This article is part of our Beyond the Family Business series.
Hosted by Luke Hansen-MacDonald, a second-generation family business leader, Beyond the Family Business is one of the most thoughtful and engaging podcasts about family enterprise in Canada. In every episode, Luke goes beyond the headlines with other leaders in family businesses and family offices to explore lessons they have learned, their successes and their challenges.
Hosted by Luke Hansen-MacDonald, a second-generation family business leader, “Beyond the Family Business” is one of the most thoughtful and engaging podcasts about family enterprise in Canada. Every month on Canadian Family Offices, Luke goes beyond the headlines with other leaders in family businesses and family offices to explore lessons they have learned, their successes and their challenges.
In this episode of “Beyond the Family Business,” Luke sits down with Jen McCain, whose grandfather and great uncle co-founded multinational frozen food company McCain Foods in 1957 in Florenceville, N.B.
McCain has carved out a niche of her own as the president of Toronto-based Irie Capital Corporation, a privately held investment and holding company focused on acquiring small and medium-sized businesses.
In her conversation with Luke, Jen shares:
- How she came to understand her own value, and the importance of discovering what your own drivers are, so when you do come into the family business you are more successful.
- Ownership as a skill set that needs to be constantly practised and improved upon and why that matters today.
- How family values evolve over time and how she sees herself within the family ecosystem.
- Why purpose investing does not need to sacrifice profit.
Previous episodes of “Beyond the Family Business” on Canadian Family Offices feature K.C. Daya, Jeffrey McCain , Ian Wilson, Derrick Hunter, Pierre Somers and Iqbal Kassam.
Disclaimer: This podcast is sponsored by BMO Private Wealth. The information provided in this podcast is for informational purposes only and does not constitute financial, investment, or professional advice. The views expressed by the host and guests are their own and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of any organization or company. Always consult with a qualified financial advisor or professional before making any investment decisions.
Luke: Hi, I’m Luke Hansen-MacDonald and welcome back to Beyond the Family Business, a podcast where we discuss the world of family enterprise. Today’s guest is Jen McCain. She’sa proud Maritimer from Florenceville, New Brunswick, and a member of one of Canada’s most prolific family businesses, McCain Foods. This episode is made in collaboration with Canadian Family Offices and is sponsored by BMO Private Wealth. As a client myself, I’ve seen firsthand how they can help families like mine navigate the future.
So, there were three main takeaways for me. First of all, we discuss the importance of ownership as a skill set. Jen is very passionate about this concept and how you need to be proactive and intentional as an owner and there’s a great deal of responsibility that comes with this role. So, you need to be constantly practicing and improving over time. Next, we discuss family values. Where do they come from? Are they inherited? Are they taught? As well, how do they develop over time? And third, we discuss purpose-driven investing. For example, Jen has recently become the co-anchor in The51 Fund III. This is an investment fund focused on female entrepreneurs, and it’s largely supported by a huge group of co-anchors that are all female business leaders. Jen discusses why she believes that purpose investing does not need to sacrifice returns and in fact when done well, purpose and profit can reinforce each other. All right; this is Beyond the Family Business. Let’s jump into it.
Luke: Who are you? Where are you from? And what do you do?
Jen: Who am I? Well, my name is Jen McCain. I am from Florenceville, New Brunswick, a very small town in New Brunswick. Born in Grand Falls, so a proud Maritimer. That is a title you cannot take away from me despite living in Toronto now. And I get to the East Coast as much as humanly possible. And what do I do? My new favorite saying is I’m a stay-at-home parent with five jobs. So, I can describe those five jobs throughout the interview and maybe you know, speak to I guess the impact that each of those five jobs has. But I’ll park it for there for now.
Luke: Cool. I like it. It’s a cliffhanger that, you know, people will slowly find out more if they listen to the whole episode.
Jen: Exactly. Exactly.
Luke: So, so why don’t we start off there? I mean, I think everybody knows your family business and what it is, but I’m sure a lot of people don’t know your own story. So, maybe could we start off with sort of, you know, what is your background? Did you go to university? You know, if so, what did you study? And how did you get into the business?
Jen: Yeah, I’m happy to share and I think sharing my own story is something that’s important because you can get kind of caught up in the story of the family being part of a large enterprising family that that has, you know, significant roots in Atlantic Canada. So, I think I’ve always been focused on carving my own path ever since I was very little. So, as I said, grew up in in Atlantic Canada, spent most of my childhood in Ontario. So, as soon as humanly possible, I got back to the East Coast. I am a proud Dal alum.
Luke: How awesome.
Jen: Yeah, I took business management. So didn’t stray too far from sort of the family calling, if you will, but did my undergrad at Dal, a business management degree, and then had a brief stint out of school, a little bit of experience, and then decided I wasn’t educated enough, so went back to the East Coast, but in the US, and did my master’s of business in Simmons University in Boston. And there I majored in CSR and sustainability, so I kind of formed an early view, I would say it was an inherited view of community, but I always had a strong sort of social calling and definition of purpose, and I got a sort of a lot of clarity around how sustainability and CSR can be part of my life, part of sort of the Jen McCain story, and how I can weave that into the various functions that I play today. So, that’s still a strong part of how I orient myself.
Luke: Cool. I’m definitely coming back to that point, but just to keep going on your journey, I guess, so you graduate from school from your master’s. Boston is an awesome city. If I was ever going to live anywhere in the US, I think Boston may be the number one city. I just love that place. What did you do after that? Where did you sort of focus your time next?
Jen: I’m glad we share a love for Boston, maybe the Red Sox, too. A lot of the East Coasters, it’s not the Jays, it’s the Red Sox. I lived across from Fenway Park, so it was a fun couple of years. When I got out of school, I went into consulting. That helped with a really broad view of businesses and getting exposure there to a ton of different industries, and I quickly learned, well, the secret to consulting is you should know what you’re talking about. So, in order to do so, I figured I should start my own business so that I had that lived experience in order to say XYZ. I think having that experience is important.
So, I scanned the landscape of things that really excited me and at the time it was pet services. I built out three units in a franchise. I’m not part of that franchise anymore. I rolled them out subsequently and they’re independent locations, one of which is in Halifax.
Luke: Oh, really?
Jen: Yeah. Halifax’s only downtown dog daycare, the most premier downtown dog daycare there is to offer. It’s called Nooshy.
Luke: Where is it?
Jen: It is beside Alexander Keith’s brewery. So, it is in the old Alexander Keith’s house. So, it’s got canines and character is the long and short of it. Two things that I love. So, I still run that. I still have a team that helps do a lot of the heavy lifting. And then in my late 20s got called into more responsibility. So, I represent my family’s interest or personally represent my family’s interest in McCain Foods or operating business. So, I sit on our holding company board. I lead a lot of our shareholder engagement work. So, thinking about the next gen as a next gen and how we want to position ourselves over the next 70 years. We’re almost 70 years, which is a big milestone. And then it’s pretty significant and special. I can’t believe it actually. And then, wear a couple other hats that I now juggle on a day-to-day basis, too.
Luke: Cool. And where do you sit in, how many siblings do you have and where are you in the age of your siblings?
Jen: I am a middle child and totally have accepted that. Characteristically probably have similar traits that any middle child has. I have a younger brother who I believe you have met and has been on the podcast with you as well. I won’t say save the best for last because that’s my sister, my older sister. So, if you want three for three, Luke, you’re going to have to call up Sarah.
Luke: Awesome. I like it. Cool. So, you got to do your own business and then, ultimately rejoin the family business. I went through something similar which was always I feel like an important part of my journey, but without putting my own experience or projecting my own experience. What was the benefit of doing that first? Versus just automatically jumping into the family business.
Jen: I think defining yourself and your individual identity outside of the system is a really important piece of being part of a large family business. And so, I think figuring out what you get excited about, getting a degree of independent experience, meeting new people, developing your own frames of reference. I certainly feel as though that was a valuable move and I think it develops a strong sense of merit and purpose, right? I don’t think that neither of us believe in the concept of inheritocracy. You have to show a level of responsibility at least in my sibling group around making sure that you’re doing something. It doesn’t have to be anything crazy, but you have to be doing something. Doing nothing is not an option. And if that something is outside the business, that’s a great foundational way to position yourself and then, later in life if you get to add that value in the family enterprise in some capacity, I think both the family and the business benefit from that.
Luke: Very succinctly put. I definitely now at this age appreciate a lot more the importance of that stage because I did get to be myself, so to speak, and then, now I feel like that version of myself has come out in our family business in an authentic way. But one thing I also have to admit is it took time for me to realize that. And in fact, when I switched from having my own business to working in the business, there was a period there of identity crisis almost of me being like, am I going to live up to be, everyone is saying I’m the next CEO of Clearwater, which I didn’t really think was going to be the outcome I was going to have, but it’s constantly projected onto me and whatnot. What was your journey like, going from your own thing, your own business, and something you’re comfortable with, it probably is its most, you’re in it in your most authentic form because it’s something you created, versus going and joining the family business. What was that like for you as far as finding your own place and your own merit in that business?
Jen: There’s always expectations that will be cast on you by folks that are outside of the system, right? And those could be any given stakeholders. So, I think really understanding where your value is, what your drivers are, where you want to play a role is super important because then when you come into that role, you’ll be more successful. If you’re put into a role that is just a position and you’re not quite sure how to execute that position effectively, you’re not setting yourself up for success and you’re going to feel a lot of pressure because when your name is on the door you have to work twice as hard. So I think there’s various, as you know Luke, there’s various paths to entry to being part of a family’s in those ecosystems rather at the operating level or rather at the ownership level and the ownership level is a hat that I knew I would always have to wear and so I’ve been really considerate about practicing that hat not to say that there isn’t other avenues that are just as justified, just as valued and work for other people but what I said is how do I be the best possible owner that I can knowing that is a lifelong role and is one that comes with a tremendous amount of responsibility and I always say ownership is a skill set like any skill or any function it has to be developed has to be flexed and learned over time.
Luke: Agreed. It is being a good steward and owner, steward of Atlantic Canadian business, steward of Canadian business. If you are not practicing it and thinking about it proactively it can go sideways. Frankly, how did you learn it? I think your dad is certainly, he was a huge influence on my family. That was where we got the idea to start a family office, but was he a big mentor or did you have other mentors? How did you figure out that role as an owner?
Jen: I think being a member of the third generation means that you are three times removed from the founder. So, you have the G1 that has a strong operator hat and then G2 likely has a quite significant operational role or exposure, but has that capacity to think about being an owner and do things like set up the family office to your point and think about succession and think about planning. So, you start to have that muscle and then by the time you get to the third generation, you’ve evolved away from, in most cases, I think when there’s multiple family members, of which there are many in my family, you really focus on that ownership hat and I think my dad has done that really well. I know it maybe is a bit silly to say, but he’s certainly a mentor to me too, Luke, so I’m glad he’s been a mentor to you. I think he’s modeled having been an operator but being now a really effective owner. That’s the number one mandate that he has and has encouraged all of his kids to act with a level of responsibility that comes with ownership and he’s also modeled that, which is super helpful.
Luke: Yeah. That’s a really interesting point that I guess I knew, but I hadn’t really thought about the idea of how that evolves by generation because my dad was first generation and I have often observed I have more in common with my kids in the sense that of course I grew up in privilege like they will, but also you’re right, there’s this more mature family business that the concept of ownership rather than being the entrepreneur in the weeds and whatnot. And it is definitely a thing that sometimes is a disconnect where my dad has, he doesn’tknow any other reality because he built this business on his own versus, I’m now much more focused on the next generations and that lens. So that’s a really interesting insight and even though I guess I am living it, I don’t know if I really thought about it that way. So yeah, that’s that’ll give me something to chew on after this podcast.
So building on that one of the things I want to talk to you about was values and family values and it goes along with that theme of becoming a more sophisticated multi-generational family business and it’s something I have struggled with myself of just you have multiple people around the table not quite as many family members as you do, but multiple people with different interests etc. But there is some fabric of family values that does connect us. I guess what has been your experience with figuring out those family values, perhaps they already existed from the previous generation, but presumably they also need to evolve over time. So, I guess what has been your experience with building those and ensuring they stay relevant.
Jen: Values are lived not just said, right? So, I think a lot of it comes from experience and frankly there’s a bit of geographics at play. So, I was born in a very small community. I lived in a very small community. I’m actually looking at this picture here Luke because this is from that small community here if I can get it off the wall.
Luke: Oh, cool.
Jen: This is me in Florenceville, New Brunswick and probably in 1994.
Luke: Sick shorts.
Jen: Yeah, I look the same as I did back when I was five.
Luke: That’s a cool hat. That would have been back when I lived in Toronto in 2012, that would have been a very popular hipster hat.
Jen: Yeah, I really – if anyone knows where to find this hat, please contact me. But the way that I grew up was in the community with a juice box in hand and a balloon. So, I was a happy kid. I was drinking the juice quite literally. And what that meant, what was in that juice box, I’m going to take this analogy and run with it, was community and hard work and care in the products that we make. And when you live on one side of the river and you see where all that happens on the other side of the river, you cannot grow up with any other value than community because you’re in that community. So, that’s the foundation and then a lot of those other values get layered in over time. And I am so appreciative for the experience that I had as a small kid in New Brunswick in very important years in my life in the early childhood development. Having a very strong value system I think has made me who I am today and I’mjust trying to nurture that. We don’t make the juices anymore, but that’s okay. I still know the purpose.
Luke: Awesome. Speaking of your guys’ products, a fundamental childhood memory for me is the McCain cakes. And I still to this day will have a party in the summer or something and some person will show up with one of those cakes and it’s always a hit.
Jen: You cannot take Deep’n Delicious out of the freezer section because it’s coveted. And it’s nostalgic. I dropped the picture. I got to keep this up. So coveted that I need to keep it safe here. But it’s an iconic product where even if you innovated it, which we have frankly, there’s still going to be nostalgia for the original product.
Luke: Oh, yeah. I love it. But back to what we were talking about. So, is it an ongoing discussion with you and your siblings about what those values are and I guess where I’m going with this is, we do a family retreat every year where we basically go offsite and we have a day that’s all business more or less and then we have a day where we just spend time together and it’s a chance for us, as we get older and I spend more time with my kids and my brother and her his partner spend time together and my parents are getting older. This sort of brings us all together to be a family again. And one of the topics this year was talking about the next 10 years of our family business and so as a result the values and what we care about came up as a big part of that discussion and my parents really want to see me and my brother take on more and more of that responsibility because they’re getting older. And so, I guess do you, is that an open dialogue with you and your siblings or is that something that is naturally, organically morphing over time or what’s your own experience with it?
Jen: I would say that values are inherited or formed, right? So we, between me, my brother and sister have very strong values that we’ve I think inherited from our parents and from our grandparents and we continue to tone and develop those values. But then we actually explicitly talk about it. So, we get together and we do talk about it in probably similar exercise that you’ve done. And ironically, we independently went away and sort of had a stack of cards and you have to take six of those cards and say these are my six values and four out of the six there is a common denominator between four of the six of them across all three of us.
Luke: Oh, cool. That’s a good way to do it.
Jen: Yeah, So, that shows – It’s helpful, right? There’s only a few adjectives that you can talk about, stewardship, community, integrity, where I think it’s super interesting is what that word means, where the definition takes you, because it’s slight nuances in the definition of integrity or value, not value, or community or stewardship. That the definition can vary, but the fundamental values that we agree on between my dad and my siblings and I are all pretty universal in our branch or our sibling consortium, as I say.
Luke: Okay, very cool. I like that idea, too, of getting you to do it independently and then coming back to make sure that people don’t just say what the last person said, just copy each other, so that’s a good idea.
So, I guess maybe building on those values, how has that translated into your own business, Irie Capital? And what does that business look like today? Is that largely focused on the pet services business you were talking about or what is Irie Capital, I guess?
Jen: Thank you for pronouncing it correctly. In the Jamaican dialect of English Patois, Irie means good quality or good vibes. So, the literal translation of Irie Capital is “Good vibe” Capital or “Good quality” Capital. So, it implies that I’m trying to do things a little bit differently, so it’s not an acronym or something that is more finance oriented. It’s supposed to be intentionally in the naming somewhat inspirational. It’s about good quality. It’s about good vibes. And then that naming flows through all the way through to my investment thesis. So, this is very much my personal Hold Co. that I’ve developed that I invest out of and the lens on which I view investments. Which to me it feels very natural. I know it’s conceptually called something akin to impact investing. But essentially, it’s saying when you are responsible for deploying capital, what is your obligation? Well, I believe that there’s a financial return that you should be deriving from investing capital, but I also believe there should be some social benefit to investing that capital.
I.e., the model that we live in where you make capital here and deploy it over here. I think that there’s a rebalancing. It’s not a total system shift. I think it’s an evolution, but I would say that most next gens, and have to caveat that when you are the beneficiary of having a degree of comfort, you think about how do I deploy capital in a way that is more equal, more just and affords others comfort knowing that there is an asymmetric way that capital is deployed now and it doesn’t benefit everybody. So, it’s really a function of intentionality.
Luke: Very well said. I’d like to talk a little bit more about finding that balance, but first I want to talk about one of your recent investments, or I assume it’s an investment. Congratulations. I said it to you over email, but I saw the announcement that you’re one of the co-anchors of The51 Fund III. So that looks like an unbelievable group of people that have come together to do that. Can you tell us a little bit about what is that fund and the strategy behind it?
Jen: Yeah, The51 is a fascinating community. It’s really a financial services platform founded by some incredible females. One of which that leads the day-to-day operations as the CEO is Shelly and she is a fantastic powerhouse executive. But what she noticed in her career in raising for her own businesses and ventures is that in every room she went into to raise capital, she would not get the benefit of having her companies invested to the extent that her male peers did. And I don’t know if that was a function of delivery or if that was a function of some other factor, but it certainly wasn’t merit and competency because she is, when you if you ever get to meet her you’ll think this person is wicked sharp and smart, but today females get 2% of venture capital funding.
Luke: Crazy.
Jen: It’s not for a lack of competency. It’s not for a lack of ability to execute. It’s really just a reframing and I think part of it is there’s now a lot more focus on being able to have families and have careers. So, I would say it’s just capital catching up. And I believe in investing in the best business idea, but when things are under invested, they need a community to be developed and that community is The51. So essentially where capital meets community. They’re running three funds. They’re on fund three and their focus is to invest in those that maybe had a harder time accessing capital to scale their businesses. And particularly investing in females.
Luke: Cool. And so, as a co-anchor, are you involved in any of the strategy or are you a passive investor in it or what’s your involvement look like?
Jen: Well, I think one of the benefits of those kinds of communities is that there’s a level of collaboration that you can bring to the table. So, it’s not simply a function of writing a check and then getting the distributions. You can really be plugged into the community. So, they do a whole road tour where they’ll go to different cities and set up multi-day events, and you can meet founders. You can meet other investors. You can co-invest. You can mentor. So, there’s a lot of ways to engage and I think that’s really attractive, right? It’s pretty easy to write a cheque or fairly easy. It’s much harder to find a community in which you’re comfortable writing that check. And so that’s really what it’s about. And I love community. It’s one of my values in case that wasn’t obvious, but yeah, it certainly is the top of the list because doing things alone is great and fun, but doing things together is better and doing things together with purpose and impact is even better. It’s best.
Luke: Cool.
Jen: Better than best is best. You can cut that out of the podcast unless you want some comedic relief.
Luke: No, I like it. So, if I was if I’m a female entrepreneur and I want to learn more about The51 and hopefully pitch my company, what’s the best way to do that?
Jen: They have a great website where you can plug in and connect with the team there. You can reach out to me. I’m a little slow on my LinkedIn messages, but I really try to get back to most folks that reach out. The other thing that’s super cool is they both invest in the venture, but they also have something called Movement51, which is essentially an incubator or accelerator for ventures to help them scale. So, they’re building the community and then investing in at the same time. So, akin to building the plane while you fly it, right? And it’s very best in class in terms of model. So, I quite like that about the structure as well, but I think that’s the right way to do it, right? It’s if you’re going to build an investable universe, you better help that pipeline of companies develop because as I said, fairly easy to write a check. What I think is required is to really help a lot of these entrepreneurs in Canada. We’re in a Canada proud moment. Let’s put in our capital that’s social, that’s expertise, that’s intellectual, that’s reference power. Let’s get all those things in the capital stack and launch great Canadian companies.
Luke: Absolutely. Bravo for you doing that because I think when times are tough and I think the last few years things have gotten tighter around the world. This type of impact investing unfortunately is often the thing that gets cut back. So, hats off to you for continuing to invest with that purpose because I think not everybody’s doing that at this moment. A lot of people are focusing on what is purely a good financial play rather than something that’s going to really drive other benefits to the community. So, that’s awesome.
Jen: I should say, Luke, I’m a firm believer that purpose does not have to be at the concession of profit, because I think if you’re doing things with purpose, profit will follow. So, I want to create the expectation, which I think I’ve had to develop more pragmatic view over time, is that good investing should be investing for purpose. And those metrics that you focus on will unlock value, financial value.
Luke: I agree. Otherwise, it can’t be a charity forever, right? So, it has to have that balance. Which is my next question. Was, how do you, as you said, impact investing or investing with purpose, it’s something that I care about personally. Younger Luke was highly ideological. As I get older, the sands of time wear me down to be more capitalistic, perhaps. But it’ssomething that I continue to revisit, especially having kids. It’s something that’s made me think about it a lot more of like, I have a unique position and a unique responsibility to my community. And Atlantic Canada is not a big place and it’s not a massive market. So, it’s even more important that I am thoughtful of our investments and the impact of those investments. So, it’s a constant duality in my mind. Do you have any advice for me about how you find that balance and constantly look at those two different perspectives of what is financially prudent and what is actually aligning with your purpose.
Jen: What immediately comes to mind is that you’re already impact investing in and focusing on Atlantic Canada because that’s place-based investing. So, investing with purpose in certain regions, there’s no concessions there. You build great Canadian companies in Atlantic Canada. So there’s no concession there, but that’s a fantastic way to align values and purpose in a place-based way. So, I think it’s really around I, like you, have become jaded and more attuned to how the world functions. And you got to fit into that box. I believe in changing systems from the inside out. So, you got to fit into that box somewhat. The financial sector markets are not changing, but you can expand that box in terms of how you think. SoI think that will really create more change. And so, if you go into meetings with your bankers and say I really want to focus my portfolio on investing companies that have an Atlantic coast presence. That’s an impact lens. That’s a geographic filter, right? You could say I really want to focus on companies that are transitioning the food system in a more sustainable way. That is perhaps a social imperative, but it’s also a business imperative because by the way, if we don’t transition the food systems to be more sustainable, they’ll implode at the soonest possible moment because we’ve just extracted resources for years and years and years and years. There’s a certain limit to those resources, and we’re going to meet it. So good investing is sustainable investing and investing with purpose is also investing for profit effectively. And so, if you can find a way to develop your own impact thesis that does not have to be concessionary, you’re good.
Luke: Awesome. All right. I got two last questions. First one, your family is prolific when it comes to community giving. So not just impact investing, but just actual philanthropy. How does that fit into your range of activities that you focus on? In where does impact investing stop and straight philanthropy begin? And how do you meld those two important activities?
Jen: Yeah, I mean, there’s some situations where there’s only going to be a social benefit, not necessarily financial one, and that’s entirely appropriate, and I think the view there is to grant capital with no expectation of return. And that’s really what philanthropic, not philanthropic, but that’s what at least was the early stage of investing philanthropically or into charities or non-profits, was to give you a check and expect nothing in return. And sometimes they’re just like there isn’t a cash flow or revenue stream associated with it, and that’s fine. And sometimes there’s ways to be a bit more creative in models, but sometimes there’s not. So, I would say, I view capital as a tool, and within that tool, there’s various things that you can leverage and change and tweak, because it’s a toolkit that can be deployed in various ways with various expectations. So the way I view things is, okay, well, I expect this return here, and maybe I expect this return here, but I know exactly why I’m investing in the ways that I’m investing, and I know exactly what I’m going to get out of it. So, having clarity is critical.
Luke: Okay, well said. Last question. At the very beginning, you brought up the fact that since you were young, you’ve been crafting your own identity. And the challenge you can face when you’re trying to create your own identity with this large, the baggage of your family’s success and your brand and all those things. Where do you, as Jen McCain, want to create a lasting legacy? Or what do you want your legacy to be in a few decades from now? Appreciating your family’s going to do many incredible things, but I guess where do you really want to focus your time in the decades ahead?
Jen: I’d like to think that I have a long runway ahead of me, Luke. I know I’m getting older, but legacy always implies that you’re at the tail end of things, which I certainly am not, but right now, and I’m sure you resonate this with this is when my kids can articulate sentences, I want them to say that they’re proud of the work that they see me doing, that they see their mom doing, that they see our family doing, and they’re proud to be part of that. That to me is a definition of success or legacy is that they view themselves as excited by that prospect of continuing to be part of a really beautiful story. That I think I’m just the beneficiary of.
Luke: Awesome. Do you have kids right now?
Jen: I do. I’ve got, the reason why I look older than I did 2 and 1/2 years ago is because I’ve got a 2 and 1/2-year-old and a 9-month-old, so.
Luke: Oh, wow. Awesome. Good for you. I have a 5-year-old and a 2-year-old, and the 2-year-old has very strong opinions about everything. But it’s awesome.
Jen: Yeah. We’re in the thick of it, Luke, that’s for sure.
Luke: No, you look great considering I’m sure you’re not getting full nights of sleep.
Jen: I appreciate that.
Luke: Cool. Thank you so much for your time. Whenever I talk to anyone in your family, you’re always very generous and gracious with your time, and I always learn something new, so I know my audience will really appreciate this, so once again, thank you so much. This was awesome.
Jen: My pleasure. Thanks for having me.