Answer extracted from the How I Built This with Guy Raz podcast — listen to the full episode below.
How did Cape Cod Potato Chips' unexpected acquisition history shape Nicole Bernard Dawes' entrepreneurial perspective?
Nicole Bernard Dawes experienced two devastating sales of her family's company: her father sold Cape Cod Potato Chips to Anheuser-Busch when she was 12, then bought it back for under $3 million in 1996 only to sell it again to Lance for approximately $30 million in the late 1990s. These back-to-back acquisitions taught her profound lessons about business timing, market value, and the emotional toll of entrepreneurship that would fundamentally shape how she approached her own ventures.
The sting of watching something you love get sold
For a 12-year-old Nicole Bernard Dawes, Cape Cod Potato Chips wasn't just her father's company—it was a sibling, a living part of her identity. When Steve Bernard sold the brand to Anheuser-Busch in 1985, the devastation was real and lasting. The experience of watching something you helped build, something so central to your family's story, disappear overnight left an indelible mark on her perspective about ownership and control.
That pain didn't diminish when her father made the bold decision to buy the company back in 1996. After just over a decade of being an employee elsewhere, Steve Bernard reclaimed Cape Cod Chips for under $3 million—a fraction of what it would eventually sell for. Nicole returned to the family business and took on direct responsibility in the marketing and innovation department, developing the reduced-fat potato chip line that would help drive new growth.
The second sale and a transformed understanding
But history, as it often does, repeated itself. In the late 1990s, her father sold Cape Cod Chips to Lance, and this time the price tag told a very different story: approximately $30 million. While the financial success was undeniable, the emotional complexity of a second exit cut just as deep. This wasn't just about money—it was about the timing, the value creation, and what it meant to step away again.
As detailed in this How I Built This episode, these two acquisitions fundamentally rewired how Nicole Bernard Dawes thought about building something of her own. Rather than seeing acquisition as a betrayal, she began to understand it as part of a larger business lifecycle—one where timing, market conditions, and strategic vision all played a role.
"We debuted the company in 2003 at the Natural Products Expo in Baltimore. And we basically left that show a national brand."
Nicole Bernard Dawes — Founder and CEO of Late July Snacks. After leaving Cape Cod Chips following its sale to Lance, she launched Late July Snacks in 2003 with an initial focus on organic crackers. The brand quickly became one of the first to launch entirely under the USDA Organic Seal, eventually growing into a major player in the organic snack market. She is a Tulane University graduate and has also founded Nixie.
The speed and success of Late July Snacks' launch—achieving national distribution in a single show—wasn't accidental. Nicole Bernard Dawes brought hard-won wisdom from her family's acquisition experiences to her own entrepreneurial journey. She understood market timing, the value of organic credentials in an emerging category, and the importance of seizing momentum when it appeared.
There's also a curious detail in how she approached financing and growth for Late July Snacks that reveals how deeply shaped she was by the Cape Cod story—as explored further in the full podcast conversation, her approach to capital and scaling reveals someone who learned to play a longer game than most first-time founders.
The lesson: value and timing as teachers
The two Cape Cod sales taught Nicole Bernard Dawes that successful acquisition isn't a failure—it's a validation of work done, timing seized, and market conditions exploited. The jump from $3 million to $30 million in just a few years showed her that building real value is possible, but it requires the right moment and the right buyer.
This understanding informed everything she built afterward. When she launched Late July Snacks, she wasn't running from the acquisition model—she was running toward a version of entrepreneurship where growth, market fit, and strategic exits were all part of the same story. The devastation of her youth had transformed into strategic clarity.
See also
What supply chain obstacles did organic snack makers face in the early 2000s?
Even though the Organic Food Production Act had passed, there were still no established organic suppliers. Nicole Bernard Dawes had to build relationships from scratch to source the ingredients that would define Late July Snacks.
How did Nicole Bernard Dawes finance the initial launch of Late July Snacks?
She used a small amount of money from the sale of Cape Cod Chips and kept initial expenses minimal by hiring a graphic designer, covering legal fees, and bootstrapping the rest—a lean approach born from understanding both scarcity and smart allocation.
Why did the name 'Late July' resonate with the founder's vision for the brand?
Nicole Bernard Dawes chose Late July to represent the perfect moment in time on Cape Cod—knee deep in summer when tomatoes and corn are starting to emerge. It captured the essence of seasonal abundance and peak quality that would define the brand's identity.