Waterloo & Sweet Leaf Tea Founders & Operators Reveal What They Look For in $50M+ Brands with Clayton Christopher and Brian Goldberg

Consumer VC: Venture Capital I B2C Startups I Commerce | Early-Stage Investing I Brands | Technology

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Clayton Christopher and Brian Goldberg are two legends in the CPG space—between them, they’ve built and scaled brands like Sweet Leaf Tea, Waterloo Sparkling Water, Austin Eastciders, and SkinnyPop. Now, they’ve teamed up to launch Astro Consumer Partners, a $400M+ growth-stage investment firm focused on scaling consumer brands.

In this episode, recorded live at Austin’s Consumer Week, Clayton and Brian share what they’ve learned as both operators and investors—and what it really takes to build a brand that lasts:

✅ The biggest differences between early-stage and growth-stage investing

✅ How to know when you’re ready to raise capital—and why profitable brands still choose to do it

✅ The distribution trap: when to go deep vs. wide with retail

✅ DTC vs. retail: which to prioritize and why

✅ What “eliminating strategic risk” looks like in practice

✅ Real talk on CPG categories: why some brands crush DTC but flop in stores

✅ What actual value-add looks like from an investor

✅ Why profitability and leverage matter more than ever

👉 Whether you're scaling past $5M in revenue or wondering how investors really evaluate CPG brands—this conversation is packed with wisdom from two of the best in the game.

Timestamps-

00:00 Intro

01:10 Meet Astro Consumer Partners: $400M Growth-Stage CPG Fund

05:30 What They Look For in Brands: People, Margins, & Category Leadership

08:00 When Should a CPG Brand Be Profitable?

10:35 Why Profitable Founders Still Raise Capital

13:30 Avoiding the Strategic Risk Trap

16:45 When to Go Deep vs. Wide in Retail

20:00 DTC Brands Going to Retail: What Works, What Doesn’t

24:00 Launching in Natural vs. Mass Retail

28:00 Building Retail Leverage Through Velocity and Data

31:00 Positive Leverage: Retail, Manufacturing & Celebrities

34:00 What “Value-Add” from Investors Actually Means

38:00 Advice for Early-Stage Founders

41:00 The Emotional Journey of Entrepreneurship

45:00 Live Audience Q&A

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