Gourmet’s Dalia Sultan built a one-of-a-kind kitchen, how does it work?

Dalia Sultan: I don't know how or when that happened, but it happened. I've just become addicted to this kind of work. 

Everyone's telling me, "The IPO's done. Why are you still working? Why don't you just take a break?" I keep saying I will eventually, but not right now, I'm enjoying it too much.

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Patrick FitzPatrick: Hey, everyone. 

Today on Making It, I'm talking to Dalia Sultan. 

If you live in Egypt and care even a little about what you feed your family, you already know Dalia's work. You might just not know her name. 

Dalia is the chief innovation officer at Gourmet Egypt. And in practice, that means she's in charge of almost everything with the word Gourmet on the label. 

From hummus to frozen lasagna to energy shots to kobeba.

In February, Gourmet went public on the Egyptian Exchange. Institutional investors loved the story and put in requests for 12 times more shares than were on offer. Retail investors loved it too. They put in bids for more than 55 times the shares on offer.

A premium food business born in a single shop in Maadi back in 2008, selling imported meat and cheese and good olive oil to a tiny little sliver of Cairo, is now a listed company worth nearly EGP 6 billion. 

But by rights, Gourmet shouldn't exist. It started as an importer, and we've spent 15 years making it nearly impossible to import anything. Between revolutions, import bans and dollar shortages the original business model that Gourmet was built on basically got taken out and shot. 

The reason there was even a business to take public is that a little bit more than a decade ago, Gourmet started to focus less on importing things and more on making its own. They built a factory, recipes, ready-made meals — everything that makes up the brand that you trust on a Tuesday night when you've got nothing in the fridge.

That's the pivot that saved the company. And Dalia — she's the person who drove it. 

She's half of a husband-and-wife team. Jalal, her husband was the founder and the face, but Dalia literally built the innovation lab that her brother, Amgad, then built into a factory. 

And get this: she's a credit-trained banker who spent a decade at EFG Hermes and Beltone.

She walked away from finance and somehow became the creative force behind a food company. I want to understand how. 

This one goes deep into the weeds about things that drive me nuts: consistency, quality control, managing people, dealing with copycats, how a first mover keeps their edge and continues to innovate.

If you're what the AI bots like to call an "operator," this episode is for you. And that's the conversation.

Dalia, welcome to Making It.

Dalia Sultan: Thank you. Good to be here. Thank you for having me.

Patrick FitzPatrick: I want to start with something you said when we spoke a few weeks back. 

You said that food is fashion and that you sort of think about it in collections, the way a fashion designer would — spring/summer or fall/winter. Can you tell me about that?

Dalia Sultan: Yeah. I even wanted to call it SS26, or SS  whatever. Didn't get many fans..

Patrick FitzPatrick: No? 

Dalia Sultan: … for that. 

Patrick FitzPatrick: Really?

Dalia Sultan: But I do believe it's fashion. What we eat now is not what we ate in the '80s or in the '90s. It's completely different. We were talking about the matchas and the cold coffees, and also the dietary requirements. The dietary recommendations change. So we have to change when…

Patrick FitzPatrick: We all become carnivore, and then we all become vegan…

Dalia Sultan: Exactly.

Patrick FitzPatrick: …And low carb.

Dalia Sultan: Gluten-free. 

And so you have to adapt and move with it, especially if it makes sense and if it's useful and beneficial. You have to jump on the wagon.

Patrick FitzPatrick: What have been the biggest changes to the way we eat as a nation since you guys started back in 2008?

Dalia Sultan: People have definitely become much more conscious of what they eat. Much more focus on protein now, kids especially, with their workouts and bulking up. 

And people now want to know how many calories they're eating. What are the vitamins? What are the health benefits of what they're eating? And definitely we are adapting with that.

And you have to, because that is the right thing to do. You shouldn't just be consuming without looking at what you're eating. The clean label project started a few years ago.

Patrick FitzPatrick: What's that?

Dalia Sultan: The less ingredients on a package…

Patrick FitzPatrick: The happier the consumer is…

Dalia Sultan: The happier people are. 

And if there are things that you don't understand, then it's not good. That started a few years ago. We had already adopted this from the start.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Since the beginning.

Dalia Sultan: Yes.

Patrick FitzPatrick: You brought up in a previous conversation the Krugman model, the idea that the West would have been buried by China and Japan years and years ago had it stopped innovating. 

How does that relate to your business?

Dalia Sultan: It relates 100%, because when we started, nobody in the market sold the products we did. And then bit by bit, people started offering the exact same products. 

So we innovated in packaging, we innovated in the offering, we innovated in the recipes, and that's how we stayed ahead. And that's why we continue to stay ahead.

Patrick FitzPatrick: What's the one thing that drove you crazy? Like the one product that someone knocked off and you're like, "Why did you take that one?"

Dalia Sultan: There's a few. It's not one. 

It started with the hummus, which nobody had. You couldn't buy it anywhere except at a restaurant. 

And then when they copied the hummus, we did the varieties of hummus, like the hummus with the beetroot and the hummus with the other stuff. That got copied as well. 

Recently, the frozen raspberries with chocolate.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Those are amazing.

Dalia Sultan: Yep, they are. 

Patrick FitzPatrick: They really are. 

Dalia Sultan: But I stole it from my son. 

Patrick FitzPatrick: You stole it from your son 

Dalia Sultan: So I guess what comes around goes around.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Tell me about that.

Dalia Sultan: My son came to me and said, "Mom, I have a great idea for a business." He was still studying at uni. 

And [he] brought these chocolate-covered raspberries and said, "They're the best thing ever, and you have to try them. And I really want to do this business." 

And I loved them. And I thought, "Why don't I do that?" And I started doing this.

Patrick FitzPatrick: That's not a business that’s a product.

Dalia Sultan: And he saw it on social media and called me. And he was like, "I can't believe you did this to me." 

I'm like, "Ali, it's a fashion. If I don’t do it now and  wait until you graduate, the fashion is going to be gone. So I really needed to, but I'll make it up to you." 

Patrick FitzPatrick: You’ll make it up to him. Okay, we're going to come back to that one. 

What do you do when somebody comes out with a knockoff? Do you abandon the product? Do you have to make a decision like, "This is core. We have to stay in it, but we're going to innovate somewhere else"? I mean, what goes through your head when a copycat appears?

Dalia Sultan: No. If it's core, we keep it, because we do it and we do it well. I don't think we've removed an item just because somebody has done it. I don't think that's happened.

Patrick FitzPatrick: What else goes into staying ahead of the competition?

Dalia Sultan: Consistency. [That is] the most important thing in our business, and it's the most difficult as well.

Patrick FitzPatrick: I remember you having said previously that innovation is sort of like a roller coaster. There are some things that die on the shelf and cost you money. And then there are other things that fly off the shelves and you can't keep up. 

Give me an example of both.

Dalia Sultan: Well, the chocolate-covered raspberries flew off the shelves, but it wasn't uncomputed. I knew it would do that because it was amazing. 

Recently, the sauerkraut and the kimchi.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Really? 

Dalia Sultan: Didn't stay two days on the shelf.

Patrick FitzPatrick: The whole mania for all things fermented, or what’s?...

Dalia Sultan: Yes. That's also part of the fashion or whatever. 

They stayed two days, and then we were out of stock, and then we had to produce again. And that wasn't calculated. We didn't expect that. We thought it would be a niche.

Patrick FitzPatrick: How do you figure out or forecast demand? What is it? Literally a finger up in the air to see which way the wind is blowing?

Dalia Sultan: Yes, at the beginning, kind of. 

But we have a good supply chain team. We have all the numbers, and we have all the history and the previous launches. So by now we kind of know, more or less, unless it's something that blows up.

Patrick FitzPatrick: And what's something that surprised you — something you thought was going to be a hit and it just didn't work out?

Dalia Sultan: The arancinis.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Really?

Dalia Sultan: Yes.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Okay. Why did you think they would go over?

Dalia Sultan: Well, I think they're great, and they taste great. They're just really, really good. Each bite is a sensation, but it's not doing very well. 

And so they wanted to take it off the shelves, but I begged them to keep it a bit longer. And I promised I would do marketing for it, and…

Patrick FitzPatrick: Hoping that it finds its people. 

Dalia Sultan: Hoping that it finds…  But I don't know for how long.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Where do the ideas come from?

Dalia Sultan: Everywhere. Friends, family, any person who works at Gourmet, from TikTok.

Patrick FitzPatrick: What's something that came over from TikTok?

Dalia Sultan: We've recently launched the layered dip. We have a whole range of products for the football fans. 

So one of the team members saw it on TikTok, and she said that she thinks it would do really well, and I said, "Let's try it." And that was another thing that wasn't expected to do so well.

Patrick FitzPatrick: So how does a Gourmet product get born? She comes to you and says, "Look, Dalia, I saw this on TikTok. It's awesome. All these different flavors in one bite." What does the process look like before it gets to the shelf here in Maadi or on the North Coast or in El Gouna?

Dalia Sultan: Somebody comes up with the idea from wherever, and it sounds good. And so we start researching the recipes. And then also, scaling is different. So we go to the factory, and we have to make it easy for them to produce. We have to make it foolproof. Sometimes it's too expensive, or sometimes it doesn't fit within the category or...

So there's a vetting process, and once it's approved, we start the production.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Are you the approval? What's the approval?

Dalia Sultan: No, I approve the taste. But the category team approves the cost and where it fits in the category, and sometimes the size of the product. So they'll say, "No, we need it a bit smaller to make it less expensive," or, "No, we need to stay competitive, so we need a larger package." So it depends on what the product really is.

But it's teamwork, of course. And then on the launch date we go to the factory again. And the price is quite often adjusted again, because things change in it. And then it's stamped and approved, and hopefully it remains as is.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Okay. So a lot of iteration there. 

How many ideas die for every one that makes it to the shelf? Do you have a budget for that?

Dalia Sultan: Not a budget, because they die slowly. So it starts off selling okay. And then either people don't like it or just simply don't know enough about it, and then it starts selling less and less and less, and then it starts becoming a liability. 

If it's a fresh item, the death rate is faster, because then the wastage is going to be too high.

Patrick FitzPatrick: What about in the idea phase? How many product ideas never get to production?

Dalia Sultan:  Oh hundreds. 

Patrick FitzPatrick: Hundreds? 

Dalia Sultan: Yeah, I mean, we sit and talk, and the wishlist is huge, and the Christmas wishlist is even bigger, and the Ramadan wishes are humongous. But we have to keep it down.

Patrick FitzPatrick: So we're recording in July right now. What season are you actually planning? I mean, is it Christmas for you, or is it Ramadan for you? Is it Halloween? Like, where's your head? Is it back to school?

Dalia Sultan: Back to school is done.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Back to school is done? When did you finish back to school?

Dalia Sultan: Two weeks, three weeks ago.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Okay. 

Dalia Sultan: But the funny thing is, at the office, I'm like, "I need the Christmas stuff very quickly. We're running out of time." And the kids were like, "We haven't even worn our maillots [swimsuits] yet." But you have to stay ahead, and it takes time.

Patrick FitzPatrick: How do you get in the mood when you have to think six months ahead, five months ahead? How do you put yourself in a Christmas headspace or a Ramadan headspace to go explore a product?

Dalia Sultan: I just got so used to it, and I'm very diligent about it. Otherwise, things would not be out on time. 

Patrick FitzPatrick: You know, cooking food, it's emotional, right? Fashion is emotional. Food is emotional. How do you imagine the world in December when you're sitting in July?

Dalia Sultan: You get in the mood. Sometimes I put on Christmas music.

Patrick FitzPatrick: No way.

Dalia Sultan: I do, when we're doing the photo shoot. First of all, there's a lot of information out there. Once you start researching and looking for the trends, it's all out there already — the color trends, the palettes. So it's not that hard to find information and get in the mood and wrap your head around it.

Patrick FitzPatrick: I like to ask everybody who builds something what they measure that nobody else measures.

Dalia Sultan: I think quality and consistency.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Those are huge.

Dalia Sultan: Those are huge. And they're not easy.

Patrick FitzPatrick: And on that note, you've hit the perfect segue. 

If there's one thing that still drives me nuts, 25 years after deciding to call Egypt home, it's that this thing that you love today probably isn't going to be on the shelf tomorrow. And if it is on the shelf tomorrow, it ain't going to taste the same. And yet you guys are consistent.

You're not breaking our hearts day to day. Why is it so hard here?

Dalia Sultan: I don't know why it's hard. Honestly, I wonder the same thing all the time. Maybe because people are, I would say, quite innovative and out-of-the-box thinking. So everybody wants to add their touches and their additions. 

Patrick FitzPatrick: Ahh. El touch el Masry..

Dalia Sultan: El touch el Masry. It's useful sometimes, but…

Patrick FitzPatrick: Well, it's born of need oftentimes, where you have to be creative to find a solution to a problem.

Dalia Sultan: Exactly. So I think that's one of the reasons, and the lack of discipline. So there's creativity with no discipline, and it takes you to places you don't really want to be.

Patrick FitzPatrick: You don’t even want to go. You found a way around it. You've built this creative process that is disciplined. But what does that look like in practice? How do you actually do that?

Dalia Sultan: At the factory level, it wasn't me who did that, really. It was my brother, who was Jalal's partner.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Amgad?

Dalia Sultan: Yes, he was Jalal’s partner. He was in charge of the operation and the factory. Without his support and his backing, there's no way we could have done all of that. I would call him and say, "I need help," and he would come down immediately: "Where's the problem?" And then he would come up with the solution. 

So remember when we talked about the weighing room?

Patrick FitzPatrick: Tell me about the weighing room.

Dalia Sultan: He came up with this concept. Say today we're producing 100 packs of hummus. So what exactly do you need for 100 packs of hummus exactly? The chef goes down to the weighing room and receives the products — from the dried hummus to the lemons to everything — for the 100 packs.

They can't do less and they can't do more — even the salt, everything. And that helped a lot. There's the sorting room, because we had problems with the ingredients. Products come in and they go through a sorting room, and everything is sorted. Whatever is rejected gets rejected from there so once a recipe is approved there are no changes;

And like you said, the chefs would come up to me and say, "The fish sauce is not the same brand as we had last time. You need to try it." So it's come to that now. 

Patrick FitzPatrick: How long did that process take?

Dalia Sultan: Years.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Years, huh?

Dalia Sultan: Yes.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Was it easy in the beginning? Hard in the beginning? Was it faster in the beginning? How did that go?

Dalia Sultan: It was very, very hard at the beginning. They were just used to doing things their way, adding the Egyptian touch. And then they quickly realized that any creativity or any addition to the recipe needs to be added at the workshop at the beginning, where they do have a lot of input.

Patrick FitzPatrick: So your time to have a  voice is in product formulation, not when you're running a line.

Dalia Sultan: Yes, and there have been serious consequences for people who violated that rule.

Patrick FitzPatrick: How so? What's the serious consequence?

Dalia Sultan: Some people were fired. Some people were moved from that department to another.

Patrick FitzPatrick: And today, is it sort of this self-improvement process where the people themselves reject the people who don't want to follow the process?

Dalia Sultan: Very much so. The turnover can be a bit high because of that.

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Patrick FitzPatrick: Tell me how I get hired to do product with you, and then tell me how I get hired to be a chef.

Dalia Sultan: I don't know if this is the right thing or not, but for me, it's how passionate you are about food and Gourmet. 

If you don't know my products, and if you're not familiar with the Gourmet products and you haven't actually used them, and…

Patrick FitzPatrick: You know in the first couple of minutes.

Dalia Sultan: Yeah.

Patrick FitzPatrick: So show me that you're passionate. And then what?

Dalia Sultan: And then we do a small test, like, "Make us a few recipes."

Patrick FitzPatrick: So I get to come in and say, "Hey Dalia, I think this would be great for Gourmet because one, two, three." And you try it.

Dalia Sultan: And we try it, and then it's a go-ahead.

Patrick FitzPatrick: And what about in the kitchen, when you're looking…

Dalia Sultan: I don't hire for the kitchen. The executive chef at Gourmet does. But I think the main criterion would be leadership. 

Because if you're heading the kitchen, or if you're a big chef, then you have to lead by example and by being able to get the team together, make them motivated, make them want to work.

It's a very difficult job. You stand all day and it's not easy. So you've really got to like the team you're working with and your boss. Otherwise, it doesn't work. 

But the kitchen heads, the executive chefs, we have had since we started, and they have developed. I think they're very passionate about what they're doing, and they're great leaders.

So we're lucky with that.

Patrick FitzPatrick: What would you tell a young person today [who] wants to come work for you someday? They want to build food products with you. They want to build experiences that their families will convene around, that their friends will enjoy at parties. What career paths do they follow? How do they get from high school to working for you?

Dalia Sultan: They need to be in the kitchen a lot. Try out a lot of recipes, feed their family and do it happily, because if you are doing it as a chore, no that's not the career for you. 

And keep trying. Keep trying new things, new ideas, keep cooking, keep innovating. And then you'll get there if you are really that passionate about it.

You will get there.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Does it matter where I study or what I study?

Dalia Sultan: No, not really.

Patrick FitzPatrick: So I don't have to go to France and study at Cordon Bleu. I don't have to go…

Dalia Sultan: It helps. But no, you don't have to. And usually, if you've studied this career — because we've tried this path — you want to open a restaurant. You want to open a catering business. You don't really want to be confined to supermarket products.

Patrick FitzPatrick: So 18 years, almost 20. We've heard of other people on the market having to do food recalls. What's the closest that you've ever come?

Dalia Sultan: Ice cream…ice cream is very sensitive. Any fluctuation in temperature affects it. So there are times where I got the ice cream from the shop and I was like, "No way," and I pulled it out. Maybe one or two other products that I had to pull out.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Nothing at scale?

Dalia Sultan: No. And nothing unhealthy. It's just that I didn't like the tase…

Patrick FitzPatrick: The quality wasn't there for you. What's your favorite type of ice cream?

Dalia Sultan: My favorite ice cream?

Patrick FitzPatrick: Yeah.

Dalia Sultan: I think I love our strawberry ice cream. It's so good. So fresh, and very little sugar.

Patrick FitzPatrick: You routinely face decisions where you have to uphold quality standards. Quality costs money. Consistency costs money. "I need to be able to reject a batch of food…”

Dalia Sultan: All the time. 

Patrick FitzPatrick: “...I need to be able to hold the line on a key ingredient." And I don't know if you've noticed this, Dalia — you may have heard a thing or two about this from your suppliers and your customers — but I think prices went up a little bit in the last few years.

So how do you hold that line? How did you deal with that and maintain quality?

Dalia Sultan: It was extremely difficult. We did some value engineering. Like, instead of a kilo of vine leaves, we went to 750g. We sometimes had to take two pieces of whatever out of the pack. 

But we never compromised on quality. I think that's something that everyone recognized: that this is our edge.

So the new products that we launched during that time, we tried to make them cheaper to start with. We reduced a little bit on the creams and the milk, reduced a little bit on the butter, the expensive ingredients. But when things stabilized, I went back and changed these recipes.

Patrick FitzPatrick: You went back? No way.

Dalia Sultan: Yes. I increased what I had held back, because there's no way. I mean, Gourmet is Gourmet. If you buy a béchamel, you want a béchamel.

Patrick FitzPatrick: You want the taste of that. The consistency, the mouthfeel, everything.

Dalia Sultan: So I went back and put the parmesan in, and put [back] what I had taken out.

Patrick FitzPatrick: What do you do when something just isn't available anymore? We had import bans. We had stuff stuck in port. It was a mess. What do you do when something just disappears?

Dalia Sultan: Well, there was no teriyaki sauce, for example, at some point.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Yeah, for like the better part of a year.

Dalia Sultan: Yeah. And we went and did teriyaki sauce.

Patrick FitzPatrick: You made your own.

Dalia Sultan: We made our own. And we launched it as a product as well, because we made our own to use at the factory. We launched teriyaki sauce in a bottle.

Patrick FitzPatrick: How many of the products on your shelves started that way?

Dalia Sultan: A lot, funnily enough. The sweet chili sauce, the teriyaki sauce, even the feta and olive oil. A lot of products, actually.

Patrick FitzPatrick: We hear a lot, Dalia, about how the float of the pound and the challenge of getting hard currency would drive us all to become a nation of manufacturers. And you were already a manufacturer. You make things. 

But have you seen this show up in your supply chain? Is there more and more good made-in-Egypt stuff?

Dalia Sultan: For sure. Across the board, not just in food, in everything — in furniture and clothes. Everything.

Patrick FitzPatrick: How has that affected you as a business, or what's most remarkable to you as Gourmet?

Dalia Sultan: Being able to get a lot of local ingredients that are perfectly fine. That really did help a lot.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Is it in produce or is it in spice? Where is it coming from? Where do you see the innovation?

Dalia Sultan: Mozzarella. That improved a lot. There used to be [local mozzarella], but it wasn't good quality. But now they could improve the quality. It's not bad at all.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Is there a switch that flips in their heads? Like, why was the guy who was previously unable to do great mozzarella now doing acceptable mozzarella?

Dalia Sultan: Because they could use better ingredients and increase the price a bit more. [Before,] they always had to be less than the imported price, so they were unable to use better ingredients.

Patrick FitzPatrick: So they rode the inflation to hit pricing parity, or just a little bit under, on the cost of goods.

Dalia Sultan: Yes. Another example is the canned tomatoes. You know the imported Italian canned tomatoes? We could never produce them. It was always my dream to produce them, because we have amazing tomatoe  s, in my opinion. But we could never make it cheaper than Italy. But finally we can. And we did. And we have our brand of homegrown tomatoes.

So we do the canned tomatoes. We do the tomato juice. We do the passatas, the chopped canned tomatoes. That's a great example. We could never do it before. It just didn't make sense.

Patrick FitzPatrick: I promised my producer I would not do this, but I kind of can't help myself. I ask all the guests a little bit about AI. What is the role of AI in your job leading innovation at Gourmet?

Dalia Sultan: As much as I hate to say it, it's playing a bigger role now. I just threatened my whole team the other day that I'm going to replace them with AI the other day.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Oh, no.

Dalia Sultan: Yeah, because I was saying that the way we make a difference is by being there and by making sure everything is right and on target and proper. And if you're not willing to do this, then let's let AI do it.

Patrick FitzPatrick: If you're going to let AI do the job, let AI do the job.

Dalia Sultan: Exactly. But our input is very important in the actual progress of the product. It's helped a lot in packaging and writing out the product use, how to use the product. It's helped in recipes. Recipe check.

Patrick FitzPatrick: So what's a recipe check?

Dalia Sultan: So if I follow a recipe and it doesn't turn out as good, especially in baking — because baking is chemistry.

Patrick FitzPatrick: 100%.

Dalia Sultan: Sometimes it just doesn't come out. And you ask ChatGPT, or AI, and it tells you what you did wrong.

Patrick FitzPatrick: The butter was too soft going in.

Dalia Sultan: Try and leave it a bit longer. Try and take it out earlier. Increase the temperature.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Where do you see humans never being replaced in your business by AI?

Dalia Sultan: I don't know about never. Never is too big a word.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Really?

Dalia Sultan: Yeah. I mean, we work in food, which is all by hand, so the chances are less. But who knows? Maybe there will be robots that will do exactly what we do. So I wouldn't say never, but not right now.

Patrick FitzPatrick: But do you think people really want to eat food processed for them by a robot?

Dalia Sultan: Why not? It's going to be clean. No infections. You don't have to wash your hands every 20 minutes.

Patrick FitzPatrick: So it doesn't matter that it comes from a person.

Dalia Sultan: I think eventually it won't.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Food won't come from people? Like, your job — you will not be creating food?

Dalia Sultan: No your creativity will remain. I think creativity will always remain, and the human touch will always remain. But the chopping and the forming, that can eventually be replaced.

Patrick FitzPatrick: You, let's say, appropriated Ali's business idea — the chocolate-covered raspberries. 

Dalia Sultan:  Sorry, Ail. 

Patrick FitzPatrick: What is he doing now?

Dalia Sultan: Ali is studying music. Actually, he just finished this year, in London, at a music institute. He's studying music business and production, and he is a rapper. He has a lot of music on Spotify and Apple and all the right places.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Are we going to hear these crazy tracks played in Gourmet stores?

Dalia Sultan: I don't know about that. There's some language…

Patrick FitzPatrick: Some language issues. Mature audiences only.

Dalia Sultan: Exactly.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Do you have concerns about his career, with AI looming off on the side, as a mom?

Dalia Sultan: No, because of what we just talked about. There's nothing compared to seeing a performer on stage — seeing his interaction, his passion, the glow in their eyes. These creative people have a glow.

Patrick FitzPatrick: When they're doing the thing that they love.

Dalia Sultan: Yeah, which I don’t think AI will ever…

Patrick FitzPatrick: No, it’s about the process. 

Dalia Sultan: Mhm. 

Patrick FitzPatrick: When we come back, we're going to ask how a credit-trained investment banker who, by her own admission, didn't know the first thing about food, ended up building all of this.

———

Patrick FitzPatrick: Okay so you've gone from CIB to EFG, Beltone. You still sit on the boards of a couple of financial companies. You're sort of part of the core of the core of our community. 

How do you wind up making kobeba?

Dalia Sultan: Well, when I was at Beltone, I needed to take some time off because we were moving houses and because the kids were very small. So I decided to take some time off. I was going to take six months off and then come back after I'd moved and settled the kids in. But the revolution happened and the market collapsed, and there was definitely no need for more people.

So I started pestering Jalal to join his company. And he kept refusing. I think he kept refusing for about a year. And then, as he puts it, the ship was sinking anyway so...

Patrick FitzPatrick: So the revolution kind of had an impact.

Dalia Sultan: The revolution, the devaluation, the ban on imports. So he was like, "Fine, come do whatever." At the time, we had just done a deal with Wadi Degla. They participated in a capital increase, and part of it was the factory. So we had a whole factory to produce whatever we wanted. And I'd gone with Jalal to trade fairs and to food fairs, and I'd always thought, "Why do Italians have all these products?"

We have the same produce here — even better — and available all year. They tomatoes it in one season, we have it all year. So why can't we have all these beautiful packed foods? 

 And then it started.

Patrick FitzPatrick: I'm curious, what did you take from that world, your original world, into this new world that let you do what you did, that set you up for success?

Dalia Sultan: I think I would say the discipline, and the time management, anticipating the problem before it happens and sharing it with everyone. 

So, you don't wait until the disaster happens. You don't wait until the market crashes, or you don't wait until the end of the session before you tell the client, "No, I haven't actually been able to get you the price you wanted."

So I think this made a huge difference. I could see the problem coming, and I'd stop it and share it with everyone: "Listen, guys, we have a potential problem."

Patrick FitzPatrick: That sort of comes naturally after what you've been through in finance.

Dalia Sultan: Yes, had I not had this background, I don't think I would have been good at execution, because everybody has ideas. As Jalal always says, "Everyone has ideas. It's who can execute them."

Patrick FitzPatrick: What did you actually do in week one, month one, year one of moving over to that business that you can trace a through line from to where you are today?

Dalia Sultan: It was mainly marketing at the beginning. And then when the deal happened and the factory was available, Ramadan was coming up, and I wanted to do products for Ramadan that were not sold in any supermarket.

Patrick FitzPatrick: What was your first product for Ramadan? What was your first product from the factory that you are proud of?

Dalia Sultan: It was a group of products, the Oriental range. That's what we started with. I wanted to do the best kobeba, for example. 

So my mother-in-law's best friend, Asma — thank you, Asma — we went to her house with a whole team, and she showed us how to do the best kobeba. And until now, Lebanese people come to me and say, "Oh my God, thank you for the kobeba."

And that's a huge compliment.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Lebanese people do not compliment you on food.

Dalia Sultan: Especially not on their food. So I got so many of those. And the vine leaves and the sambousek [stuffed pastries]. All the recipes are really home recipes from my mom, my mother-in-law, my friends.

Patrick FitzPatrick: When did you know that you'd made the right decision? That you were not going back to banking — "I'm a food person now, and I'm building this business"?

Dalia Sultan: I think the fact that I've become so passionate about it. I don't know how or when that happened, but it happened. I've just become addicted to this kind of work. Everyone's telling me, "The IPO's done. Why are you still working? Why don't you just take a break?"

Patrick FitzPatrick: You made your money. Cash out.

Dalia Sultan: And I keep saying I will eventually, but not right  now, I'm enjoying it too much.

Patrick FitzPatrick: That's the best. That's really the best.

Dalia Sultan: It's fun and it's interesting. And just the fact that you go around and people tell you, "We like this, we don't like that, this needs improvement." 

I've always welcomed feedback. Jalal really taught us how to welcome feedback. I think it was an important part of our success.

I remember once the call center manager told me, "One of your friends — or I think you know this person — she's called and complained, and we can't calm her down. Could you call her?" And I said, "Yeah, sure." So I called the person, and we started discussing. And then I got in a fight with her and I hung up the phone. And then [the manager] was like, "I'm never coming back to you again. Forget it." And she never did. She handles things herself. 

Jalal always says that the people who actually complain are the people who like us and want to continue buying, because if you don't, you just don't show up again, or you don't buy the product again.

Patrick FitzPatrick: No matter how they express it, that's what makes you better. And they cared.

Dalia Sultan: It's super important. That really has been a big part of our success, taking in all these comments and…

Patrick FitzPatrick: Learning from it.

Dalia Sultan: And learning from it and changing. Doing something about it. Like, if you call me and tell me, "I had this product and it wasn't good," I will go and change it.

Patrick FitzPatrick: All right. This is a question for the residual banker left inside of you. In locally manufactured goods, your margins are substantially more attractive than they are on imported goods. 

When did you realize that that wasn't a one-off in the P&L — that, "Hey, maybe this manufacturing thing isn't just necessity, but potentially a more robust business for us"?

Dalia Sultan: Quite early on, I think, when we started doing the Greek yogurt.

Patrick FitzPatrick: That was it? 

Dalia Sultan: Yeah. Because you could have a high margin. It was non-existent in Egypt. Every once in a while, some people try to import it, Jalal tried to import a little bit, but it doesn't make financial sense at all. 

Very short [shelf] life. Very difficult to get in. Shipping costs. So you could put up the price a little bit, because it was a luxury product. And then we were able to really see that, "Hey, replacing imports is…"

Patrick FitzPatrick: Import substitution is not just government policy. Maybe it's decent business.

Dalia Sultan: Yes, exactly. That's when we moved on to other products.

Patrick FitzPatrick: When you look across this product range, you guys have built an incredible moat around the business. 

How do you scale Gourmet without changing what has made you great? How do you deliver that growth without delivering a subpar product?

Dalia Sultan: Well, like you said, we have to continue innovating. Obviously, we're opening more stores everywhere. There's a potential export element. There's potential for going to other countries and opening stores. So all of that is being looked at one by one. We will start working on it. There's also growing the produced-by-Gourmet percentage of the products.

So eventually we want to have much more.

Patrick FitzPatrick: What's the percentage today? How much of turnover is what you design and the factory makes versus what you import?

Dalia Sultan: I think about 40% at the moment. But the target is to grow that to 60%, and eventually even more.

Patrick FitzPatrick: When you scale something, stuff goes wrong, right? It's really hard. 

It was hard enough for us to do one email covering Egypt. And then along comes PM, Saudi, UAE, logistics, etc. And it's this constant grow, consolidate, grow, consolidate — quality control, quality control at every stage.

What's that for you guys?

Dalia Sultan: There is a big challenge in keeping talent. We're definitely a target. Everybody who wants to start a food business or grow their food business comes and makes offers to all our people. 

Increasing capacities at the factory is going to be the next move, which we're working on right now.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Is that a new factory, or is that another line within the factory?

Dalia Sultan: Potentially both. I think these are the two main challenges. Innovation will always remain, but the quality team has to grow and be trained again. They are a target. 

These are the challenges, really.

Patrick FitzPatrick: There are some export products that have legs, right? You know they're going to grow. 

We've reported on Jalal, for example, baladi [local] bread gracing the shelves of a very well-known supermarket somewhere else, far, far away. 

When you look at an export, how do you decide, "This is going to work in Saudi. That might work in Dubai"?

What's the decision-making process for you there? How do you figure out what might work?

Dalia Sultan: A lot of research. We need to find out what they're selling in the supermarkets and where the gap is. And from what I know so far, there are many gaps. There are many products that people would like to see that are just simply not there.

Patrick FitzPatrick:  In the Gulf or in Europe, or where? 

Dalia Sultan: In the Gulf.

In Europe, definitely a lot of demand, but I don't think that will be our target market at the moment. 

Patrick FitzPatrick: Is the gap in the market product-specific? So is it a range of exported Gourmet products, or is it the full Gourmet experience in Saudi?

Dalia Sultan: I think we're going for the full Gourmet experience somewhere. I don't know exactly where yet, or what's happening yet.

Patrick FitzPatrick: But that's pretty capex-intensive, to go open stores. You've got leases, you've got build-outs. I mean, I don't need to tell you you know the business a whole lot better than I do…

Dalia Sultan: I think in these markets there's always a local…

Patrick FitzPatrick: A local partner. Okay. I wanted to ask, what was your role during the IPO?

Dalia Sultan: Not much. Honestly, I was against the IPO.

Patrick FitzPatrick: No way.

Dalia Sultan: Yes. I think everyone was, except for Jalal and Maged [Maged El-Ayouti, the Co-Head of Investment Banking at EFG Hermes. He was the one to successfully conclude advisory operations for Gourmet IPO on the EGX]. 

Patrick FitzPatrick: Tell us the story.

Dalia Sultan: Nobody wanted to take that route. It's a big risk.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Having to report all your secrets to the whole market four times a year kind of sucks.

Dalia Sultan: Yes. And then having to perform. Every quarter has to be better than the previous one, with no exceptions and with no excuses. So we were really all against it, but Jalal kept pushing, and we did it in the end. And to be honest, I'm very happy that we did.

Patrick FitzPatrick: I was going to ask how you feel now that it's done well.

Dalia Sultan: Very, very happy, very proud. Very excited about what's to come.

Patrick FitzPatrick: What has being public let you do that you couldn't have done as a privately held business with B Investments on board fully?

Dalia Sultan: Nothing. But that's the beauty of it. I wasn't held back. I was worried that I'd be held back.

Patrick FitzPatrick: More risk aversion.

Dalia Sultan: Yes. But that didn't happen. On the contrary.

Patrick FitzPatrick: You could go anywhere right now. You could do anything right now. And it's still this. Why?

Dalia Sultan: Because it's such a thrill. It's such a happy place to be. Such an interesting business to be in, with moving parts everywhere. The innovation is endless. The transformation is endless. And the seasonality adds to all of this — every season is different, every month something is happening.

Patrick FitzPatrick: It's not the same job every day.

Dalia Sultan: No. And food is an integral part of our lives. If [there's] football, there's food. Halloween, there's food. Everything. Eid, there's food.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Complete change of topic here. If you could change one rule, one regulation about your business in Egypt, what would it be?

Dalia Sultan: The shelf life of some of the things just doesn't make sense.

Patrick FitzPatrick: And that's set by the Egyptian standards organization?

Dalia Sultan: They have a guidance, yes, that you have to follow.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Okay. I didn't realize that. What's one thing that doesn't make sense?

Dalia Sultan: Like, anything that has chicken or meat, frozen. You can't have more than three months' shelf life. And that doesn't make sense, because it's good for at least six to 10 months. 

And that's also the same with a lot of the imports. A lot of the products you import that have a 12-month shelf life, they will give six.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Interesting. I didn't realize that.

Dalia Sultan: They just want to be on the safe side, I suppose. They don't guarantee the cold chain. But if you have the proper cold chain, then it doesn't make sense.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Earlier, Dalia, I asked you how you got into the business, and you talked about fighting your way into it. 

In the end, though, you told me that one of the most liberating things that ever happened to you was no longer working with your husband. 

Walk me through that.

Dalia Sultan: It was tough at the end, because we'd gone through a lot of difficult times and a lot of difficult decisions, expansions and retractions. And Jalal — it's not his thing. He's never been a retail guy. He's an entrepreneur. He's a visionary. He can spot deals and businesses. He's great at that. But he hated the day-to-day work, the operations, the daily decisions. It was just killing him.

I used to tell him, "I hear your brain grinding at night." That's how heavy it was. And that, of course, created friction.

Patrick FitzPatrick: It's tough to work with your partner.

Dalia Sultan: Very, very difficult. But shipments were being rejected. We were changing recipes every week. We were changing prices every week. It was really difficult.

Patrick FitzPatrick: What was the denouement to that? What saved your marriage?

Dalia Sultan: My friend always tells me, "Michael saved your marriage."

Patrick FitzPatrick: Michael? Who’s Michael? 

Dalia Sultan: Michael [Wright] is the new CEO. He came on board, and then Jalal left . He was still the chairman of the board, but he left the management, and our relationship has taken a brand new turn. We're back.

And everybody keeps asking me, "Why don't you leave Gourmet now and go work with your husband?" I'm like, "No. why?"

Patrick FitzPatrick: Been there, done that and bought the T-shirt.

Dalia Sultan: No, no. I'm happy.

Patrick FitzPatrick: All right. I want to talk for a few minutes about what's next. 

What's next for you? What's on your list?

Dalia Sultan: What's next for me within Gourmet is I'm working on setting up a solid team. I already have a solid team, but I'm working on making sure that it doesn't matter if I'm there or not anymore. So I'm going to be taking lots of holidays and testing it.

Patrick FitzPatrick: Very good.

Dalia Sultan: I'm empowering them, and I want to make sure that whether I'm here or not, it doesn't matter. It's good to drive the business and for the ideas, but I want to make sure that they really don't need me. And then I'll move on.

Patrick FitzPatrick: So there's another act for you.

Dalia Sultan: I don't know. I have no specific plans. But I'd like to see if my kids need my help in starting businesses. And maybe Ali wants to go back to his idea of doing…

Patrick FitzPatrick: Is Ali going to talk to you about business after you stole the raspberries?

So do you think the kids might want to do something?

Dalia Sultan: Yeah, well, the whole family is foodie. My kids, my nieces, my nephews, they're all into food. I'd love my next step to be helping them set up their own businesses. I don't know if they want me to help them or not, but if they do, I want to be able to start them off.

Patrick FitzPatrick: I love that. Dalia, thank you so much for joining us today.

Dalia Sultan: My pleasure. Thank you so much. It was really fun.

Patrick FitzPatrick: This was a blast.

Dalia Sultan: Thank you.