Ep. 46: Dylan Wolff - Wait, Kitchens Defrost How?!
You may know by now that I get pretty excited when people walk through the figurative BIV door with an understanding of reality that is virtually impossible to diagnose from the outside. From the moment I met Dylan Wolff and he explained what he was up to, I couldn't believe what he was solving. We will go into some depth as to what he's building at CNSRV, but it's the vehicle for the deletion of a stunning quantity of waterway as well as the provision of a multi layered, deeply practical and financial set of value propositions, all of which drop straight to their customers’ bottom line. Once you see it, you really can't unsee it. Dylan also happens to be, as we say back home, a really lovely bloke to spend time with. Please enjoy my conversation with Dylan Wolff.
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Full show notes and links to mentioned content below.
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Dylan Wolff is the Founder & CEO of CNSRV, a startup transforming commercial kitchen sustainability. A product developer driven by California’s water crisis, Wolff identified a hidden source of waste: running faucets to defrost food. He built the CNSRV DC-O2, a device that saves 98% of water and halves prep time. Resilience has defined his journey; weathering the COVID-19 industry shutdown, he bootstrapped development and secured groundbreaking rebates from water districts. Today, his tech is used by industry leaders, proving environmental impact drives financial ROI.
00:00 - Introducing CNSRV and the Future of Water Tech
00:49 - Exposing Hidden Water Waste in Commercial Kitchens
02:36 - How Dylan Discovered the Defrosting Problem
04:02 - Validating a Silent Industry Pain Point
06:17 - Turning Curiosity Into a Scalable Startup Opportunity
09:01 - How CNSRV Saves Water, Time, and Labor
12:10 - Matching Value Propositions to Kitchen Stakeholders
15:12 - Navigating COVID and Early Product Development Hurdles
19:42 - Building a Lean Team and High-Performance Product Design
23:52 - Lessons From Founder-Led Sales and Market Education
27:22 - Early Distribution Wins and Scaling Through Rep Groups
30:18 - Product Evolution: Smarter Interfaces and New Models
34:27 - Enterprise Logos vs. Regional Rollouts
36:05 - Quantifying the Massive Market and Water Savings Impact
37:05 - How Utility Rebates Accelerate Customer Adoption
39:14 - The Emotional Reality of Entrepreneurship
41:45 - Essential Advice for Water Innovators: Perseverance
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