Brami
From lupini snack brand to protein pasta contender.
And the organizational build that made it possible.
Brami had something most emerging brands spend years trying to earn: a decade of shelf credibility, real retail relationships, and a founder with a genuine food philosophy. Aaron didn't just want to sell protein pasta. He wanted Americans to eat the way Italians do — and believed that if he could get them there, the health and social outcomes would follow. That's a mission worth building around.
The problem wasn't the vision.
It was the org chart.
Brami was about to open 2,000+ new retail doors in one of the most competitive categories in the store. Protein pasta was exploding, and the established players weren't giving up ground quietly.
To win at that scale, really win, not just get on shelf and fade away, Brami needed capabilities it hadn't yet built: a seasoned sales team, a retail media strategy that could really move units, tight working capital management on an imported product during peak tariff confusion, and a category story compelling enough to walk into a Walmart meeting and leave with placement.
Oh, and Aaron needed to stop being the simultaneous head of sales, marketing, operations, and HR.
One shot.
High stakes.
Build and lead a sales effort capable of finding and closing opportunities without oversight, earning the right for full-time hires by winning key accounts first. Build a retail media strategy that drives velocity, not just impressions.
Manage forecasting and working capital with surgical precision through a volatile tariff environment. Develop the category story: packaging, PDP, shelf presence, buyer decks, a story that can win in a 20-foot pasta set.
And help the CEO be a CEO.
"If we can hit certain KPIs, if we unlock certain accounts, prove certain velocity numbers, then we'll raise the capital to build the team we actually need. But you can't hit those KPIs without the team. And you can't afford the team without hitting the KPIs first. This is a common reason people call Dovetail." The Founder's Equation
Two people, embedded in the day-to-day.
Started where all good strategy starts: the consumer.
We layered three research inputs: secondary market data as the foundation, primary qualitative work with a research agency to understand shopper friction points and and motivations, and in-store mobile eye-tracking studies to understand what actually drove attention and trial on shelf.
What were people searching for online? What language did they use? What worked on Instacart versus the shelf at Target? The data surfaced real gaps between how Brami was showing up and how consumers were actually looking for protein pasta.
Working alongside an external creative agency, we helped develop positioning that married Aaron's food philosophy to real consumer intent, building a portal to Italy, not just another protein play. Packaging updates that performed in both the 20-foot pasta set and the 2-inch Instacart thumbnail. Category captain decks that told a story about a movement, not a moment.
Seven months of buyer presentations to Walmart, Target, Publix, and Meijer. Finding and managing brokers, holding to the strategy when all temptation was to bend the rules, and showing up over-prepared every time.
A Costco opportunity emerged mid-engagement that was too significant to treat as secondary scope. We project-managed a complex five-region Club launch, coordinating plant, logistics, brokers, buyers, and design agencies on a tight timeline. Brami's first-ever Club offering, landed with sprezzatura.
By mid-year, Brami was on track to double sales. We collaborated with Aaron and external recruiters to identify, evaluate, hire, and onboard permanent heads of Marketing, Operations, and Sales, and stayed through knowledge transfer to make sure nothing fell through the cracks.
& 5× ARR
Walmart distribution
rotations
The team Brami eventually hired is, candidly, one of the best we've seen assembled at this stage in CPG. Built with a fraction of the risk of hiring too early and burning runway before the business could support it.
Today, Brami is recognized as one of the leading protein pasta contenders nationally. Dovetail continues as a strategic advisor to the CEO, helping navigate the next phase of expansion.
Human talent is the number one driver of venture outcomes. The Brami engagement is a proof point for what's possible when you sequence the build correctly: fractional execution first, permanent hires second, at exactly the moment the business can support and leverage them. The foundation was built by design.