Body and Business Building Insights from Kion CEO Angelo Keely

Yo yo, welcome back to the Alchemist Library Podcast. Today on the show we have Angelo Keely. Angelo is the CEO of Keon, which is an incredibly successful supplement company. It's one of my favorite brands, and today we discuss EAAs, which are essential amino acids, their role in muscle building and in health. And then we discuss starting a business and some of the lessons you can learn from that pursuit and some of the key things beginning entrepreneurs should be aware of. Angelo was kind enough to provide a discount code for Alchemist Library listeners, so if you guys want to purchase something from Keon, you can use the link in the description below to do so. Catch you guys inside the episode Peace.

Are you doing this work to facilitate growth or to become famous?

Which is more important Getting or letting go? Angelo Keely, thank you so much for being here today.

Ryan, thanks for having me, man, I'm stoked to be here.

I am stoked to have you here. I was just listening to podcasts. You were talking about EAAs and astronauts. Tell me what you learned about that?

Yeah, I like that's a good intro. Eaas and astronauts Well, they're important to each other, or their connection to each other is something called muscle protein synthesis, and the way that they're related is that astronauts, when they go into space, they don't have much resistance, right? Without gravity there's not resistance. So today, one of the primary ways that we are able to stimulate muscle protein synthesis and to train our muscles, build our muscles and improve the function of our muscles is through doing things like resistance, so lifting weights here on earth with gravity. So NASA, almost 20 years ago now, basically was curious hey, what can we do to help astronauts? They're in space, they're missing out on this form of resistance training. They're going to lose a lot of muscle. They're losing muscle. Is there something that we can do nutritionally to support them? And what they explored and uncovered was that there was a solution, and it was essential amino acids and a specific type of formula of essential amino acids. So what essential amino acids are? Are they actually the active component of protein? So when you eat protein of any kind it could be a plant protein or an animal protein you're going to get some essential amino acids out of it. Animal proteins tend to be much higher in these, and also animal proteins tend to be more digestible. So if you're trying to get a high amount of essential amino acids very available to your body to support muscle growth development, you'd want to be trying to eat protein sources that have that. That said, even just eating like whole food protein steak, chicken, eggs, etc. Only about half of it is the essential amino acids, which oftentimes people just think. Oh, essential amino acids are the amino acids your body can't make. That's why they're called. That's actually where their name, essential, comes from. But the more interesting element, I think, of essential amino acids is that they're the active component. They're actually the part of the protein that says, hey, go replace existing proteins. And we can go more into like why that's the case for replacing existing proteins in the body, but they're the stimulator of that new muscle protein synthesis. And so when you eat something like steak, eggs, chicken, only half of it or less is as essential amino acids. But on top of that, it takes a while for you to digest them and for them to be broken down and then for them to enter your blood and thus they actually don't have that great of a stimulus on the body. And that's why oftentimes in weight training circles they think, oh, you have to have resistance training, you have to lift weights to communicate to the body, to stimulate this muscle protein turnover and to build new proteins, and then you fuel it with the protein or amino acids. But actually that's not the case. That is true on its own, but what we uncovered and initially through these NASA studies and many other studies, is that actually through consuming a dose of just the essential amino acids, particularly if you increase the leucine, isoleucine and valine and lysine in it, it will stimulate its own muscle protein synthesis without any form of resistance training involved. And the way they proved this is they had a group of volunteers be at complete bed rest for 28 days. So you're like literally lying in a bed. You're being fed regular meals, but no moving like, no weight training, no, walking around, nothing. But you're given 15 grams of essential amino acids, which would be the equivalent of like 30 grams of really high protein, like a weight protein. About half of it would be essential amino acids, but only the essential amino acids, none of the non-essential. And they were given that 15 grams six times a day and after 28 days there was no net muscle loss and anyone who's been bed rest for a week, bed rest for a week would be like what, that's not possible, like that can't be. And it is. And they proved that there was a bit of carbohydrate sugar included with those amino acids to help have an insulin response. But they've proven in other cases that it was the essential amino acids themselves that actually stimulated the additional muscle protein synthesis and allowed those participants to maintain all their muscle. Now, naturally, the function wasn't as good. They lost strength I mean, if you're just like not training for that long or not moving but they're actually able to maintain their muscle mass. So it's a pretty cool, like mind blowing study. I think for a lot of people who have a more traditional view of thinking like no, you have to train, you have to do weight training to stimulate muscle protein synthesis. And there are there actually are nutritional therapies that they can do it on their own.

It is almost mind blowing study. It's crazy. So these people, they were bedridden and then, from getting 15 grams of EAA six times a day, they had no net muscle loss. That's insane.

It's pretty wild, man yeah.

I've been taking EAAs during the fast, so throughout the day, every like four or five hours for hunger. Is there any? What do you think of a situation like that, like in order to maintain muscle and to stay, make it an easier calorie deficit. Do you think that's a good solution or is there some problems you could run into if you are only taking EAAs for an extended amount of time?

Only taking EAA is like not even eating anything. It just in a fast so just in a fast yeah like a 24 hour, something like that, yeah. So, so there's actually very interesting, compelling research the last few years that have come out that was actually sponsored by the military. That because they have. I think the original intent was like thinking about special forces and going into you know long durations of having to have very minimal equipment and food supplies and be able to operate in the most efficient manner possible. And in these conditions there's naturally a caloric deficit. That can start to happen if you're maintaining very low food supplies and in these studies that were sponsored by that to determine this, they showed that when you're in a caloric deficit, your need for essential amino acids is even higher. So maybe, maybe, let's like take a step back and just explain even kind of how like, why would you, why would you need essential amino acids or protein in general in a caloric deficit? So when you eat less calories than you burn in a day, what happens is you lose weight. You lose weight. Now the thing is, when you consume carbohydrates or fat, the primary role of the carbohydrates in the fat is to be burned as fuel like gasoline, and if you're the car, it's like gasoline that gets burned. That's not the primary role of the protein. The protein, as we talked about earlier, gets broken down via digestion into the individual amino acids. Some of them can be used to be converted into glucose and burn this energy, but their primary role is to help rebuild all the proteins in your body. And you need to consume enough protein and amino acids on a daily basis, ideally every few hours, in order to avoid something called net muscle loss, because what happens is all the proteins in your body are constantly in a state of turnover, some degree of being broken down, because they're old and need to be rebuilt, and the older amino acids you pee them out and the ones you can reuse get reused to rebuild the proteins. But you're constantly losing some If you don't consume enough essential amino acids or protein. When you're in that deficit either a complete caloric deficit or even just a protein or amino acid deficit immediately what your body starts to do is to break down your muscle. Your muscle is not only the place of strength and function and movement to move your body through space, but it actually also is the reservoir of amino acids for all of your other organs. Because you can't just like, not rebuild your heart. You can actually spare muscle fibers. You can't spare heart tissue, so you're going to rebuild that heart tissue, those missing proteins. So what happens actually is, when you go into a caloric deficit, if you don't dramatically increase your protein intake and ultimately increase your essential amino acid intake, you're not only burning fat, you're going to end up burning and degrading your muscle because you don't have enough amino acids and protein to help rebuild all the other tissues and proteins in your body. And what we found is that the stress on the body from being in a caloric deficit basically increases your need for essential amino acids even more than it would be outside of the caloric deficit to maintain your existing muscle mass. So you need even more. So what I would say is anyone who is doing intermittent fasting or is in some kind of let's say, you're a competitive athlete and you're trying to cut weight, or you're in a leaning phase after a bulk phase, a strategy of using essential amino acids strategically throughout the day is an ideal way to maintain lean muscle while cutting fat.

You know what it makes me think of is you hear so many people talk about like ozempic nowadays and these semi-glutide, these GL1P agonists, and I was reading a study where about a third of the weight that people were losing was muscle and my suspicion there is, like they're not that hungry. Protein is so satiating they're not getting enough protein. It seems like if someone were to be in that deficit but were to be very diligent with their EAA intake, they can lose a lot of fat and maintain that muscle.

Many people are familiar with the idea that if you cut 3,500 calories, that will equate to about a pound of fat, but actually just cutting 750 calories you can lose a pound of muscle. Now it's not like a direct equation, because it depends on what you're eating how much protein, how many essential amino acids, et cetera but it's definitely the case that when most people typically do an aggressive calorie restriction diet to try to lose weight, you're losing a lot of muscle in addition to the fat and actually you'll sacrifice more muscle on the front end of that, which could be like one of the most inefficient long-term weight loss strategies that you could possibly invest your time and energy and money in, because what's happening is your muscle. Actually, the more muscle you have improves your ability to perform athletic activities which are going to help you burn more calories. The more muscle you have increases just your resting metabolic rate. You burn more calories just trying to take care of the muscle that's in your body, help support that muscle protein turnover, and then when you exercise, you burn even more calories when you have more muscle. So if you do these kind of aggressive caloric restrictions, including fasting, like I'm just going to fast for three days once a month and you're just cutting out all these essential amino acids from your diet, you're likely eating away at your muscle tissue and then when you go back to your normal diet in the many cases you might like binge. If you've been starving yourself for three days Then you're going to put back on the weight, but it's very hard to put back on the muscle that you lost. You have to again increase your essential amino acid intake via protein or supplementation. You need to get back in the gym and do weight training. So it's definitely kind of like a silly approach, I think, if long term you're trying to have like a sustainable physique that supports you in your athletic goals and your vanity goals, or whatever else you want to call it.

I've been listening to Dr Gabrielle Lyon. She has this idea of muscle-centric medicine and the overarching premise is if you look at what's going to keep people, what's going to help people have the longest health span, it's going to be muscle and muscle on the body. And I was hearing her say the other day that your total amount of grams of protein you take in per day is more important than the frequency at which you get that protein. So if you have all your protein at the end of the day and one meal, you're able to get that in, versus eating every three hours. How big of a net negative is it if you're going to just do one big meal from a protein or muscle loss standpoint?

I think the take that what's more important is to get in the protein every day is a reasonable perspective. What I would say is, though, for most people and I would assume, for your listeners, thinking in terms of more nuance is probably helpful and going to support people even more, and I would say that the idea of protein timing will also depend on your age, activity levels and many other things. So there is a situation in which, when you consume a certain amount of protein and a certain amount of essential amino acids in that protein at a time, it will create a maximal spike in muscle protein synthesis and you can't really get higher than that. So the example with essential amino acids is it's about 15 grams of free form essential amino acids. If you take 15 grams, it's about three times better than taking five grams approximately, because you are actually increasing the ultimate spike of the muscle protein synthesis. As you start to take more than those 15 grams, you're not getting the same increase in muscle protein synthesis and at some point, depending on your body size, amount of muscle activity levels, it's going to plateau and those essential amino acids are simply they're not going to contribute to more muscle protein synthesis. At that time You're not going to be able to store them and they're going to end up getting converted via gluconeogenesis into sugars, into glucose, and so, that said, that doesn't mean that, yeah, some say is like there's an optimal amount that you would try to take at a given time to have that happen. And so for most people, what I would say is ideally consuming protein and or essential amino acids a few times throughout the day in doses that optimally stimulate muscle protein synthesis is, and try to get in the right amounts. Let's just say you're going for a gram per pound of body weight and you weigh 200 pounds. So it's like, yeah, trying to get like four doses of 50 grams of protein, I think is going to be better than just trying to consume 200 grams at the at the end of the day. Now, if the question is what's better, to get 200 grams of protein or to only at the end of the day, or to only eat 50 grams of protein, then yeah, I would say probably getting the 200 grams of protein all at the end of the day is better than only getting the 50 grams. But if you're already meeting, if you're, if you're able to get the total amount that you want in a day. I think the science does show that optimally, you would space it out more throughout the day. Your body would be able to utilize it better for actual protein synthesis. It doesn't mean that it's going to go to waste and, honestly, if you're, you know, like if you're trying to eat this amount of protein to lose weight, consuming your calories as protein instead of carbs or instead of fat, at the end of the day, those 200 grams of protein, they are going to be more efficient calorically, even if you don't use them all for new protein synthesis. They're going to be more efficient than the carbs because your body simply to break down the proteins and then to convert them into sugars via gluconeogenesis takes more energy. So it's like they're calorically more efficient. But if you can do both, I would just like try to aim for both. And then another point I would make is and this is different, you know, I don't think it's necessarily your case, but when you get older it starts at age 30, but particularly at age 40, 50, 60, it progresses and gets worse decade by decade your ability to digest protein. Break it apart into the individual amino acids and your sensitivity to those amino acids to stimulate mTOR and to stimulate new protein synthesis becomes reduced. And so what happens is it becomes very difficult to maintain your muscle mass as you age. And even someone who is eating higher protein diets even few meals of protein per day and doing resistance training, as they get older it becomes harder and harder to maintain that muscle mass, and in those cases, the idea of then interspersing essential amino acids in between their meals like take 15 grams mid morning, take it again mid afternoon you're actually introducing one more spike of that muscle protein synthesis that can help you maintain your muscle as you age. So this is not to contradict her or to say that that's not the case. I would just offer more nuance to the whole thing. You know, I think. But it all depends on what your goal is. You know, it's like I think if your ultimate goal is to have a certain target body composition in terms of lower body fat and a higher muscle mass and to age well with that, you're gonna have to watch how many calories you eat per day and you're gonna have to increase the amount of protein. You're gonna want to do some weight training, and so there's probably a lot of different ways to do that. Maybe you can do intermittent fasting in the morning and just eat lunch and dinner. I would say, though, if you did intermittent fasting in the morning and you took essential amino acids during that period, you're gonna definitely get better results than if you did not take essential amino acids during that that time period. So it's like, rather than being like a right or wrong, I think there's just there's nuance.

And so if you were advising someone like a friend came to you and they were saying they wanted to you hear this one all the Time. Right, I want to lose fat and gain muscle. How would you approach that with that person?

Well, I think it would. It would You'd want to first set a goal with them or like how reasonable their expectations are on how much fat they want to lose. You know, I think trying to lose more than, say, a pound of fat per week is, in most cases, too aggressive for most people. Maybe get up to a pound and a half or two pounds Well, you're getting pretty aggressive. So, like, if you're down to make it like half a pound or pound a week, I think it's gonna be pretty sustainable and easier to lose the fat and to Maintain your muscle and even potentially build it. And what it's gonna look like is you're gonna. None of this is like like rocket science. It's like pretty readily available information online. But I'm gonna say it and then add in, like my my additions to it. I mean, basically, you look at what your resting metabolic rate is. So how many calories Do I burn in a day, just based off of my height and weight? And if you have, like you did, a body scan, you know your muscle mass, it's gonna be even more refined and that's literally just calories you burn in a day with no additional activity. So if I consume less calories than that, let's say I consume 500 calories less than that per day, but I ensure that I'm getting at least a gram of protein per pound of body weight. So we 200 pounds I'm gonna get 200 grams of protein in every single day, but I'm gonna make sure I'm still 500 calories below. So I'm gonna be cutting carbs and fat out of my diet in order to get to that target and increasing my protein With no additional like activity. I'm going to lose. I'm gonna be targeting just like losing about a pound a week, because that's 500 calories times seven days. I mean, this is very loose math and everybody's different, but you're gonna lose about a pound per week. But if you're hitting those higher amounts of protein, then you're you're giving your body and especially eating it throughout the day. You're really giving your body throughout the day these multiple muscle protein synthesis spikes and supporting it with what it needs to maintain the muscle and it's prioritizing instead Burning fat like the, the stored fat that you have as an energy source to replace the 500 calories it needs in order to keep going. If you then add to that some weight training, then what you're communicating to your muscles is like hey, I want to refresh you even more and I want to grow you more. And then if you increase your protein intake even a little bit more, you remove a little bit more carbs and a little bit more fat or you just leave it at the the one gram per pound of body weight, but you you take more essential amino acids. So let's say you start adding in essential amino acids before your weight training, during and after you are Matt, you're super optimizing that weight training to be focused on muscle growth and a muscle recovery. And then if you add essential amino acids again before you go to bed, when you wake up in the morning times in between you're eating any other time that like maybe you're hungry Because you're like you're trying to restrict these calories by like 500. You added in a few other times during the day you have a really good shot at not only maintaining the muscle but actually building muscle over the course of. You know you do that for 10 weeks. You could easily lose 10 pounds of fat and Build some muscle over that period. Definitely built strength. But you know there's a great example of a guy in our office who got a muscle. He's got a shoulder injury and I mean he's he's been part of the company for like six, seven years and he went on. But he's having a hard time training because his shoulder was hurting. He got a body scan before he started this diet. He went into caloric restriction With the target of losing a pound to two pounds per week, up to his key. On aminos intake, and by many people who work here can have as much as they want. So I mean he's probably taking like three servings three to four times a day but he did that. Yeah, and over three months he lost 25 pounds of fat and lost no muscle, whoa yeah. And there was no weight training. He did zero weight training during this period because his shoulder has been hurt but but he walked and he walked all. He made sure he kept up his steps. He was in the caloric deficit and he's super jacked up, not only his daily protein intake but the free form essential amino acid intake, which goes which kind of ties us back to the NASA story and and this is some of the more actually interesting research that's evolved over the last few years there's a paper in nutrients from 2020, authored by David Church, that really broke this down. But basically what they uncovered is that the Free form essential amino acids the fact that they don't have to be digested, they immediately into the blood and they into the blood at this like really high, peak concentration. They hit the muscle at a peak concentration level and they stimulate muscle protein synthesis way more than other forms of essential amino acids. You would get significantly more than way protein isolate, significantly, even more significantly than than like an isolated protein, like, just say, like a piece of chicken or egg, and and even that much more than like a mixed meal reading like steak with potatoes and Broccoli or something. So by interspersing these essential amino acids throughout the day, in addition to eating high protein and being on a caloric deficit, you you actually are Introducing like this guy who works in our office, he actually is introducing a Stimulation of muscle protein synthesis without having to do resistance training. Now, it's not the amount that he's gonna get like jacked over the course of three months, but literally like he came back and his lean muscle was the exact same that it was three months before, but his fat mass was down, you know, 25 pounds.

So, with that said, I can't imagine, it doesn't make sense to me, why, knowing, knowing this, why you, why someone would take a protein powder over ea's.

That's a good, that's a good question. I think they're a little. I think they're very similar but a little different. So what I would say is a protein powder is a supplement. It's not. It's not a whole food, right? So I think people talk about, like I don't, you know the people who, some people are into supplements. Some people are not only want to eat whole food diets but then they take protein powders. Like if you take it way, protein isolate, you took the milk protein and Feel like very clean cold filtration systems. Like you separate out the way protein and then isolate, you separate out even more, like it has become a Dietary supplement. It's not like the food as it exists in nature and a way protein isolate definitely is like Like the most superior form, like one of them, not the most superior form protein that you could just like eat if you put it in a Smoothie or you you know, make, make it into pancakes or you know something else like that, outside of that, as a protein source, like if someone's thinking about, say, plant protein powders. I definitely would not waste my time or money on that not saying that plant proteins Are not good sources of real food, like not saying like hey, I mean you eat some like quinoa and beans combined with like fiber and Meat, like that's a great meal for people, for many people. But actually making a plant protein powder, you are processing plants to such a degree that are full, often times, of heavy metals because they've been growing in the ground that you're not Going to get if you just eat like a scoop of peas. But if you like, process down the peas to that level, you end up with this product that has a lot of heavy metals in it and that, honestly, is not even that great of an amino acid source to begin with. Like it's it's. It's much lower in the essential amino acids than just animal proteins would be. So Like a plant protein powder doesn't make really any sense to me. So in that case, if you're comparing a plant protein powder supplement to Essential amino acids which they aren't all, but one like Keon amino is the one we make is a plant based, so it's vegan. There's no, it makes no sense to me like why you would do the plant protein powder that said like so why does Keon make a whey protein isolate and why do I drink it on a you know a daily basis? Because, like, sometimes I want something that's more like a shake, like it's. I'm not like there's maybe not only one way of doing things. Like I, what I do is I take Keon's clean protein, I mix it with blueberries and ice and water, and then maybe some Like peanut butter or like peanut butter powder and and some colostrum, and that is like it's like a milkshake. It's so delicious and good and like boom. I just got, depending on how much protein, I put it like 20 to 40 grams of protein, and that is something I like doing, you know. That said, if I have the option of doing that or doing, you know, keon aminos and and this may be the best example like if I'm doing it before I work out, I could take like five grams of Keon aminos and for someone my age, it's gonna be worth about like 20 grams of Whey protein isolate, 20 to 25 grams of whey protein isolate. It's definitely way more efficient to take the Keon aminos. So I don't like, before I'm gonna go train, I don't take protein, I use Keon aminos and when I'm training, I take it. It's easier to digest, it's more effective, it's more efficient, but it's. It's like they're two tools and they're both good tools, but it's definitely the case that, like the Keon aminos is like the scalpel, like it's, it's way more efficient and and precise and directed and does exactly what you want it to do, but it's like in a capsule or it's like a, you know, a lighter fruit kind of type drink. So it's just, it's not the same thing. But yeah, in terms of like pure efficacy, essential amino acids are superior.

You threw a very important life hack at us talking about peanut butter powder.

That PB fit is incredible.

And it's so much lower in calories. That is a cheat code right there.

Yeah, If you haven't tried it you got to.

I know I wrote the with the colostrum too, and you guys make the colostrum a key on dude. That's a powerful combo, and give it a gut too. That's a good little combination.

That's definitely. It's like a super food milkshake.

Talk to me about colostrum because it's very interesting. There are some people who claim, make very bold claims in terms of colostrum's ability to heal this, that and the other in terms of the gut, and people talking about autoimmune diseases, and there's just a lot of interesting information out there. When it comes to colostrum, what has your experience been like?

My colostrum is not necessarily something I take every single day and that's because I think it's really potent. That doesn't mean someone couldn't take it every day, but I don't have like a need state where I'm like, oh, I need to take this every day. I think probably, if I, if I struggled with like really significant gut issues, like really bad irritable bowel syndrome and just like super sensitive leaky gut type condition, I might, I might consider it, I think about it as something that boosts immunity, boosts exercise performance and recovery and overall does kind of like fortify your gut. But I don't think of it as like a magic cure or something that's going to heal things etc. The most of the research on it is actually around like exercise performance, like giving it to like soccer players and lacrosse players and stuff like that, and it is like I mean both because it's an amazing protein source, but also for anyone who doesn't know what it is, colostrum is the liquid that is secreted from a mammal's breast before milk. So when an infant baby is first born, it's what the mother provides for the baby. The colostrum that Keanu makes as a bovine. It comes from cows. The baby calves are able to get all that they need first, and then they basically continue to milk the cows in order to get additional colostrum, and humans do the exact same thing with their babies. And so, if you can get the basic idea of it, it's like the original, like mammal super food. Super food it's what the baby needs to have the best immune system to support it, to support its growth, et cetera, and so like yeah, I mean they've shown that we think that there's connections with it in terms of like human growth hormone and overall, just like supporting performance in that way with athletes. So I think if you're training for something really hard and pushing yourself really really hard in some kind of training endeavor, it makes sense to use. You can support both in the training and in the recovery. If I'm starting to get sick or I'm afraid I'm going to get sick, it's something I make sure that I use. We're just kind of like going into. Honestly, lately I've been feeling pretty vibrant, but it's like I'm about I've been traveling a lot more and now I know I'm about to like I'm originally from Austin, I'm going to go back to Austin, see my family for the holidays and see like a new nephew who's a baby, and it's like I want to stay, I don't want to get sick, so I'm taking, I'm putting colostrum in that shake anytime I have it. But yeah, so that's how I think about it and there's a lot of good research online, but I think the you know, I don't know about magic cure stuff. I think if someone has that, that's awesome. You know, I'm happy for them.

So I guess that probably comes from it being the first milk of the cow and it being so effective for babies immune systems that people are claiming it's a cure all. But so that would probably be great for somebody looking to gain weight right Taking a good lot colostrum supplement. Um.

I mean, you're saying like, really like bulk.

Yeah, yeah.

Like, yeah, I think if someone's like, I think if like their goal is like aggressive bulking yeah, I honestly even think about it people preparing for races that are training really really hard in the heat as well, because that can that can create stress, like GI distress Anyone is just like training really hard. But yeah, I think if you're trying to bulk it, it's definitely it's a supplement that makes sense. I mean, I would probably say creatine first, like creatine would be. I'd recommend creatine and essential amino acids before colostrum, but colostrum is definitely a good, a good thing to add onto that stack.

We've talked about EAAs, which are essential amino acids, but I've been kind of fascinated recently by a couple of non essential fatty amino acids like glycine, torene. It seems like some of these non essentials have some pretty unique positive effects in the body.

Yeah, I mean, I think that you can actually use. You can use individual essential amino acids and individual non essential amino acids in strategic ways to provoke or to stimulate specific responses in the body, and there's like a wide variety of research on many different amino acids, you know, specifically for those purposes.

Have you looked into any of those particularly?

You know I mean the ones that I've spent the most amount of time looking at. I've looked quite a bit at glycine and actually looked a lot at glycine, because we formulated a sleep supplement and glycine is amino acid that's like indicated potentially in relaxation and improvement of sleep, et cetera decided not to focus as much on that amino acid when we formulated the sleep formula because it seemed that there were others that had an even greater impact, and so we actually ended up working with tryptophan, which is an essential amino acid, and then also with GABA, which is a neurotransmitter, but it's an amino acid, and L-theanine, and that's because those seem to have the best indications and you know, just like significant research over decades showing the improvements on both. You know GABA itself is an inhibitory transmitter, but all three of them supporting helping people to fall asleep more quickly, stay asleep and overall improve sleep quality. But I think glycine has some awesome you know indications for that and it's a really cool amino acid.

With GABA. Is there any truth to it being too big to cross the blood-brain barrier and have any like true effects? Because I know GABA, gaba-nergic amino acids and other supplements can have a really positive effect on the sleep, but from what I've heard GABA is too big to cross the blood-brain barrier and to elicit the effect. Is that true?

It's a really interesting question and I think it's a great time to actually break apart the different types of research that exist and so whenever we hear things or we read things, to try to break it apart in these different types of categories of research. So, basically, what you'll have is you can have studies that are in vitro and they're mechanistic studies. We were just really understanding how does this thing work on a molecular level. And then you can have animal studies, where they actually look at the outcomes of what happens with these animals and they also maybe can cut up the brains of the animals and look at things in more detail. And then you have human studies which you're basically looking at human outcome studies, Like all right, we gave this group a placebo, we gave this other group this other ingredient, we have them perform these actions, what happened? And in all of these cases, you're going to learn different types of information. Right, when you do something where you're really studying something kind of in vitro at this, like super mechanistic level, you're going to understand better, like cellularly, like oh, what's going on here? Like is this too big? Does it fit? Like, can it get? Can you even get across this barrier, et cetera. But animal studies. You might get some of that, but you're going to get also insider on, like what happens when we give it to the animal, Like does the animal fall asleep? Does the animal live longer? Does the animal build more muscle? And then with humans, I think you get what I think is the case and many people in the space think is the most meaningful research. Someone took this product or took this ingredient. They didn't know it. There was, it was, it was a you know, double blind placebo, controlled study. And it was like, okay, so what happened? Like was there something meaningful that happened? And so I think the conjecture around the size of GABA and does it even work, et cetera, I think that there's conflicting studies on that. What I can say is that, specifically, pharma GABA, so we can talk about GABA, but actually the compelling story stories with GABA are all pharma GABA. It's from a Japanese manufacturer and it's a very specific form of GABA that I should brief myself better on this I thought we're going to talk about. I can't remember the exact fermentation process through which it's derived, but it's a unique process basically for for fermenting the GABA. That's where all these human outcome studies have come from, the really meaningful ones. So I'd be curious actually to look more into the research of, like you know what is the molecular size or the resiliency of the GABA itself. You know to that. But what I can tell you is, in double blind control study, like people who took this ingredient did have this experience and it's been shown you know multiple occasions, multiple times. So how that's achieved, if it's, if it binds on to some other type of molecule or if it's incorrect to the size of it, can't cross the blood brain barrier. There's pretty clear human outcome data that show that it works.

I believe it. I have these, these neuro neuro mints here in front of me and I have the calm and clarity supplement mint and it's GABA and the L-the-Indian and the relaxation effect from taking those is pretty profound. So I definitely believe there's some truth in GABA being able to do that, because I've taken L-the-Indian on its own and it's good, but I find something particularly more relaxing about about those.

That sounds pretty good it's. It's interesting I've gotten so into taking like I don't take it every night, but taking Keon sleep to go to bed and it has both of those. It also has like a gram of tryptophan, which is the precursor of serotonin and the precursor of melatonin, so naturally it makes you like it exceptionally helps you to fall asleep. But I'm almost like nervous sometimes to try to take GABA and theanine during the day combined because I just don't want to get too chill. But I know theanine with coffee is great. Oh, that's a good idea on a plane.

On a plane. But yeah, that's a. That's a great supplement. So it's just GABA, l-theanine and tryptophan.

Those are the three years there. That's the three, that's it.

That's nice. That's a pretty sustainable one for people if they have like sleep issues and they don't want to rely on melatonin all the time.

Yeah, it's a supplement that you could take every day. You don't have to like worry about it, you know, creating some other type of long-term side effect or dependency, et cetera. They're all ingredients that have been studied, you know, at those dosages to have meaningful effect and to not, you know, create other types of issues. Yeah, and it's cool. It's like people don't realize. With tryptophan, it's almost like this idea to have given your body almost an earlier, an earlier form of the amino acid. So when you take tryptophan, the tryptophan then is the precursor of the serotonin, and the serotonin actually is what helps you feel more relaxed and sleepy. But it's also the precursor of the melatonin. But it's not like dosing yourself with the melatonin. What actually, which actually like resets your circadian clock, and so if you take melatonin at the wrong time or you become dependent on it, it can create all these issues with your circadian rhythm by just supplying your body with the core nutrients it needs and it wants to kind of provoke more serotonin production than, ultimately, more melatonin, and it gets more regulated.

What was your guys' first product at Keon?

We actually came out with a few, but like Aminos, aminos has basically been the hero product from the beginning.

That's been the hero. It's funny because it seems so simple and it's not fancy or like. There's not that many good EAAs out there.

Yeah, yeah, I remember too, like telling partners or trying to work with you know like manufacturer, distributor type people being like you know, yeah, so what's the product? And they're like essential amino acids, like that's it. Because, like I think everyone's looking for what's like the hot, new, cool ingredient that no one's ever heard of before but, in my opinion, like only has one study, like what happens if you take it every single day for two years, and two years from now, you realize this hot new ingredient has a bunch of side effects. Like I would prefer personally to take supplements and to eat foods that have more research over decades behind them and that are really solid. And so I think just choosing to build a company that's like more based on that, it's based on like hey, what are the supplements that we know work and we know provide benefit and are very safe because we have decades of research behind them? That is, it's not sexy like the new, you know cutting edge branded ingredient that some scientists just made up, but it's, in my mind, it has more integrity for me.

Absolutely and like it's such a simple product. But yet, like I told you before here, record that I use the product every day and the main reason for that, more than anything else, is I know how efficacious EAAs are, and outside of you guys there's next to nobody with like a clean product. Everything is real like bro-ee with a bunch of fillers and a bunch of artificial flavorings. It's hard to find just like a nice, clean amino.

It's weird. Yeah, I know.

Shout out to Keon.

Thanks, man, we appreciate it. We appreciate it. Yeah, we're just, I mean, kind of follow a simple formula Like what is, like you know, kind of you consolidate all the research. What does it say? Make that product, don't add other weird stuff. Say on the label how much of each thing you put in there. Duke some cool branding, you know, and like have good third-party testing, make sure it's always quality product, and like you know, it's like it's actually a pretty simple recipe, but yeah, it's surprising how novel it seems.

Simple, not easy, right Like if you were to go back and think about this. This whole journey, how long has it been in terms of since you started the company?

It's been six years, six and a half years.

Damn, only six years.

Yeah, six and a half years yeah.

What do you know now that you wish you knew when you were first getting started?

Less is more. I think my story is not that unique or is not that unique in that like it's kind of like an entrepreneurial spirit that's more on the manic side, has all these ideas, wants to do all these things, trying to make all these things all happen at the same time. I'm gonna do this and that and this and that and that, and yeah, I mean I think I just discovered that like some of that came from just honestly, like a really beautiful child, like curiosity and interest in the world, and just like it's a beautiful form of immaturity. They just want to like do everything. And also some of it came from, I think, fear, like an unwillingness to commit to things. Because if you really commit to this one thing and you say that's what, I'm gonna stake this all on, I'm gonna try to do that one thing really well, what if I fail? And being scared of that failure. And so if I have multiple pots, kind of all cooking at the same time, then like I'll be safe somehow. And having multiple pots all cooking at the same time does not make me any more safe and it doesn't really like because nothing's like turning into anything, everything's like going too slow and I can't do anything that well. And the more that, like I focus on less things and try to go deep, like just try to go really deep on that one thing and do that one thing really well, the more I can feel like I'm actually achieving things in my life, the more other people feel like I'm achieving things, meaning like I'm actually creating like value and benefit to other people, versus like overstimulating them with and this could be like my own team overstimulating them with a bunch of ideas and products and stuff, or even overstimulate our customers with a bunch of ideas and products and stuff. And it's like, well, which, which one is the one that I take? I don't know which one is the most important, because you're talking about so many things and there's all the stuff going on, the more that I just like do less, the do it better. My life has just gotten like so much better and the company's gotten so much better. And yeah, I mean I'll, but I don't know that. I could have known that. You know, it's like I think you just got to totally. I had to just learn it. Learn it through suffering.

You got to do the thing.

Yeah.

I'm impressed with your guys's branding and marketing. Like it's been so cool to follow you guys through the years to see, like all the cool collabs you guys done with influencers. And are there any real key takeaways in that world of the branding and the marketing side of things, any key takeaways there?

So I'll segue from the last point I made and then I'll like say something quite different. So my segue from the last point is, I think, making your brand simple and making it simple to understand so someone like understands what it is, that, what your name is, you know. Simple to identify your branding and your mark and your logo, whatever it is like. Not trying to make it too complex, making it while at the same time, trying to make it distinct, like can you, can you find that way of being simple and clear but being distinct, not being like what everyone else is doing? And I think there's such a, there's such an inclination and a poll for so many people, when they're doing marketing and branding, to basically want to copy what everyone else is doing because that's what's getting attention. You just you want to do what everyone else is getting attention for, versus trying to do something that's not what everyone else is doing. In some way, and sometimes it can be simple. It's like what we're just going to make essential amino acids. But even if you look at our branding, it's like we chose to make these big ass energy markings. This like art, like the center of the bottle, where as much of other brands like no, it's like the logo is what's bigger, or you have like the name of the product and it's like no, we want to be distinct by like communicating the energy. So the key on stands for energy. Key means energy. It's like energy for life, so like making the focus on the energy that you're going to get from this experience, from this product, that your energy you're going to get in your life, and trying to communicate that more, like emotionally and so like our branding is just, I think it's pretty in some ways, it's really simple and restrained, but it's really like repetitive and just it, just it's just focused. I think it's highly, highly focused and as we try to do like more in different expansions of products and branding and how you title together, just like continue to just try to keep making it like of the same, and I think that's true for like messaging too. Like just just figure out what you're trying to say and like say it again and again, and again and again and again and again, and again, and again and again and again, until it sounds like you think it sounds repetitive and boring, but like maybe finding a little cut through and what I'll pair with that is, I think, to be successful, you want to diversify. So it's like, how do you find this balance between, like, being really simple and clear and repetitive while also diversifying? And I actually think influencer partnerships are a great example of that, because influencers have their own brands, they have their own distinct personalities and identities, their own followers, and so is there a way that you can bring your distinct brand and product and marketing into their world as, like a collaboration and becomes part of what they're sharing and what they're doing and what they're talking about, but in a way that doesn't just become them, you know, but really like almost enhances their brand, you know, like enhances who they are because they're getting to partner with this other thing, this other brand, this other product that is designed well and has clear communication, et cetera. And I think you know, in many ways like, the more you can diversify with different influencers and with different basically it's channels to educate more people about your product and reach more people. You also become more stable as a business. If you're really dependent, kind, of, only on YouTube marketing with your own branded stuff, or only on Facebook or only on this one influencer, then you don't really have that stable of a business. You're like over indexed on this one thing and if that one thing goes wrong then you're going to be in a lot of trouble. So it's an interesting balance, I think, between being really disciplined with your branding and your marketing and your messaging and your communication and your visuals, while on the other hand, really trying to diversify with the marketing channels and the partnerships.

Having those win-wins with partners and influencers is an interesting dilemma. How have you guys succeeded in that role?

I think for the partners where it's like an obvious win-win, it's really easy. So there's like some partners where their audience is going to be super receptive to what essential amino acids are and to priorities that are in Keon, like having really clean label and kind of the most premium product, like audiences that are going to want that. And so if you're partnering with someone that is talking about health and their interest in things like muscle and energy and recovery and their audience is primed to like want to invest in buying kind of the most premium version of that product, you're probably going to be aligned. It's probably going to like work out and you can figure out ways to partner. That makes sense. If, on the other hand, you know you potentially start working with an influencer or a partnership of some kind that's some platform, and like they would love to partner with you because there's a potential financial upside for them and having some kind of long term engagement. But like they're not, they're maybe not really as into the product as you are, or I mean they're never going to be into it as much as you are. But like someone like yourself right, like I mean like you you could be a great partner for us because you take the product, you give it, you give, you give other products of ours to your parents, like you care about it, mean something to you. If you don't have that kind of relationship and or their audience is just not that into it, but you're kind of trying to force growth, you're like we need to be investing in partnerships and making these things work. And getting out there and advertising and everyone says is the way to do it, you could end up investing time and money and things that like don't make sense. You know it's just like it doesn't make sense. And so I think if you're just if you're clear about who you are and about what you're trying to do with your brand and you seek out legitimate partners that are actually aligned with you, then things will go well and you will be successful together.

In that whole realm. Is there anything we haven't talked, talked about, that you think is key for like a young entrepreneur or someone like myself? I'm, hopefully, just a few months away from starting my first company in the health and wellness space, and this is somewhat selfish question and all these questions have been actually put. Is there anything else you want to stress to like a young entrepreneur, someone like myself?

Patience. I think patience and consistency and it's something that I couldn't like. You're blessed if you can hear it like right, if you can hear me say this, you can actually absorb it. It's going to help you so much. I couldn't really hear it Like. When I was a young entrepreneur, I'd have people tell me, like bro, like like man, if I could invest in Angelo stock, I would invest in it right now because you're going to be so successful. Things are going to work out like you've got it, man, you're smart, you're educated, you care, it's all going to work out. And I was like, but I want it right now, like I needed to work right now. And it's just like. It doesn't work that way. And I've I have managed and mentored so many smart people, and particularly in key on like. We've just attracted, like some of the coolest people I've ever met in my life that have worked here, some that are still here and some that have left and had gone on to do other things because they were so hungry, they wanted so much more. So you know so fast and I think yeah, I mean I think just like, just show up every day, stay patient, stay consistent, keep working it and like you will get there as fast as you can get there. Like there's no, I want to say, is there's no shortcuts? I mean, that's another like. I just don't think there's shortcuts. It's just showing up every day with the best intention and just trying and being patient and I promise, like, like even you, like you just told me earlier, like wow, it's only been six years, like for me I'm like man, it's been like six years, like six and a half years feels like a long time, you know, but I said that because you guys have such strong branding and it seems like it's been this thing that's been there for a while. Which is awesome, and I think that's probably. I hope that that is the result of a really dedicated team of like thoughtful, considerate, smart, pretty young team. Our team is pretty I'm like old and our team of people just like showing up every day and just trying and being consistent and building their chops and trying one more time and testing that thing and trying to do better and carrying and like. So I think, yeah, just don't rush it, just keep showing up and it'll develop when it gets there and promise you'll get there before anyone else could have, if you just like stay patient.

It's great advice. It's something I think I definitely needed to hear. So you said you guys have a ton of younger people with Keon. Is that just how the nature of things happened, or was that pretty deliberate?

Um, I mean, I think if you have like 33 year old co founder CEO me and like and like the vibe is like, hey, I want really like I want to work environment where I feel really comfortable being myself and leading in a way that feels really comfortable to me and at the same time, I have experience, like I run a company that was much bigger than the company this company was when I founded it and had had an interesting career overseas and done other hard things, but it was different, like you know, like it's a different type of thing and in that, just like creating a culture that was pretty lax in some ways and I'm smart but I didn't know what I was doing. You know, I think you naturally like you just end up attracting people who like the vibe and, when they're younger, are willing to kind of just be part of something because it feels so good, you know, versus if someone was older and they had a family to support and other obligations and a bunch of other stuff with their career, they would have been like, yeah, I'll come and work for you, but you like, I need to make like tons of money and I need all the security and all the stuff. I'm like I like I know we don't have that yet. We don't know what we're doing, you know. And so I think, naturally, like you just recruit younger people typically for that, or those people that are interested in the community, and then I think, just like, as it's grown, I mean it's funny, I think we're still young, but I mean I'm 39 now almost 40. So, yeah, it's like a. I guess it's a bunch of 30 year olds now, not a bunch of 20 year olds, but it used to be a bunch of 20 year olds. So take that, take that for what it is, and I think it's. Yeah, we have a lot of people that have been here from the beginning and then people who have you know, come on and it's just, I don't know. I don't know. That's my best explanation.

I think it's a great explanation. Is there anything we, anything you want to talk about that we haven't spoke about today?

I'm just curious, man, for the sake of conversation, like what's your biggest block or fear or concern going into trying to start this, this new health company you're starting?

I think the biggest thing is just the uncertainty of all of it, like just putting something out into the world and not knowing if anyone will ever buy it or if everyone will buy it, and then that poses some questions. But just the uncertainty of how everything will play out is both equally terrifying and exciting in terms of can we handle handle X, y and Z? Is they even a possibility? Is there going to be no business whatsoever? What do I do if there's no business whatsoever? Just that whole world is. It's exciting more than anything else, though.

If it I don't know that makes you feel better or makes you feel worse. The being in business, the unpredictability of it, does not go away. So if I look at it right now, sure, like we're, we're a sustainable company with sustainable profits, loyal customer base and we have a really good track record. And yet still, you know there's going to be some amount of like attrition. You just you lose customers that they're not interested. They've they moved on to some other thing or maybe they don't. You know, like whatever priority shift and change. So you kind of constantly have to stay in the game, trying to do advertising and communicate to people and grow. And now you're in a situation where it's like economic conditions are uncertain, like who knows what's going to happen with that, and then you know you're focusing the business on, like this same product or should we do a new one? You know it's like I don't know, man, I'm just trying to do my best each day about. Like you know, I'm looking at 2024 and trying to be like, hey, how do I, how do I plan and kind of figure this out and what's my best analysis, what's going to happen. And I would say I'm in a similar boat to you, that I'm just going to take my best shot off of everything that I've learned, known and so previous to starting this business and then running this business like what do I think is going to be best for our current customers, the market, for the employees, for just like the whole thing we've been building, like what's the best? You know what's the best thing and I hope you know if it's not the right thing, I'll try the next thing I'll try again, I mean, but that's the beauty of it, right?

is that? The uncertainty of it is the fun and exciting part that brings you those high, highs.

Totally man. Just it's the, it's an adventure.

Angel Keeley. Thank you so much for this man. I had a absolute blast recording this one and I'm about to go take some EAA's and have some dinner.

Awesome, all right, thanks, ryan. It was great being here.