Tara Bosch

This founder took out $105K in debt and dropped out of college to launch a gummy bear startup. Four years later, she sold it for $360M.

At 21, Tara Bosch was cooking gummies in her basement with a candy thermometer and a $10 mold from Amazon.

She was a sugar addict.

Grew up eating candy every day with her grandmother.

As she got older, she realized all that sugar made her feel awful.

But she really didn’t want to quit candy.

So she dropped out of the University of British Columbia and launched SmartSweets with $105K in debt, leveraging her 2009 Honda Fit and a life insurance policy.

Her first year? $2M in candy sales.

By year four? $125M.

Investors dismissed her.

Accelerator mentors ignored her.

Even her own grandmother was devastated when she dropped out of school to “make candy.”

But she kept going.

She sold candy out of the back of her car.

Cold-emailed retailers.

Landed a national deal with Bed Bath & Beyond a month after launch.

Tara got into The Next Big Thing accelerator. Won a $100K Thiel Fellowship. And pitched on Dragon’s Den.

She was only 25 when she sold a majority stake in SmartSweets to TPG for $360M.

But it wasn’t just the exit.

It was how she did it…

80% of her team was female, every employee had equity, and she started a $25K grant program (Bold Beginnings) for young women with big ideas.