The founders behind Fort Worth’s healthy food concept Rollin’ n Bowlin’ have launched a new venture looking to help “kick a sugar craving.”
Co-founder Sophia Karbowski says the new venture exemplifies her “passion for eating the way nature intended,” leading the duo to spin off and rebrand Rollin’ n Bowlin’s snacking line as realsy and launch its first product line.
“Realsy is a shelf-stable snacking brand with a mission to make delicious, nutritious and simple snacks with real ingredients only,” co-founder Austin Patry wrote in a LinkedIn post.
Disrupting the ‘better-for-you snacking industry’
Rollin’ n Bowlin Co-Founders Sophia Karbowski and Austin Patry. [Photo: Rollin’ n’ Bowlin’]
Patry said the idea behind realsy started about a year ago with Karbowski looking into a nutrient-dense snack. Now that idea is the company’s first product—a line of pitted Medjool dates stuffed with different types of nut butter.
Three ingredients or fewer
Currently the lineup consists of almond butter dates, peanut butter dates, and cacao peanut butter dates. Karbowski said each snack pack is made with three ingredients or fewer, adding that she wants realsy’s products to be made with ingredients customers are able to recognize.
Karbowski wrote in a LinkedIn post that realsy is a “small but soon-to-be mighty platform to educate consumers on how twisted our food industry has become.” While remaining scant on details, Patry wrote that the launch of the brand is the “start of something big.” He added that the branding of Rollin’ n Bowlin’ didn’t “strongly convey the purpose” of the realsy product line in a market “where you have half a second to catch a consumer’s attention on the shelf,” which led to the decision to set up the company on its own.
“We’re so excited to disrupt the better-for-you snacking industry with an actually good-for-you snack,” Karbowski wrote.
Co-founders previously launched Rollin’ n Bowlin’
Patry and Karbowski first became business partners in 2017 while studying entrepreneurship at Texas Christian University. Wanting a healthier eating option on campus, the two launched Rollin’ n Bowlin’ as a food truck, serving up smoothies and açaí bowls. The brand has since traded in its wheels for walls and focuses on opening brick-and-mortar locations on college campuses. It has also since expanded its menu to include a lineup of toasts.
The company’s first storefront was at TCU. It now has locations at other campuses like Southern Methodist University, the University of Notre Dame, Tulane University, and the University of Denver. It’s managed that growth without taking on angel or venture capital funding. According to AccelerateDFW, the company was launched with the help of Bitcoin investments from Patry and an $8,000 Indiegogo campaign Karbowski set up. Due to lockdowns early on in the pandemic, Rollin’ n Bowlin’ now also sells directly to consumers and through grocery stores like Sprouts Farmers Market.
Giving back to student entrepreneurs
With a mission to “spread healthy vibes,” Rollin’ n Bowlin’ also looks to spread entrepreneurship. Last year, the company launched its Bowls n Goals incubator program for student startup founders. Through the semester-long program, students from across industries get training, networking, and $1,000 to help fuel “their passions.” The program mainly focuses on business growth, with participants connecting with Rollin’ n Bowlin’s operations, marketing, and ownership teams via monthly calls, joining strategy sessions, and exploring additional entrepreneurship support and resources.
“Starting a business during college can be an immense challenge if you don’t have the necessary resources and support, but I also think it’s the best time in your life to start a company,” Patry previously said about the program. “We’ve developed Bowls n Goals to assist in propelling the dreams of other students that were just like us—this is our way of paying it forward.”
Get on the list.
Dallas Innovates, every day.
Sign up to keep your eye on what’s new and next in Dallas-Fort Worth, every day.
R E A D N E X T
-
UT Dallas marketing professor emeritus Brian Ratchford and his team explored the effects of social media on crowdfunding across nearly 440 GoFundMe campaigns. They found that social media is most helpful in the first 10 days of a campaign. “If a campaign doesn't do well at the outset, it is unlikely to succeed,” Ratchford said.
-
William Spears, founder and CEO of Dallas-based sustainability solutions firm Cenergistic, has given SMU the largest donation from a non-alum in its more than century-long history. The gift will be used to set up the William S. Spears Institute for Entrepreneurial Leadership within the Cox School of Business, as well as the Spears Accelerator, to help get student- and faculty-formed businesses off the ground, and other entrepreneur-supporting efforts.
-
Deloitte University—the financial services and consulting giant's 'cultural home' in the Fort Worth suburb of Westlake—will be a key site for impactful events of Deloitte's new DEI Institute. Launched with a goal of pursuing "sustained equity and belonging for all," the institute will "convene and collaborate with organizations and thought leaders to share resources and accelerate impact," says Dan Berner, Deloitte's North Texas managing partner.
-
The research team recently unveiled an imaging microchip that can see through low-visibility environments like fog, smoke, and snow. The product of more than 15 years of research, it could one day help drivers and autonomous vehicles detect objects in low-visibility conditions, assist manufacturers in package inspection, and help firefighters navigate through smoke and fire.
-
The funding from the National Institutes of Health will help UNT HSC at Fort Worth advance its ongoing research on how Alzheimer's disease affects different racial and ethnic groups. Sid O'Bryant, executive director of UNT HSC's Institute for Translational Research, said there's never been a large-scale study like this before. “This award and project are nothing short of a bio behavioral ‘moonshot’ program," adds Brian Gladue, HSC executive VP for research and innovation.
