Assertion certainty 4/5 debate potential 4/5

Lion Capital ballooned headcount and destroyed profitability post-acquisition

Barry Turner · Lenny & Larry’s Protein Snacks: Barry Turner · Feb 24, 2025 · at 1:00:11

Barry Turner, founder of Lenny & Larry's, criticizes Lion Capital's operational management after acquiring the company.

0:00 / 0:12exact quote · 12.9s
720p mp4 · rendered on demand · StarZero watermark
“Within six months of selling the company to them, we went from 17 employees to 59 employees. The business didn't triple. They only grow the business about six to eight percent a year, if that. They destroyed profitability.”

quote is from the automated transcript, cleaned for reading: filler sounds and stutters are removed, nothing is rephrased. names can be misheard (the analysis reads context, assessments check outside sources). how →

More from Barry Turner

Opinion
Turner says private equity turned his Ferrari into a Ford Taurus
“I felt like I handed them a Ferrari, and they turned it into a Ford Taurus.”
Barry Turner Feb 24, 2025 ▶ 1:00:24 Lenny & Larry’s Protein Snacks: Barry Turner
Disclosure
Turner admits to using anabolic steroids to reach 250 pounds
“At that, to get, yes. Yes, I did.”
Barry Turner Feb 24, 2025 ▶ 9:03 Lenny & Larry’s Protein Snacks: Barry Turner
Assertion Contradicted
In 1993, no one was adding protein to foods besides bars
“But there was no one putting protein in anything other than a protein bar.”
Barry Turner Feb 24, 2025 ▶ 21:17 Lenny & Larry’s Protein Snacks: Barry Turner
Insight
Founders often overthink brand names and design instead of executing
“I think people overthink things now that I look back on this. I think people overthink trying to get the perfect name or the, you know, the perfect design or whatever, rather than just doing it.”
Barry Turner Feb 24, 2025 ▶ 24:25 Lenny & Larry’s Protein Snacks: Barry Turner
Disclosure
Early on, Lenny & Larry's targeted mainstream consumers over bodybuilders
“We did, but to be honest with you, we really were developing these, we said, for the average consumer. We thought if we could make a, we coined a term later called better bad, but at that time, we thought if we could get them to stop eating, you know, Little D…”
Barry Turner Feb 24, 2025 ▶ 29:13 Lenny & Larry’s Protein Snacks: Barry Turner
Insight
Consumers need intermediate 'better bad' snacks before adopting functional protein bars
“I want to create a better bad. I want people to make a better choice, and nobody's going to go from eating A, you know, a little Debbie to eating some sort of protein bar. It just, there, there's not, there has to be something, there has to be a stop in the mi…”
Barry Turner Feb 24, 2025 ▶ 50:55 Lenny & Larry’s Protein Snacks: Barry Turner
Made with StarZero

Turn any episode into a week of clips.

This entire site, over 800 episodes transcribed, diarized, checked and made playable, runs on the StarZero media pipeline. Drop in your own episode and the podcast clipper finds the moments worth sharing, cuts them, captions them, and reframes them for every feed.