Larry Olson’s Working Radio

We’re Justin and Dave, and this is our improbable bacon-flavored story. Who are we? We’re just two regular guys who love grilling and football on Sunday afternoons, eating until we can’t get off the couch and of course, the taste of great bacon. And it’s our dream to make everything taste like bacon.

Not too long ago, we used to work together in a little technology company. While on a business trip together, we had the chance to sit down for dinner and eventually, the conversation turned to our mutual love of bacon. It was then that Justin told Dave and another coworker named Kara about his idea for Bacon Salt®. Kara, who is a vegetarian, loved the idea. Dave, a card-carrying carnivore and Midwesterner, loved it even more. Even the waiter at the fancy restaurant loved it.

And from that point forward, a partnership was struck to turn this bacon-flavored dream into a reality. In 2007, we and a few of our close friends tasted the first flavors of Bacon Salt, on Porterhouse steaks, mashed potatoes, eggs, corn and tomato soup - literally everything Dave could find to eat in his house. One enthusiastic person even tried bacon-flavored ice cream, which we don’t really advise doing, but to each his own. With the one exception of Maple (which was recently resurrected and is much better), everything was absolutely delicious - we were all just licking our plates.

Even more improbably, Dave’s 3 year old son Dean provided our first round of financing with this $5,000 win on America’s Funniest Home Videos:

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Faculty Director Lester Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation. Mr. Engel joined the University of California at Berkeley in 1991 to found the Lester Center. He serves as both the Center’s Executive Director and the Director of the Haas School’s Entrepreneurship Program. He is responsible for the creation of an institution that coordinates all of the university’s activities in the areas of entrepreneurship and innovation. Mr. Engel is an adjunct professor at the Haas School in Entrepreneurship and instructs in both the School’s MBA and Executive Education programs specializing in Entrepreneurship, New Venture Finance, Corporate Innovation, Venture Capital and Private Equity (see schedule below).

Mr. Engel is also Co-Founder and General Partner of Monitor Ventures, LLC, a venture capital firm organized in collaboration with the Monitor Group, a global strategic consulting and private equity management firm founded by Prof. Michael Porter of Harvard.

From 1979 through 1990, Mr. Engel was the San Francisco Bay Area Director of Entrepreneurial Services for Ernst & Young. Promoted to Partner in 1982, Mr. Engel specialized in consulting on capital formation, corporate strategy and management organization of entrepreneurial ventures, with an emphasis in software and biotechnology. In 1990, Mr. Engel was appointed Ernst & Young’s National Director of Capital Resources, where he directed the firms efforts in raising capital for its emerging business clients nationwide. During his career, Mr. Engel helped a number of entrepreneurial firms go public, including AutoDesk and Fair Isaac Companies.

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