What makes a founder stand out isn’t the size of their vision. It’s how little they let get in the way. Choose focus over noise and move further in 60 days than most do in a year.
John Liu had been thinking about starting a food brand for years. When he finally left his job at TikTok, he gave himself 60 days to do it.
The product: rice-based pancake and waffle mixes.
The process: bring mochi pancakes to every event he went to, host 100-person tastings in his apartment, and test 80+ recipe iterations.
Two months later, KiuKiu wasn’t just a product. It was proof of concept. His first run brought in $100,000 in the first month, 10x’d his original order, and is now hitting shelves across the country.
Give yourself guardrails. John didn’t just “work on an idea.” He ran a 60-day sprint. Every tasting, every tweak, every post led to one thing: would people pay for mochi pancake mix? Without deadlines, ideas drift. With them, ideas are proven or die fast (which is still progress!).
Don’t mistake effort for impact. John almost went full scrappy founder mode: renting a commercial kitchen, hand-packing mixes, shipping boxes himself. But that would keep him from doing the work that really mattered. Connecting with customers, meeting buyers, and telling the brand story.
Feedback only helps if it’s honest... and many times, it isn’t. John hosted tastings for 100s of people and heard nothing but praise. “I’d only get positive feedback to my face. Then I would check the Google form, and there’d be really honest feedback on things to improve on,” he says. “That made me realize we need to keep doing this form.”
Branding is not just a pretty package. John spent 20% of his total investment on brand design. And it's already seeing a great return. Not only does it look good, a branding helped KiuKiu attract buyers, stand out on shelf, and stay top of mind.
Build a go-to-market strategy you can sustain. Every founder wants their product to be everywhere, all at once. “But a lot of retailers are very willing to take a new brand, but are also quick to drop you if you don't see velocity straight away,” he says. “For each store, have a strategy for how you're going to get velocity and don’t bite off more than you can chew.”
Market insight → For years, the market rewarded big launches and bigger raises. Now, the advantage goes to those who focus: fewer SKUs, shorter timelines, smarter bets. Efficiency isn’t about doing less. It’s about doing what matters most.
Rice is on a roll
The 60-day launch sprint
Sixty days. One idea. Zero excuses.
1. Pick one question. What’s the single thing you need proof of before you go all in?
2. Set a deadline. One week, one month, whatever works. This turns tinkering into testing.
3. Collect honest feedback. Give your product to as many people as possible. Keep it anonymous. Pay attention to patterns.
4. Launch in public. Pre-sell, post updates, show progress. Don’t wait until it’s “ready.”
5. Decide and move. When your deadline hits, make the call: keep, kill, or scale.