Most founders building toward an exit picture the same scene: the wire hits, the celebration starts, and life finally rewards the years of grind. Juliet Barratt lived that exact moment in 2021 and what actually happened bears almost no resemblance to the fantasy.

In this episode, Juliet sits down with Chris and Helen to tell the full Grenade story. From a failed teaching career and a chance meeting in a Birmingham bar, to building a sports nutrition brand around a plastic grenade-shaped container. From driving a tank down Oxford Street as guerrilla marketing, to landing the protein bar that turned a niche sports brand into a household name. From bootstrapping with no investment to taking on private equity, and finally selling to Mondelez in 2021.

But the moment the deal closed is where the story gets honest. Juliet describes the lawyer ringing her the Monday morning after the sale to ask whether the money had hit her bank and she hadn't even looked. The sale was never about the money. It was about handing over a business she'd lived, breathed, and built her entire identity around for eleven years.

This is the founder exit story most podcasts don't tell. Honest, unfiltered, and essential listening for any founder thinking about what comes after the sale.