How Elizabeth Holmes unintentionally transformed an independent jerky brand’s sales

Some brands pay big bucks for a Hollywood cameo. Think Jerky got Elizabeth Holmes, a prison vending machine, and a very confused internet.

But for founder Ricky Hirsch, that’s been quite the marketing package.

The snack brand appears in the closing sequence of You Can See Everything, Nathan Fielder and Lance Oppenheim’s buzzy new documentary about the disgraced Theranos founder. Released on October 16, the film begins with Holmes inviting a camera crew into her life 34 days before she heads to prison. Eventually, of course, turkey jerky enters the picture.

Without spoiling the ending, the sequence involves Holmes requesting turkey jerky during a prison visit, a vending machine purchase, and a closing glimpse of Holmes and her partner, Billy Evans, with the snack. For Hirsch, whose Sriracha Honey Turkey Jerky gets the screen time, the business implications are considerably less mysterious than the film’s key subject.

Over the 10 days preceding his interview with Retail Brew, sales of that flavor increased 345% on Think Jerky’s website and 93% on Amazon, per figures Hirsch provided.

“I think I got 12 minutes left of my 15 minutes of fame,” he said.

Jerky duty: Hirsch actually learned about the appearance from a colleague who had seen the movie. Naturally, he rushed to the cinemas immediately the next day along with…jerky to hand out to moviegoers afterward.

So far, however, he hadn’t heard from anyone involved in the film, and doesn’t know how the product landed in the prison vending machine. “At no point did I tell my team, ‘Guys, prison vending machines are the thing,’” he said.

But now, he’s hearing from people making Think Jerky costumes and watching TikTokers decode the dried meat bag’s significance in the film. His response? Join the conversation and occasionally encourage the speculation.

That attention is a departure for a company Hirsch said has spent virtually nothing on advertising or marketing over its 11-year history.

Think Jerky’s original strategy for generating conversation, in fact, was having different chefs develop different flavors. The Sriracha Honey Turkey Jerky featured in the film, for example, was created by chef Gale Gand, according to the company’s website.

Hirsch also wanted packaging that departed from the category’s traditionally masculine presentation, as he noticed “a vast majority of meat eaters and jerky buyers were women, but the marketing was typically very masculine,” he said. “A lot of black [and] red colors. So I was like, ‘I think [our branding] should be white, center aligned, modern design. Don’t show the jerky because the least sexy thing you can look at is beef jerky.”

Something to chew on: For a country with grocery stores filled with a plethora of snack options, standing out matters. US dried meat snack sales reached $6.8 billion in the 52 weeks ending August 9, up 11.5%, according to Circana data reported by Snack Food & Wholesale Bakery. In fact, jerky itself accounted for $2.4 billion, declining 0.5%.

At the moment, Hirsch said, Think Jerky is profitable, has never raised outside capital, and gives every full-time employee equity. Its distribution is across approximately 10,000 stores, with business split almost equally between e-commerce, retail, and alternative channels.

But although You Can See Everything has given the retailer an unexpected boost in demand, it has also meant a potential strain in supply. Hirsch said the company remains small and typically holds two months of finished inventory and could sell out temporarily with the surge.

Meanwhile, he’s sending sampler packs, supplying jerky for a Los Angeles look-alike contest, and handling most marketing outreach himself. Longer-term, he hopes the recognition will help when pitching retail buyers. Wegmans, for instance, is on his wish list. However, he clarified, the grocer hasn’t expressed new interest.

Beyond long-term advertising, Hirsch’s objective for now is to keep people talking. “I think the initial [goal] is just to get gasoline on this thing,” he said. Preferably somewhere away from the jerky.