"My [Adam DeMartino] old company, Smallhold, raised a lot of money by branding a mushroom farm as a technology company to justify it. We built an extremely popular mushroom company and brand, but failed to make critical decisions at key moments to sustain the business. This led to a minority investor taking control and making necessary but — in my opinion — poorly executed cuts, which severely damaged the new category we created in grocery retail and dismantled a circular economy business that provided living wages to farmers. We could have taken a slower, more sustainable growth path, but we chose the fast lane," shares Adam DeMartino.
Nearly six months ago, Adam resigned in protest from Smallhold, a company he co-founded seven years ago with his (now former) best friend. Today, it emerges from Chapter 11 bankruptcy as shadow of the company he and Andrew once envisioned.
"The new owners, a private capital group, had made an ill-fated investment into our struggling mushroom farm company, which management had been mostly pitching as a technology business. While some of their restructuring decisions were expected and even necessary, others were not, and ran contrary to the principles upon which we built the company," he continues.
Read his entire article at Medium