Andy Unanue
Managing Partner, AUA Private Equity Partners
To me, the biggest piece of success is happiness. That's what we all work for. I often say there are two families: a family of chance, and a family of choice. I've been blessed to have a great family of chance. But I'm even more blessed to have the best family of choice that I can pick.
Summary
This week on “Leadership Matters,” Managing Partner of AUA Private Equity Partners, Andy Unanue, joins Alan to discuss building family businesses, helping them become more enterprising, assisting entrepreneurial families to scale their ventures, and dealing with the challenges of succession in family-run businesses, all while giving back to the community.
As the grandson of the founders of Goya Foods, Andy began working for the family business from a young age, which helped him to define his values in business and life early on. Andy used what he learned to found AUA Private Equity Partners, a firm that specializes in scaling family-run businesses and helping them navigate the unique challenges these businesses face. As one of the leading investors in this space, Andy is often sought after for his mentorship. With his wife, Marie, Andy runs the C. and J. Unanue Foundation, a nonprofit dedicated to providing opportunities in education, professional development, and health and welfare. In his insightful conversation with Alan, Andy discusses the importance of embracing and understanding the people and cultures that you serve in order to best scale a business.
Mentions & Resources in this Episode
Guest Bio
Andy Unanue is the Managing Partner of AUA Private Equity Partners, LLC and a member of AUA Private Equity’s Investment Committee. Prior to establishing AUA Private Equity, Unanue founded AU & Associates, LLC, the family office for the Unanue family. Previously, he held various positions with Goya Foods, Inc., including Chief Operating Officer.
Andy currently serves on several corporate boards including: Goya, Raymundos Food Group, Tijuana Flats Restaurants, Westminster Pet, Gel Spice Company and Water Lilies Food. Additionally, he serves on several not-for-profit boards including his family’s charitable foundation, The C&J Unanue Foundation. Andy is a member of the University of Miami’s President Council, the University of Notre Dame’s Cavanaugh Council and is on the Columbia University Medical Center’s Board of Advisors.
Andy received his M.B.A from the Thunderbird School of Global Management and his B.B.A. from the University of Miami.
Episode Transcript
Alan Fleischmann
My guest today is a businessman, investor and thought leader who has helped families and business owners across the United States achieve the American dream. Andy Unanue is the Founder and Managing Partner of AUA Private Equity Partners. AUA is an operationally focused lower middle market firm with a particular specialty for helping family-owned and consumer businesses achieve scale. This focus is built on Andy's own personal and professional history; a member of the Unanue family behind Goya Foods, and he previously served as Goya’s COO, and he continues to play a key role in the family's charitable foundation and family office. Andy has built an exceptional organization in AUA over the last decade, assembling a remarkable team of leaders and developing a meaningful track record for building strong businesses. He serves on a variety of corporate boards, including those of Goya, Raymundos Food Group, Tijuana Flats Restaurants and Water Lilies Food. He also serves on several nonprofit boards, including his family's Charitable Foundation, the C. & J. Unanue Foundation. Andy has long navigated the challenges faced by business leaders who are looking to achieve scale. And I'm thrilled to have him on the show today to discuss his fascinating career journey, his history and share some of the wisdom that he has to offer. Andy, welcome to “Leadership Matters.” It is such a pleasure having you on the show.
Andy Unanue
My pleasure. Thanks for having me, Alan. Good to see you.
Alan Fleishmann
Well, you were born and raised in New Jersey. Your father, Joseph, was President of Goya Foods. What did your mom do? And, I've heard a little bit about both, so I'm really excited to hear a little bit about both mom and dad. Tell us a little bit about them and your siblings and what life was like around the house growing up.
Andy Unanue
Yeah, so I was born in a great little town in New Jersey, North-Northeast New Jersey in Bergen County called Bogota. Bogota, New Jersey, a little one mile-square town, a mile by a mile. Right outside of New York City, about 15 minutes to the city. Yeah, and I was the youngest of six kids. I had four older sisters, and my brother was the oldest. So, we were bookends. And it was a great town to grow up in.
And we were, like I said we were six, so we were one of the smaller families in town. So, it was a nice Irish Catholic town with one or two Hispanic families in the neighborhood. And that was us. But yeah, we had big-big neighborhood parties, and we were out playing games all the time. It was just a great place to grow up.
And I still have many friends from growing up. My best friends are still people I knew from the day I was born. Peter Gallagher, Danny Felter, John McGuire, John Coles, Peter McGuire, Matt McBride. You know, people I knew, literally, from the day I was born or kindergarten. And that was great, great place to grow up.
Alan Fleischmann
You know, I love that. And I love the fact that you're still maintaining those friendships. They’re your family. You celebrate things, you do things together I'm told.
Andy Unanue
Yeah, we had an anniversary party, me and my wife, six, seven months ago. And I'm fortunate enough to have good enough friends that a lot of our friends flew over to Ireland and we celebrated. And like I said, there's a bunch of people in the room, but probably 40 or 50 that I knew, literally, for over 50 years. It was it was a great celebration of Marie and I and our friends and we really enjoyed it.
And like I said, I grew up in this little town called Bogota that had strong Irish roots. And there were a lot of my friends who were Irish who had never been to Ireland. So, getting notes from their mothers who were in their 80s and 90s saying, “Thank you for finally getting my son back to the homeland. I'm glad he finally made it.” It was a great experience. I really enjoyed it and am really grateful to have such great friends for so long, and we're very fortunate for that.
Alan Fleischmann
It keeps you humble when they know where you’ve been and they know where you’re going, you know?
Andy Unanue
Exactly, exactly. Like I said, we grew up and there were six kids, two parents, my grandparents used to visit. And my father grew up — I grew up in a house where my father and mother shared a bathroom with four girls. And different world nowadays, but it was fun. And like I said, most of my friends knew where I came from, know where I come from. And my parents always taught me, “Never forget where you come from.” So, it's all a good mix.
Alan Fleischmann
Let's talk about that for a minute. For three generations, the Unanue family has owned and operated Goya Foods. In many ways you're the embodiment of the American dream I mentioned in the introduction. Tell us a little bit about your family's arrival in the United States and the founding of Goya, because I grew up with Korea too. In fact, I remember being a kid and going and because we had Spanish speaking family members as well, we were very drawn to Goya Foods, and it always had a special place in supermarkets. It never was where the other foods were. So I thought that it was, you know, it was like the “international section” or the “ethic section,” you know, maybe near your kosher foods, I'm not sure. But I remember that I had to go to a special place to get Goya Foods.
Andy Unanue
Yeah, so look, there's a lot of history to Goya here, right. My grandparents emigrated from Spain. In the early 1900s, my grandfather and grandmother started the business in 1936. My grandfather really started as a food broker, buying and selling food products. And the business was then called Unanue and Sons. Tough business, tough name. But he grew the business and then realized during the hard economic times in Spain — he started the business, you know, importing Spanish foods: sardines, olive oils, olives. And what was happening was, you know, this was the early 1900s.
So, there wasn't technology like we have today. So, he would go around to stores, get orders, then send the order to Spain to fulfill it, and got to a point where he was sending an order for X brand of sardines or olives. By the time it got to Spain, that company was having financial trouble, and his counterparty in Spain would fulfill the order but with a different brand, send it back, and then my grandfather had to resell the whole thing, because it was a different brand. So, he decided that he wanted to create his own brand. And as he was going through this process, he received an order of sardines under the Goya brand, which was not something he had ordered.
He spoke to his counterparty who said he really liked the brand and wanted to buy the company. And his counterparty told him the company had just gone out of business in Spain, and if he wanted, he should go down to the U.S. Trademark and Copyright Office and trademark the brand and start using that as his brand. And he did, and every order from that point on had the Goya brand. And he started the brand of Goya. And that was the beginning.
His business started down on Tribeca, in New York City and on Duane Street. And the rest, as they say is the fulfillment of the American dream, like you said, right. Which I think is still alive today, it has different forms. But I think this is still a place where people can be born here or immigrate here and create their own pathway. You know, freedom is a beautiful thing, and this country provides us that freedom to create our own path.
Alan Fleischmann
How old was your dad when the business was starting to come up?
Andy Unanue
So, my father has long passed away, you know, 10 years ago next week. But, he started in the business after — so my father graduated high school, got drafted, went to the war, served in World War II under Patton liberating concentration camps and plowing through with the Battle of the Bulge under Patton. When he came back, he went to Catholic University under the GI Bill, got his college degree, became an engineer. And he was offered, I don't remember the numbers, but he used to love telling the story that he was offered a job out of college for something like, you know, $10 a week. He went to my grandfather told him that he didn't think it was enough. And my grandfather convinced him to take a job at Goya for $7 a week.
But, he followed in my grandfather's footsteps. His brothers eventually joined. Charlie was older than him, he was already in the business. But Tony and Frank also followed in the business. But this was after World War II and then after college, so it was, you know, late ‘40s, early ‘50s when he joined the business. Started from the bottom, worked his way up.
The business really started to kind have some growth in the 60s, especially with Operation Bootstrap when Puerto Ricans started immigrating in. And I will say one thing that my grandfather, one of the visions that my grandfather always had, and my father and uncles alongside him was that he understood that he wanted to sell to as many people as he could. And there was a big Latino influx coming in. And he had a common bond with them through language. So, he wanted to try and target those people. They had similar food tastes, but were slightly different. So he started targeting Latino groups as they emigrated to the United States. Especially since he was in New York, he started with the Puerto Rican population as they were the first really to start coming to the New York area. And one of the ways he did that was by hiring Puerto Ricans.
He realized that the best way to sell to people was to understand their culture and to learn from them. So, he started hiring Puerto Rican salesmen and salespeople. Back then it was probably all men. And that's how the kind of, you know, how the pan-Hispanic culture of Goya began. And then as other cultures started coming to this country, others, my grandfather, my father and my uncles, started hiring all those diverse ethnic groups to better understand what products we should have and where we should be selling and how we should be selling. And that's really how the diversity of Goya really happened.
Alan Fleischmann
That's very exciting, actually. So, when you were growing up then, obviously this very enterprising family, hardworking, enterprising family, did you experience at a young age Goya Foods as well? Did you find yourself working in the business? Were you in high school?
Andy Unanue
Yeah, so even before that I used to go — you know, it's weird — I used to go to the office with my dad as a kid. So, we moved out of Bogota to a town called Alpine in 1976. So, I was nine years old. But I still remember, even when I was in Bogota, going to — the company was in Brooklyn at the time — driving in with my dad on Saturdays or Sundays to the office. And it never hit me that he was the boss at the time. My grandfather was usually in Puerto Rico when I would go in with my father. But there was a guy there named Nick Bonfiglio who ran finance. And I always thought he was the boss.
But it was just great, you know, and I spent a lot of time in the warehouse with the warehouse people and the forklift drivers. And back then, the warehouse was multi-levels, right, because we were in Brooklyn. So going up and down the elevators with forklifts and wrap pallets of rice beans, it was just fun. And, you know, I didn't really understand his work and I didn't understand my dad was boss until later on. When I was in seventh or eighth grade, I started working Summers. And I started in the print shop we used to do all around printing for PLP materials and price lists and sales materials. And I was too young and small to work in the warehouse. So, my dad put me in the print shop with a character named Wally Cararas. Great guy, but had some…he was a character, I'll just say that. But I learned a lot there.
That was when I started working. And that's when I really understood that my dad was a boss and my family was all involved. My uncles and my grandfather and all that. But I didn't understand that until seventh or eighth grade when I started working Summers and holidays.
Alan Fleischmann
Were you able to spend more time in Puerto Rico once you started to develop and became bigger?
Andy Unanue
So no, he spent more time in New York. But he used to go back and forth. He would spend the Summers, the warm weather season, up in the Northeast, and cold season down in Puerto Rico until 1971 or ‘72. He had a stroke and got very ill and was told he shouldn't fly ever again. So, he spent the last few years of his life in Puerto Rico because he couldn't come back home.
But we would spend Summers in Puerto Rico or for a couple of weeks, and we knew him and I got to know him. I was, like I mentioned, I was the youngest of six. So, my sisters and brother knew him much better than I did, and my grandmother and my mother's parents. My mother's father died long before I was born. My mother's mother lived in Puerto Rico most of the year as well and spent the Summers with us. So, I got to spend a lot of time with her as well. But Prudencio and Carolina were the founders of Goya. And he spent, in my lifetime, more time in Puerto Rico due to his illness. But I did get to spend time with him.
Alan Fleischmann
That's very cool. And to learn that your father was the boss must have been a very big epiphany, but it sounds like you worked a lot during your high school years. And it was a family business that you were involved in as you got older as well. And your brother joined the company, I guess he's much older. How much older was your brother?
Andy Unanue
Joey was 10 years older than me. Yeah. And he started right out of grad school, but most of us, my cousins as well, almost all of us worked Summers and holidays since we were kids, right? One, just that's what people did back then, right? High school and grad school kids worked. And it was, as a family business, that was really kind of second nature. We all knew that we had to do that, we were never forced into the business after college. But we knew we needed to do some sort of work for the Summer. And I don't know if we were ever kind of pressured into doing it at Goya, but we all kind of enjoyed it and wanted to do it there. So, we did. But some of my other cousins and siblings had different jobs. But me and my brother and a lot of my cousins all worked at different Goya facilities throughout our childhood and early adult life.
Alan Fleischmann
You're listening to “Leadership Matters” on Sirius XM, and on leadershipmattersshow.com. I'm your host, Alan Fleischman. I'm here with Andy Unanue, Managing Partner of AUA Private Equity Partners. We're discussing his journey, his family — who are the founders of Goya Foods — grandfather and father, and the enterprising family that he was born into, and the work that he's done from there.
After high school, Andy, you chose to attend the University of Miami. Tell us a little about your time there. What did you study and were you involved in things there? And had you thought at that point you might go into the family business?
Andy Unanue
Yeah, so I always felt I would go into my family's business. So, I kind of knew I had a job. And yeah, I actually started my college career at Catholic University, and then transferred to the University of Miami, which was just a better fit for me. I enjoyed college a great deal, we'll say that. But I learned a lot and made some great friends in college as well. And yeah, the day after I graduated college, I was sent down to Puerto Rico and I started my career — my full-time career at Goya.
Alan Fleischmann
You didn't start at the top, you started at the bottom but moved up, right?
Andy Unanue
Well yeah, we all did, right? That was kind of the way my father and my uncle did. So, my father and my uncle Frank really ran the business from when I remember right. My grandfather passed away in 1976. My uncle Tony passed away literally the week after him, unfortunately he died young. And my uncle Charlie, who was the oldest, left the family business really before I knew. He left in ‘69, then again in ‘74, and soon again in ‘89.
So, I just wrote an article that was an op-ed in Fortune, that talks about enterprising families and the struggles that some families have going from one generation to the next. And my family was — is — no stranger to that, right. There have been generational issues and succession issues throughout every generation, starting with — every generation except for the first generation because my grandfather really couldn't fight with himself. But, so Charlie was never really in the business from when I was born. Two years after I was born, he was kind of out through many issues, but it was really my Uncle Frank and my dad, Joe, who ran the business from what I knew. So yeah, all of us kids after that started at the bottom. As we should have, right, because we didn't know anything,
Alan Fleischmann
What kind of lessons did you learn? What positions did you hold? And are there certain aspects of a consumer focus business that, obviously impacted your life, this is what you do now, when you think about so much of what you're focused on? And tell us a little bit about that.
Andy Unanue
Yeah, okay. Look, I held every position you could think of. So, like I said, when I was in seventh and eighth grade, I started in the print shop. I then worked in traffic, which was really, you know, helping this guy Lailo who ran the trucking department and everything. One of the early people in the history of Goya working in the traffic department with him. I worked with people in purchasing and sales, marketing. And then finally when I was big enough, you know, sophomore or junior in high school, I was promoted to the warehouse where I learned how to unload and load trucks, and all about warehousing and eventually got up to be able to drive a forklift and all that. But then really spent most of the next few years in a warehouse. And once I got to college, started back up in the office and then spent some time when I was in college in Miami, worked at the Miami location with a man who was running Miami, Agusta Ledesma, who was one of the mentors as well. And my cousin Frankie was down there as well. So, it was good. We worked in every department you can think of, but yes, started at the bottom.
Alan Fleischmann
And then eventually as of 1999 you took over as Chief Operating Officer of Goya Foods. What sort of challenges did you face during that time? And were their strategic directions that you were taking the company at that point?
Andy Unanue
Yeah, so it was it was kind of a weird trajectory to get there. I worked all over the place. And my last stint before that at Goya, I was President of Goya Santa Domingo. So, I was running our facility in the Dominican Republic, which was a relatively large manufacturing facility. I was there for three years, and I decided to go to graduate school. So, I told my father and my uncle that I was going to go to graduate school and my brother was being groomed to take over from the second generation.
I was going to go to grad school. Get an MIM at Thunderbird and then I was going to get an MBA at Harvard. And then I was going to start a family business kind of financial group with some people I had been working with out of the Wharton Entrepreneurial Center. So, as I was at Thunderbird and getting ready to do that and preparing to get my Master's in International Management at Thunderbird, and then go on to Harvard, my brother got sick. I was asked to come back and fill his seat temporarily while he got a bone marrow transplant. My brother unfortunately passed away and then my father and uncle asked me to come back and fill my brother's seat on a full-time basis, which I did. So that's when I became Chief Operating Officer, Vice President of Operations, whatever you want to call it.
I did that in ‘98. So, there were a lot of challenges, right. I was trying to fill in for my brother who was older, much more mature, much more qualified, much smarter than me. And there were some family dynamic issues about who was really going to take over, what was next. My job, I felt, was to follow in my brother's footsteps and try and professionalize the organization. Kind of bring in some professional management to work alongside the homegrown and legacy management that we had, which was very good, but I thought some outside experience would help. And was really trying to push us deeper into other markets within the United States, further West and to break deeper into the general market. And that's kind of what I did from ‘98 to 2004. Helped the brand cross deeper into the general market and welcome new immigrants as well. Right, we were seeing a lot more Central and South Americans coming through to our country at that point as well.
Alan Fleischmann
In 2004 that was the year you went to Thunderbird, right?
Andy Unanue
That's when I, so I went in actually ‘98, started, left and didn't finish. And then when me and my dad left in 2004, the business, I went back to Thunderbird and finished up. I had a few classes left. So that's when I finished up and got my masters. I decided not to get a second degree at that point. I had just launched my family tranches family office and was working on institutionalizing that and figuring out what I was going to do next after we left the day to day operations of Goya.
Alan Fleischmann
You left with your father at the same time, I didn’t that you left at the same time.
Andy Unanue
Yeah, it was one of those, you know, again, family dynamic issues. And, you know, my father had grown the business from, you know, then 15-20 million dollars in revenue to close to a billion or over a billion. And it was time for us to move on. And my cousins took over the business. And I, like I said, I started my family's family office, my family tranches family office. And my father eventually went back on the board of Goya, but really retired at that point, and then started coming to my office every day. And my father then was, again, a different type of mentor to me in my next endeavors and in launching the family office, and in launching the private equity fund. I had done some deals in between those two through the family office, but really, my dad was there with me all along and, and actually worked until the week before he passed away.
Alan Fleischmann
Did your father understand the vision you had? And you know, your idea of going to private equity already at that point?
Andy Unanue
Um, I think so. Yeah, look, My dad was an operator, right? He operated Goya to its fullest potential. And he was a people person, right? He hired great people. That was one of the great things I learned from him. And he had incredible insight into people. And trusted people until, as Ronald Reagan said, “Trust but verify.” He trusted people until he couldn't trust him. But that was one of the great things about Goya, right? That family feeling with everybody that my father brought in. So, my father was a true operator. I think he understood what I wanted to do and saw the beginning of it and it take off and was very happy for me. But he was much more helpful in the companies that we were buying and giving me advice as to how to run those businesses and what to do with them once we got them. And less on the private equity kind of structuring side and all that.
Alan Fleischmann
And that was the beginning of what was AUA?
Andy Unanue
Correct, correct. Yeah, so in 2009 or so, I institutionalized the family office, That was pretty much run by professionals. And that's when I decided to do more what I had wanted to do, you know, 10 years earlier and start this business investing in family-run businesses. But now, since I had spent some time running what is arguably one of the most successful Hispanic-focused businesses in the country, I wanted to look at that demographic, that multicultural demographic, as well. So, I kind of went out and started looking for people that I could partner with, people that kind of shared my vision and had investing experience in private equity and in consumer businesses.
And that's where I met my partner's Kyce, Dave and Steve. And 2011 or so I think, or ‘10, we met and kind of started spending a lot more time together. They had just left the family office running their investments and started their own business, kind of like a fundless sponsor. And we started looking at deals together. I interviewed about 15 to 20 groups, narrowed it down to two or three and Kyce, Dave and Steve are one of those groups that I narrowed it down to, and just over the next year or two and working with everybody felt that these would be the best partners for me, and they were.
So we went from meeting you know, every month or two to talk about deals and how we could help each other to eventually then moving into my little office in Penn Plaza in New York City. And like, we joke now, Kyce actually sat in a closet that was separated from the rest of the office by like, I don't know if you remember but the 70s beads that kind of hung down from the ceiling.
Alan Fleishmann
Yeah.
Andy Unanue
Yea, so we didn't start the business in a basement but we started it in a closet with 70se beads hanging in between everything.
Alan Fleishmann
Like Arota had that in her apartment.
Andy Unanue
Exactly. Yep. And so that was 2011 and 2012, we started looking at deals, did a few deals to get to know each other and make sure we were on the same page. And then 2014 or so we launched AUA Private Equity Partners Fund I. And we're almost finished investing out of Fund II now and hopefully, if things go, well knock on wood, we’ll raise Fund III in the next six to nine months or so.
Alan Fleischmann
And all the two funds, and potentially Fund III, the focus is always on helping family and consumer businesses achieve scale.
Andy Unanue
Yes, that’s right. We have two demographic overlays. We look at Hispanic businesses within the United States or multicultural businesses within the United States, because we've had good success with some Asian companies as well. But the primary demographic is family-run businesses. Every business that we've done as a platform is a family-run business. And I would say almost every, if not every business we've done as a tuck-in or a bolt-on acquisition, is also a family-run business. So, we find good partners, and we hope we're a good partner to the families. And the goal is to get them some liquidity now. But as long as we're a traditional fund, everybody knows we will have a liquidity event in four-six years. And that's what everybody we invest with looks forward to. Now we have had families roll on into the next investment too.
And B, we've also brought in people I would consider family and have done a management buyout where they buy the business from us and start another family business for themselves and a new family group. But the focus is on families, helping families transition and gain liquidly. And kind of an evolution of what my dad and me and my brothers and sisters have done is kind of gone from this focus of being a family-run business to an entrepreneurial family to an enterprising family. And that's really where I think a lot of families are trying to go, is have an enterprising family philosophy where you don't need to be tied to one asset. But if you are, that's great. But eventually, there will be other liquidity and things you want to do to help keep the family together, and this enterprising-family structure is what we also try and instill in the partners when we partner with him in acquiring the companies.
Alan Fleischmann
I imagine there’s a good deal of coaching about succession issues in particular or becoming an enterprising family?
Andy Unanue
Oh yeah, look, it's a lot of work. And right, as I mentioned in that article that we spoke about earlier, succession planning, family business planning, becoming an enterprising family isn't an end-of-life goal. It is a business-building activity that you should be entertaining from day one. And successful families that have transitioned multi-generations spend a lot of time, effort and money in getting that done. And one of our operating executives, Tim Habbershon, who has also been a mentor to me, is and has been an expert in succession training and planning for families for many, many years. And he helps us, as does another family business expert we have on our board, Francois de Visscher, who's actually not only a coach and a consultant in the family business arena, but he's a member of, I think, the fifth or sixth generation of his family's business, a European business. So, it is a thoughtful and deliberate process and, in my view, needs to be part of the business plan from as soon as possible.
Alan Fleischmann
Clearly, you know, well-run family businesses are not easy to send, you know. It's not easy because of all the interplay that goes on across the families, but what approaches and strategies might you share that you guys deploy at AUA to help family operators grow their business at scale?
Andy Unanue
Look, communication, right? All these things are going to sound easy, but when you’re running a business and then you throw family dynamics in the mix, it becomes and become messy, right? Understanding that not everybody is going to be qualified to be CEO and sometimes an outsider is going to be more qualified than your son, daughter, niece, nephew, grandson, granddaughter.
So, we teach, coach and rely on as much transparency as possible: Mentoring, coaching, syndicated information. And working alongside our partners — our new partners, the families — in helping them understand what both of our goals are, and making sure we're all aligned before we make the acquisition and the partnership, and doing what we can through that transparency, through governance, having the proper board put in place, the right people in management, communicating well through the whole period in the ownership period to make sure everybody stays aligned. We fully believe in alignment of interests throughout the entire process to make sure everybody's goals are achieved.
Now, does that run smoothly every time? Absolutely not, right. But that's where, you know, hopefully, our experience and relying on the family and their knowledge of the business, working hand in hand, works out. Sometimes the family doesn't want to be involved in the day to day and they want to evolve into a governance model where they control the business, through governance and through ownership. And helping them learn how to hire and retain and incentivize the right C-Suite is important, right? So, all those things.
And obviously, knowledge of your industry and of the specific businesses is key to all that and usually the families we partner with have more knowledge on their specific sector than we do at times.
Alan Fleischmann
I got to imagine that the key to their success is that ability to want to transition and ask the right questions and to see the house play a different role than operating.
Andy Unanue
Sure. And look, it's a big, big decision, right? So, I've talked families out of selling their business, right. I often tell people, this is going to be the most important decision you make in your life, right? You will maybe have more than one child, you may have more than one marriage, but you will very, very rarely find a family that builds a business to the scale that we invest in businesses more than once. And selling that business or taking on a partner or transitioning to a different structure is a major, major decision that needs to be thought on deliberately and thoughtfully and with time to make sure this is what you want.
And like I said, we've spoken to many families who thought they wanted to sell, and they really didn’t. And sometimes they're just not ready today, but they are tomorrow, right?
I can remember, we did a great deal with a family and the patriarch was John Alair Garcia, he owned a great institutional dessert business. And it was going to be probably the second deal we did in the first fund. And my partner, Steve, was the lead on the deal. And he had been working the deal literally for about a year and a half. And I sat down with John and we went over things. And I told John, he wasn't ready to sell the business and that he should keep it and we would help him build the business. And we did we worked with him and helped him for three years. And three years later, we ended up partnering with him and we were the only people he spoke to, but he wasn't ready when we first spoke to him.
Now, will I tell you my partner was happy when I talked them out of this? No, but we all get it. And the worst thing you can have is an unhappy partner because they're not willing to sell the business and it's not fair to the family. But anyway, we ended up doing a deal. And three years later, it was a tremendous partnership. And we sold the business two years ago, maybe, to a big strategic in Switzerland. And actually, John is still there and he's running now the Swiss conglomerates U.S. division. And he couldn't be happier and we couldn't be happier for him. It worked out great. But it's a big decision and not everybody is ready. And the family all has to at least know what's going on and some parts of the family will not be happy either, right?
Alan Fleischmann
If they're not ready, you don't want them to be unhappy, you know? And for that to be their future and wondering why they did it.
Andy Unanue
Right, right. It's not fair to either party.
Alan Fleischmann
Yeah. Across the history of the firm, what are some of the investments and partnerships at the firm that you've been most proud of?
Andy Unanue
I think that one is one of them, Indulge Desserts, it was called Taste it Presents when it was just John and his family. I think that's one. I think another one that has been tremendous, it was Water Lilies Foods. So, this was an Asian appetizer, frozen appetizer and entree business based in Long Island. The Lee family, a great family, the second generation was involved. Peter Lee, who was the CEO, and his wife, Luzia, they were running the business. Parents had kind of been semi-retired. They were looking for capital, they were about to make a big expansion with a new factory, weren't sure if they wanted to take on that risk all on their own. My partner Dave made the introduction, and we spent some time with Peter and the family and eventually came to terms and joined forces. This was one of these deals where everything started firing right away, all the pistons were firing. We built that new factory, it worked well. Started filling that up. Really got to a great place in about, I want to say, three and a half years and realized we needed more capital to expand and spoke to the family and decided was it now time to transition to a new owner? Or did everybody want to put more money in the business and start building another factory?
Everybody decided we should test the waters and test the market. We ended up, we actually thought about buying it again in a different fund. But the market just really kind of took off when we brought it to market. And we had a very successful exit. And again, Peter, the CEO rolled serious equity into the next tranche. So, he made out very well and is still running the business. But a great family story. Everybody did very well. And they have a lot more liquidity now. And Peter has a very large investment in the next chapter of his family business.
Alan Fleischmann
Amazing. That's a great example. Among your many pursuits, I think of you and your wife Marie as being grateful, and philanthropic. You played a critical role in helping to set the Carmen and Joe Unanue Family Foundation. What sorts of philanthropic areas is the foundation focused on? And then tell us a little bit about the impact that they're having.
Andy Unanue
Yeah, so look, my parents from the very beginning taught us to be philanthropic. And I think I mentioned earlier, never forget where you came from. And, I don't think anybody in my family, cousins, siblings, has, right? We came from very humble roots. And hopefully, all of us are still humble now. But look, honestly, I think this came a lot from my mother, but also the way my father ran the business, Goya, and my uncle, that we gave a lot back to the community, right?
I often tell stories about how when my grandfather and father transition from one generation to the next, there was a few competitors of Goya that were in similar size. And I think the two differentiating factors of why Goya became Goya, and the others are much smaller or gone is two things.
One, my grandfather, father and uncle did everything they could to put every penny back in the business, right? They did not take much out of the business for many, many years. But probably more importantly was the amount of grassroots marketing and grassroots charitable, philanthropic work they did within the Hispanic and Latino communities that they were involved in and sold into.
And I think we all learned from that. And you know my mom kind of ran, outside of the business, how we did community service and how we gave back. And, you know, in the beginning of the conversation you mentioned that you wanted to learn how my father and mother impacted me and that my father obviously ran the business. And what did my mother do?
So, my mom was a stay-at-home mom, except she didn't just stay at home. She did a lot of volunteering. She was a Spanish teacher at our local grammar school. Luckily, I moved out of town before I had to take Spanish from her. But even when we moved out, she continued to teach Spanish on a volunteer basis. She was a Catechism and CCD volunteer, she volunteered at the church. So, she was also a volunteer volleyball coach for women, and worked in women's leagues and things of that nature. So, her volunteering, it was ingrained in us as we grew up, right? So, my mom was a stay-at-home mom, like I said, who wasn't always home, she was always working as a volunteer somewhere. And that was impactful to us. So, it is the Carmen and Joe Unanue Foundation. While I contribute to the foundation, a lot of the funds came from them. So, we still follow the kind of philosophy and the setup of how they thought about it.
So, we donate a lot to education, especially helping immigrants and people get college education. So, a lot of times, they will be the first people to go to college in their families. So hoping, investing in university scholarship programs, we do.
So my parents, as I mentioned, I was the youngest of six. My parents, unfortunately, buried two children. Against the laws of nature, you shouldn't bury your child, they buried two. So, there's some components to health and welfare and wellness and longevity of life and leading a healthy, longer life. My father had diabetes as well. So, kind of trying to help people lead healthier lives. And those are kind of really the focuses.
And I will say also within the educational space, you know, maybe a little bit kind of weird today, but we believe in helping people find jobs. Right now with full employment, anybody graduating college can get a job, but helping prepare college students and tradespeople for jobs is important. So some of the philanthropy in colleges is also in the career centers, and helping people be prepared to enter the workforce. And, and a lot of times, that's within the Hispanic community. So, helping our community and all the communities understand that when we come here, we want to be as powerful, positive an impact as possible. And getting a good education or a good trade and getting a good job and providing more for your family, and providing a better life for your family than what you had is kind of the goal. Right? So, I think that's the goal for most parents, is for their children to have more than what they had. And so that's a lot of what we try and do.
Alan Fleischmann
It speaks to the next thing I want to ask you about, which is a big part of you, is that you're a mentor to others. And you've been that way, whether you are inside a big company, or you know, the way you approach I think AUA, the way you approach the company's portfolio. But then just in general, you're a mentor to those who kind of get near to you. So they played, obviously, a big part in your life and your career in your journey, they’ve been mentors. I'm sure some of them are your family members even. Tell us a little bit about some of the most important mentors you've had in your career.
Andy Unanue
Yeah, well look, obviously my father and my brother, who I learned from so much in this business, are primary mentors. My mom, as I mentioned on the philanthropic and also giving back side and working hard, right? If nobody has ever volunteered, trust me, it's not an easy job, and it's sometimes a thankless job, right? But I think that hard work ethic came from them. Like I said, I've learned a ton from a lot of the original people that I knew from Goya going back to Aldo Cunningham in sales, Nick Bonfiglio in finance. You know, Dave Canqela in computers and IT, all those people taught me a lot.
But, I'll say, and I'm not trying to win points here, obviously one of my biggest mentors over the past 15 years, I know my wife 15 years a week ago, I met her 15 years, one week ago, today. And June 6 will be our anniversary, or 15th anniversary of our first date. But what she has taught me about kindness and gratitude and how to treat people kindly is unmeasurable. And I've learned so much from her in that and being able to translate that into business and trying to stay calm. And, like you said, mentoring people through kindness is a tribute to her.
So, first of all, thank you for saying, I'm a mentor. it's hard for someone like me to understand because I owe so much to so many people. But my wife is a big mentor to me on that kindness stage and being able to mentor other people. So, I owe her a debt of gratitude for that.
Alan Fleischmann
Love that. And I also love the fact that you recognize how important it is for people to kind of whisper in your ear and not even whisper sometimes.
Andy Unanue
Yeah, sometimes that's not a whisper, Alan, you know my wife.
Alan Fleischmann
To make sure that we stay grounded and what's the most important thing and what's next, you know, that kind of thing as well.
Andy Unanue
Absolutely. And to that point, like I said, all the kids that I grew up with — Johnny McGuire, Peter Gallagher, Danny Felter — all those people who are no longer kids, but I knew as kids, that's a different type of mentoring. And the fact that I'm still close to them, and there's all different levels of success and happiness in that group. That's extremely important to me and keeps me tied to my roots, to my family and to my friends. And they've been a tremendous help to me. And hopefully, I've been the same to them, right?
Alan Fleischmann
Your eyes lit up when you talked about bringing all your friends together in Ireland, and that wonderful travel trip. And then your wedding you talked about with me before, you know, this idea of celebrating all the loved ones in your life and bringing them together. You know, your own community — it’s pretty extraordinary thing. It's not done often. But I will say, and that’s where you’re a mentor role even for me. Don't waste the time not to do it, do it while you can if you have the ability to do it. In your case, how generous of you to do it. But I know that you didn't look at it that way. You and Marie looked at it as a way to say thank you to your community.
Andy Unanue
To me, the biggest piece of success is happiness. Right? That's what we all work for, for happiness. And I often say there's two families, right? There's a family of chance and a family of choice. And I've been blessed to have a great family of chance. I was born into a great family. But I'm even more blessed to have the best family of choice that I can pick. And I'm blessed to have them. Like I said, right, there were 50 people in Ireland with me that I've known for over 50 years. And of the 300 people that flew to Ireland, over 70% of them I had known for over 20 years. So, these are real people, die hard friends, and those 50 that I know from my days in Bogota are so core to me. And I've learned so much from them. I can never repay that. But they're a lot of my happiness.
As is right my wife who I've only known 15 years. But those friendships and that family of choice, everybody can do that, right. Everybody can make the choice to bring somebody close, hug them, tell them you love them, and tell them how you feel, right? It's important, right?
I learned something from — I had two friends die years ago. Andrew Hennessy and Dave Musican died the same year. I went to kindergarten with both of them. And I remember when Andrew had his stomach cancer, I would talk to him every week to see how his treatment was going. And he told me who he’d spoken to, and I'd say, “Oh, wow, I haven't spoken to him in a while. Next time you talk to him say hi for me.” And Andrew would say, “No, I'm going to give you his phone number, and you call them and you say hi.” And Andrew taught me a lot through that one little thing. And through that one comment, I probably now have 20 more people that I include in my family of choice that I would have never spoken to if Andrew didn't give me that advice. So, I owe him dearly for that.
Alan Fleischmann
That’s so beautiful and I love that, I've never heard that expression before, family of chance and family of choice. I'm going to use that now. But it is the only way, or maybe I shouldn’t say the only way, it is your secret sauce of finding happiness is to give back and share the love that you bring. It's actually a key part of, I think, your business and professional life too. Life is short, be with the people you want to be with, invest in them wholeheartedly. It's not just a capital investment. It's more than that.
Andy Unanue
Absolutely.
Alan Fleishmann
Such a big part of what you show by example every day and if there's one message that I'd love our listeners here to hear, and to absorb is that capitalism works. But it only works if you care. And it only works if you build a real community. I know you talk about community a lot. Tell us about your community.
Andy Unanue
Look, I spoke earlier about how my grandfather hired Puerto Ricans because he was going to sell to Puerto Ricans. Right. He hired Cubans and Dominicans, right? That's the beginning of ESG. But he wasn't doing it to be politically correct. He was doing it to build a business. And that's what I believe in, right? If you do things right, if you are inclusive, and you worry about the environment, and you worry about proper governance and having a diverse workforce, you're going to sell to more people, you're going to have a cleaner, better product, you're going to have less waste in the ground, which means you're going to have a cheaper cost of production.
All that I learned from my grandfather before DEI and ESG and all that was a term. To me, it's caring about people and doing what's right for them, right. So my father used to say, when somebody would ask him, “Well, you have 4,000 employees?” He goes, “No, I have 4,000 partners that I worry about their families every day.”
Alan Fleischmann
That speaks volumes. And at the core of that is a deep understanding and respect for each and every one of them.
Andy Unanue
Absolutely. And I didn't mention this, but it should be said that even though we left Goya in 2004, and before my father died, like I said, I’d bring him to board meetings or whatever at Goya. And we would walk the warehouse floor getting to the offices, every single person on that floor would call him Papa Jones. Because they knew him as a second father figure and as a mentor and as the person who used to walk that floor and treat them as his equal, because they were. They were a big part of what made Goya, Goya. And that's why everybody called it en familia Goya.
Alan Fleischmann
I love that.
You’ve been listening to “Leadership Matters” on Sirius XM, and leadershipmattersshow.com. I'm your host, Alan Fleishmann.
We've had this extraordinary hour with Andy Unanue, Managing Partner of AUA Private Equity Partners. And this amazing discussion, Andy, about building family businesses, helping them become more enterprising, taking entrepreneurship through scale, and dealing with the challenges of succession. But more importantly, how do you build community and how do you give back at the same time — which is a cornerstone of the AUA investment strategy — is what are we doing in order to show that respect, that understanding and the know-how, so that they can scale just like you've seen it done.
I want to have you back on the show again, we can continue talking about this. This is not a topic worthy of one hour. This is a topic worthy of at least two if not more. Let's make that happen again, but this has been very inspiring.
Andy Unanue
Thank you very much for having me, Alan. And again, thanks to everybody who's been a part of my life.
Alan Fleischmann
One is very lucky if they can somehow be in the community of Andy and Marie, I'll tell you that right now.
Andy Unanue
We are the lucky ones, but thank you for all this, Alan. Perfect. It’s been a great pleasure and I would love to come back and talk more.
Alan Fleischmann
Yeah, let's do that. Thank you so much, take care.