Popcorn magnate's grandson gives tips

He walked to the podium with a grin on his familiar face. Gary Redenbacher, grandson and nerdy sidekick of popcorn magnate Orville Redenbacher, addressed the Wharton School's annual Mid-Atlantic Conference on Entrepreneurship last Saturday. After apologizing for his grandfather's absence due to illness, Redenbacher kicked off the conference with humor and sound business advice. Redenbacher explained the company's marketing strategy, "Grandpa likes to do things with a sense of humor," and illustrated this with two commercial clips. In one commercial, the elder Redenbacher discussed the hybridization of male and female kernels and his grandson asked, "How do you tell the difference?" "You turn them over and look," his grandfather replied. "The marketing people wouldn't agree to run that one," the younger Redenbacher said with a laugh. Redenbacher's speech was peppered with tips for prospective entrepreneurs. "If you're expecting entrepreneurship to fly you into fame and fortune, I'm sorry," he said. "But, it could be something where you're very comfortable and enjoy life." His first pearl of wisdom was to be prepared for a new idea, and "ready to run with it." "Opportunity is quick and elusive," he said, "people will be ready to go and will pass you right by." Redenbacher also had advice on where ideas could be found. "If you see another good idea, grab it," he said. "Go find these ideas and steal them. But not if they're copyrighted or trademarked." The second way to develop a new idea was to find "variations on a theme," Redenbacher said. The Orville Redenbacher popcorn company uses this as the basis for their product, Redenbacher said. "Grandpa took a commodity and changed it," he said. "He made it gourmet. Think about how society is moving around you and how you're going to fit your product in." Debbie Holt, a Wharton senior and conference participant, called the tips "very pertinent." The conference consisted of three seminars and two keynote speakers, Redenbacher and Jim Koch, the President of Boston Beer Company which makes Samuel Adams Beer. "We had to give Jim Koch beer, because he couldn't speak without a beer in his hand," said Howard Greenspan, a Wharton senior and Conference co-director. Greenspan said that Koch was also very funny, demonstrating the differences between his beer, water and other beers. 150 businesspeople and college students from 15 to 20 colleges and several states attended the conference, according to Greenspan and Paul Horrocks, a Wharton junior and Conference co-director. In an interview after his speech, Redenbacher gave some advice for students aspiring to entrepreneurship. "Tell them to enjoy their college experience," he said. "Take five years instead of four." "You don't have to rush out and crush the world immediately," he added. Of course, this was easy advice for a man born into popcorn royalty. His last tip hit a different note. "Remember to give back," he said. "Especially after you've had such a good education at a cut-rate price." Redenbacher thought that Penn is a public university. Not to worry, though. He knows that we're not Penn State.

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