Episode

R&D Radio: Lara Tiro of Rebel CPG — The PB&J Framework, COGS, and How to Scale a Food Product the Right Way

Podcast
The Startup CPG Podcast
Published
May 25, 2026
Duration seconds
1881
Processing state
not_requested
Canonical source
https://share.transistor.fm/s/37a4b919
Audio
https://pscrb.fm/rss/p/pdst.fm/e/media.transistor.fm/37a4b919/17c95da8.mp3
JSON
/v1/public/podcasts/the-startup-cpg-podcast-1235739/episodes/r-d-radio-lara-tiro-of-rebel-cpg-the-pb-j-framework-cogs-and-how-to-scale-a-food-product-the-right-way
Markdown
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Summary

In this episode of R&D Radio, hosted by food scientist Adam Yee, Adam sits down with Lara Tiro, founder of Rebel CPG — a commercialization and innovation agency helping food entrepreneurs bridge the gap between a great recipe and a retail-ready product. Lara is a food scientist with over 20 years of experience in food manufacturing, quality assurance, product development, and commercialization. She has worked with brands across baking, frozen foods, refrigerated products, plant proteins, and value-added food categories, and is known for her practical, business-first approach to helping founders scale without bleeding money. Lara started her career grading organic eggs at a tiny local farm, moved on to processing raspberries at a jam facility, built her foundation in food safety and quality assurance, and eventually moved into product development for a commercial bakery before launching Rebel CPG in 2021. Along the way she picked up a degree combining food science and economics at the University of British Columbia — a combination that shapes everything about how she thinks about this industry. Adam and Lara get into all of it — why getting cozy with COGS is the single most important thing a food entrepreneur can do, how the PB&J framework gives founders a structure for thinking about their product, brand, and business, and why your formula is always going to change at scale and that is not a failure. Lara also shares a real client story about scaling a frozen baby food product from a home kitchen recipe to a commercially viable product — and what that process actually looks like when done right. Listen in as they cover: Why COGS is the most important and most overlooked thing early stage food founders need to understand The PB&J framework: Product, Packagin…