The Tater Tot story with Les Grigg - The Kitchen Stunt
Hi. This is Ain't That Somethin', and I'm your host, Levi Smith, CEO of Franklin Building Supply. We're an employee owned building material supply company headquartered in beautiful Boise, Idaho. I'm a former ranch kid from Texas who found his way to Idaho and into leading this storied company. We're proud to be part of the fabric of communities we operate in and wanna help share stories of other companies doing the same across this great state.
Levi:In each episode of Ain't That Somethin', I interview founders or leaders about the stories of companies you may be surprised to learn have either had their start in Idaho or now call Idaho home. In every interview, you'll hear about an interesting cast of characters, learn about daunting obstacles, and be inspired by the persistence it took to succeed. Get ready to be surprised and entertained with each episode of Ain't That Somethin'.
Les:Levi and Golden made their way to Miami with 15 pounds of tater tots. They knocked on the back door of the Fontainebleau, gave the cook, head cook, a $100 bill and said, cook these potatoes.
Levi:On this episode, I have something extra tasty for all the kids out there and everybody that's young at heart. I talk with Les Grigg, whose great uncles, Levi and Golden, invented a crowd favorite food more than seventy years ago. That's right. We get into the story of Tater Tots, an Idaho original, as Les helps us unpack the story of how his great uncles brought that product into the market out of a frustration with the scraps leftover from making french fries at the company that they started or Ida. So now my conversation with Les Grigg.
Levi:Well, Les, it is a privilege to have you on the podcast today. I'm excited about what we're gonna dive into, which is a subject that's a favorite one for a lot of people, certainly for their taste buds, Tater Tots. But before we get into that and what your great uncles created and what is now just a food item that's enjoyed by so many. So how do you fit into the family? I referenced great uncles, but maybe we start there.
Les:Nephi and Golden Grigg are my great uncles. And when my I was, in the third grade, my father was hired as a cost accountant for Oreo Foods. Oreo decided to build a plant in Burley, Idaho. And, they hired my father. He did the cost accounting, then he became the plant manager and, served in that capacity until 1964, 6364.
Les:We then moved to Boise, and my father went to in business for himself in Boise, and I ended up graduating from Capital High School. My first real job, though, was working with my mom at the Birdie, Oreida plant, filling vending machines. And our house was a vending machine food storage unit.
Levi:How old were you when you started doing vending machine work? Fourth grade. Fourth grade. That old? And I thought they started them real young and burly.
Levi:I mean, fourth grade, mean, that's, you're not very big in fourth grade. What so as you get exposed to just being in business and of course that plant in Burley reference, what were you doing with your mom with that vending machine business? What was the actual
Les:We were the vending machine caretakers for the Oreo plant.
Levi:Okay. So the employees had vending machines they could use. Y'all were restocking
Les:Employees had a cafeteria vending machines and so forth. Yeah.
Levi:Man, first job, fourth grade. That's incredible.
Les:And my father actually paid me as lie an allowance to to do my work. And that whole experience, I mean, starting in the fourth grade and that whole experience that I had from the fourth grade well into my 20 year convinced me at the age of 23 that I wanted to be an entrepreneur. And so it took me a couple of years to think through that question, And the ultimate decision was I found that being a stockbroker was the ultimate choice of becoming an entrepreneur.
Levi:Early on fourth grade, you got the itch. Yep. Get through high school and you end up becoming a stockbroker just to see that vision come into reality. Yep. Yeah.
Levi:So walk me through the early part of your career then. So you get into finance, you're doing that in Boise or by this point had you moved over to
Les:I had gotten married and my wife and I, we met in Provo, Utah and my wife was from Idaho Falls. I I got hired originally in Provo, Utah for the brokerage business that didn't really work well. So I looked for a different place to park. We ended up landing in Idaho Falls. So then I spent forty three years in Idaho Falls working for Merrill Lynch.
Levi:And Idaho Falls, I mean, today is of course, like all of Idaho and lots of areas of the country grown. Yes. But just, you know, for folks listening this particularly, they're from Eastern Idaho. Just give me a snapshot when you were there in your twenties in Idaho Falls, what was Idaho Falls like?
Les:Well, it was a town of about 40,000 people. I've lived in Pocatello, Boise, Idaho Falls. I've traveled the state extensively, but Idaho Falls was my favorite town of the state. It was it was very progressive city in terms of just the society and the mindset. And thirty minutes west of Idaho Falls is the INL and Atomic City.
Les:The first Atomic Energy City was Right there. Yeah. Yeah. Right there. Atomic City.
Les:And so they had the energy complex there. And and so Idaho Falls was from the time I was nineteen eighty until 19 until I retired, Idaho Falls to me was like living in Boise, but not not having all the people.
Levi:Right.
Les:I mean, it was just you know, it was as progressive as I was. I graduated from Capital High School, so I lived in Boise for about four or five years. I love the city, it was too big.
Levi:For a kid coming from Burley, Boise was too big. Well, Idaho Falls, only like you said, know, it's got a unique asset there with with Ain't That Somethin', you know, involved in that, like you said, the first place in the world that's powered by, you know, lit by atomic power there in Atomic City, but it's also a gateway to a lot of great adventuring there. Yes. You know, the mountain range there, Yellowstone Tetons aren't far. You've got, you know, of course, exceptional fishing north of there and well known places like Henry's Fork and all that.
Levi:So just just a great area to be around good people, recreate, have a good lifestyle.
Les:My favorite hike was to climb the, it's called Table Rockets on the Western Side Of The Tetons. You walk it up and down to about six hours, six hour trip.
Levi:Short jaunt.
Les:Walking up, you know, and when you get to the top, you're right at the saddle of the Tetons, but across the valley.
Levi:Yeah, it's an absolutely beautiful area. We've enjoyed doing a lot of things in the Tetons over the years and one of our favorite spots. So we could talk about the beauty of Eastern Idaho all day long, but let's kind of go back to Burley, about fourth grade, you're helping your mom with vending machines in Ore Ida, but that Ore Ida is a company that was started by your great uncles. Yes. Tell us a little bit about those two men, the family that they came from.
Levi:And, you know, I want to walk through with you how they went from how they grew up to then eventually, you know, getting into business together and then, you know, forming Orion. And we're going to walk through this, but just let's step back and how big was their family? How did they grow up? They were young kids during the depression. Is that am I getting the timing right on that?
Levi:Yeah.
Les:Got the timing right. So Nephi and Golden were were the the family was 13 children. The thirteenth child died in infancy. But Golden and Nephi were about maybe 12, maybe 13 apart in a fam right in the middle of a family of 12 kids.
Levi:Okay. So they were ones that are getting all the attention.
Les:And and so, you know, right from the get go, they were they were best friends, and friendship
Levi:They're raising themselves.
Les:My uncle Golden passed away somewhere around 1989ish. At the time that he passed away, Nephi was in the hospital with some medical problems. And Nephi's wife made the comment, it wouldn't surprise me if they died at the same time.
Levi:Oh, wow.
Les:Because they were that close.
Levi:Like a married couple, Yeah.
Les:Nephi ended up living about four or five years longer, but they were best friends from birth until they died.
Levi:And they were born in like early 1910s?
Les:1913, 1910, 1912. I'm birthday buddies with my uncle, Nephi. We both are born on May 6.
Levi:So they're raising themselves in the middle of this large family. I'm laughing, but that's been my observation of a large family. The kids in the middle, they're kind of on their own, right? Because the older looking after the younger, but by the time you get the two in the middle, they're just, they're doing their own thing.
Les:So they wanted to be entrepreneurs at the age of 20. They were out contracting with corn farmers. They would go out in the midnight, they'd pick the corn, they'd put it on ice. Then they would go out in the hot part of the day and they sell the corn back to the corn farmers. So
Levi:they were they they were they're creative.
Les:They built between nineteen nineteen forty and 1949, 1950. They created Grigg's Brothers produce, and they were producing they were shipping frozen sweet corn from Ontario, Oregon all the way into into the Washington state down into Northern California and over close to the to the, Dakotas. They wanted a business that gave them a twelve month cash flow. And so as it turns out, JR Simplot is 30 miles away in Boise at the time, and most people don't know it, but JR Simplot invented the frozen french fry.
Levi:And this is we're we're talking about the night this is night late night?
Les:Nineteen forty five ish.
Levi:Okay. Alright.
Les:Yep. The the french fry itself was invented circa '19 circa eighteen hundreds in France. Well, it's a big debate as to whether it was the French or the Belgians, and that debate will never be settled.
Levi:Okay. Like any good debate.
Les:It's a frozen French fry. The frozen French fry was invented by Jared Simplot.
Levi:Right. That that's well settled and part of Deep Idaho not not just the lore, but yeah. It's the story that's that creating the frozen French fry. So they're in that area. They're exposed to people like Jerisimplot, what he's doing.
Levi:Take us back, you just said, with the corn, that's just a seasonal crop, right? They're trying to figure out how to balance it out and have something year round. That's what led them to looking at potatoes.
Les:In Ontario, Oregon, the time was a frozen food processing company was in bankruptcy.
Levi:Okay.
Les:This building was dilapidated. It had dirt in the floors. It was a total disaster. They decided that they would buy that bank that building out of bankruptcy, and the bankruptcy court told them they would need $250,000. They ended up needing $500,000 to finally clear it out of bankruptcy.
Les:So if you can imagine two twenty five, 29, 30 year old kids walking around Treasure Valley, raising $500,000 in 1950, that's that's an entrepreneurial dream.
Levi:That's really incredible. I mean, it's hard to, you know, really frame how much money that was back then, how unusual it'd be for people that young trying to raise those type of funds. I mean, took a tremendous amount of courage and confidence to go out there and do that. I mean, how did they carry themselves at that time? Were they, you know, were they, you know, instill a lot of confidence people about, you know, what they were capable of or, you know, what was their, what was their angle in trying to convince people that they could be trusted with that?
Les:Well, we I really don't know. I mean, we don't have any records, but I know that that that Levi was very charismatic. He was a a great thinker, charismatic, a good a good guy, just an entertaining guy. And Golden was the ultimate salesperson, salesman.
Levi:Good combo. So they end up raising these funds to buy this plant that had gone into bankruptcy. That that's the beginning of Ore Ida. Yep. What year are we talking about then that they end up purchasing that plant and renaming it Orida?
Les:So Orida was officially launched in 1952.
Levi:1952. So they're taking over this plant. At that point in 1952, had they started processing potatoes there?
Les:No, they started processing potatoes once they got the plant retrofitted and running.
Levi:Okay, so they're processing potatoes in what year? 1953 is their first year processing?
Les:1952.
Levi:1952.
Les:So it took about a year. Okay. 1951, a whole year to get that plant retrofitted and back into production.
Levi:But they saw what other people were doing with french fries thought this really can go a long way. This has some legs and they retrofit the plant. They get it producing French fries. How long did it take them to get frustrated with some scraps, some slivers coming off the French fry production Not
Les:very long.
Levi:From from what I've read, it sounds like it it took a matter of days or weeks before they just can't stand the fact that there's a little bit of waste. Is that kind of what you've heard?
Les:Yep. We don't have any written records, so everything is just up to our imagination. But we know that, in December 1954 in, Miami, Florida was the grand opening of a resort called the Fontaine Blue. Their grand opening was 12/15/1954, and we know that, somewhere between December 1954 and just a few months into that year, Nephi and Golden made their way to Miami with 15 pounds of tater tots. They knocked on the back door of the Fontainebleau, gave the cook, a head cook, a $100 bill and said, cook these potatoes and put them on every table.
Les:And that was done. And that became the whole hit of the entire food convention.
Levi:Wow. Mean, that's the explosive moment, but how creative and just again, back to, I'm just kind of in my mind thinking about these guys, like you said, walking around trying to find $500,000 to buy this plant, just courage and bravado and confidence to go in and say, if we could just get this on people's plates, we know they'll love it. Leading up to this convention, they've got all these slivers and scraps. They're getting frustrated. They're making French fries at this point.
Levi:They're in the French fry making business, but they got these slivers and scraps. I don't know what other, I don't know what JR and other people were doing with this. They're not the only people making French fries, but they get frustrated enough and creative enough that they decide to experiment and do something with them. So let's take a step back. So before those Tater Tots get fried up in Miami and end up on people's plates and create a whole new essentially product category with potatoes, What did they do with those scraps and slivers?
Levi:How did they experiment? What led them to think about pressing these into a board and ending up creating tater tots? Just kind of talk us through how they experimented with the slivers and scraps.
Les:So the scraps, as they began production, went into a bin and they shipped that to the local cattle farmers.
Levi:Just becoming part of a feed?
Les:Just became part of the cattle feed. And they did have a kitchen. As they were retrofitting the plant, they decided we need to build a kitchen here so we can do some experimentation. So they had a kitchen built. And like I say, we have no record.
Les:So we just have to imagine they probably we know that they grew up as depression era kids. So waste was was something that they that they aboard and they saw this waste. What's really amazing is that I was reading an article not too long ago about a potato producer in somewhere in Philadelphia and Pennsylvania. And even today, the article made a point, they sell their potato scraps to the to the cattle farmers. And so that's
Levi:Assumably, they weren't making a lot of money doing that. Nobody does. I mean, you're selling scraps, it's it's not lucrative. So they're unsatisfied with that.
Les:It's amazing to me that, you know, it's so there was Simplot doing the same thing. They they just didn't have the they didn't have the creativity to figure out what to do with these scraps except Golden and Levi.
Levi:They had probably spent a lot of their childhood figuring out how to do something with scraps, like you said, just to get a little bit more to eat with a family that big.
Les:Well, whole life was living on scraps.
Levi:And not to make light of how extremely challenging that economic era was, but it shaped people. I tell people a story of remembering how my grandmother who passed not too long ago made it well into her 90s, but how she was born in that same era. But I remember how she took care of scraps and gathered things from the table when we would go over to her house. You couldn't get her out of that mindset. She had been in her teens during the Great Depression.
Levi:And though this was now nineteen eighty, ninety, 2000s, it was so deeply ingrained and it made an impression upon me as a kid. I'm just thinking about your two great uncles, same thing where they're they're not running this company, that they took in a lot of money from other people to buy in terms of the plan. And they're not going to let anything go to waste. They're they're dissatisfied with sending this off for cattle feed. No offense to cattle, but you know, they can get some ingredients elsewhere.
Levi:They start experimenting in the kitchen. What leads them again, as best as you know it now to this now kind of famous experiment, if you know anything about Tater Tots nor Ida, where they end up mixing up these scraps with some flour and some spices and end up pressing these through a piece of plywood.
Les:So, yeah, so there's one step, one step before that.
Levi:Okay.
Les:The big problem that they had was separating the slivers of potatoes from the from the good potatoes.
Levi:They
Les:just they struggled with that question for several months. But one day, a traveling salesman came by. He, he was a salesman that sold prune sorters. And he thought these people were in the food business, so they would naturally be a market to buy a prune sorter from him. And so he did his sales pitch to sell them a prune sorter, and they decided that, hey, we can just modify this prune sorter in such a way that this is gonna become our separator from the good potatoes and the bad potatoes.
Les:And then they got the potato slivers and the good potatoes separated in the in the in the processing belt, and then they decided to experiment with recipes to try to mash these potato pieces into something that was tasteful and efficient. And then somebody, my uncle Otis Otis Williams, he was an engineer by profession, and I suspect that Otis probably was the one who came up with the idea. Again, we don't have any written records. This is all speculation. I suspect that Otis was the one that came up with the idea to take this one inch plywood board, 18 inches by eight inches, drill some one inch holes and some some three quarter inch holes.
Les:And because we needed something to form the food.
Levi:Yeah. And they just start pressing this recipe or some iteration of this recipe through this board, holy board, as it's called with an e, pressing these through and just letting them drop into a fryer. Yep. This season of Ain't That Somethin' wouldn't be possible without the generous support of Truss Joist, a division of Weyerhaeuser. Truss Joist has been a great supply partner to Franklin Building Supply with their array of engineered wood products, including their marquee truss joists, which you may be surprised to learn was invented and first sold right here in Boise, Idaho.
Levi:Now ain't that something? Future episodes will drop every one to two months, so be sure to subscribe to the podcast in your listener So you'll see the next episode when it arrives. So yeah, it would have been fantastic to be there for that first moment when that when that now what we call it tater tot bubbled up to the top as it was nice and golden brown and crispy on all the edges and sides. I wonder if they got burned by that first one. We're just, they're all three of them are staying in there.
Levi:One of them can't taste it anymore because they got burned handing off to another guy, but they so they they do this and they they realize they have something obviously. How quickly did they end up settling on the name Tater Tots?
Les:Okay. So the name is a is another thing that's that's lost a a lot of
Levi:Did they have that when they went to Miami? Where they did they have a name that they were calling it when they went to Miami?
Les:I'm not sure of the time frame because I'm not sure of the time frame. So there was there was two versions. One version and I'm not gonna get too deep into the history, but one version was that they did a naming contest for the employees of Lorida, and the winner of the contest was Chloralee Orton. And I've interviewed Chloralee's children. They all live in Idaho, and they actually remember when she came home from work and she showed them a gift certificate that she had won.
Les:The question of how much the gift certificate it was is is an undecided number, but they remember coming home. And, when she passed away before she passed away, she actually wrote in her journal that she had won this, gift certificate for naming contest for a food product. She had forgotten by the time she died. She forgot the details, but she just descriptly so that she won she won a naming contest for this new potato company.
Levi:Okay. So that there that's one story. So there are two.
Les:The other story was, so Ore Ida was acquired by Heinz Ketchup in 1965, but my uncle, Levi, in 1989 got a letter from from Kraft or from from Heinz Ketchup. And they said, we realize we don't have a written history of Ore Ida. This was 1989. 8089. Yeah.
Les:1989.
Levi:Okay. They had owned this company for twenty five years. Yeah. Yeah.
Les:And so they asked Nephi to write a history. So he wrote a six or seven page history called Tater Tots' Success Story, and so then that that history was put was preserved in the papers of Nephi Grigg that are held in reserve at the University of Utah. And when the press started looking for histories, that became the de facto story of how tater tots were invented. But Nephi didn't remember the history either. He he wrote down something about them having a the employees looked in the thesaurus and got some names about Tater Tots and
Levi:the
Les:company salesman had something to do with it. He didn't remember it.
Levi:Okay. So the employee naming contest certainly seems a little bit more compelling and maybe given the fact that how we know that they operated and with their employees in that company wouldn't be surprising if that's how they took on trying to figure out how to name this new product. But in short, we don't know for sure because no one really captured at the moment in time. But Tater Tots ends being the name for this product, which is that's a registered trademark. And it's why any copycat products today in the freezer section or whatever have to come up with some other name, potato puffs or whatever they're going to call them.
Levi:But this is Tater Tots. It's not dissimilar to Kleenex and some other products that are just ubiquitously known as well a tissue as a Kleenex. It's actually a brand name, but tater tots belong to Ore Ida.
Les:I'll share an unknown, fact that I've observed out of the top 20 iconic, foods, only two of them are trademarked foods. The two trademark foods are Ore Ida, tater tots, and Oreo cookies.
Levi:I did not know that. That's interesting. Very interesting. So tater tots
Les:So everything else is a generic a generic brand. Buffalo wings pizza.
Levi:Right. So we went back in time, talked about how they even how they experimented, how they came up with the recipe, pushed it through this holy board, fried something magical and a whole product category was really created. Let's go back to that stunt in Miami. They show up at this convention, get the cooks to put these on the plate. You had said that that became the talk of the convention.
Levi:Obviously, the reaction was positive, but help us kind of understand how that really launched the product because it sounds like that's when this product really came out into the open and really took off. We're going to get to how it got into the freezer section and grocery stores and those type of things. But just let's go back to that resort in Miami real quick. How did how did
Les:it So, obviously, they they made a lot of good connections at that at that event because of of the reception that the attendees had on this strange new product. And they just started working those relationships. They got some products on the shelves. They had originally priced the product fairly low.
Levi:Low.
Les:And I guess that I'm thinking this was probably by the time that all took place, it was probably nineteen fifty six ish, fifty six, fifty seven. Time they got that whole process
Levi:Okay.
Les:And some traction, and they people weren't buying it. They they kind of thought that this low price potato thing was not very compelling. And so
Levi:It was too cheap.
Les:Somebody came up with the idea of raising the price.
Levi:That'd been a fun meeting to be in. Right? Someone walks in and says, now hear me out. I got a good idea. I think we're not charging enough, and that's why we don't have enough sales.
Les:And that that really launched the sales. And I I I I'm gonna do poorly with this because I haven't looked at the data for several months. But somewhere between nineteen fifth well, 1959, they had enough money coming in by 1959 that they knew they had to build a new plant. So the original plant is in Ontario, Oregon. It's still in Ontario, Oregon.
Les:That's where 100% of Vorita tater tots are produced in the Ontario, Oregon plant.
Levi:Still today?
Les:Still today.
Levi:K.
Les:So they had enough money that they that they needed to build a new plant. That's when they built the Burley plant in 1959. That's when my dad was hired, by Ore Ida. And so they built the Burley plant, and so they had the french fries stuff was shifted to the Burley plant. The Tater Tot stuff was maintained in Ontario.
Levi:So they they work those relationships from that convention. Everybody's impressed with the product, interested. They end up getting this into the frozen food section of of grocery stores. They really started out with grocery stores, right? This wasn't pushed through restaurants and stuff.
Les:Yeah, grocery stores.
Levi:Pushed through grocery stores in the frozen food section. And then shockingly, the price was too low, needed to raise the price to really get it to take off. So if I have my timing right, that means that essentially by, you know, the late fifties, early sixties, this is now a product that is starting to move in the frozen food section of these grocery stores. To your point, it's it's enough now where they've got to even, you know, get this other get another plant going to, handle their whole mix of foods that they're doing.
Les:So between 1960, 1965, Oreida became the largest frozen food company in North America. They doubled doubled or tripled sales about four four years in a row.
Levi:That's an incredible pace. I think it's surprising, you know, for for folks as they think about what you know, where's that coming from? Again, some people know a little bit of the Simplot story in the frozen french fries McDonald's. One of the reasons we're doing this podcast, right? I think not as many know about Ore Ida.
Levi:And just to state the obvious rights, Ore Ida, it's an Oregon Idaho mashed up. That's the name. Ore Ida starts on the border there between Oregon and Idaho. Then what you just said that it's the largest frozen food producer in The US in that era. There's a lot happening in Southern Idaho with frozen foods and potatoes in particular is the epicenter.
Les:So in 1965, Heinz ketchup comes to town, and, they end up buying Ore Ida for $30,000,000. And and Ore Ida went public too circa '19 I think it was 1959, 1960. They went public, so they were trading on the New York Stock Exchange. And, then Heinz Ketchup acquired them in 1965.
Levi:So Heinz acquires them at some point in the nineties, late nineties when Heinz splits off the food service?
Les:Let's see. Kraft acquired Heinz Ketchup 2016, I think it was.
Levi:Okay. When did the split happen where McCain Foods bought the Burley plant? There was some split between food service and frozen food.
Les:Right. And McCain Foods now runs the Burley plant. I don't know when that took place. I haven't researched
Levi:Okay, I think it's the late nineties, I was trying to get an idea of where essentially after Heinz acquires the company, it took them twenty five years. We're joking about to think maybe we should capture the story here, But eventually, the frozen food part of the business and the food service part of the business gets split off. McCain Foods still operates that plant in Burley, Idaho today, or Ida has been retained by Heinz. Like you said, there's a merger between Kraft Heinz ten years ago, and they've talked about, you know, splitting things up, but they've kept it all together. But today, Ore Ida is owned by Kraft Heinz, and all the tater tots are made in that original plant that your great uncles bought and retrofitted with the 500,000 investment.
Levi:That's incredible.
Les:And one other piece of history is that today Simplot now owns the Ore Ida plant in Ontario.
Levi:Okay. They operate it on behalf of Kraft Heinz.
Les:They own it and operate it currently.
Levi:So Kraft Heinz has kept the trademark. They own the name. They've contracted out manufacturing these, you know, to JR Simplot. Okay. So there's a bit of a full circle moment there.
Levi:Full circle moment. In Southwestern Idaho. Anybody that's ever had children is thankful for Tater Tots. It's a crowd pleaser every time. It's one of our favorite things.
Levi:We happen to have a we do a lot of camping, have a trailer that we take out into the wilderness in Idaho. One of our favorite foods to take with us that's a crowd pleaser when we're camping is a big old bag Oreo tater tots and throw them in the oven there. And it's just an absolute perfect camp snack food. So that's just one of the kind of memories that seared into our kids. You know, brain is associating, you know, huge serving of tater tots when when we're out in the wilderness.
Levi:Let's talk a little bit about what you're doing today. Obviously, this story of your great uncles matters immensely to you as part of the family. And it's a story that should be preserved. And I think is a story that should inspire other people in Idaho to think about what they can do with what they're observing, their upbringing, their experiences, those opportunities to create a product, create a business, do something that no one else is thinking about. You made the point earlier that, you know, when they came up with Tater Tots, everybody's dealing with the same problem, just scraps leftover from making french fries.
Levi:But it takes somebody breaking through and figuring out something that no one else has being more attentive, more observant, more relentless, whatever it is. So I think the story is so important to preserve and maintain for a number of reasons. Help me understand what you're doing as part of the family legacy. So you've got a website, my Tater Tots story. I just told you mine, but my Tater Tots story, we're kind of collecting these stories because people just associate good memories and fun with Tater Tots.
Levi:Great thing about the product. You're collecting those stories. You have a foundation that's putting some resources into helping prevent child abuse. You're working on a soon to be released trailer, movie trailer, telling the story and trying to produce a film that would documentary that would tell the story. Help us.
Levi:Yeah. Share with us what you're doing to preserve this incredible family legacy that people can get involved with.
Les:So I spent forty years, forty plus years in Idaho Idaho as a financial adviser. And and I would always tell them my my legacy. I'd approach somebody as a prospective client. I would say, by the way, my family invented Tater Tots. It was a nice chat.
Les:It was a a great business lead in to help me to build my
Levi:They're already smiling. So, hey. My great uncles took care of a $500,000 investment. I'll take care of yours.
Les:And I always wondered the reason why the questions that I had existed was because when Heinz ketchup acquired Orion, I think Heinz ketchup had 10 brands. And I think today, Orion, Kraft Heinz combined have 70 brands. So this this legacy was buried in in a smorgasbord of brand ownership.
Levi:Sure.
Les:And so it had no chance whatsoever ever sustain itself. The story just basically got lost in time. So when I I finally got the idea that this would had to happen, I thought about it over many years. In 2018, I got a phone call from CBS Sunday morning, and they were actually this is where I actually started thinking about this prod process. And I had left I had talked to the Idaho Potato Museum and several different companies thinking that there was a pathway to monetize this family business or family story and, left my contact information.
Les:And so it just so happened that, when CBS came calling, they got my contact info. We connected. We helped them put together some information. That was kind of where I really started to think about this thing was a serious opportunity, but nothing started to happen till 2020, then COVID hit. And at the same time COVID hit, Kraft Heinz decided to put the Oriida brand under review that took two and a half years.
Les:And then in 2022, they decided to sell the production facility to Simplot Corporation. And in January '23, that's when I decided to strike. And so we wrote a letter to Simplot Corporation, outlined to the board what we wanted to do with this legacy. They approved it. We set up meetings with the brand branding department of Kraft Heinz, the legal department of Kraft Heinz, the board members from Simplot.
Les:And, basically, our foundation was given birth to preserve the history to protect your tots as a brand name. We're wanting to protect your tots as a child abuse prevention project initiative and just whatever we have to do to preserve and protect and expand this entire story.
Levi:Yeah. That's interesting going through that process with large corporations now getting their support and buy in. With all that, I think if I understand it correctly, you know, you've you've done a lot over these last few years to really get this off the ground. You're still looking for the original holy board if it still exists out there. You got a little bit of a
Les:No, it exists. I'm not looking for it.
Levi:You know it exists. You know where it is. This isn't like an Indiana Jones episode. I know where
Les:it is. It's sitting on the wall with a plant in Ontario, Oregon.
Levi:Okay. Alright. So it's got a place. We know where it's at.
Les:But the search is to try to figure out how to make it as famous as the product it gave birth to.
Levi:Well, that'd be fun to let more people see that because not too many people are seeing that holy board in that plant unless you work there. That'd be great to get that more out in the open. So right now you've got a trailer that you've produced. You're working on some form of a documentary. Is that trailer, the link to that trailer going to be updated on the My Tater Tots Story website?
Les:Have published the trailer on a site called nocamerafilms.com.
Levi:Okay. So we'll include a link to the trailer into the My Tater Tots story. Love what the foundation's doing with the play on words there protecting the tots and working to prevent childhood abuse. Just, you know, appreciate what you're doing to preserve this story for a product that people love and really in honor of your two great uncles and other people obviously didn't do it by by themselves. Every entrepreneur knows that, but it takes the entrepreneurs to be the spark and the engine and then the gatherer, you know, the team and resources around them to just honor them by making sure this story is preserved.
Levi:You know, also an inspiration for other people, I think, whether in the food services business or manufacturing or in Idaho, the opportunities might be literally just falling on the floor, falling off the conveyor belt. You know, can you see it? And can you do something different with it than other people do? Can you recognize an opportunity where other people just see scraps? Fantastic to get this story from you, I appreciate you taking the time to share it with everybody.
Les:Thank you so much.
Levi:We'll get those links in the show notes and wish you all the best as you continue to push this story forward and get more and more people exposed to how Tater Tots ended up in their freezer and on their plate. Thank you for listening to this episode of Ain't That Somethin'. If you enjoyed the episode, please consider subscribing to the podcast in your listener and sharing the podcast or this episode with others. Thanks again to our season sponsor, Trust Joist, and to our guest for graciously sharing their time and story. So go start, create, or build something surprising so I can share your story.
Levi:Until next time.
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