Nima Jilali, former pro snowboarder and founder of Salt & Stone, shares his path from filming snowboard parts to building a premium body care brand. They get into launching with sunscreen, turning deodorant into a breakout hit through product obsession, staying profitable from day one, scaling with a lean remote team, retail growth, global expansion, and building a lasting brand.
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question_answer ANECDOTE
How Pro Snowboarding Trained Nima For Startups
Nima Jilali spent a decade as a pro snowboarder, filming video parts instead of chasing contests.
He compared it to entrepreneurship: months of invisible failure, hard falls, and competition for the coveted last part.
question_answer ANECDOTE
Why Salt And Stone Started With Sunscreen
Salt & Stone launched with sunscreen first because deodorant was not ready, even though deodorant was always the real goal.
Nima Jilali lined up 40 to 50 retail accounts at launch, collected cash immediately, and reached profitability from day one.
insights INSIGHT
Why The Deodorant Actually Broke Through
Salt & Stone's deodorant broke out because it solved clean deodorant's usual tradeoff between ingredients, scent, aesthetics, and performance.
Nima Jilali wanted deodorant to smell like fragrance, look good, and feel pleasurable instead of smelling like mint and failing to work.
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This is our full interview with Nima Jalali, recorded live on TBPN.
We discuss how he went from pro snowboarder to building one of the fastest-growing personal care brands in the market, unpack why relentless product obsession, profitability from day one, and brand building over playbook thinking helped the company scale to $165 million in revenue, and debate what aspiring consumer founders can learn from his unconventional path on everything from product development and retail expansion to focus, funding, and building a legacy brand that can last for generations.
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