Start Bold, Stay Real: The Entrepreneurial Journey of Tara Gilad

Can grit and curiosity build a national brand?

Here’s a blunt observation: most entrepreneurs romanticize the launch and ignore the routine. Tara Gillad refuses that fantasy. She’s spent 25 years starting companies, learning how to build smarter each time, and quietly proving that persistence and practical systems matter far more than flashy narratives.

Resilience as a design choice

Tara argues that resilience and resourcefulness are not optional traits; they’re design choices you can cultivate. She didn’t stumble into success. She treated every setback as data, not destiny. I found that claim oddly comforting — especially because she described fear as a signal that you’re stretching, not failing. That small shift in perspective turned anxiety into a practical tool: break a big scary thing into tiny manageable steps, and the overwhelm evaporates.

What really caught my attention was a line she keeps at her desk: you can let fear or you can feel fear and still move forward. That reads like a leadership manifesto for anyone trying to scale a venture without losing their nerve.

The ruthless pragmatism of the first 90 days

Don’t imagine glamour. Tara insists the first 90 days are brutal, and they should be treated like a sprint with clear guardrails. Her checklist approach — document everything, validate demand, build SOPs, and set up basic financial tracking — is less exciting than a viral launch video, but far more effective. She recommends talking to customers tirelessly and using their feedback to shape the product and brand before you pour time and cash into what might be a vanity project.

I was struck by her practical endorsement of franchising as a growth shortcut. It runs counter to the lone-founder myth. Franchises, she says, provide operational playbooks, training, and marketing systems that dramatically increase the odds of success. For many founders that seems like surrendering creativity, but Tara frames it as amplifying what works so you can scale with integrity.

Product development: treat it like research, not inspiration

“Obsess over the customer” is a tired platitude, yet Tara gave it fresh life by describing product work as a research project. Start with customer pain points and look for white space — the frustrating gaps that competitors ignore. At Vitality Bowls, ingredient integrity and allergy-safe practices weren’t trend-chasing. They were solutions to a real family problem that evolved into a consistent brand promise.

Her most compelling practical move is to involve franchisees, team members, and customers in R&D. That collaborative lens led her newest company, MyFlexi, to focus on clean sleep and beauty products. The product roadmap was less about launching quickly and more about solving a widespread frustration: too many products loaded with synthetic fragrances and preservatives.

Avoidable mistakes founders keep making

The most common misstep Tara sees is trying to do everything at once. It’s a neat reminder that early-stage entrepreneurs need ruthless prioritization more than broad ambition. Burnout comes from scattering attention across too many experiments, not from a single well-chosen bet executed relentlessly.

Her practical prescription: choose the one thing that moves the needle this week. Create repeatable processes. Start building SOPs the moment a task becomes routine. Those habits convert overwhelm into momentum.

How fear actually functions

Her take on fear is refreshingly anti-mystical. Confidence for Tara wasn’t manufactured overnight — she describes it as a long practice of showing up despite doubt. The tactic is simple and actionable: control the process, start small, and ship incrementally so fear has less power to freeze progress. That’s a lesson that hits harder than motivational platitudes because it’s operational.

Honestly, I didn’t expect such clarity about practical courage. It’s one thing to tell people to be brave; it’s another to map a process that reduces the stakes and preserves momentum.

What stays with you after the conversation

• Resourcefulness beats raw intelligence: be the person who figures it out.
• Start with customers, not assumptions: validate before you build.
• Document early, automate later: SOPs protect sanity and scale.

What really caught my attention was Tara’s refusal to trade values for speed. Whether she’s opening a franchise or formulating a new product, quality and integrity are non-negotiable. That’s a rare posture in a world that often worships rapid growth at any cost.

If you’re an entrepreneur chasing momentum, her advice is both humbling and liberating: you don’t need to be flawless. You need to be consistent, curious, and stubborn about solving real problems. And if you treat fear as a sign of growth rather than proof of inadequacy, you’ll move from reaction to strategy.

Reflecting on all of this, the quiet question lingers: how would your work change if you focused less on the image of success and more on the small systems that make success repeatable?