In the oil and gas industry, companies are looking to Texas for leadership in technology, ESG, investing, and lowering fossil fuels’ environmental impact. In today’s episode, we take a “Sweet Break” and discuss a couple of key reasons businesses and families are moving to Texas.

I sat down with Addison LaBonte, CEO, Athlete, and Founder of Sweet Addison’s gluten-free & dairy-free desserts. We cover her competitive soccer background and why she settled in Texas with her nationwide business.

You do not want to miss this episode, as it is a great episode about trend examples, including trends in health, marketing, and where businesses are moving.

Thank you, Addison, for stopping by the Crude Truth – Rey.

Highlights of the Podcast

02:56 – Addison’s Background
05:13 – Gluten Free
08:28 – Eating Gluten
12:52 – Story about how Addison ended up playing D1 school
17:06 – Part of the UMaine soccer program
19:33 – Addison’s career and business
23:40 – Audience online
25:44 – How do you launch a food product?
28:59 – Being an entrepreneur
32:09 – Other favorite trick and tip

Please reach out to Addison Labonte on LinkedIn

Sweet Addison's: York native launches 'better for you' cookie brand

Check out StatusJet HERE

THE CRUDE TRUTH Ep. 83 Soccer Superstar, Addison Labonte

Video Transcription edited for grammar. We disavow any errors unless they make us look better or smarter.

Rey Treviño [00:00:00] With all the craziness of the world. On this episode, we take a sweet break. We talk about that and much more on this episode of The Crude Truth.

Narrator [00:00:10] In 1901 at Spindletop Hill near Beaumont. The future of Texas changed dramatically. As, like a fountain of fortune, thousands of barrels of oil burst from the earth towards the sky. Soon, Detroit would be cranking out Model TS by the millions, and America was on the move thanks to the black gold being produced in Texas. Now, more than a century later, the vehicles are different, but nothing else has truly changed. Sure, there may be many other alternative energy sources like wind and solar and electric. But let’s be honest. America depends on oil and entrepreneurs. And if the USA is truly going to be independent, it has to know The Crude Truth.

Narrator [00:00:53] This episode is brought to you by LFS chemistry. We are committed to being good stewards of the environment. We are providing the tools so you can be too. Nape Expo where deals happen. Air Compressor Solutions, when everything is on the line, air Compressor Solutions is the dependable choice to keep commercial business powered up. Sandstone Group, Exec Crue. Elevate your network, elevate your knowledge. Texas Star Alliance, Pecos country operating. Fueling our future.

Rey Treviño [00:01:27] Well, hello. Get out there. And thank you, as always, for tuning in to another episode of The Crude Truth. Well, as we continue our year in 2024, what an up and down year it has been from the oil and gas industry to our economy to what’s even going on in Washington DC. And on this episode, I just wanted to really, as my teaser said, let’s take a break. Let’s, let’s, let’s step back and let not only take a break, but let’s, let’s enjoy some sweet treats while we’re at it. And today I brought out a guest that is perfect for that because, as you all know, we’re already halfway through the year. We’re trying to watch our figures, I’m sure. Right. So today my guest is somebody that is just I’m just super excited to have on. They have traveled the United States, and they have chosen Dallas as the premier place to live and thrive as an entrepreneur. And they all. And she also shares her sweet treats with us. My guest today is Addison Labonte. Addison, how are you?

Addison Labonte [00:02:26] I’m good. How are you? Thank you so much for having me on your show.

Rey Treviño [00:02:29] Well, thank you so much for coming into my show and putting up with all the pre-production, mishaps and everything like that. So thank you so much for coming on. I, I, I when I had the opportunity, you have been an entrepreneur and you have been thriving and, you know, pre-production. We were able to talk just a little bit and even, you even share a little bit about yourself in that you played sports in college, but for everybody out there that doesn’t know who you are. Addison, please tell everybody out there who you are.

Addison Labonte [00:02:59] So my name is Addison. I was born and raised on the coast of Maine and a very small town. I went to the University of Maine to play soccer, Division one sport. So it was very intense, but I, I loved it. It was the most rewarding and challenging journey. And when I graduated, I wanted to stay in really good shape. So I started distance running. And I noticed that after 3 to 4 miles of running, my legs would experience just severe pain, almost like a Charley horse in both of my calves. And as I continued running, my legs would become completely numb. I would have no feeling in my legs, and which is a very concerning sensation when you’re running, and then your depth perception is off and you’re trying to jump on and off a sidewalk and it’s it’s terrifying. And so I went to see three different doctors and they said that you have something called compartment syndrome. So I had actually heard of that because my college soccer coach had it, and he ended up getting the surgery for it. But basically what compartment syndrome is, is all of our muscles have muscle fibers that surround our muscles. When we’re working out a muscle group, the muscle tries to expand. You get extra blood flow to the muscles, and those muscle fibers also expands for whatever reason, in my legs, when I do distance running, those muscle fibers never expand. So my muscle is trying to expand. It’s bumping up against those fibers, causing pain, and the blood flow gets cut off. So then I would experience the numbness.

Rey Treviño [00:04:30] Yeah.

Addison Labonte [00:04:31] So all three doctors said you need to quit running or you need to get this surgery. And I said at the time I was 22, and I said, there has to be a better way. You know. I said, actually, I’m just going to run through the numbness. I don’t really care. And they said, you’re doing lasting nerve damage. This is really unhealthy for you. We really recommend that you get this surgery. So the surgery involves them going in and making small incisions in the muscle fibers to allow them to expand. But they said there’s no guarantee that the surgery actually works. So on a whim, I decided to do some lifestyle changes and see if it would help. So my aunt is a seasoned marathon runner. She lives in my hometown in Maine, and she said, I think you should become gluten free because whenever I’m training for a marathon, I’m gluten free and I feel amazing. And I said, well, that has nothing to do with running. And but I’m so desperate. You know, I was in so much pain. I was so frustrated. I had tried different shoes, I had tried compression socks, I had tried yoga and stretching and thought something hot. You know, something has to help and nothing did. So on a Monday morning in July of 2016, I became gluten free. Oh, just overnight. Quit it. Cold turkey. I was eating fast food every week at that point, and so I went from eating fast food every week to reading every ingredient label. And I was shocked at what goes into our foods. Horrified,

Rey Treviño [00:05:56] Horrified.

Addison Labonte [00:05:58] Horrified at the things that are in our foods. And. After about 3 to 4 days. Not even kidding that quickly. I had my first long distance run where I could feel my legs the entire time.

Rey Treviño [00:06:10] Whoa, that that didn’t take much time.

Addison Labonte [00:06:14] No, it didn’t, because I was eating gluten every day leading up to that. And then suddenly it was. It was mostly out of my system. Now I could run again, and I was I was shocked, but I was so excited to feel normal. And I had this newfound appreciation for running and for my own health, because before that, I considered myself a pretty healthy person. I mean, I was a D1 athlete. Yeah. I thought, you know, this is the pinnacle of my athletic career and I’m in the best shape of my life. And but I look back and I was still getting 1 to 2 really bad headaches a week, to the point where I bought those huge bottles of ibuprofen and just run through them.

Rey Treviño [00:06:52] Yes.

Addison Labonte [00:06:53] But when I became gluten free, I realized I was I was so sick and I didn’t even realize it. I just thought it was normal. And I think a lot of Americans feel that on a daily basis, they have joint pain and inflammation and oh, my knee just hurts. It’s hurt for years and that’s not normal. You’re not supposed to feel like that. Yeah. So I would encourage people to to take a look at their lives and, you know, their, their health issues and try to solve it in a more natural way because we don’t always need medicine.

Rey Treviño [00:07:25] Well, you know, my my youngest brother is a long distance runner, and, he we’re we’re we’re both in the oil and gas industry, but and he, he was like me. Until you go out to the oil field, you’re out there for months on end. So you’re, you know, grilling out, cooking, doing this, doing that, you know, very unhealthy. Right? If he took a sabbatical, and then he goes back. But he came back a vegetarian and a long distance runner himself by a long distance. We’re talking the ultra marathon, the ultra close 100 K things, and he became a vegetarian over night. And he’s probably in the best shape that he’s ever bit him. And he says that he’s just so lightweight, so clear. And he’s also, doesn’t drink alcohol or anything like that. And he just says he goes, can’t explain it. But I just feel like I’m like all the time. And then I’m like, okay, is that kind of what it is?

Addison Labonte [00:08:21] The first few months, I was shocked at how different I felt. So when I was still eating gluten, it was like after every meal, I felt so heavy and so full, and now I feel so much lighter. And that was that was my first comment was, I just feel light and like I’ve eaten enough and I’m satisfied, but I don’t feel gross, right? And it used to be like like, you know, after Thanksgiving meal, it’s like, I feel so heavy and like there’s a rock in my stomach. I feel like that every day. And now it’s like, wait, you can feel full and not hungry, but not weighed down by your food. I mean, it’s it’s life changing. Honestly, the way I feel now is I never thought that I would feel like this, so.

Rey Treviño [00:09:08] Okay. You know, I know you’re not from Texas, so I don’t know, like you said, you mean you eat fast food every day? So you’re in Maine at this point? What was it like on that Monday morning? What was that? What did you eat that Monday? Like, if you can remember, or something like that. It was like, because, I mean, I can see myself having to, like, read everything in my pantry the next morning. I mean, what was that like?

Addison Labonte [00:09:29] So thankfully, I’ve always been a meat and potatoes type of girl. Okay, I love to eat fruit as well, so I eat a lot of fruit. In the beginning, especially for breakfast. And then I relied a lot on protein bars. I’ve always been someone who needs to eat a lot of protein every day. So and being an athlete, you know, you really need your protein. So it was a lot of fruit, peanut butter, protein bars. And dinner was always meat and potatoes. And then where I really struggled was dessert. I have had a sweet tooth my entire life. In fact, most days I could probably just eat one savory thing and the rest would be sweet. Like, I just I love chocolate.

Rey Treviño [00:10:08] You’re not hungry.

Addison Labonte [00:10:08] So yeah. So the good thing is, most ice cream is gluten free. So I was eating a lot of ice cream and a lot of meat and fruit. And so I would go to the grocery store and spend like an hour or two just going through every aisle, reading ingredient labels, figuring out what I could and couldn’t eat. I was never a big fan of pasta because I always felt gross after eating pasta. And it makes sense now because pasta is just gluten. It’s just wheat. And oftentimes if I wasn’t pairing that with a protein, then all I was eating was gluten and I would feel awful. So even to this day, I’m not really a huge pasta fan, but I remember pasta was one of the easiest first foods I eat. Gluten free. At the time, gluten free pasta was really good and it still is really good. Most people can’t tell the difference. I was eating a lot of rice cakes. Rice cakes? Three gluten free rice cakes with peanut butter and banana. But it really forced me to read ingredient labels and to choose things that are naturally gluten free. So most people think, oh, gluten free, that’s gross. And I’m like, well, do you like steak? Yeah, steaks. Gluten free.

Rey Treviño [00:11:17] It is. Okay. I was meant to ask you that because it’s all potatoes.

Addison Labonte [00:11:20] Potatoes.

Rey Treviño [00:11:21] I see. I thought those were. But again I haven’t deep dove into it. So you could definitely do a crawfish boil though because there’s potatoes in.

Addison Labonte [00:11:30] That, right?

Rey Treviño [00:11:31] Yeah.

Addison Labonte [00:11:31] So all meats and it’s natural. Just meat. A lot of times seasonings won’t be gluten free, but just meat itself gluten free. All fruits, all veggies just by themselves are gluten free.

Rey Treviño [00:11:42] Well, you know, so that’s how bad. So, I mean, so, you know, for every guy out there, you know, hey, you could, you know, I mean, potatoes. I think we’re doing okay, but cut out everything else because, I mean, I’m always like, man, if I could just cut back on my meat potato intake, but maybe if I just cut out my gluten intake. Yeah. Keyboard meat. Potatoes.

Addison Labonte [00:12:00] Right. There’s like a carnivore diet. People do that where it’s just all like meat and eggs and yeah, that’s gluten free.

Rey Treviño [00:12:07] Shoot.

Addison Labonte [00:12:08] You like a lot of gluten free things. You just don’t realize it. Oh.

Rey Treviño [00:12:12] Well, I wonder you made a great post. I want to switch gears here and kind of dive back because you mentioned once or twice that you’re an athlete, but, you made a great post on your LinkedIn a while back about you were, you were a soccer player. Well, first of all, what position you play?

Addison Labonte [00:12:28] Center defense.

Rey Treviño [00:12:29] Oh, you were that one.

Addison Labonte [00:12:31] Yeah.

Rey Treviño [00:12:32] Okay, I know I’m tall.

Addison Labonte [00:12:34] So that’s.

Rey Treviño [00:12:34] Okay. Okay. And. Yeah, I know that, I played a little bit, in my time, and, some defensive players were always, you know, the meanest ones out.

Addison Labonte [00:12:43] Yeah. Down. I’m very mean.

Rey Treviño [00:12:47] But, but you mentioned, you had a fun little story, and I wanted to share that story about how you ended up playing D1 school, when that probably wasn’t your first choice. Is that correct? On.

Addison Labonte [00:12:58] Right? Yes. Right. So growing up, I played year round Premier Soccer, for a club in New Hampshire. But when I was in probably sixth or seventh grade, I have two younger siblings, and my parents both worked full time outside the house and they said, we can’t we can’t drive you to these practices. I mean, practice was 45 minutes away, two nights a week and games on the weekends all over New England. They said, we just can’t do this like our family comes first. And so I had to quit playing year round soccer. So from seventh grade to senior year of high school, I only played in the fall and I was a great high school player. But that was at a small school in Maine. You know, that’s not indicative of D1 as a whole in the United States. So I thought, I’m going to go to a really great academic school, play Division three soccer and soccer will be, you know, kind of the background to academics, you know, and I was so set on going to this very prestigious D3 school in Vermont, and I went to one of their ID clinics in the fall of my senior year of high school and got to meet the coach. All the players is basically like a big tryout to see if any of us wanted to go play there, and I thought I nailed it, and I emailed the coach the following week and said, I loved your school. I love meeting you and all the players, and I, I really want to come to school here. And he said, you know, unfortunately you’re not fast enough, to play here. And, you know, there’s some, some skills on the field that, you know, you just you wouldn’t make it here. And I was crushed. I mean, that was my life plan. I was going to the school. I already knew my major. I already knew I had everything lined up. Yeah. And so hearing that I wasn’t good enough to play at that school made me question, am I good enough to play at all? Anywhere. So. I remember one night my mom said, I want you to email the coach of every single college that you apply to. It can’t hurt. And I had applied to ten schools, and the University of Maine was the only Division one school that I applied to because I didn’t think I was good enough to play there. So I told my parents, I will email every coach, but I’m not going to email you Maine, because that’s Division one and that’s my backup school. You know, it’s a state school. Whatever. I’m really into into academics.

Rey Treviño [00:15:11] And yeah, give me to the private school. We can talk about that. Yeah.

Addison Labonte [00:15:14] Right. Exactly. Yes. So I actually ended up emailing the UMaine coach. I didn’t tell anyone that I did because like I said, there’s no way he’s going to reply. I mean, there’s I just was told I couldn’t play D3. What am I thinking? I can go play D1. It’s also November of my senior year of high school, which is pretty late to commit to a Division one school. Yeah. So I thought there’s there’s no way. And sure enough, he emailed me back and I remember his very first email said, I want to get you on campus. I know who you are. And I was like, what? You know who I am? And I was shocked. So I told my parents, I said, well, and I ended up emailing, you know, coach at the University of Maine, and he wants to meet me and can we go up to Orono and see the school. And so my parents met at the University of Maine. My dad was a football player there. Oh, wow. So I was very well-versed in UMaine athletics, but never thought I was good enough to play there. So I met with the coach and he said, I’ve heard about you. I’ve heard you’re really fast. Which is shocking because that D-3 coach said I wasn’t fast enough, but I had just won a track state championship the year before and he said, I know that you’re really competitive because I’ve talked to your high school coach, so although I’ve never seen you play, I’ll let you walk on. You might never play a minute in your four years here, but I like your competitiveness and I think it’ll be good in practice, you know? Yeah. You’ll push our other players and you’re also very good at school. That brings up the team GPA and we, you know, we like you. We’ll take a chance on this. And so I went home and I said this is a once in a lifetime opportunity. Mom and dad I’m going to commit to this. So I called my coach on Leap Day 2012 and said, count me in, coach. Wow, I’m coming to school year.

Rey Treviño [00:17:03] And then you did play two though, right?

Addison Labonte [00:17:04] Yes. Yeah. So part of the UMaine soccer program is going to school in July and August, taking summer courses so that you’re ahead for the season and also training all summer on campus. So I knew that it was quite an undertaking. So July 1st, 2012, my parents dropped me off and that was the start of my Division one soccer career. My freshman year, I played six minutes. Okay. Just one random game, and we were winning by a lot. Coach put me in for six minutes before halftime, and I thought, I really need to figure this out if I want to play. So my freshman year, I scheduled weekly meetings with my coach. Just on my own. Coach, what can I do better? What does it take to play at this level? And the cool thing was, because I wasn’t playing year round, all all my years growing up, my coach had kind of mold me to the player that he needed, and I was I was almost naive to the point where he could he could create the player out of me that he that he wanted. Yeah. So I worked my tail off. I mean, I’ve never worked so hard for anything in my life. And by the time sophomore year rolled around, I was playing every minute of every game and starting my very first game that I ever started in, played was against the University of Connecticut. UConn, who’s a top 25 school, and I was terrified. It’s like, well, here’s this opportunity that I’ve been like, praying for. Here it is. And it’s like, welcome to the big leagues. And I remember that game. We lost 1 to 0, which is like very, very respectable for the top 25 teams. And it was that was the start of my career. And from then on I started and played every single game until I graduated. I went from being a walk on who played hardly anything to a full ride starter, and it just, I think my coach all the time for taking a chance on me. I had no business being there, but he saw something in me that other people didn’t. And being a Division one athlete is so much of who I am. And I think about being an entrepreneur now, I could have never done this if I didn’t have that boldness that I learned in college.

Rey Treviño [00:19:18] Well, I’m glad you mentioned the word entrepreneur. And thank you for, sharing, everything from the gluten free for your journey so far, because, I want to get to let’s fast forward a few years to 2020, and talk about your career and your, your business that is thriving in just a years time frame. Our goal is under a year. But let’s go to 2020. And your decision and why you’re here in Dallas, you know.

Addison Labonte [00:19:46] Right. So in 2020 I had my Instagram and my blog and I was doing that just as a side hustle, just on the side. I was working full time in an office in finance. I was doing hedge fund analysis. Oh. Super thrilling.

Rey Treviño [00:20:00] Yeah, it’s real fun.

Addison Labonte [00:20:02] Not fulfilling whatsoever. So I was so thankful for this, for the blog and for Instagram because that was my creative outlet. Yeah. And that was something I was just doing, you know, for myself and my, my audience online. And so 20, 20 hits and suddenly I’m working from home. And I said to myself, I’m going to treat this like a business. This is no longer just a hobby. This is my chance to really pour into this, see if I can make it something. And so I worked all the time. I would wake up early, finish my finance job. I would try to get everything done before noon, and then I would just work on this business on the side. So I’m so thankful that for that time where I was able to dedicate a lot of my time and effort to my business, so I continued growing that audience online. And then by the time 2021 rolled around, main were still very shut down on beaches, were still closed. And I thought, you know, I’m young, I’m an entrepreneur, I can’t live here if I want to, to really grow this into something special, I need to live in a place where big, exciting things are happening. And so actually, my best friend and her husband used to live here in Dallas. He’s a former stars player, and I told them that I was interested in leaving Maine, and they said, Dallas is the best city for young people. I mean, you’ve got all four major sports teams. There’s no state income tax. There’s so many business owners and you just need to move to Dallas. The weather’s a lot better and better than me at least, so I didn’t know I had never been to Texas.

Rey Treviño [00:21:39] Whoa.

Addison Labonte [00:21:40] I’d never been to Texas. I didn’t know anybody who lived here. And I said, I need to go down and visit for a week or so. Yeah, just to make sure that I like it. And then if so, I’ll move. So I came down Labor Day weekend of 2021, and when I landed, it was about 105 degrees. And I thought, okay, it can’t really get worse than this. So if I can handle this heat, I think I can do it. And I stayed in Uptown and I just I really loved the energy and everybody that I met just, you know, at restaurants in passing was so generous and, genuine and kind. And the food was amazing. And I thought, okay, I think I can do this. So I flew home, I walked in my parents house, and I said, I’m moving to Texas. Well, I said, I loved it. Yeah. So again, didn’t know anybody here and didn’t move here for a job. And I moved right after Christmas 2021. Okay. So it’s been one of the best decisions I’ve ever made. I am thriving here, I love it, I’ve met the most amazing people. I get so energized and inspired by all of the success in Dallas. And there’s so much to do. I mean, even in the winter, it’s, you know, 70 degrees at like, I’m just so confused all the time. Like what? What day of the week it is and what time of the year it is because it’s just it’s so sunny all the time.

Rey Treviño [00:23:08] Yeah, well, shoot, two days ago it was 90 degrees. And today I think it’s like 35 or something like that. You know. You know, you don’t like the weather in Texas. Just hang around for feeding. We’ll get something new. Well, so you’re an entrepreneur and you’re here in Texas, and let’s talk about what you’re doing now because you’re taking not only your lifestyle, you’re taking your passion, and you’re fighting those, and you’re now molding them into into your career. And so I love to talk about that.

Addison Labonte [00:23:38] Awesome. So I built up this audience online. And I remember in December of 2022, I did this really cool series on Instagram. Each day leading up to Christmas, I did a different cookie recipe and I’d say like, welcome back to the 25 Days of Christmas cookies! Today it is this cookie and it blew up. People loved it and I started getting questions from my audience saying, these look so good. If I pay you, will you ship these across the country to me? And I said, well, no. Like, you know, that’s a liability issue and they probably won’t last. And I’d probably have to charge you a lot of money so that the shipping, you know, was worth it. And I’m only making a small batch of this. It just it doesn’t make sense. But in the back of my mind, I thought I might do something. If people are asking for this, and this sort of product doesn’t really exist in the market today, you know, what would that look like? And so I spent a good chunk of 2023 coming up with a product. And what does this look like to launch a food brand. Yeah. So in early 2024, I launched Sweet Addison’s, which is a brand of better for you, better tasting desserts made with clean ingredients that are minimally processed, sustainable, ethically sourced, better for you, better for the planet. My cookies are gluten free, dairy free, refined, sugar free. Just they’re truly better for you, you know? And I travel a lot, and I always, I always bake an entire batch of these cookies, and I bring them with me, like, through TSA, through the airport. And I always get question like, why do you have a whole thing of cookies with you? And but it’s because you can’t go buy healthier, better for you cookies. It just it doesn’t exist. And my sweet tooth wants a cookie every single night before I go to bed, right? So I thought, I’m going to create the product that I wish I could buy. So it’s been a whirlwind. It’s been a lot more work than I was expecting, and a lot more doing things for the first time. Things that I previously had no idea how to do. How do you how do you launch a food product?

Rey Treviño [00:25:46] There you go. That’s going to be my next question.

Addison Labonte [00:25:48] So there’s I mean, there’s legal things like getting your food handler’s license and setting up, you know, UPC codes and barcodes and, you know, working in compliance with the FDA. And then there’s where do you source the ingredients from? Yeah. So that it’s not super expensive because launching a food brand, you don’t just go to, you know, the grocery store and Whole Foods and buy all these ingredients. I mean, it would cost an arm and a leg.

Rey Treviño [00:26:13] Yeah. Because that would be, either Whole Foods or a market that goes right to sources. I would, I would go with and if it’s not there, I’d be like, well, it was a good idea. I’m done.

Addison Labonte [00:26:22] Right? So it was figuring out all of these things for the first time and then the actual product itself. So I went through about four months of recipe testing. I did over 25 variations to land on the first product, which is chocolate chip cookies. So to think about where I started with these and where they are now is comical because they’re just, I’m so in love with these cookies like I want every single night. In just the first few weeks, we’ve had over 250 orders. They’ve gone to almost every U.S. state. Which has been thrilling. Wow. To get to hear people’s feedback. I mean, I had a comment come through this week from somebody who just left a review on my website. I don’t know this person. I don’t know where they live. I don’t know how they found me. And this woman said, in my 50 years of life, this is my favorite cookie I’ve ever eaten. And I thought. Wow. I mean, the fact that I can give this gift to people, especially those of us with food allergies who can’t enjoy regular products, the fact that I can give this to them means the world to me, and I’m such an intense person, I’m very goal driven. And at first I said, you know, I want to hit this for sales and be in this many stores. And but getting the feedback from people I’ve, I’ve shifted my mindset to. I just want to spread joy to as many people as possible.

Rey Treviño [00:27:46] Yes. I mean, you talk about being at Ted and in the room in the studio right now, you are and not not like in your name. But yes, you could tell you. But you also, I just felt this passion, joy of you just talk about what you just said. Like, this whole other aura just came about you and I’m I cannot I’m so happy that that we did it the way we did when we talked about, growing up in Maine, being gluten free and then talking about because that whole all of that went into this dark cookie.

Addison Labonte [00:28:20] Yes.

Rey Treviño [00:28:21] And I can think of 100 things that are worse than trying to find out 25 ways to make a chocolate chip cookie, for goodness sakes. So that is awesome that you were able to do that. And I love how, like you, you’re saying right here, right now that’s like, hey, I’ve already switched my game plan a little bit. You know, and being an entrepreneur, that’s definitely something that has to be there. It’s like you got to be ready to roll with the punches or, you know, go with the flow in some form or fashion sometimes and then pivot.

Addison Labonte [00:28:52] Right. I really exactly what you said. I really feel like my whole life has prepared me for being an entrepreneur, and especially now, being a founder of a food brand. I learned so much perseverance in college, going through being a Division one athlete, and there are days when it would be so much easier to just give up, throw in the towel. But I think to myself, I’ve done things that are more difficult than this, and I’ve gone I’ve gotten through them. And I was a Division one athlete for four years. I’ve run two marathons like I’m I’m pretty unstoppable. And even on the hard days when it’s easy to say, what am I doing with my life? You know, all my friends right now are getting married, starting families, and I’m baking cookies on a Saturday night. It’d be so easy to say, I just want to do what everybody else is doing, and I. I love my friends to death and what they’re doing is amazing. I’m so excited for them. But I have felt called to start this business and to be able to help those of us who have food allergies or who are health conscious. And this is my way of of giving back, and I really feel like I could be the next healthy Betty Crocker. I mean, that’s that’s my goal is to to revolutionize the dessert industry and show people that you don’t have to choose between your health and good flavor. You truly can have both. They’re not mutually exclusive, and we need to stop settling for foods that make us feel gross. Yeah, that’s so a thing of the past. That’s that’s not how I want to live my life. I don’t want to live my life drinking kale juice that tastes gross just because it’s healthy. Yeah. You know, I want to be able to sit down after dinner, enjoy a cookie and feel great after. That’s my goal. And I want other I want as many people to experience that as possible.

Rey Treviño [00:30:45] Oh, but, Addison, you are such an inspiration. And I think I needed a little bit of that here at the end to just say, like, you got to focus on what you’re doing in life and not worry about everybody else and your passion and follow your joys. But for individuals out there that are like, well, I have a health issue, let me look, how can they look at your ingredients and things like that? How can they do all that stuff?

Addison Labonte [00:31:12] So in terms of the ingredients for the cookies, they can just go on to sweet Addison’s dot com. Addison is plural. Sweet. Addison. Scott. My ingredients are listed right there. But in terms of just looking at your food products, if you’re looking at the nutrition label and you see anything that you can’t pronounce, automatic red fly, put, put it down. Why would you put something into your body that you don’t know what it is?

Rey Treviño [00:31:36] I feel like you’re judging me right now.

Addison Labonte [00:31:38] No is a question. This is a real story for everybody out there. If you wouldn’t put something that you don’t even know what it is, why would you put it in your body? I mean, we only get one body. We only get one life. Why would you put harmful ingredients into it? So if there’s anything on a food nutrition label that you don’t. You don’t know what it is. You don’t recognize it, which doesn’t always mean it’s a horrible thing. But if you don’t recognize it, you can’t pronounce it. If a first or second grader couldn’t read the word, put it down. Right. My other favorite trick and tip is look for foods that don’t have a nutrition label, meaning apples. Bananas. There’s no nutrition facts on those because they’re natural that you don’t. There’s one ingredient in there an apple, a banana. Right. So they’re not loaded with all of these harmful ingredients. So that’s another thing is you want to eat foods that are made with simple ingredients. And we don’t need all of these. Sauces and condiments and breads. We don’t need that. We just need real food. You know, look at the way that our ancestors lived. Do you think they ate cereal that’s been on the shelf for 12 months? You know, it’s funny. You know why? Shelf shelf stable food was created? Why it was created for the military so that they could ship it overseas. I believe it was World War two. Don’t quote me on that. But it was created originally for the military so they could make foods, ship them overseas, and store them for when they were needed. This was never meant to be our daily diet. And now when we go to the grocery store, a lot of people are shopping on the inner aisles, which is all the shelf stable food where I shop, the perimeter shop, the shop, the frozen and the refrigerated section, the fresh produce section. Things that will spoil shop.

Rey Treviño [00:33:32] Okay. You and I were talking of pre-production about the 1950s and 60s, about how, like, all the beach pictures were, all these. And then. And then you talk about the military, and I understand you got those movies. I mean, there’s some YouTubes out there. We got people out to, like, open those up then and try to eat them. But that makes so much sense about why we are where we are today. You getting the crude truth today?

Addison Labonte [00:33:55] I did.

Rey Treviño [00:33:56] I love it. Well, Addison, for those out there that that don’t follow you, how you know. You know, how can people get contact with you? How can they follow you and and change your life around?

Addison Labonte [00:34:09] Awesome. So if you are interested in all of my recipes, my food blog is organically addison.com on Instagram. Organically Addison. And then for the cookies it is Sweet Addison dot com and @ Sweet dot Addison on Instagram.

Rey Treviño [00:34:25] And I want to get one more fun shot of those cookie, if that’s all right, real quick. I love this place. And, Addison, I cannot thank you enough for coming on. I think I got to have you back, and we’re after this name off. A bunch of your cookies. Will have to do. Maybe we’ll do something fun and how to even try to cook. So our bakes a.

Addison Labonte [00:34:42] Live taste test.

Rey Treviño [00:34:43] Oh, that’d be fun.

Addison Labonte [00:34:44] With all the flavors, because I’m already in the works. Flavors two and three. Okay, so those will be coming soon, but I hope to expand even more from there and we can do a taste test.

Rey Treviño [00:34:53] Oh. That’s awesome. You just told me when.

Addison Labonte [00:34:57] Perfect.

Rey Treviño [00:34:57] Okay, well, to everybody out there, thank you all so much for, you know, taking this sweet break with me today on this episode of The Crude Truth. Thank you. Thank you again, Addison. Just thank you so much. And we’ll see you all again on another episode of The Crude Truth.

Narrator [00:35:12] Again, the Crude Truth would like to thank today’s sponsors, LFS chemistry, Nape Expo, Air Compressor Solutions, Sandstone Group, Exec Crue, Texas Star Alliance, Pecos Country Operating, and Real News Communication Network.

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