What if everything you’ve been told about food marketing is wrong? What if instead of polished campaigns highlighting features and benefits, your customers actually crave the messy, imperfect reality of building something from scratch?
Jake Karl’s, Chief Rainmaker of Mid-Day Squares, has proven this hypothesis at scale. Starting with three people, no social media following, and a condo kitchen, they’ve built a multi-million-dollar snacking company that customers don’t just buy from—they genuinely cheer for.
Table of Contents
The Documentary Approach That Changes Everything
Why Vulnerability Beats Features Every Time
The Hard Path That Actually Works
The Serendipity Strategy
The Documentary Approach That Changes Everything
Traditional food marketing follows a predictable script: highlight nutritional benefits, showcase perfect packaging, emphasize convenience. Mid-Day Squares took the opposite approach. “We simply just took out our phones and we started filming everything, and we just started documenting as if we were producers or we were like a movie, uh, sorry, a documentary,” Karl’s explains.
The results? Customers began watching their journey like a TV show, becoming emotionally invested in their success. When people see behind-the-scenes struggles—machines breaking down, nearly going out of business, the founders almost getting divorced over manufacturing stress—they don’t run away. They lean in.
“If I told you only good things 24/7, you’d be like, oh, that’s cool. And then eventually you’d be like, it’s not reality,” Karl’s notes. “And I think where we won was we showed you the good, the bad and then the ugly.”
Why Vulnerability Beats Features Every Time
While competitors focused on protein grams and fiber content, Mid-Day Squares shared stories. Real stories. The kind where you cry yourself to sleep questioning every decision you’ve made. These weren’t calculated marketing moves—they were authentic glimpses into what building something actually looks like.
This approach works because humans are wired for storytelling, not specifications. “Our brains are wired to process storytelling,” Karls explains. “When you go home at night and you speak to your family or your friends, you’re like, how was your day? You’re telling a story. So businesses need to be on the same level playing field.”
The business results speak for themselves: millions of customers, nationwide retail distribution, and a community that actively promotes the brand because they feel personally connected to the journey.
The Hard Path That Actually Works
When 26 co-manufacturers told them they’d need to change their product to fit existing equipment, most companies would compromise. Mid-Day Squares made a different choice: build their own factory. It took two and a half years, almost destroyed relationships, and created countless headaches.
But it also created their competitive advantage. “The bad and the ugly came from a lot of the ops problems that we had. So it also leaned into the storytelling component,” Karls explains. Every manufacturing challenge became content. Every breakdown became a story that brought customers closer.
This willingness to choose difficulty over convenience extends to their marketing approach. While other brands outsource everything, Karls still travels 140+ flights annually, building relationships in person because “there’s something about human to human that goes so deep and has the potential for anything to happen.”
The Serendipity Strategy
In an increasingly digital world, Mid-Day Squares bets on showing up physically. City by city, event by event, relationship by relationship. The ROI isn’t immediate—it’s a two-year investment in a relationship that eventually becomes a lead investor. It’s a chance encounter that sparks a creative breakthrough.
“I’m a huge advocate for serendipity and showing up and doing it in your way and not being scared to get on a plane. Even if the flight’s 12 hours for one meeting, you might not get anything out of it, but you never know. You might get something massive out of it,” Karls reflects.
For small business owners feeling overwhelmed by digital marketing complexity, this approach offers hope. Sometimes the most sophisticated strategy is simply being genuinely human, consistently showing up, and trusting that authenticity will find its audience.
Ready to transform your brand story? Start by asking yourself: what would happen if you showed your customers the real journey, not just the highlight reel? Your next breakthrough might be hiding in the story you’re afraid to tell.
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