 US craft brewery
“And it kept the demand for our beer growing until, you know, we were in the top 10 largest craft breweries in America.”
Alan Newman Jan 25, 2021 ▶ 1:21:27 Seventh Generation: Alan Newman and Jeffrey Hollender

Expressed certainty vs assessment result

none yet certainty 1
none yet certainty 2
none yet certainty 3
100% certainty 4
50% certainty 5

weighted support: a fully supported claim counts one, a partly supported claim counts half. Each filled bar is clickable and opens exactly those claims; "none yet" means nothing said at that certainty level has resolved yet

How they sound: not measured why? →

We measure speaking style by listening to the audio itself, and a fair number needs at least 2,000 words from one person on tape we have measured. There is too little of Alan Newman on measured tape to publish a rate. This says nothing about how they speak.

Everything Alan Newman said on How I Built This that made the record, most notable first. Filter by type, assessment or year in the ledger →

Assertion Not publicly verifiable
Newman: My co-founder fired me by letter while I was on sabbatical
“I didn't know until I sent an email or a letter or however we communicated in those days Saying, okay, getting ready to come back, why don't we get together and let me talk about some of the ideas that I have put together that I'd love to start implementing, a…”
Alan Newman Jan 25, 2021 ▶ 45:27 Seventh Generation: Alan Newman and Jeffrey Hollender
Insight
Newman: Eco-friendly products must sell on personal benefit, not just environment
“And this is really where I personally learned that you really need to sell from benefit, not feature. You know, the feature that you're saving the environment, yeah, that was nice, but it was only good after you passed the what's in it for me.”
Alan Newman Jan 25, 2021 ▶ 20:01 Seventh Generation: Alan Newman and Jeffrey Hollender
Insight
Newman: Creating a culture where employees share fears makes businesses more productive
“What I learned was that the greatest obstacle to success was fear, fear of people that they didn't know what they were doing and somebody was going to find out. And so what I discovered was that if I could get people To share their fears and realize that we're…”
Alan Newman Jan 25, 2021 ▶ 30:49 Seventh Generation: Alan Newman and Jeffrey Hollender
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Newman: The Gulf War crashed our daily orders from 1,500 to 100
“When the Gulf war started, everybody turned on their television and was glued to the television. And our, we went from, I seem to remember 12 to 1500 orders a day down to less than a hundred.”
Alan Newman Jan 25, 2021 ▶ 40:56 Seventh Generation: Alan Newman and Jeffrey Hollender
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Newman: I held up the IPO until Seventh Generation bought out my shares
“If you really want to solve this problem, you need to buy me out. And that's when that's when I got paid out.”
Alan Newman Jan 25, 2021 ▶ 50:24 Seventh Generation: Alan Newman and Jeffrey Hollender
Opinion
Newman: Hollender was brilliant in turning Seventh Generation around
“I think what Jeffrey did with the business after I left was in many ways, brilliant, you know, certainly deserves a lot of credit for taking this concept and this fledgling business who was really down on its luck and finding the way”
Alan Newman Jan 25, 2021 ▶ 1:16:16 Seventh Generation: Alan Newman and Jeffrey Hollender
Prediction Open · timeframe Jan 2024
Newman: It makes me sad that Magic Hat probably won't survive much longer
“I was watching Magic Hat, you know, tank, and, you know, it's continuing to tank, and it's probably not going to make it much longer, and it made me really sad to realize that that's not living in my legacy.”
Alan Newman Jan 25, 2021 ▶ 1:22:46 Seventh Generation: Alan Newman and Jeffrey Hollender
Assertion Partly supported
Newman: A nonprofit gave me their mail-order catalog business for free
“Finally, I got a call from them one day, and they said, we're done. So either we're gonna ship everything to you, and it's your business to do whatever you want, or we're gonna throw it all in the garbage can.”
Alan Newman Jan 25, 2021 ▶ 16:38 Seventh Generation: Alan Newman and Jeffrey Hollender
Assertion Supported
Newman: Magic Hat became a top 10 US craft brewery
“And it kept the demand for our beer growing until, you know, we were in the top 10 largest craft breweries in America.”
Alan Newman Jan 25, 2021 ▶ 1:21:27 Seventh Generation: Alan Newman and Jeffrey Hollender

The other half of the tape: Alan Newman's own voice is left out of every number here. Other people bring the name up 1 time in 1 episode on How I Built This. 3 statements on the record name them. every mention, with the transcript →

Who brings them up most Guy Raz 1

Statements about Alan Newman, by other people (3)

Assertion Not checkable as stated
Hollender: Seventh Generation gave a weekly prize for the biggest employee mistake
“One of my fondest memories is that in our staff meetings, we would actually give a prize out to the person who made the biggest mistake that week, and they would get a coupon to go out to dinner with their friend or their wife.”
Jeffrey Hollender Jan 25, 2021 ▶ 37:56 Seventh Generation: Alan Newman and Jeffrey Hollender
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Hollender: Seventh Generation never put Newman's sabbatical terms in writing
“One of the things we could have done that we didn't do is put things in writing when Alan left. So, A written document that says Alan's taking six months off, and he will return at the end of six months and fulfill the position he had before. I mean, that wasn…”
Jeffrey Hollender Jan 25, 2021 ▶ 46:39 Seventh Generation: Alan Newman and Jeffrey Hollender
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Hollender: Seventh Generation co-founders saw a counselor to reconcile differences
“We went to see a third party to try to reconcile our differences. And we had a series of meetings with a sort of marriage counselor type person to see if we could mend the relationship, which I don't think happened very successfully.”
Jeffrey Hollender Jan 25, 2021 ▶ 51:01 Seventh Generation: Alan Newman and Jeffrey Hollender

Every mention by year

tap a year for its mentions
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0112026episodes it came up in
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2026 1 mention in 1 episode

Appearances (1)

EpisodeDateSpeaking time
Seventh Generation: Alan Newman and Jeffrey Hollender Jan 25, 2021 25m

Played on the show (1)

Episodes where a recording of Alan Newman was played rather than Alan taking part, or where the tape carries an address with nobody putting questions to them. Listed because the words are on the record, kept out of every score on this page because they were not said on this show. We read this off the tape: who was spoken to, who was asked something, who answered whom.

EpisodeDateOn tapeWhat it is
Advice Line with Jeffrey Hollender of Seventh Generation May 28, 2026 15s clip played
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