Renegade Ventures

What if the best business you build is the one built around your life—not the other way around? In this live episode of Renegade Ventures Podcast, Ellie sits down with Toa Green, founder of Crank & Boom Ice Cream, to unpack her unconventional journey from her family’s restaurant to building one of Lexington’s most loved ice cream brands. What started with a $60 ice cream maker and a homemade coconut ice cream recipe inside a Thai restaurant grew into a thriving brand with multiple locations, nationwide shipping, and a fiercely loyal customer base. But this conversation is about more than ice cream. Toa shares the realities of entrepreneurship: taking calculated risks, surviving failed ideas, navigating seasonal cash flow, and learning that business doesn’t get easier—you just get better at doing hard things. Ellie and Toa dig into what it really means to scale without losing your soul, why defining your dream life matters before defining your growth plan, and how to build a business that supports the life you actually want. If you’re in a season of growth, uncertainty, or reinvention, this episode will challenge the way you think about success, failure, and what’s worth building.

What does it actually take to go from running restaurants to building a franchise brand? In this episode of Renegade Ventures, Lauren Coulter shares the evolution of Biscuit Belly—from early-stage growth without a clear strategy to a more intentional, systems-driven approach to scaling. She breaks down the realities of franchising, including what changes as an operator, how to think about partners and unit economics, and why delivering a consistent guest experience is one of the hardest parts of growth. Lauren also talks about “climbing Cringe Mountain”—the uncomfortable but necessary process of growing as a leader while building in real time. A candid conversation for founders thinking about scaling, franchising, or building a brand that lasts.

Ellie and Maggie welcome Mary Kay Shields, owner of Triple Crown Dentistry in Louisville, to discuss the often-unspoken reality of owning a business with a spouse and navigating divorce alongside a partnership split. Mary shares her path from starting her dental practice in 2012 to expanding into a larger, purchased 8,000-square-foot building in 2019, and how differing leadership styles created team division and conflict despite years of intensive counseling. After deciding the marriage and business partnership couldn’t continue, she describes employee turnover, the relief of resolved conflict, and rebuilding culture and leadership through executive groups like Vistage. Mary also recounts a major mistake made during a tax-related entity change when she unintentionally documented 50/50 ownership, complicating the divorce and buyout, and emphasizes leaning on experts—attorneys, accountants, and advisors—and following through on their guidance. 00:00 Podcast Catch Up 01:10 Meet Mary Shields 03:45 Mary’s Dental Journey 06:25 Building The Practice 09:21 Marriage And Leadership Rift 14:10 Decision To Separate 16:45 Rebuilding With Vistage 22:46 The 50 Percent Mistake 28:42 New Culture And Confidence 32:28 Advice For Business Divorce 35:33 Behind the Scenes Shoutouts 36:15 Why This Topic Matters 38:16 Meeting Through Vistage 38:59 Marys Dental Journey 41:47 Building the Practice Together 44:40 When Partnership Breaks Down 49:36 Divorce Decision and Team Fallout 53:39 Rebuilding Leadership and Culture 58:43 The 50 Percent Ownership Mistake 01:04:35 Confidence Returns and New Culture 01:08:43 Advice for Others Mid Divorce 01:10:21 Final Thanks and Wrap Up

Reinventing First Aid with Green Goo: Rapid Growth, a COVID Pivot, and a Hard-Won Buyback On the Renegade Ventures podcast, Ellie Puckett and Maggie Harlow interview Jodi Scott about building Green Goo, a mission-driven, plant-based first aid company she founded with her mom and herbalist/midwife sister to disrupt chemical-laden OTC first aid by leading with efficacy and family-safe, sustainable ingredients. Jodi shares her shift from a pre-med path and health psychology career into entrepreneurship, first via a bed-and-breakfast venture, then scaling Green Goo from farmer’s markets into major retail after an early break with the Army & Air Force Exchange, reaching over 150,000 distribution points in under five years while preserving their in-house plant-processing method. She describes the near-collapse during COVID due to a 98% retail dependence, the rapid DTC pivot, a partnership that unraveled when the acquiring company’s founder faced federal allegations, and an 18-month effort to buy the company back, rebuild inventory, and relaunch with renewed focus, joy, and resilience. 00:00 Welcome and Setup 00:41 Origin Story Green Goo 01:54 First Entrepreneurial Leap 02:56 From Kitchen to Market 05:30 Rapid Retail Expansion 06:11 COVID Pivot to DTC 07:08 Choosing a Partner 09:09 Retail Playbook Lessons 12:40 Scaling and FDA Path 15:05 Deal Fallout Rock Bottom 18:11 18 Month Buyback Fight 22:41 Rebuilding With Joy 25:07 Closing and Where to Buy

What do you do when the system you trained in no longer aligns with how you want to serve people? In this episode of Renegade Ventures, we sit down with Kristina Pohl, founder of Eternity Wellness in Louisville. After years as a NICU nurse and nurse practitioner, Kristina saw the gaps in traditional healthcare — and decided to build something different. With $5,000, a single treatment room, and a newborn at home, she launched her own integrative wellness practice just months before the pandemic. What followed was a crash course in entrepreneurship: learning business from scratch, hiring intentionally, investing in financial literacy, and scaling without losing the mission. Today, Eternity Wellness offers IV therapy, aesthetics, hormone care, gender-affirming care, medical weight loss, movement classes, and more — all rooted in prevention and whole-person health. We cover: -The moment getting laid off became her catalyst -Moving from provider to CEO -The hardest part of hiring and building culture -Bridging gaps in menopause and affirming care -What aspiring entrepreneurs really need to know before starting -If you’ve ever felt called to build something better — this conversation is for you. Learn more at eternitywellnesscenter.com and tune in to hear how courage, clarity, and community built a thriving wellness practice from the ground up.